May 5, 2016

Poets’ Roundtable

1. Welcome

2. News and Jabber

1. Maurice Kenny
1. Maurice Kenny, a poet who explored his Mohawk heritage in verse, often through the voices of historical figures in the forests and settlements of colonial New York State, died on April 16 in Saranac Lake, N.Y. He was 86.

   

    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/27/arts/maurice-kenny-a-poet-and-teacher-dies-at-86.html

Pontiac

Retrieving my past?

I hadn’t known

I had lost it

My footprint is still there

on fallen leaves, on cleared ground

My scent is still upon the river

where I bathed each morning

My words are on the wind

echoing through pine

My blood is in the loins

of my sons and daughters

My flesh is there . . .

it is the earth . . .

you now walk upon it,you now take harvest from it:

the corn you eat,

the tomato seed you plant,

the tree that shades,

the deer-skin that warms your coldness

I wrap you

I sing you

I blood you

I am stronger now than ever before

I am many

My war cry is loud

you hear it

   I am many

I am the broth of your soup

I am the hawk on the elm

I am the leather of your boot

I sing you

I blood you

Tell this to the scholar

Tell this to the historian

           who chronicles

Tell this to the general

           who believes me dead

I sing you

I blood you

I am the bone of your thought

Red-Tail

Eye to eye we meet

                            in my city smell

disbelief in blood

                            flecked in your pupil

                            my chin razor chipped

caged in the mountains

                            you would take pecks of skin

                            I would collect tail feathers

                            you would fall to earth

                            I would rise on wind

I doubt we would survive

I stared you with wonder

                            wing eyed for years:

wheeling, perched, crunching bones

                            on flat river-rock

You’ve ignored my presence

                            now you must face me

deciding the poisons

in my blood deciding my heart

I have no advantage even though

                            you are caged

                            wire separated your claw

                            from my liver, finger

capable of pulling the trigger

I am struck, vanquished, knowledgeable

You are too few and I too many

                            you are shrew, woodchuck

                            I am weed and weasel

                            while you soar I thief

Eye to eye we meet

                            in your meadow

                            I am bee and buttercup

                            fumed in strange smells

You are mole and berry seed

                            you guard the east and home

                            you clean the sky of vermin

                            you lick the bloody stone

Where I have opened veins

                            and split the bark

                            wearing otter skin

Bear

you keep the children warm

claws

       sharp they keep the woods clean

       hang from my wife’s throat

eyes

       spotted elderberries and bees’ wings

       kept enemies from the dark

       kept anemone in forest shade

              rats from the house

muscle/meat

              i’m sorry

                          it’s kept my belly

                          from getting too mad at me

you’ve been a good friend

i’ll burn these words

maybe

they’ll settle over berry brambles

       smoke honey for the taste

       flavor maple sugar

you’ll hear them

                              these words

i’ll leave suet by the big stone

Note: Wood Anemone sometimes known as “wind flowers” as they often tremble in the breeze.

Going Home

--© 1988 Maurice Kenny

The book lay unread in my lap

snow gathered at the window

from Brooklyn it was a long ride

the Greyhound followed the plow

from Syracuse to Watertown

to country cheese and maples

tired rivers and closed paper mills

home to gossipy aunts . . .

their dandelions and pregnant cats . . .

home to cedars and fields of boulders

cold graves under willows and pine

home from Brooklyn to the reservation

that was not home

to songs I could not sing

to dances I could not dance

from Brooklyn bars and ghetto rats

to steaming horses stomping frozen earth

barns and privies lost in blizzards

home to a Nation, Mohawk

to faces I did not know

and hands which did not recognize me

to names and doors

my father shut

           

3. The Current Assignment

1. The assignment was to write a ryhmed poem
2. How many did this?
3. After we hear the poems we’ll see what we learned from the exercise.

4. The Next Assignment

1. An exercise
1. List eight common concrete (tangible) nouns in one column, and eight corresponding, unrelated active, present-tense verbs in another column, then draw random lines, connecting one noun per every one verb.
2. 
   
3. My example, lined together:
4. Iridescence lands.
5. Fuschia saddens.
6. Literature drowns.
7. Teacup sways.
8. Clouds wander.
9. River glows.
10. Waves drink.
11. Hands evolve.
12. 
    
13. Now, write a poem using the noun/verb combinations in your list

May 12 is National Limerick Day    .

1. 
   

1. Next Meeting

1. The next meeting will be Thursday, May 19, 2016 from 1-2:30PM

2. Other Notes

1. Continue thinking about the book project. Email me or comment here on the blog with any further ideas.