“details” (A Poem, “52 Makeup” Week 6)

Rhythm can be a more subtle form of poetic organization than rhyme. This week’s entry in the 52 Makeup challenge plays with iambic pentameter.

details

“Every poem could be titled either ‘Heaven, a Detail’ or ‘Hell, a Detail.’ — Stevie Smith

chocolate chip bread pudding and a beer
the man behind the counter knows my name
it’s warm and bright and just enough people
a cheerful crowd against the winter night

I could sit here and write unceasingly
and lose myself in joy of flowing verse
a bliss of movement that is like a dance —
there’s nothing better when the words align

if just the world would let me be a while
instead I worry about ones I love
theirs sicknesses, their fears, their money woes
(and my own bank account, it ain’t too strong)

and politics, now as the nation shakes
convulsing with anger and ignorance
I write a line and then my thoughts trail off
worries about these things I can’t control

one foot in heaven and one foot in hell
the details fight it out inside my mind
someday I’ll learn to make the world I want
out of the pieces that I see float by

but now I only sit and watch my mind
and try to write a word or two or three
and hope perhaps this brings some clarity:
setting my confusion down in words

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