Why is reading so complicated?
Continuing with the Poetry Writing class, I received the assignment for this week about 14 hours before it had to be turned in (which hours included what small amount of sleep I usually get). While I usually spend fairly little time writing a poem, usually an hour or less the first time through it, finding the hook, the lead-in, the image or phrase the poem is built on top of is the hard part, the part that takes time. This assignment required us to use one line from one of th epoems provided in the packet, and use it in as part of a new poem. Included in the packet was an excerpt from All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy which included the line “sweeter for the betrayal. Nesting cranes that stood singlefooted among” in the middle. I took that line and wrote this (more in part 2):
None So Pretty
after McCarthy
Forgiveness the last thing on her mind, her tongue otherwise occupied with his, the stranger for the night fetched from the corner cafe over a caramel machiatto and biscotti, almond. Birds of paradise cooing in the nearby aviary to attract breadcrumbs; the many built bowers laced with floral scents like the lilac-mango body wash washed over her as she came to godlike proportions in her self-assurance, or bitterness, or a twisted sense of cat’s away chasing the parakeets the id left in charge with a stern warning. Wings clipped and confined, she exposes her back and his, both tan, toned, his lacking the red stripes she will incise, mark her property, leave a souvenir. Him, the other, the raptor, was a sweet kiss like a liqueur in a cordial glass: tonight she drinks a bitter gin, but one sweeter for the betrayal. Nesting cranes that stood singlefooted among the incoming tides they collapse, nest filled, eggs carelessly exposed. Forgiveness the first thing on her mind once the coffee americano interrupts the next morning, mourning fidelity for her part, the part of her like the birds of paradise mating for life in the mango-scented bowers like the bathtub she soaks in when her raptor returns, having hunted alone.