Lisa Dalrymple

W

lisadalrymple — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 22:07:48 +0000

Unwillingly I wallow,
I wish I could will
myself beyond the
wishing well.

The bit of caution tape
on my welcome mat
Who will ignore the warning?
Who will trespass here?

The willows are wary
What do you expect us to do
we wonder

I wade around the whale in the room
the room of why’s
without a whisper or a whimper

A wanton god withholds the winter
A wily woman withholds the truth from herself
Who wields more power?

My mind wrestles with details that sneak
and the doom I seek

Wrought for lack of a writhing partner, the wet war
this writer weaves a world of w words for wont of a wild side.

Writing is Hunting (prose poem)

lisadalrymple — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 06:38:13 +0000

Writing is hunting. Taking cover and waiting for the right time to pull, shoot, eat, and honor. Music is my gun and my table dressing. Seasonings are the objects clipping a wing, trapping a leg. Reverence for the choked emotion in my throat, the ball of fury sub-rib.

Writing a Poem at 1:28 AM

lisadalrymple — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 06:29:06 +0000

The popcorn ceiling like my arms
white elevation map in the cold
tapping the ebonies and ivories
of a laptop keyboard
White letters housed in black squares
black elevation map warmed by
the pads of my fingers
I have the whole world in my hands

Easy is Alone Re-Post

lisadalrymple — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 19:40:58 +0000

This is a poem I wrote about two years ago that I rediscovered, and it fits my mood:

Easy is alone
like a floozy
in the moon
Talk in peeking
me’s and balked
eyes speaking
Meet in circle
Curved parapet of
ward, feeble
Crawl through window
The sky is small
Fear too, below
Moon is whitewash,
a resigned gloom
Midnight’s gloss
dulls soon.

Cleo Chemical

lisadalrymple — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 00:37:16 +0000

Cleo Chemical is a priestess
Cleo Chemical is obsessed
with crowding womans’ veins
with cherry cordial white
Cleo Chemical sops up
watermelon with her mouth
in Midsummer humidity.
Cleo Chemical is robed
with hot pink neon,
pop art in a window
Cleo Chemical is a hand
waving upside down
Cleo Chemical is holy
beads of sweat on a brow
blessing the ripe
praying for harvest

“Where Did the Day Go?”

lisadalrymple — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 18:22:24 +0000

The sun inserts itself into night’s envelope
to be opened with the morning mail
with the tear of afternoon thunder coming
a woman with a victorian name like Victoria
reads your letter speckled with ink
like stones kicked up along the road home
a tongue stretched out too long
tasting the citrus sealed morning
and the tear of evening thunder coming

————-
The answer to your question is that I have no idea, but it made me write this. The end.

Untitled (the shark poem)

lisadalrymple — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 04:48:55 +0000

The conversation turns to a shark breed
whose incubating young fight to be born
terminating its company to be alone
in the womb, waiting to slip to freedom
and I ask for my competitor
who are you and why do we fight?
there is room in the water
for every evolution of me
but I subdue the meeker me

—–

Inspired by a bit of trivia. I’m not emotionally invested in this poem so it was more about getting the idea out of my head and into the post for right now. Not communicating what I’m really feeling, but its interesting. Listening to a love song and trying to write about violence and rebirth just aren’t mixing.

Evening Thoughts

lisadalrymple — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 00:29:08 +0000

I am reading Michael Ondaatje’s The Cinnamon Peeler, his collected works. I wish to emulate his ability to communicate inwardness with sophistication and universality. I feel like so much of what I say is too much in the first person. Basically, I would like to work on communicating first-person sentiment in something that could be more universally recognized, appreciated, and understood.

I have been sitting on several poems and letting them rot beneath me. I only remember one concept from my long weekend in Florida:

The Last Walk Home
I walk hand in hand with shadow girls
parallel women, inbetweens, to the
old school named for dead shuttles, Discovery
the songs of my recent life spiral into me
the songs of my old life click, click, click, slideshow
old enough now to carry that crackle aftersound
a spinning record. I catalog the familiar houses
pastel cookies in a humid jar, an economy of sucked air
the for sale signs, the street signs,
the bike rides and skinned skin of my childhood
everything clear in the afternoon glass
of this day I make the final walk
to Guy, tree memorials, dry grass, home.

The Looking Word

lisadalrymple — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 00:42:10 +0000

I learned to read the word hesitation
by drawing my index finger slowly
under the letters, sounding it out
I know what it means when your gaze lingers.
Tomorrow brings a new word, and you.

Robert Hart

lisadalrymple — Sat, 12 Nov 2011 16:04:28 +0000

Robert Hart was shot in St. Augustine.
Robert Hart was shot in the streets.
Headlines yell across the page:
fast as a blink, I saw it in my sleep.
-
You necked the pair of sunflowers,
the black soil moist in your window box
and said this is the future of togetherness.
Like stars the flowers guide
the lost through the dark alley
of this aging coastal city.
-
A man of few words was Robert
but with swift thieving hands
swiping all that is warm
and blood-bearing, he was a
street-drummer, beating buckets
with mallets, collecting.
-
I peek from the morning paper
my eyes hem the headline
to peer at the man heading my table
What and Where have been answered,
but not Who or When or Why.