A Lane of Yellow

Poem A Day Project of the Cupertino Poet Laureate Follow the Cupertino Poet Laureate at http://cupertinopoetlaureate.org/

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Poems in the style of Emily Dickinson for friends getting married.

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Even though the poem-a-day project is over, I'm still writing.

[sanjosemuseumofart]

LISTEN, STEEL

(A poem by Jennifer Swanton Brown inspired by Stephanie Syjuco’s International Orange featured in Initial Public Offering)

“Listen, steel,” “listen,” said the engineers to the towers: “Listen to the voices of the ferries, and of the nearby hills, even the ocean and the sky have voices that speak, that count.” “Steel, you will have to stand through the changing seasons. Your name will be taken into the mouths and onto the wings. Your song will be highly pleasing and unusual in the realm.” “The black water, the grey sky, the aluminum sea gulls will look to you for a returned music.  One vermillion bird,  one terra cotta grain of sand.” “Listen, steel, to the voices and with your molecular symphony, carry our message of admiration.” “Our message,” said the engineers, “will be in your voice for anyone  who wants the news.” “The bridge news, steel, is you.”

Poem (c) Jennifer Swanton Brown. From the 5th Annual Poetry Invitational presented by San Jose Museum of Art and Poetry Center San Jose, April 17, 2014. 

Image: 

Stephanie Syjuco The International Orange Commemorative Store (A Proposition), 2012 Mixed-media installation Commissioned by the FOR-SITE Foundation as part of the exhibition “International Orange” and on the occasion of the Golden Gate Bridge’s 75 Year Anniversary Gift of the artist and Catharine Clark Gallery 2013.04

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I wrote this poem as part of the PAD project as the Cupertino Poet Laureate. This is so fabulous of the San Jose Museum to post!

[nevver]

Robert Frost

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Today marks the end of the poem-a-day project. I'll be working for a while to put up photos and type up poems. But I won't post any new work. To celebrate the end, I offer you Frost.

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Postcard poems. Going to Berkeley and Oregon.

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Today's rainy musing poem whatever.

[twirlyword]

The redwood tree next door. They’re cutting it down. I’m writing at least two poems. Here are some of the photos.

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Read about it, write about it, eat 'em up, yum yum.

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Almost Rain, Almost Poem

It rained but it didn’t rain here somewhere the air is wet I notice it in my nostrils like a sea turtle pokes her nostrils about the surface of the water to breathe and party I poke my nose above the surface of the air to swim

PAD 9/18/14

(too metaphoric for a haiku)

(with debt to the Sea Turtle Conservancy's photo)

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A little almost rain almost poem

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I think this might be a song “Words of Love”

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Anniversary haiku draft.

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Double duty. This is my weekly prompt for my year long Poem-A-Day, and it’s yesterday’s poem for the September 2014 PAD challenge. It’s also just a little turtle haiku, but turtles can be tough when they are challenged.

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I’ve been working on this poem for a couple of weeks now. There are earlier drafts of it in several earlier photos.(9/6 and 9/10) Together they are an interesting representation of my process.

[theparisreview]

“A poem has secrets that the poet knows nothing of.”

Stanley Kunitz (via theparisreview)

More good advice to myself struggling with September poem a day.

[apoetreflects]

Let’s thank our mistakes, let’s bless them for their humanity, their terrible weak chins. We should offer them our gratitude and admiration for giving us our clefts and scarring us with embarrassment, the hot flash of confession. Thank you, transgressions! for making us so right in our imperfections. Less flawed, we might have turned away, feeling too fit, our desires looking for better directions. Without them, we might have passed the place where one of us stood, watching someone else walk away, and followed them, while our perfect mistake walked straight towards us, walked right in to our cluttered, ordered lives that could have been closed but were not, that could have been asleep, but instead stayed up, all night, forgetting the pill, the good book, the necessary eight hours, and lay there—in the middle of the bed— keeping the heart awake—open and stunned, stunning. How unhappy perfection must be over there on the shelf with a crack, without this critical break—this falling-this sudden, thrilling draft.

Elaine Sexton, “Rethinking Regret,” The American Poetry Review (vol. 29, no. 6, November/December 2000)

A great poem to read if you are struggling with the idea of perfection in your work.

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This time, today, I talked the poems to myself walking from the parking garage to the office then wrote them down. Safer than driving. The paper says 9/9 but these are today’s poem drafts 9/10. I think this is further progress on the poem for the Cupertino Fall Festival.