The Poetry Marathon

Someone posted a picture

The Lahaina Banyon Tree

A block-sized wonder

Over a hundred years old

Thought to be lost.

In the deadly fire.

It’s branches black.

Its trunk dark and lifeless.

As the endless stream.

of sad stories and

deep loss

bombarded us every day,

some experts decided to try to save it.

They watered it, fed it

Babied it, cherished it

Three weeks later,

signs of life surge through the trunk

New saplings grow from old, lifeless branches

Hope is a tree

In the center of Lahaina Town

Doing it’s damnedest

to bring hope

to a town broken in pain and loss.

Hope in the form of a tree.

The challenge is write of

a world that isn’t this one.

So that world would be fair, equal.

It would be sensible.

It wouldn’t be on fire.

There would be no war.

No child abuse.

No broken hearts.

The elderly would be respected.

The young would be encouraged.

Teachers would be paid more.

And Football players would make less.

A world that isn’t this one,

would be cooperative.

It would be something we could be proud of.

There would be no guns, no bullying,

No rape, no homelessness.

A world that isn’t this one

Would make sense.

I will take a pizza.

Just cheese please.

Maybe pepperoni.

No, pepperoni.

I get heartburn.

Bacon. Bacon and Pineapple.

NO mushrooms. I hate mushrooms.

Just Bacon and Pineapple and cheese please.

I know it isn’t a real Hawaiian pizza.

But technically Hawaiian Pizza isn’t Hawaiian.

I love cheese pizza though. Maybe half and half

Half cheese, half bacon and pineapple.

No extra cheese.

Extra cheese gets weird.

It throws the sauce, crust, cheese, topping ratio off.

I know what I am talking about.

I do. I have made hundreds of thousands of pizzas.

No that isn’t hyperbole.

I worked in pizza places most of my adult life.

You know what, never mind.

Just make me a cheese pizza.

With extra sauce. but not too much.

Light extra sauce.

Yes that’s a thing.

I don’t want my cheese to swim off the pizza.

It’s simple really.

If you want, I can make it myself.

I know I don’t work here, yet.

Then make me a cheese pizza.

A little extra sauce.

Cook it just a bit longer.

No, not well done.

Just cooked a bit longer.

If you can’t do it, find me someone who can.

It’s Pizza. Very easy to make.

I have made hundreds of thousands of them.

No, it isn’t hyperbole.

How many have you made?

Duke has grown bored.

His weird parents

playing at their computers

for 20 hours plus.

He goes from one room to the other.

Inside then out,

outside, then in.

Running, jumping, sleeping

Begging for morsels

Begging for meals

Begging just to beg.

I danced with him.

He wasn’t amused.

I gave him superior rubbies,

he bit me.

He is getting older, cantankerous.

Much like his human father.

He knows this ritual happens every year,

but he lets me know,

this is unacceptable behavior.

A continuation will not be tolerated.

A cat has needs, the most important of which-

he is more important than any poem.

This is gobbledygook.

Gobsmackingly,

God awful.

This is a helter-skelter poppycock

with mumbo jumbo on top.

This is nothing but rigamarole,

drivel, prattle.

Really. Its gibberish.

This is foolish, rubbish, and hogwash.

It is nonsense, baloney,

balderdash.

It is downright absurd.

What do you think you’re doing here?

This is boring babble, tripped-out tripe.

Surely you know this right?

This is flapddoodle!

I have never run a Marathon,

but I written through a few.

I have struggled through the last miles.

My legs and back aching.

Newfound self-hatred.

Marathoners of the running kind

have water passed to them.

I am responsible for my own coffee and food.

And yes, I am drinking some water.

I am making a point to do so.

I have never run a marathon.

I have never pushed to come in second or 90th or 275th.

But I have pushed through poems.

Lots of them,

sword fighting Muses,

jumping over thesauruses,

searching for inner strength and inner will

in an aching soul.

I have written marathons.

Tried to find new subjects,

new focuses,

new ways of doing old things.

I have never run a marathon,

but I know what it feels like

to be engulfed in one.

He didn’t quite know what to do with himself.

They don’t teach disembodiment in school,

or church, in University classrooms,

or in 12 step meetings.

His parents never said a word.

At first he didn’t know anything had happened.

The truth began to present itself

pretty quickly.

Walls that could be moved through.

Friends and family who didn’t answer.

The change was abrupt.

The adapting took much longer.

Flying, interacting.

Avoiding the evil ones.

Helping the young ones.

Making friends only to have them disappear.

There’s a learning curve.

He wished there was a class to attend.

Flying was clunky when you didn’t know how.

Not having a body was a struggle.

The transformation hard to maneuver.

The future increasingly uncertain.

It was much harder being disembodied,

than it looks in the movies.

Pink Flamingos play games in my head.

Making a kaleidoscope

with their prancing.

Pink rainbows give way to multicolored ones.

Twirls of maybes and possibilities.

Swirl in cut out designs.

Images dance in modest regard.

Flamingos prancing and dancing in swirls

Kaleidoscopes full of imaginings.

Thank you all for coming

Today we will discuss the lack of talent

by some poets,

(specifically this writer.)

She believes, erroneously,

that poetry will change the world.

She never quite gives up,

despite all evidence to the contrary.

As we study this poet’s work,

we can see an unusual amount of triteness,

a lack of form,

a failure to submit to the attributes

long-held by generations

of those we call poets.

Yes audience.

I know, times have changed.

,The conventions of Whitman and Barrett-Browning,

of Frost and Dickenson are long gone.

The parameters of poetry have certainly

modernized.

However, this poet has far overstepped

even that basic framework.

We must fine this poet and those like her,

We must punish the audacity.

How dare anyone

abuse a sacred artform

like poetry.

For shame. For shame people!

Dear Reader

We meet again

under the direst of circumstances.

See this year,

I am broken.

Tired.

Uninspired.

You have such faith in me.

I just don’t have it to give you.

Not this time.

Not this place.

I can only write.

Vomit my thoughts

onto this page.

I am callous perhaps.

Too caught up in myself

to even consider your needs.

See this time, these lines are about me.

Not you.

I know that is wrong.

Self-serving. Cold.

Please bear with me

While I pull myself together.

It has been a really harsh month.