poetry – Page 7 – Chris Bevens

Buying Poetry

The last poetry-related journal entry I posted was about getting rid of a collection of books, and coming to terms with the ramifications of that now, decades later. One of the points was that I find myself here today, a poet with few books of poetry at hand. If you want to know a bitContinue reading “Buying Poetry”

On Writing Poems – part 4 – Copying

I’ve already proposed you should steal. Now I’m going to encourage you to copy. A lesson I think is quite valuable to keep in mind when attempting to write poetry is to look at other crafts, other arts, and other pursuits for inspiration in regards to systems and ways of thinking, and of process. Let’sContinue reading “On Writing Poems – part 4 – Copying”

Selling Rare Books

Life seems to come in fits and starts. I doubt my experience is unusual in that regard. I seem to uncover truths, meaningful to me in certain moments of clarity, which lead me to a deeper understanding (or the illusion of a deeper understanding) of self; moments like lighthouses defining just enough of the worldContinue reading “Selling Rare Books”

White Privilege Day

On Reading Poems

Sometimes I’m reminded that not everybody comes to poems on their own, and that poems can be confusing without a framework of how to go about reading and enjoying them. Here’s how I’ve come to read poems: a poem is a stand of woods you’d like to walk through. Usually there is a trailhead, startContinue reading “On Reading Poems”

Mountain Biker’s Prayer

To be undressed at the Subaru’s hatch, pulling on shorts and peering into the woods for trails and sounds of life and signs of riding. To lube chain and dial-in brakes, shifting, saddle height, alone at the trailhead or with buddies, talking smack, sneaking a hit, stretching legs. To attack the trail and climb immediatelyContinue reading “Mountain Biker’s Prayer”

Alone

Go home after the party alone to empty bed Covers pushed back bare sheets wrinkled Basho: the old verse can be about willows Haikai requires crows picking snails in a rice paddy Not this world’sContinue reading “Alone”

Drinking Alone

Sitting in my car in the employee lot at work, five am under one of two tall lights listening to A Ghost Is Born My car alone tucked in next to a squarely hedged viburnum Rain spits and splatters shadows cast from my windshield AContinue reading “Drinking Alone”

Ruin

What new element before us unborn in Nature? Is there a new thing under the sun? Continue reading “Ruin”

The Bear

In our tent (at Bear Lake of all places) six miles in, second night, reading lamp off for half-hour or so A nosy scratching on the flap at our feet. —Squirrel? —Raccoon? Then, I hearContinue reading “The Bear”