day 23 - grapes of wrath and yum

I flew in last night. I'm in California. I wrote this in Minneapolis airport under the stares of these two teenage guys. They could see I was writing poetry. I wonder what they thought. I'm guessing they didn't find it supremely masculine.

So this poem is a hybrid of two poets I've been reading for the last two days. Sharon Olds and Colin Cheney. Sharon Olds was a teacher of mine and one of the most amazing modern writers. If you aren't familiar, pick up any of her books.

Colin Cheney was a student of hers as well and a peer of mine. He just released a book called Here Be Monsters which won the National Poetry Prize. He's that good. He'll be around for a while.

So these styles.

Sharon has this very confessional, narrative style that lends itself well to me. These many times end up in a grand line that lets us understand our humanity a little better.

Colin is like a juggler. He'll have a poem with three things going on. A personal story, a scientific concept, and a greek myth, for example. And he'll weave them all together into one illuminating whole. It's like you think he's juggling three things but he holds it up you realize it was one, spinning very fast.

So I've tried combining these. And it sounds really sad. But I didn't intend it that way. And it may be stretched for drama. And I hope I don't get any calls about this from my fam.

The Sandwich Days

There were poor times and poorer-
My Grandfather bled his savings for us,
put us in clothes, in used cars. For years
our Mom was unknown to be home
two consecutive nights. Her desk
was a labyrinth of checkbook registers.
do what you gotta do, make ends meet
make do, get by, the Lord helps those
who don’t cry “Lord!” every other second
We never dressed like poor players,
Nama made sure, gave us modest skins
to blend and strut, and if money didn’t stick to us
it sure didn’t smell us out, turn us in
as phoney, eat white bread and bologna trash.
~
I hated every opulence. Especially the whole gloss of skiing, the neon passes swinging from jackets so store-starch fresh, all the Monday high school hallway talk, Did you get new skis? I got new skis. Last year’s ski were so last year’s skis. I bought a new sneer every winter. Even dumped this ski chick cold when her family invited me to the slopes for a weekend. Because I knew how I’d look out there, next to that money, in my matte blues, every worn sleeve and stretched thread revealed in the inescapable glare of miles of powder.
~
No one said without much in our home.
Sometimes it was money and one night it was time
and there were no groceries and dinner
Mom announced, our captain informing the crew,
dinner would be slices of bread and ham.
And the moment hung between all of us,
our perception of being haves or have-nots.
It was the youngness of her eyes that snapped me,
into a chant, into a silver banging march around
the dinner table, which made me play first mate
all those stripped down years even
when the ship was on fire, our battle cry
always, even now, being, “Ham Sandwiches!
Ham Sandwiches! Ham Sandwiches!”