Diane di Prima
OLD AGE: The Dilemma
most of what I’m writing
not that interesting
but the act of writing itself
more compelling than ever
*********
Dear Siobhan
Thank you for your snail-mail, but I happily disagree with you when you write about the card, “It makes me think of you encouraging me to write poetry, and anything I would write is absolute trash. That’s okay—it’s not my thing!”
Reread Diane’s poem a few times.
It’s just her candid thoughts.
I’d bet you have comparable thoughts umpteen times during a workday.
Catch yourself thinking one of those times and scribble it down. Honor you own ordinary, brilliant mind.
Diane shows us: Poetry doesn’t have to be a big deal. It can sometimes pop right out of us.
You don’t have to share it with anyone. It’s just something you do for yourself, like a runner stretching before going for long one.
Here are some of my ordinary mind flashes, also no big deal.
Happy Day #2 of National Poetry Month!
Mark
And a $65 Million Book Deal for Obama
Won’t apologize for Hiroshima obliteration
Won’t apologize for Indochina devastation
American Exceptionalism is oh so sweet!
Another Yom Kippur
Reading Koheleth
Listening to Rostropovich’s Bach
Drinking Stoli
Writing six postcards to Bella Levenshteyn in Brooklyn
At My Wake, Someone Will Hear Someone Else Say…
“He was always telling me to share my writing…”
“You, too? He said that to me, like… weekly!”
“Weekly? He’d badger me daily for a fortnight until I gave up.”
“He was relentless.”
“Yep, he could be a pain, but when I think about it now, he was on to something.”
“How many times did he quote someone the scripture, ‘Don’t put your light under a bushel basket’?”
Seven people within a earshot raise their hands…
Cheer Up
Hungry ghosts are everywhere
But bodhisattvas are everywhere too
Suffering is everywhere
But the transnational sangha is everywhere too
