Master Violet Ray #1

[sgt.null]

Master Violet Ray #1

Haphazard Lucy strolls by -
a parade of colors, fall
season. today is and Wednesday
in November (if you remember)
it is sunny, breezy and cool,
everyone is here. Humpty Dumpty
is a spider on the floor, an
old man at your door. Doppler
is a clockwork man, counterfeit
man on a counter earth in
a counter rotation. broken sky,
bright orange sun (one of many)
heavy sky - our shadows glowing,
marshmallow ash. as the choir
sleeps in a dog-fog. tell-tale
death rattle. rowboats for our
road-dogs. singing sad tunes
on auto-tune. roadmaps and
cremation blues. all out of tune.
take a compass, take a map...
a straight edge for legends at
the fold - searching for our
lost cities of gold. burnt tar,
gravel pits. sixteen gears switch.
Haphazard Lucy strolls by.

[sgt.null]

as some of you may have guessed I wrote the above poem for Lucimay. a constant fan and supporter of my writing. in fact the only greater fan I have of my work is my lovely wife Julie (mrsnull)

the first part of the poem i have had for awhile, but with work and ill health (both julie and myself) i had stopped writing for a bit. if anyone requests i can break down parts of the poem.

but i needed a thank you for luci - she has defended my writing for so long, and she really gets what it is i do.

one of my favorite poets is Vachel Lindsay
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vachel_Lindsay
like Vachel i want my work to be read aloud. i discovered him by cosmic accident. a line of his 'Factory Windows' was quoted in the Houston Chronicle's comics page (a practice they have discontinued) Julie bought me a 1923 collection of Vachel's poems. it includes an autobiographical forward.

i also love Thomas Lux - he wrote my all time favorite poem. 'Tarantulas on the Lifebuoy'
www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/178152
I can not read that poem aloud without crying - it is so beautiful. the author himself reads the poem at the link.

i also love TS Eliot - his 'The Waste Land' is what i constantly strive for in my poetry. Julie bought me an annotated version of that poem with Ezra Pound's notes and editing! an amazing gift that helps me with my work.
www.bartleby.com/201/1.html

Wallace Stevens is also an absolute favorite. his 'Emperor of Ice Cream'...
www.everypoet.com/archive/poetry/Wallac ... _cream.htm

James Joyce is also in the pantheon. in fact I hope to write the sequel to 'Ullyses' when recovering from my ankle surgery.

so thank you Lucimay(not) for your constant and unflagging support.

and somewhere on the Watch there is a thread where Luci defends and explains my work - damned if i can find it though.

[lucimay]

yeah i can't find it either sarge, its prolly in the writers circle somewhere but damned if i can find it. (i'd really like to know what i said too! lol!!)

but thank you again for the pome. i ruv it.

haphazard lucy just about sums me up.

[sgt.null]

luci - discussing my work...

the assumption that there is something to get is correct.
else why would the writer write it in the first place?
there always is something to get.
take one of sarge's pieces for instance.
i think a lot of people don't "get" sarge's work.
they want to know what he's meant when he wrote
some of the things he writes.
and frequently sarge is loathe to explain any specific meaning
in a given piece.
in sarge's case, he writes a lot like joyce in finnigan's wake.
it's not an easily "understood" piece if you're trying to read it
like a "well made story" (meaning beginning middle end)
because it's not constructed that way. it's like a piece of music
which you listen to and don't try to "get". sarge's work is like that.
so so sarge's answer would, on occasion, be "don't try to get it, just
read it, like the way you listen to music."
in which case, he's instructed the reader to read in a different way,
much as joyce was instructing us to read in a different way.
and that is what there is to "get" as it were. if you get me

[lucimay]

oh wow. heh. i'm so glad i said that!