morning poetry

May 8, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

most mornings
as i write my silly morning poems
i have a cat
on my lap.

since the new puppy’s arrival,
the cat has avoided all points of potential contact
and not set foot in the entire downstairs area,
save for moments when the pup is
well caged away
(crate and gates and the like)
but even then,
a cat paw on the main floor
is a rare sight indeed
theses days

so instead
of a cat on my lap
i must write this poem
with a dog by my side
barely touching
but still comforting
to have her there
as a reminder
that there are creatures around this house
(human and non)
when i get so lonely
hanging out with
just my own words…

April 21, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

let’s see
if i can get a little bit of writing done
a little bit of wandering through my brain
a little bit of active meditation
before i start my day

my day, which is decidedly different
lonelier
lost
without her
(her being my dog
and i know it sounds over exaggerated
but damn,
those creatures have a way
of infecting every part of your life;
the companionship
throughout the day,
the routine that makes time
into a full day…
and now we are left
damn near floundering
looking
for something else to fill thee time
the void in our hearts where love needs to go
(our cat can only take so much affection, so…)
even going outside
feels cheapened
without her,
even naps
to pass this hard time
unconsciously
i’m unsure if i can do
because guess who
was the being i used to
nap with
you know who)

so a day
is just a day
not necessarily an adventure
not necessarily a struggle
it can just be a day
(maybe eve with some little adventures and struggles inside it)
and i’m unsure where i’m going
with this poem
and i’m unsure where i’m going
with my day
and i’m unsure where i’m going
with my life
but at least i have my kip and my cat
to hold and grieve
and to distract and entertain

and maybe
in a few days
or weeks
or months
there will be a new dog in the house
who needs our love
as much as we need them to receive ours
and Louka will be proud
of how well she trained us
to be such good dog parents

(and i hope
all my hope
that everything i’ve been saying
and assuming
and observing
was true:
that she did have a full dog life
in the nearly eight years she spent with us,
and that our love did block out
the struggle that was
her first six years of life,
and that she did enjoy this house
more than any other inside she was ever in,
and that when she dreamed, it was of running around our big Madison yard,
and that she wasn’t in too much pain
up until those last few days,
and that she was ready to go
when we[had to make]made that decision for her,
(she did
she really did
look like
she was looking for a place
like her soul was looking to escape
but her body was still holding on),
and i hope she knew
that when we held her
it was for love
and that she loved it
even though she sighed at us so much,
and there’s so many other things i wish
but if i think too much
the tears will come
and i won’t be able to do
much else today
except cry
(which i’ve already done
for days)
)

and wow
this poem started out
vaguely trying to
not
be about Louka
but that’s just how much
she’s infected our lives
and how much it feels wrong
to go from bed to wardrobe
without saying “excuse me, Louka,”
and to go from upstairs to downstairs
without some cajoling,
and to go from waking up
to morning pages and coffee
without a morning walk in-between,
and to go throughout a day
without worrying
when
walks are needed
and timing things out
and coming home to make sure
and checking in on the little donut dog on the couch
and i’m doing it again
falling into the trap
of writing lists
instead of dealing with emotions
and i hope Dog Heaven is real
and that we get to join her someday
and that she’s there now
learning
(from other dogs)
exactly how to play

(or not, whatever Louka wants)

whatever Louka wants

April 13, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

did the work
did the thing
should i feel accomplished?

here’s the rub:
i know it could have gone better
(i know it could have gone worse)
but
it has become part of me
part of my mornings
(alongside my coffee)

and yeah, i guess i’ve learned a little
about myself
my words
my process(es)
my struggle-busses
(though i still feel so far away from having any of those
actually/totally ‘figured out’)

but does it have to mean anything?
does there have to be a large lesson learned
do our lives ever truly have
a beginning/middle/end
(except
birth/
the entirety of our lives/
death)
?

so,
i tell myself
from myself
to myself,
stop trying to make a neat story
where life just is
(that’s the fun thing about life:
it doesn’t get tied in a nice bow
at the end of every chapter;
it seeps
and bleeds
into every part of you;
your childhood
didn’t just cut off when you turned teen,
your teen-self didn’t stop teen-ing
when you entered college,
and with every passing year
you grow
but you can’t just let go
of who you once were,
you carry those stories
those strengths and faults
those likes and dislikes
those selves
with you
always,
they are part of what helped you get here;
you can’t have leaves without the branches,
and you can’t have branches without the trunk,
and you certainly can’t have a trunk without the roots
(and, if we’re comparing ourselves to trees now,
we might as well commit
and talk about how,
underneath,
supporting the roots themselves,
are mycelial networks
helping with nutrients
and
connecting trees to each other
and
living symbiotically,
so community
is the lesson learned there:
not even trees
stand solely alone)
)

so
i suppose
what i/this poem
are saying
is
this experiment might continue on for another year
or another five
or stop abruptly
just before another year mark
or i might not poem tomorrow

the point
is that i did it
i proved to myself
that i could do it
(though, with my stubbornness, i didn’t have too much doubt)
and i’ve written
(at least) one poem
every
single
day
for a year
and posted them
for the internet to see

and that’s all that matters
(right now, at least)

April 9, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

and some days
it’s the procrastination
that turns to housework
that’s all that’s needed

and the sadness
that turns to book-reading
that really mattered

and the morning poetry
awkwardly completed at night
that was what had to be done.

March 29, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

yesterday was a
good(?!?)
day

chores accomplished
things done
(ahead of time even)
friends talked to
(friends!
what a concept!)

and i hope
that this energy
positivity
whatever-y
lasts
just a few days longer

because man, i have so many things on my to-do list
that are just waiting for a day
when i feel like i have the mental stamina
to do them.

~~~

toaster strudels
toasted
iced
eaten

bagels
ordered
made
still waiting
for delivery
(to house and to mouth)

do we need two different breakfasts this morning?
absolutely not.
but do we deserve them?
i’d say…
maybe?

~~~

being an actor is so weird
because not only are we
sharing intimate parts of
our selves/emotions/brains/pasts
and saying ‘hey, do you believe this
in a totally different context?’
we are also airing all our dirty laundry
out
for others’ entertainment
and hoping it’s cathartic
to both audience and us
(while still holding a piece
within our toolbox
just in case
we need it
again)

all the while,
those of us who have gone to school
for this
weirdness
have literally been graded
on things that
can be quite subjective
and we all just kind of had to
admit it
and accept it
and be graded
on our souls
(while being so young
we probably weren’t even connected
with the fullness
of those souls
quite yet)

(i know i, now, ten years later,
could still be more connected,
for my self and for my art.)

March 22, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

capture
the way
poetry
made you feel;
say
the phrases
only you
could come up with
within your big [fat] brain
(we all thought that was hilarious
way back in grade three:
‘you have lots of fat in your head,
if someone calls you a fat-head
say “thanks, it’s true!”’
so thanks, Bill Nye,
for giving us both an insult
and rebuttal
in one educational episode)

but the words
and flows
don’t flow
the way they ought
they used
to
they should
too
be calling from my mind
climbing
clambering
to come out
like i once came out
no, wait,
twice
came out
first from the closet
then from the binary
and finally,
maybe someday,
i’ll just come out from expectations set upon me
through old traditions
and new
and if i only knew
how to come out from under my own
oppressive
thumb
how free could i be?

but
the feral cat is still meowling
somewhere
outside
and the music is making
both myself
and my spouse
subtlety sway side to side
and the coffee hasn’t entered my system
fully
quite yet
and i wish there was a way
to have a style
without
reusing the same tired
words
phrases
that i use
every day
in every poem
in every way they come to me
(but i suppose that might be
because
humans
and humanity
and only having a certain capacity
and phases actually being a thing
that happens
it’s just, sexuality/gender is not usually one of them
(but sometimes they are, that doesn’t make them
less legitimate
and real)
(and, as a cis human, isn’t your gender ever-phasing
ever-changing
too?
is what you thought as the most important part
of being a boy/man
the same as it was when you were 7?
15?
20?
40?
70?)

all of life is moments
phases
fading in and out

let’s just acknowledge
pay attention
and enjoy the ride.)

March 8, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

falling asleep just
thinking
about the words i’m about to write
and the things necessary to be done today
and the accomplishments i need to do before this week ends

there’s a van down the street
just a few doors down
rumbling
and popping
and waking itself up for the day

if this van with
[clearly]
many things in need of fine tuning inside it
can take its time
getting itself ready
for its tasks for the day
then i certainly can wake myself up
through poetry
[and coffee]

~~~

but
i’m not awake
yet

~~~

the fake fireplace glows
and blows
forced heated air
at us
while the tiny humidifier
blows vapored water
up
into the air
into the plant beside it
reflecting in the mirror behind it
and we drink our coffee
as the dog tries so hard to lick her legs
on the couch
(that has become 100% hers)
and the cat is…

…somewhere

(a standard morning at the kips’)

February 18, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

my brain is not awake yet,
nor is my body, really,
and the first sip of coffee is cheap
when
you know you could sleep for hours
even with the whole mug in your bloodstream,
and i keep getting distracted by tiny chores
which probably could/should be done,
but will it take away from these
morning page poetry streams of [semi-un]consciousness(?)
and
why can’t i think of myself like i did
at fifteen
seventeen
nineteen
when i fancied myself a mini-ee cummings
well on my way to
making language my b*tch(?)
even though now it’s probably more reality-based
to think that someone else has thought of
‘streams of [semi-un]consciousness’
before,
but boy,
did it give my ego a boost
to think i was thinking
entirely new thoughts
new concepts
new words
new communications
with new people
instead of how my brain is now
knowing that there are no new ideas
and instead of that spurring me on
to create without worry of plagiarism,
it instead spurns every concept i have
with the barrage of
‘you will never be creative enough
to think of anything
fully
new’
[
you
].

February 4, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

man
these morning poems aren’t doing shit for me
and i’ve felt adrift since 2022 day three
and i thought i’d found where my serotonin was lost
but it turns out it was just capitalism in a silly mustache
and i tried for a while to follow the dopamine
but i guess that dopamine i followed wasn’t meant for me
so i suppose i could just succumb to the unconscious dreams of sleep
but naps give me less time to accomplish the day
but is it even day if the sky is so grey
and the haze of the rain pounds the panes in sheets
and this playlist slaps but sometimes too much too deep
and i’ve probably lost the rhyme scheme somewhere in this mush of words
but i push and i pull and i try to open new doors
but they scare me so much
i’m paralyzed
to the floor

so i guess i’ll write
and write some more
until i can pull up my feet
and walk outside
once
more.

January 30, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

not knowing what to write
from day
to day
makes the flow of
‘i don’t know what to write
day to day’
both overdone
and
sparklingly new

like, if one looks at the
subject matter,
the themes between the lines,
it all kind of
muddles together,
but the ways i go about
expressing
these same subjects
can sometimes have
lives
within the poems themselves.
like the tempo of
‘it’s been days since i knew what to write’
is much slower than the pacing of
‘i’m itching for something to write about
and i feel on a precipice
about to find
it’
and the stuttering step of
‘who am i and what do i write’
clashes at its core with
‘i’m figuring out
that it’s ok
if i don’t know what to write
from day
to day
to day,
i’ll just write
and write
and see what happens
and what writings
may sling
from my head
to my fingertips
to this [formerly] blank document page
before my bespectacled eyes’

and that,
i find,
is the difference.