Weekly Photo Challenge: From Above (Part II)

Sitting in the backyard this evening with my family, I thought I’d snap one more photo for this week’s photo challenge. Yup, we were relaxing around a fire. Beneath the photo, I’ve posted a poem from my book Private Hercules McGraw, a poem that is loosely connected to the photo. My book is available on Amazon.com.

photo by S. Thomas Summers

Testimony

Regiment settled near a little church
one Saturday night – tents speckled
graveyard grass, the wings of sleeping

angels. Every man was listening to
ham sizzle – music we’d soon forget –
on fires that bloomed like angry roses,
but I snuck off with a blanket and granddad’s

copy of the Good Book. Curled in a corner
of the church, I found Psalm 23 – laid my head
on its promises. Grandpa stuck a curl of birch bark
in the pages so I could find it easy. Can’t read

it none, but he said when I went off that Psalm 23
would usher me through blood and hell.
Sunday morning dragged rain off the mountains.
Lord nudged me awake – said it was time to rise.

I asked if He might march with me a spell
before the sun opened its eye.

Weekly Writing Challenge: A Manner of Speaking

I’ve decided to take part in the writing challenge offered this week by WordPress. It tasks writers to connect with their “our geographical, generational, and cultural affiliations” and produce a piece of writing. I (kinda) did just that. The poem posted below is from my book Private Hercules McGraw: Poems of the American Civil War. The poem’s speaker, Hercules, is a Confederate soldier. I hope, I think, the poem illustrates a Confederate voice.

Seasons

It’s like a season passed in the blink
of an afternoon. This morning
I smiled at tall shoots of lavender
reaching above the grass and clover.
Bees hummed from bloom to bloom
like politicians knocking on doors,
mustering votes. Breeze carried scents
of earth and honey – sweetest spring day|
that ever filled my lungs. Made me wanna
touch something soft, something special –
maybe the hand of a Tennessee beauty.

But after a day of trading spit and smoke
with a regiment of Billies, this pretty spot
done shed all its pretty. Blood has a queer smell,
like a bog choked with sour fish,
but it don’t mud a patch of ground
like water does. Blood turns dirt
into syrup – walk in it too long
and you’ll get all gummed up.
And the dead are leaking blood all about.
From here it looks like a herd of fellas
decided to nap, but they ain’t waking up
no time soon. You can see their last thought
carved on each of their faces. It’s never fear or anger.
Mostly it seems like sorrow to me, like they know
they just lost memory and hope all at once.

Don’t seem like spring no more.
What season is it? It’s a season for breathing –
at least while you still can.

We All Need Poetry – Do We, Really?

This morning, I read an article in which poet and professor Tracy K. Smith is quoted saying that “We all need poetry — even hedge fund managers. The moments in our lives that are characterized by language that has to do with necessity or the market, or just, you know, things that take us away from the big questions that we have, those are the things that I think urge us to think about what a poem can offer. Even the students who probably won’t keep writing poetry can learn from poems. The things that a poem can teach them to see and to hear and to listen for are necessary.”

My response? Do the hedge fund managers know they need poetry?

Yes, we all need to see the doctor from time to time. Yes, we all need to take our medicine, but do we know that we need to? And if we know, do we? Honestly, I really don’t think so.

I’ve also read that “In all ages, poetry has been regarded as important, not simply for pleasure, but as something central to each individual’s existence, something of unique value, and something which makes us feel better off for having and which we are spiritually impoverished without.”

Poetry is central to my existence, but I don’t believe it is central to existence. People live and live well without poetry. Rather, in my opinion, most people run from poetry as they might run from pestilence; yet, they live well. From their point of view, they live better.

I do believe that if poetry were a bigger part of the world the world, and those in it, might fare better. Sadly, I believe poetry may die before the world does. Those people I mentioned, those runners, everyday people, intelligent people…well, they just keep running.

I need poetry and I seek it out. Do others need it? Maybe they do, but why pursue it when they, in their minds, are getting along just fine without it?

Perhaps then, I’ve just convinced myself to spread a bit of poetry. Perhaps not. I’m really not sure.

Related articles

• Does Poetry Still Matter? Yes Indeed, Says NPR NewsPoet (npr.org)

Confederate Ghosts

The poem posted below is taken from my developing
manuscript, The Journals of Lt. Kendal Everly: a
Story of the American Civil War. I thought it well
met a writing challenge presented on New Jersey poet Adele Kenny’s
blog, The Music In It. The
challenge is to write a “mysterious” poem. Would you like to read
the challenge? Just visit Adele’s blog.
In this journal entry/poem, Everly imagines his enemy,
Confederates. What will they be like? He wonders for he is soon to
meet them. Let me know what you think. Confederates July 17,
1861 – Entry Two Night comes and my heart finds its
rest. But daylight: a cursed time, when the enemy unfurls long
shadows, long fingers that stretch from behind the wrinkled hide of
trees and stones, scratch promises on the wind: blood and death.
Damned, foul ghosts: gray, so gray.

Related
articles

• Writing Challenge: Christmas and the Civil
  War (thelintinmypocket.wordpress.com)
• A Poem from my Forthcoming Book
  (thelintinmypocket.wordpress.com)
• Where I (Wish I Could) Write
  (thelintinmypocket.wordpress.com)
• I Wonder as I Wander – Why?
  (thelintinmypocket.wordpress.com)
• One Writer’s Resolutions
  (thelintinmypocket.wordpress.com)
• Faces of the Civil War
  (cbsnews.com)

Where I (Wish I Could) Write

A Writer’s Dream Room

The photo featured here…well, it’s beautiful. Isn’t? It’s a reader’s/writer’s dream. Perhaps one day I’ll have a room like this in my house, a room with dark brown, leather chairs, shelves heavy with old books, a fire place, and most of all, a room draped with a silken quiet. Yes, there I could read, and write, and think, but I don’t have a room like that.

Yesterday, I started a poem in a local karate dojo, where my son is taught karate. Kids were everywhere: noise, noise, noise. And I was sitting on a plastic chair – no brown leather. And I couldn’t find the glow, the warmth of a fire – or a fireplace for that matter. Still I wrote anyway, the first few words of a poem. I saw my son smiling. I watched him diligently punch this and chop that. He was happy. That made me happy. It made me warm. Guess my dream room can wait.

Below are the words I spoke of, the first words a new poem crafted in a karate dojo. In the poem, my new book’s protagonist, writes about waking up after killing a Confederate soldier, killing him brutally, and after being injured himself.

The Ache of Light

September 3, 1861

When my eyes opened again,
light draped over me like an ache;
it soaked through skin, into bone
and caught fire.

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A Poem from my Forthcoming Book

I thought I’d share a poem that will be featured in my new book, The Journals of Lt. Kendal Everly: Poems of the American Civil War. Lost in a murderous shroud of war and hate, Everly kills an enemy, a young Confederate solider.

A dead Confederate soldier

Silken Filaments of Salvation

August 4, 1861 – Entry IV

His neck was thin. My fingers
slid around it as they might caress
your neck, Elizabeth. Yet, it was slicked
with blood so it felt as if I tightened

my grip around a fish. Hunched over
like Notre Dame’s bell ringer, I pulled
his head closer to mine. He might
have thought I meant to kiss him.

My heart, my mind, both bubbled
with some foul Satanic froth,
both marvelled at the deepening color
of his face, a deep purple, a fine wine.

I gulped the dying gasps of this boy
as if his death would envelop me
with the silken filaments of salvation.
My fingers tightened. His neck grew

thinner, a wet string. His mouth,
like a gate, opened, dark and wide,
attempting to conjure breath. His limbs
flailed attempting to embrace the air.

His eyes, opened wide like globes.
Damn you, I screamed. DAMN YOU.
And then, there was death. He was still
And I was lost. Dear God, I am lost.

One Writer’s Resolutions

New Year’s resolutions – cliches for the most part. Yet, I’ve a few goals, writing goals, that I hope to accomplish in 2013. I’ll share them here. Hopefully, I’ll return over the next 12 months to inform you all that each were indeed accomplished. My fingers are crossed.

1. Finish my new manuscript, The Journals of Lt. Kendal Everly: Poems of the American Civil War and see it published.

2. Begin manuscript number three. Well, it’s actually already in the works. So, therefore, I hope to get a “hunk” of it done. It’s revolves around the life and times of Jesse James. Details to follow.

Jesse James

3. Become a better marketer of my work. In this area, I’m really at a loss. If you have any advice, let me know.

4. Write more consistently. I think most writers want to be more consistent writers.

5. Blog more consistently.

6. Connect with more writers. Great minds think alike – ha!

There’s my list. It’s simple and achievable.

Happy New Year all. What do you hope to accomplish?

 

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• Setting and Accomplishing Goals (writingwranglersandwarriors.wordpress.com)
• When Hurricanes Strike…Write (thelintinmypocket.wordpress.com)
• Good Ideas for Writers (leartisteboots.wordpress.com)

 

Writing Challenge: Christmas and the Civil War

I posted this poem last year, but thought to post it again when I read New Jersey poet Adele Kenny’s writing challenge. Basically, Adele challenged her readers to write a Christmas/winter poem. You can view the challenge here.

I enjoyed the colloquial aspects of this poem. All spelling mistakes are made on purpose. The poem is inspired by an actual letter written by a Civil War soldier to his wife. Let me know what you think.

Merry Christmas.

Private Levi McCormick Writes His Wife: Christmas 1864

I bin down with squirts.
My backend’s raw as a sun bernt scalp
and cold air snaps at me
when I drop my trousers.

I borrow’d some clothes.
Had to wash mine, bein’ so smelly.
Ther hangin’ on a tree limb near the fire –
stil they be frozen, stiff as a ten day corpse.

Seen me plenty of them.
Anyway, send on a box. I need a scent of home.
Tell the boys mery christmas.
I’ll be lookin’ for that christ star whilse I wate.

I Wonder as I Wander – Why?

A few weeks ago, I wrote about one of my habits, a habit that, in part, compels me to write: I wonder. I grant my mind liberty and let it travel where it might. But why do I wonder?

As a child, I often visited places I was unable to travel to physically; however, I did travel to these places both mentally and emotionally. Simply stated, I employed my imagination. As all children do, I embarked on incredible adventures. I explored the reaches of space. I grappled with undersea tyrants. I flew. I spoke to animals. I became animals. I piloted starships. I…well, I did it all. But all kids do. Right? But I’m not a kid anymore. A few days ago, I turned 44. Guess what. I’m still piloting starships.

Psychological studies suggest that people wonder, or day dream, because it helps them relax, manage conflicts, boost creativity, and relieve boredom. I’ve no doubt that all of this is true, but I believe that, for me, it’s more. When my mind zooms me to new and other places, it’s asking me to knit reality to the dream. It wants me to blend each into one. When I write, that’s exactly what happens.

For the last few years, I’ve been writing about the American Civil War. My efforts resulted in my first book, Private Hercules McGraw: Poems of the Civil War. Currently I’m writing a second volume of Civil War poetry, The Journals of Lt. Kendal Everly. Respectively, each book tells the story of its title character; however, it also tells my story. As I carved each story, I lived each story. I smelt the cannon smoke. I trod upon earth muddy with blood. For me, my poems are much more than poems; they’re memories.

So, I’m a writer. I write because I wonder and I wonder to weave reality with fantasy – but why do that?

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Poetry Reading – Yup, I’m At It Again

Bridgewater Public Library

Sorry for the late announcement, but…

Tuesday, December 4

S. THOMAS SUMMERS (me) and JIM BERKHEISER

Somerset Poetry Group

Bridgewater Public Library
Meeting Room C
1 Vogt Dr., Bridgewater
7 PM Free

Open Reading to follow featured readers.

Contact: 908-526-4016 or

Bob Rosenbloom: 732-371-3817
bloom306@yahoo.com

Bud Berkich
amnestyblackcat@aol.com