Thursday Poem Share

Posted on May 23, 2013 by jessiecarty

I’m working a different schedule today because we are having a refrigerator delivered. Our 12 year old fridge has been on the fritz for at least the last few months, but we’ve been putting off the purchase, hoping I’d find some additional work. Alas, work hasn’t happened, and we are tired of the ice-maker and water dispenser malfunctioning so we gave in to the good deals of Memorial Day Weekend.

This week’s poem started on Saturday. I tried to write on Thursday and Friday of last week, but I mostly just babbled at myself in my journal again. So this poem went through handwritten revisions on Sunday and Monday before I typed it up on Tuesday. I have not worked on it sense, and I won’t work on it again until next Thursday when I take it down (along with any poems you guys post).

–Goodbye, for now, poem

I’m pulling some poems that I submitted in November of 2012 and marking them as assumed declined so hopefully I’ll have something to submit soon. I’m actually going to work on a submission packet this afternoon of poems from the last few months.

On the reading end of things I finished a book that I just picked up on a whim at AWP. I was getting books at the Sibling Rivalry Press table and I decided to add From the Belly by Virginia Bell, and what a terrific surprise! I kept marking poem after poem that I enjoyed. One of my favorites was “The Art of Displacement” where Bell writes: I might as well darn together the ice floes / on the lake with needle and thread // from my mother’s sewing kit, then set out / across them under a radiating sun.

Another book I finished, but didn’t fall in love with, had me interested in researching more the poetic device/form of aubade. Perhaps that could be your writing inspiration for this post?

Now I’ll be off to work on that poetry submission, cleaning out the fridge, reading, starting a new draft, and picking poems for the first reading I’ve given in a long time – Sunday in the Chapel Hill, NC area. Send your friends

Thursday Poem Share

Posted on June 30, 2011 by jessiecarty

It’s that time again: Thursday Poem Share! YAY!

Recently, I finished the book Shadowbox by Fred Chappell. I know I mentioned this book in a previous post after hearing Fred read from it at a Charlotte Writer’s Club meeting. I gave the book a 4 out of 5 stars on Goodreads because it can be a tough book to read. Having a “tough” book, for me, can mean a variety of things, but in this case it is because some of the poems have a very academic feel. They are steeped in specific references and diction. This really happens further into the book though and I still strongly recommend this collection if, for nothing else, to appreciate how Fred often makes three poems out of one.

For a bit of online poetry I’ve been enjoying the Poetry Foundation and Poetry Daily apps that I added to my iPhone. I particularly enjoyed Naomi Shihab Nye’s poem Making a Fist. I’d highly recommend her books also, btw.

Uh oh, now my own poetry? Well, the best news is I HAVE BEEN WRITING! After a lot of non-writing, I feel like I’M BACK. It really helped to be around other writers on Saturday. That being said, I have been working in notebooks a lot so I don’t have a lot typed up. I know: EXCUSES! So the only thing I have is one that was recently rejected so I’m reviewing it for revisions. More on it below.

–and the poem is gone

Side note on this poem is that it is part of 1 of the 2 projects I’m working on now. This one is where I am taking individual words from Blake’s Tyger poem in order to give myself a jumping off point for writing. Do you know how many times he says dread, for example, in that poem?

So what are you guys writing? Post your work below to be removed next week. Link to it. Link to readings, books etc. Comment with each other.

Share poetry!

Thursday Poem Share

Posted on September 17, 2009 by jessiecarty

Well, it has been another very busy day around here! And I have managed to get nothing done on my to do list, well, except for finalizing things with my auto accident and buying the new car! Now, little bits and pieces to clean up tomorrow but everything is basically done.

So back to our regularly scheduled poem share Thursday.

Here is another poem that I am hoping will appear in my upcoming collection. It has never been published before.

The Diver

We are still a block away from the pool
when I feel the reverberations
of the diving board
up and down my spine—
ga goooon gaa goooon

“It’s like sex,” you whisper. Like
you would know, I think
but as we changed
into our bathing suits
only I was hairless.

At the end of the diving board
you push off, your feet bouncing
up from the white plastic.
You flex your hips in and out
of the pike position.

You break the surface with your eyes
closed and your legs kicking beneath
the water line where the curve
of your torso is distorted
by the refraction of light on the water.

As you pull out of the pool,
I note the fullness of your waist
and I see you, and your feet
straining against metal stirrups.
I hear, Too young. Too early.

You run past me to get back in line
at the diving board. I walk back
towards the shallow end of the pool.

This next poem is a work in progress so comments are always appreciated Feel free to also post your poems in comments or to link to them! This poem is from the second manuscript that I am working on. It is the final in the Zombie series of 16 poems that is one of four sections. Whew. Why do I make stuff so complicated for myself? Well and by final, I mean the final one I needed to write but not necessarily final in order.

[thanks to anyone who looked in, poem is gone now, but i will be putting a new one up for my next Thursday Poem share, just jump 7 days forward]

Tomorrow is FRIDAY!!!

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Jessie Carty

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