Ever think your life could be a movie? In MY movie, I'd have to let Calgon take me away...
The bug-gut green that I am spreading along the vanilla trim will
Eventually turn to "Bay Leaf Brown" -- so says Sherwin - Williams.
Each stroke of the plastic bristled brush tries
In vain to hide the house's splintered past.
The ladder trembles under my paint-splattered Rockfords. My eyes
Squint in the afternoon sun, while dribbles of bayleaf bug-gut
Trickle from my novice fingers to my bony elbow.
A spaghetti western flute invades my ears.
The beating sun nearing the horizon
Chisels a ghost rider drawing closer.
Clint Eastwood, riding?
I wipe my sweating brow leaving a bug-gut trail across
My nose as I peer at the approaching figure.
The half-painted house wails
While
This Calgon cowboy comes
galloping,
trotting,
traveling, riding, approaching
Under the ladder as a slipping shoe betrays
My balance and I fall into his embrace.
I've come to take you away. Grasping his muscled torso,
I nestle into his arms as we ride off into the sunset.
Bug Gut Green dries to its promised Bay Leaf Brown
All alone.
ROOTS AND WINGS: Marriage, Motherhood, Moments, and Memories
Thursday, September 1, 2011
8 comments:
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Suzanne
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A respite from acedia! You're a genious. Some people can write. Some people can make you feel like you are really there on that ladder. Clint Eastwood. A true hero on and off screen. You have good taste!
ReplyDeleteYou do have a way with words. Flirtations and a meaninging project - all in one. Now, that is multi-tasking! Clint Eastwood always seems to pick earthy women. Bug Gut Green and all.
ReplyDeleteYour talent truly shines forth in this efficient piece with words so beautifully and skillfully used. I felt hot, tired and scared to death of the ladder. Then, Clint. Be still my menopausal heart. Being overweight, I can't picture Clint catching me! You are so lucky to be able to write about such a variety of things and truly tell a story. This was great! On another note, we are so often left alone after hopes, expectations or the carelessness of others. Often, we've done everything just about right. Sometimes, we just don't know why. Of course, we learn to go forward. We can even become skillful at it.
ReplyDeleteRe-reading, I missed "we ride off into the sunset." Sorry. I thought I had read it through several times - carefully. A happy ending and that "old ideas and experiences" might be left behind - they, the ones who are alone and covering up the past rather than leaving, sometimes a very healthy thing (especially with Rowdy Yates), stay and make changes make rather than gloss over it. Of course, I'm assuming I know your meaning. Isn't a piece of art open to interpretation and having the ability for others to relate and then take their own message? I can caught up in the rigid Cliff and Monarch notes mentality and don't venture into free thinking. So often, when I've been at an art show, concert or literary reading, I don't want to offend the artist and think I have to guess their message to flatter them. Is there a happy medium to being a classically trained writer and a free spirit, breaking the rules along the way?
ReplyDeleteThere are 2 camps on the interpretation issue -- find the writer's exact meaning or let the reader glean from his own experiences. I've taught both. I lean toward the latter. I will let those in the "Literary Criticism World" work on the former. If there is a happy medium, then I am right there with you!
ReplyDeleteLike Gabby above, I become a bit uncomfortable, not wanting to be disrespectful when reading a piece that I know a writer has worked hard on to put forth ideas - and feelings - unique experiences of their own lives. It's very brave to write and put it out there. Some say that the ability to write a fine poem is harder than writing an entire book. It is sometimes interesting to read a poem or other work, pick it apart and look at it like a puzzle and see if we can come up with what the writer wanted us to see. A communion. I don't feel that it minimizes the reader at all. It maximizes the writer's ability to be appreciated. For me, this poem takes me away, too. It's been a time of difficulties at home, wondering what my life has meant, were my choices true to myself, did I put my womanliness into the right relationships, take life on life's terms and more and realizing it's o.k and healthy to divert once in a while and "go away". Did I take time play hooky and be bad? Not a crime. I think of my dream guy and it's a tie - Gregory Peck or Anthony Hopkins, also both on horses! And, I am trying to choose colors for the house - very hard. It seems so important to make the right choices because they have impact for a long time. Gotta wear it all a little more loosely, I suppose... I think I hear Gregory knocking.
ReplyDeleteOne more thing. You must write a combo spiritual, humorous and maternal anthology. Husbands and significant others included, too, of course.
ReplyDeleteJust watched From Here to Eternity for the 100th time. I wonder how Burt Lancaster would look riding up on a horse? He's always so meticulous and well-mannered even on a bad day, except if he's had too much to drink but then, he still looks good. Maybe he could give a few hints about the painting and then, we could ride away - never to be seen again. He can be so proper, he would probably ask for an explanation of why I was willing to leave. None of his business. Just drive, old boy! Always the one to do the right thing, he would take me back, but the break was nice and I would be home, where I belong.
ReplyDelete