WATERMARK

a poet’s notebook

Established 02004

lily

June 29, 2005

Snapshot 29 June 02005

I dream of children I have known, womennow; fickle, graceful, demanding. A strangerconsoles me. This house is encased in fog. It is like a shell, this house. It encloses mefrom winter. Summer washes through likewater, waves of scent and passing. Science tells me my mind is made other than yours.Set us the same destination and… Continue reading

Photos 2005, Snapshot Poems 2005

lily, photograph, poem, poetry, Snapshot Poem
July 7, 2004

Snapshot 07 July 02004

once I imagined the bell all the rest came easily the young man in the burgundy coat lilies trumpeting their scent in the garden pale moon over narrow streets, it all dreamt itself into tall dark trees shivering with sparrows and wind the wind in the shutters the nervous courtyard something… Continue reading

garden, Photos 2004, Snapshot Poems 2004

garden, lily, photograph, poem, poetry

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.

lily

Snapshot 29 June 02005

Snapshot 07 July 02004