New Underwear and a Poem


Ah.... Nothing like sitting in front of the computer listening to Brown-eyed Girl on sattelite radio in your favorite t-shirt and a new pair of underwear. (Thanks mom.) I really should be working on the report that I'm supposed to be writing for the city on what happened with the camp this summer. But I don't feel like it.

Sha la la la la la la la la la la ti da la ti da
So hard to find my way, now that I'm all on my own...

I had a great night. I went to a barbeque at my mom's house, and her cool friends Stewart and Bethany were there. We laughed over dinner, sharing hillarious travel stories. Stewart and Bethany seem like they've been almost everywhere and done almost everything. The kids played in the pool.

After dinner we watched "Blue Crush," which really made me want to run out and start surfing--an impossibility because 1) it was the middle of the night 2) I don't have a surfboard 3) I live roughly 75 miles from the beach 4) my gas tank is on "E", 5) I have the ab muscles of a jar of jelly, and 6) I don't even know how to surf.

But hey, I'm an impromptu kind of girl. I'll put it on my list of things to do. It's a shame to live in Florida and not surf, even if surfing in Florida typically means chasing down a hurricane so that the waves are higher than 2 or 3 ft.

I tried surfing once a few years ago. I got up once for half a second, then lost the wave and sank. Then it started to rain hard so we went bowling instead.

Below you will find today's poem. Please remember that I'm writing these poems as a personal excercise. The forms you see here are the very first versions of the poems. Plus, I am usually forcing myself to write, so there isn't even the aid of inspiration to make them a little more interesting. The idea is that forcing myself to write, even when I really really don't want to, will somehow stretch my brain, and out of the process something workable might appear.

FYI, what really wants to come out of my mind at times like these looks more like this:

Poop

Poop poop poop
poop poopy poop poo-poo
poop poop poop poopy poop poop.


Instead, I force myself to write something slightly more intelligent, such as today's poem:


Arbeitskur

Ich bin eine arbeiter
The arbeiter who smokes two packs a day.
Grisly fingers on drink machines.
I like to look at the cold beads of sweat and imagine
how five tablespoons of sugar and some soda water
are gonna cool me off.

I like to take two aspirin every morning to ease the swell
of my arthritis, and a packet of BC powder before coming home
so that my kids don't give me a headache.