Thoughts on National Poetry Month Ending

Hint: Poetry is cool…

It’s May now, which means April is over, which means National Poetry Month is over. Most of you probably didn’t even know it was any kind of poetry month, so you’re likely unfazed. I, on the other hand, always have a bit of a let down.

I never expected to become a person who spent so much time reading, writing, and thinking about poetry, but here we are. And I love, when in April, the shy poets come out of the woodwork, like little spring daffodils popping their lovely heads up to the sun, and write more poems than usual, and talk about being poets. And we all actually call ourselves poets.

So I get a little nostalgic when it ends. Missing the motivation to write more rather than belabor over works that maybe need to be put to rest. Coming away with a fistful of ideas worth investing some time in. Seeing other poets produce new things with such aplomb that I am stunned by their talent.

I love getting to call myself a poet. And I’ve finally outgrown the imposter syndrome of whether I was worthy of the title or not.

I also love that it has afforded me some incredible seats in circles of people making art in my community over the last month that have yielded stunningly gorgeous conversations. All in all, I highly recommend becoming a poet in your old age. And also, reading more poetry. Listening to more poetry. Talking about more poetry.

On that note, I thought today I’d share a piece I’ve written lately about what it feels like to be a poet. Maybe you’ll see a bit of yourself here.

Go Ahead and Call Yourself a Poet

I rise up in the mornings and blink my eyes open just so I can read another Andrea Gibson poem.

I turn the blinds at night to block out the light of tomorrow while the black poets’ voices carve a place in my memory.

I linger long in bed on a Sunday, Walt Whitman and Natalie Diaz and Joy Harjo dancing a warped but rhythmic waltz down my spine.

On weekdays, at lunchtime, I find a word on the backside of the sun and draw it down to me.

Close my eyes until I see its color run, roll it around in my mouth until I know the flavor notes on its front end and back end and whether to call it sweet or sour or savory or something I’ve never tasted before.

I sing it to myself over and over until its sound becomes lyric on my lips.

When people talk into the air around me, I pluck words between pinched fingers and examine their undersides and veined wings and bulging eyes before I let them go, learning to always be aware that not all words mean what they say.

I was a lanky-legged middle schooler when “I must go down to the sea again, to the lonely sea and sky” carved itself into my memory so that I can still recite most of that poem to myself when I want to remember that my brain is a growth spurt that never stopped growing.

I was a sad, scared high schooler who wanted to know why her heart broke anew every morning when Edgar Allan Poe and his Annabel Lee froze me solid and set my teeth chattering with their necrotic love song.

I sat in a circle in a college classroom with other students who all held a slim hope of writing something that mattered one day. We read poems to one another and wished for approval.

I remember a poem about potatoes and a shy nun who wrote love poems to God that made me feel guilty for the mad crush I had on every woman professor who taught me new words to add to my litanies.

I guess what I’m trying to say is this: this is the way a person becomes a poet, with a fistful of memories in one hand and a pair of wings clenched between her teeth, and her cheeks blushed with the color of a word she hasn’t heard yet.

…………………

Also, here’s a little lagniappe. A poem I penned this week after a too hot bath made me new:

Soap and Sacrament

They told me there was only one baptism.

That its mark on my soul was indelible.

That I could not be re-baptized in the same way I could not be un-baptized.

That there was no way for me to be born again.

But I say every bath is a baptism.

Every bit of rising steam an eraser.

I have un-baptized and re-baptized myself a hundred and a half times this month alone.

Crawled out of my pinked up skin and shriveled finger pads

to be born again every other Monday and some Sundays too.

I guess my rules are different.

If you’ve got water and a will to be just a little bit new, welcome to your next baptism.

The ceremony is simple.

Slide down low enough in the tub that shampoo drips into your eyes just a little,

clouds your vision a bit.

Anoint yourself with something that smells slightly sweet and a little bit heady.

Go under. Count to three.

Come up again, taking enough water with you that they can

follow your wet footprints back

to the altar they tried to sacrifice you on and witness your

original skin.

………

We’re celebrating a college graduation at my house this weekend, which has brought my oldest child home and my sister to twin. My heart is full. I hope, you too, find fullness this weekend.