WATERMARK

a poet’s notebook

Established 02004

Snapshot Poems 2006

July 19, 2006

Snapshot Poem 19 July 02006

how I would like to release this love for you as the body expels its waste in a spasm of relief, or pain, or ecstasy how we wound each other with something soft as wordsor silence — easily, or with difficulty– how to let it go this heat wrapping the sky in smoke, how we… Continue reading

Snapshot Poems 2006

poem, Poems, poetry, Snapshot Poem
July 12, 2006

Snapshot Poem 12 July 02006

my past is stalking me that shadow by the gate the rigid body of a squirrelnose-down in the gravel a child’s high, thin voicethe scent of old lovers green tomatoes on the vinebombs in Mumbai, blood on the pavement — heatabductions, rage and retributions, this solid grief heavy at the throat an ivory necklace carved… Continue reading

Snapshot Poems 2006

grief, poem, poetry, Snapshot Poem
June 28, 2006

Snapshot 28 June 02006

too hot to write a poem Continue reading

Snapshot Poems 2006

poem, Snapshot Poem
June 21, 2006

Snapshot Poem 21 June 02006

summer solstice ~ longing for someone who doesn’t long back Continue reading

small poems, Snapshot Poems 2006

haiku, poem, small poem
June 14, 2006

Snapshot Poem 14 June 02006

I am stubborn, sulky and sullen, caught in a thorned net of dreams — too many children in need of rescue, too many villains smug, and famously unpunished. I am a glass jar, filled with judgement and despair — even as a rainbow circles the sun; even as the aspen sings and shimmers in the… Continue reading

Poem Dancing, Snapshot Poems 2006

poem, poem dance, poetry, Snapshot Poem

Ancestral (Artificial )Intelligence

I do not use AI to write. For me, writing is how I think, and I prefer to do it myself. If/when I post anything here that I suspect or know to be AI generated, I will tell you.

I have changed this from Artificial to Ancestral, after Abi Awomosu @ Substack. This medium was made with human history, human thought. All of it, bright and dark. It is ancestral.

Poems

Please do not assume that I am the speaker/ subject of my poems.

In these times of creative nonfiction and fictionalized memoirs, I think of the poem itself as true fiction: it is most likely not factual, but it must be true.

It is likely to be — it is best if it is — a truth I did not know before I wrote, and may not understand even then.

A poem is my way of discovering (dis-covering) what I feel; sometimes, what I think — but it is not necessarily biographical.

Snapshot Poems 2006

Snapshot Poem 19 July 02006

Snapshot Poem 12 July 02006

Snapshot 28 June 02006

Snapshot Poem 21 June 02006

Snapshot Poem 14 June 02006