The water is cool and trickling over my fingertips, my wrist, and I hold the icy metal Sigg bottle still against the lip of the fountain. Tremors in my right hand make the push of the button unsteady--the water rises and falls in a graceful, dipping arc and I find myself doing a little dance with the bottle to catch it all.
The vessel is filled; I want to linger in the lobby. It's hot today, 91.3 degrees outside, and this foyer is the only spot in my building with AC. The tiles are cold beneath my bare feet, a blessing. I walk on my heels right now because I blistered my soles, walking without shoes on burning sidewalks under the sun. I shuffle like a bear to the doorway, and wave my card-carrying wallet before the sensor to gain access to the hall.
My dorm, right there. The roommate's gone, it's just me and there is quiet. Lights are off, shadowy the way I like it, and that is good. Fans running, also good. I'll get used to life here, somehow. I did it last year.
I sit here typing and I hear the blare of a TV from the next room. My roommate likes the TV running, too. I've never seen her watch it, it's just a background noise that fills the air with the subtle sounds of drama or cartoons that wiggle on plastic-bright backgrounds while I work.
I finished Saga of the Volsungs, at least, as far as I need to read it. It's full of brutal people doing dumb things. Why do people in stories always do dumb things? Violence and incest and revenge and beating each other to death... McTeague was full of that, too. When I write my books, I at least want them to be less incest-y.
Little McCoy figure is standing guard next to my fan, his plastic medical PADD held at the ready. I like that. He's keeping an eye on my health, you know. Mono can't stand up to Space Doctors.
Empty fishtank on the other side. I intend to fill it soon. If the fish is red, the name shall be Rasputin (everybody sing! Ra ra...). Purple, he'll go by Donald McGillavry. I don't look for color though. I alway choose the angriest one I see. The one with the most life in them. Those are the ones that live. That's what Leo was. A fighter to the end.
I want to write something. I'm not sure what. Aside from rambling (boring) blog posts, does anyone have a prompt for me? I'm taking requests.
Monday, August 30, 2010
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Original Poetry
Memento.
It’s like forgetting something
like your mind
stifled in a bare room somewhere-where
scenery
shifts
falls
slips into
It’s like forgiving
something like your
self it’s like arranging a
room full of mirrors where
a single breath can
shatter
shave
shiver
I will quiver into
It’s like redemption but
without the taste
It’s like rain pattering
garbage on an empty waste
It’s like a sad song reaching no
one’s ears
It’s like a poet that nobody hears.
************************************************************************
Copyright 2010 J. Coate
It’s like forgetting something
like your mind
stifled in a bare room somewhere-where
scenery
shifts
falls
slips into
It’s like forgiving
something like your
self it’s like arranging a
room full of mirrors where
a single breath can
shatter
shave
shiver
I will quiver into
It’s like redemption but
without the taste
It’s like rain pattering
garbage on an empty waste
It’s like a sad song reaching no
one’s ears
It’s like a poet that nobody hears.
************************************************************************
Copyright 2010 J. Coate
Monday, August 16, 2010
One of my favorite poems...
The Writer
by Richard Wilbur
In her room at the prow of the house
Where light breaks, and the windows are tossed with linden,
My daughter is writing a story.
I pause in the stairwell, hearing
From her shut door a commotion of typewriter-keys
Like a chain hauled over a gunwale.
Young as she is, the stuff
Of her life is a great cargo, and some of it heavy:
I wish her a lucky passage.
But now it is she who pauses,
As if to reject my thought and its easy figure.
A stillness greatens, in which
The whole house seems to be thinking,
And then she is at it again with a bunched clamor
Of strokes, and again is silent.
I remember the dazed starling
Which was trapped in that very room, two years ago;
How we stole in, lifted a sash
And retreated, not to affright it;
And how for a helpless hour, through the crack of the door,
We watched the sleek, wild, dark
And iridescent creature
Batter against the brilliance, drop like a glove
To the hard floor, or the desk-top,
And wait then, humped and bloody,
For the wits to try it again; and how our spirits
Rose when, suddenly sure,
It lifted off from a chair-back,
Beating a smooth course for the right window
And clearing the sill of the world.
It is always a matter, my darling,
Of life or death, as I had forgotten. I wish
What I wished you before, but harder.
by Richard Wilbur
In her room at the prow of the house
Where light breaks, and the windows are tossed with linden,
My daughter is writing a story.
I pause in the stairwell, hearing
From her shut door a commotion of typewriter-keys
Like a chain hauled over a gunwale.
Young as she is, the stuff
Of her life is a great cargo, and some of it heavy:
I wish her a lucky passage.
But now it is she who pauses,
As if to reject my thought and its easy figure.
A stillness greatens, in which
The whole house seems to be thinking,
And then she is at it again with a bunched clamor
Of strokes, and again is silent.
I remember the dazed starling
Which was trapped in that very room, two years ago;
How we stole in, lifted a sash
And retreated, not to affright it;
And how for a helpless hour, through the crack of the door,
We watched the sleek, wild, dark
And iridescent creature
Batter against the brilliance, drop like a glove
To the hard floor, or the desk-top,
And wait then, humped and bloody,
For the wits to try it again; and how our spirits
Rose when, suddenly sure,
It lifted off from a chair-back,
Beating a smooth course for the right window
And clearing the sill of the world.
It is always a matter, my darling,
Of life or death, as I had forgotten. I wish
What I wished you before, but harder.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)