I wake up and read a poem.

It's Tuesday, so I can afford such a luxury. I afforded the luxury of grappling my pillows and going back to sleep when my alarm went off at 7:30, then spending five minutes in bed daydreaming about someone when the dreamlands solidly rejected me an hour later, so I can afford the "luxury" of reading a poem now.

Though a better part of myself frowns when I call it a "luxury". That part of me sees reading a poem as a spiritual experience that should be sought by all. This part of me is also the one that wrote an elegant argument about how all people should try poetry at various stages in their lives, seeking it in different places and in different lights. I think the world would be a better place if every human enjoyed one piece of poetry a year.

Making poetry a staple of my morning would make my life a better place, I believe, so it's not fair to call it a "luxury", but if I think too much about making it part of my routine, I'll put pressure on myself and feel guilty when I don't.

Anyway, today I did take the time. I flipped open the poem delivered daily to my inbox, thinking, "why not?" and hoping for a nice surprise. I almost liked it.

The poem in question is Daily Life by Susan Wood.

I appreciate the imagery at the beginning--

A parrot of irritation sits
on my shoulder, pecks
at my head, ruffling his feathers
in my ear.

--and the subtle way it ends--

... the sun
a blood orange in the sky, the sky
parrot blue and the day
unfolding like a bird slowly
spreading its wings, though I know,
saying it, that it won't.

--(I left out the line that makes the closing make sense), but the middle is a little... pedantic.

to wit:

Too much to do today: the dracena
that's outgrown its pot, a mountain
of bills to pay and nothing in the house
to eat. Too many clothes need washing
and the dog needs his shots.

My objections are one-third about this specific poem and two-thirds about the "image" creative writing* in general and poetry in particular have in my head, but I can't easily extract one from the other, so I'll try to explain it all at once.

In my mind there is a Type. An Archetype, really, the Middle Aged MFA. I've constructed this type in my head and it somewhat rubs me the wrong way. Probably because I've never confronted one of this Type and tried to understand it, tried to meet the poetry heart of such a person instead of focusing so much on the dracena/bills/pantry/laundry/dog part of such a person.

For some reason I put up walls when a settled in, nested down person gets "creative" and starts writing poetry about the birds in their yard or collaging with doll catalogs. For some reason I get privately angry when I flip through Poets and Writers magazine or find myself in a painting class surrounded by women old enough to be my mother. Until today I hadn't put my finger on it, but I think it can be boiled down to a lack of passion. They're on my turf, they're in my game, but they don't seem to have the passion for it that I do. They're not hot, opinionated, driven, and challenged to express their vibrant inner lives. Or at least I don't sense it. My creativity is based in imagination, exploration, awareness of the universe, rather than just beauty, and it seems I react poorly when aesthetics are the most important part of creation.


Hm. I'm very young.

:)


Perhaps it's unfair that I judge Susan on this level based on a poem titled "Daily Life". It feels so much like something cobbled together out of cliches and blue feathers while she was waiting for the dishwasher to finish its cycle. But maybe that's part of the point. There is undoubtedly a large number of people who will relate to this sort of daily life. I just don't want to. Not yet, and maybe not ever.

But cliches, oranges, and feathers aside, I do appreciate the well-crafted way "Daily Life" ended, the last line's antecedent hidden six lines before and obfuscated by three or four vivid images. It does something right.