[stylist] Poem - "Pool" - Second Draft

[William L Houts]

Hey Brigit,

Yeah, on second look I'm thinking that this poem, as it stands, is 
almost too cute for its own good.  When I posted it, the thing felt 
about the right length for its subject.  But upon running through it 
again, it seems to me that the ending is a bit abrupt. I think this is 
one of my real challenges as a poet, and maybe it's everyone's 
challenge:  when is the piece too long?  when is it too short?  Only the 
well-trained ear can tell, I suppose, and I'm still training mine.  One 
day, maybe, I shall be a Wallace Stevens, a Milton, a Frost!  Today, I 
metaphorically burn my works in order to get some warmth out of them, 
since I don't get much sense, ha.


--Bill



On 6/24/2015 11:08 PM, Bridgit Kuenning-Pollpeter via stylist wrote:
> Cute. Love Margaret Atwood.
>
> Bridgit
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: stylist [mailto:stylist-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of William L
> Houts via stylist
> Sent: Wednesday, June 24, 2015 11:37 PM
> To: Writer's Division Mailing List
> Cc: William L Houts
> Subject: [stylist] Poem - "Pool" - Second Draft
>
>
>
>
> Hi Poets and Scribes,
>
> Here's my effort for today.  It came as a great relief because I hadn't been
> able to write a single poem for about two weeks, and that always makes me
> feel a bit plugged up and nauseated--I'm betting you know the feeling.  This
> ones about our little rubber swimming pool, just purchased last week.  I
> recently wrote another poem about water and I'm thinking of combining these
> two plus a third, if I can come up with one, and calling it "Three Poems
> about Water".  I've always been impressed with Margaret Atwood's great
> cycle, "Five Poems about Dolls", and lowly scribbler that I might be, I
> aspire to be accounted, some day, as belonging in the same solar system as
> Ms. Atwood, even if out there somewhere in the Oort Cloud, LOL.
>
>
> --Bill
>
>
> ---
>
> *Pool*
>
> Twelve feet by three our pool:deep
>
> enough for a leisurely dunk or even a dive
>
> if our splash is not too radical, ecstatic
>
> in feeling if not in form.But today,
>
> late afternoon, I lean over and bring the cooling
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> earthjuice up, waxing baboon mad and shaking
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> my hair free of drench, rinsed in the living wet,
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> sweat and chill drops from red self raining
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> onto brown grass praying escape
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> from the harsh, the stiff and scowling drought
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> without whose face the summer grace of sun
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> would ape the other months and by them blandness cry.
>
> And so I burn with joy, and salve myself with washings cool,
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> and nominate to pauper sea, our ocean toy, our pool.
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-- 


"Oh, Sophie!  Whyfore have you eated all de cheeldren?"