I’ve been
thinking about poetry a little, lately, so I decided maybe it would be
fun/interesting to go back through some old notebooks, find some poems I wrote
a million years ago, and see what I thought of them now.
First of all,
never go back through your old notebooks. Don’t do it. If you find yourself
thinking about doing this, leave the house immediately, go do something else.
It’s miserable. Everything you thought was a big problem 15 years ago is either
pathetically dumb or still a problem, which is even worse. Trust me.
Yeah, I wrote a
fucking ton of poetry between the ages of like 15 and 22. Pages, endless pages.
Pages scratched out revised, and then revised back to their original form. How
many hours did I spend debating the best way to complain about Hot Topic in
poetry form? Apparently around 100 hours. No wonder all those problems from
like 15 years ago are still problems today…
Thing is, if
you’re being honest—yes, you—you’ve got some poems in your history, too. Admit
it. The number of people I’ve met in my life who I’d honestly believe never
ever wrote some scraggly poem in that same 15-22 age range, I don’t even need
my hands to count. I can count that on my dick. One and a half.
Crude, but once
I typed that out I can’t bring myself to delete it.
Moving on.
The most
straight-laced friends I’ve ever known had some poems scribbled down in a
notebook. I’m not naming names, but let’s just say that the world being full of
gates and doors stuck with me, and you know who you are. The most deranged,
hazy people I’ve ever known (and let’s face it, I’ve known some deranged, hazy
people) had some poems, usually balled up in the pocket of their poncho,
usually about how being high was alternately great or a drag, or else about
their parent’s failings. See if you can track the pattern there.
I think it’s a
universal shameful secret, right? Why is that? Is it because we look at poetry
as this kind of arch, heavy emotional thing, perfectly prepared to help us
process emotions we don’t have a better outlet for at that age? Is it because
translating our feelings into metaphor and imagery allowed us an outlet for
whatever without forcing us to actually confront our shit head on?
One guy I knew,
he’d proudly tell everyone he was a poet, wore a beret and showed up to parties
with this little notebook he wrote his poems in. He’d stare at some girl,
tapping that notebook with a pen, until she asked about it and he could unload
upon her what a thoughtful, deep motherfucker he was. I don’t think it ever got
him the desired result, unless the desired result was to find creative
inspiration in the dull thud of rejection.
Another guy, he
used to write these long sonnets, was all into romance everything until I
loaned him a Bukowski book. After that all his poems were suddenly about catching
a peek at some pubic hair jutting up above a bikini line, or jerking off on
dead bodies or something.
I’m trying to
think of why I spent so much time working on these things. I certainly never
thought I’d be a great poet one day. I certainly didn’t really like reading
poetry that much. Maybe I just enjoyed screwing around with language? I don’t
know, probably not. Judging from the anger on display in most of the poems I
found, it was definitely an outlet.
The first two
poems I ever wrote, which are lost now,
were about smoking weed and STD’s, respectively. This was years before I ever
smoked weed, years before I ever kissed a girl, let alone had to worry about
getting an STD. I think I wrote them because I was sick of my classmates and
their shit about how their grandma’s death really put things in perspective.
People thought they were funny, I remember. In fact I remember at one
point—this was ninth grade—some kid I didn’t know standing up and lunch and
reading them both aloud, claiming he’d written them. Not the last time something
like that would happen to me, actually. I guess that sounds like bragging but
c’mon, give me something.
I had this
Creative Writing teacher in community college, he was a poet, so that was an
inspiration. He was a great guy, had this wild sustained energy like watching a
bottle rocket frozen mid-explosion, just seething in the sky, lighting
everything up, never losing its intensity. I remember him telling us that our
job as writers was to write until our armor fell off, until all the shit
blocking the free flow of ideas from our heads down our arms and out onto the
page was demolished and it all flowed like water. I e-mailed him the night
after he said that in class and told him I wanted that more than anything,
asked him what I had to do to get that to happen to me.
I think he
responded but I don’t know what he said.
Anyway, I
thought I’d look through these poems, find something worth sharing, share it.
Say something funny about what was going through my head back then. But again,
and I can’t stress this enough, going through those notebooks was a bummer. And
I didn’t really find much worth revisiting. But okay, follow through, here’s
one:
I think this one
is broken
I’d like to
trade it back
I tried a newer
model
And I think it
suits me better.
No,
I like the color
Yes,
I like the ride
But my hair
won’t blow as freely and I
Think I might
have made a big mistake.
Took the new one
for a test drive
It felt so
smooth and cool
When I got home
to the old one
It seemed boring
Dark and dull
Okay, so there’s
no trade in
Right now I just
don’t care
We can run off
to the coast
I will leave the
old one here
You can have it.
Too many miles
Not enough
torque.
The title of
that poem is ‘Wife,’ a joke that only works (even then barely) if I tell it to
you after you read it. I wrote this thing when I was like 20 years old. Why did
I have such a view of marriage at age 20? I wrote this for that community
college class, where many of classmates were either married or divorced, and
man did they think it was funny. Maybe there’s something there about how you
develop as a writer or something, first figuring out what works or what people
will like before figuring out what works for you, what you like, what’s
actually authentic. But then it strikes me that I still don’t necessarily know
what people will like, so maybe forget that.
And I still don’t
totally know what torque means. I know it’s from physics…something to do with…rotation?
Momentum? It’s a car word, I know that.
One more…this
one doesn’t have a title.
Split my chest
wide open
And crawl inside
of me
Twist my guts
around your chest
Rest your head
against my heart
And sleep
You’ll be safe
and warm
And I will be at
peace
Hm. I wrote that
one for a class, too. Well, for a girl, but also for a class. I read it for the
class and after, this girl who looked just like the girl from that movie Amelie
asked me if she could have a copy. I wrote it out for her and handed it over
and she said, in like a rough Russian accent, ‘For one so brutish to write so
sweetly, astounding,’ which was exactly what I’d always wanted someone to say
to me, at that point.
The teacher
thought it was gross. When I finished reading it he did this big exaggerated shiver.
I was never sure if it was the image or if he thought I was being creepy, or
naïve. I figured I’d know when I got a little older/smarter/more experienced.
But damn it, I’m still not sure. Maybe it is naïve, or maybe there’s something
there about consuming another person that’s unhealthy? Remember what I said about realizing that the
problems you had 15 years ago are still the problems you have today?
I don’t know. I
kinda like that one.
I don’t know if
there’s anything to learn from this. I don’t know if this turned out
interesting.
You know? I just
realized that I lied to you a minute ago. The first poem I wrote was actually
about my brother dying. About how lonely and jilted I felt that he got to be
dead and all relaxed up in heaven while I had to slave away like an asshole on
earth. Wow. My parents got it framed, I think it might still be hanging on the
wall in their bedroom. Damn. That thing was fucking sincere. So I bounced from
that to the two goofy ones about drugs and risky sex…
Maybe that’s the
allure of poetry, then, to a young ‘un. It’s sincere. And when you’re at a
certain age you have some feelings that are big and overwhelming and sincere as
hell but it’s freaky to admit that, unless you break it up into stanzas and
call it art.
Or maybe
everyone (almost everyone) just goes through a couple years of being an
asshole, wanting to be an artist, tapping their notebook at the party, waiting
for an opening.
