Simmer in my mind

[vaneramos]

underneath the emperor's new clothes
here: inside the body of our ancestor
he was all about me

i tried to get him to go a shade lighter
to climb into the sky repeatedly

stumbled into a throng of
magpie daemons in my mind
further from the tree that was their origin

too much like a hysterical housewife
i was barely able to contain my laughter
went storming up the long lane
far outside the city lights

we looked at the flowers again
picked a few more dandelions
planted some of those sunflower seeds
but somehow there is an emptiness

~~~~

I liked this exercise so much two weeks ago that I did it again: picked phrases from my friends' journals and used them to construct a poem. It was a much different experience this time because I have started to get to know people better. Looking at the poem, I can remember what most of the lines meant in their original context. They belong with different people and stories. It feels rich.

It's also a good exercise for learning to work with words and images. I remembered to pick more verb phrases this time. I like the result better.

Here's a list of poems I've posted on LJ so far: Van's poetry.

Comments

[missprune.livejournal.com]

Wonderful poem, Van! I would not have guessed it was an exercise, made from various friends' posts. I want to start doing this kind of thing too. At the moment, I don't have enough friends! I suppose I could take more than one phrase from each.
Here's an exercise I made up: Look around at your books and pick a title to be the first line of a poem.