V E R S E and I M A G E

[with 3 poems by Scott Owens]

. . . walls that don’t line up, some bricks
uneven, some not quite the right size,
and that’s what the mortar’s for,
the gray areas of tolerance,
forgiveness, understanding,
empathetic appreciation of things
being left imperfect, only as good
as we can stand to make them be.
+++++++ from Reclamation

E&A Nature Trail, Elkin rec center, Mountains-to-Sea, Forest Bathing – none of these trails today. Instead Mom and Dad and I walk their customary course behind the townhouse, traversing maybe 200 meters of blacktop. They tap their canes on the far curb to mark the first turnaround; it’s a little uphill and a lot slower approaching the second turn but then all downhill back to their doorway. Some days we keep going a little farther. This afternoon we feel like it’s been enough.

And why do we spend 45 minutes on our little trek, 3 or 4 careful steps per meter? Just needing the exercise? A breath of fresh air? Halfway through our circuit, Maggie’s owner appears and drops her leash, little fluffdog who gallops to Dad because she knows he always carries biscuits in his pockets. Norris stops to share the latest (oldest) joke. Here’s Peggy to check on how Mom and Dad made it through family travels over New Year’s (and to say Hi to this particular family person still staying with them tonight). Wave at Julia who’s expecting company for supper, wave at the FEDEX guy. Comment on all the little gardens behind each townhouse – Nice wreath! Is that a new bench?

This slow-gaited noticeably-hunched deliberate meander is the mortar of Mom and Dad’s days. These few folks they greet, and never overlook the dogs, are their neighborhood. “I’m going to get better, I’m going to walk farther,” says Dad, but even this afternoon it no doubt strengthens him just as much to hear, “I just can’t believe you’re 96.” Acceptance, understanding, empathy for the relentlessness of aging and decline – these hold the chipped, uneven bricks together. Let’s take another walk tomorrow, no matter how meager, no matter how slow.

And you can keep an eye out with me – I have yet to catch Dad slipping those dog biscuits into his pocket.

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Common Ground

My brother has never kept a single lake,
a single lost grave to himself.
Always he calls, then waits until I
can come, lets me lead the way,
find it like the first time,
proclaiming the names I know, the shapes
of bird and stone, cloud and tree.

Once in the same day I saw
a kestrel, a mantis, an arrowhead
and took it as a sign, though since
I have seen each in their own days
and miles away from each other.

I do not believe God will bend
to kiss this mouth. I do not believe
the wine will turn to blood. But something
knows the moment of sunflower,
the time of crow’s open wing,
the span of moss growing on rock,
and water washing it away.

In the pictures I remember, there is you
letting me stand on the fallen tree
as if it were mine. There is you
letting my arm rest on top of yours
around our mother. There is you
lifting me up to the limb I couldn’t reach.

This is the faith I’ve wanted, to know
that even now we are capable of such
sacrifice, such willingness to love.

Scott Owens
from Prepositional, New and Selected Poems, Redhawk Publications, The Catawba Valley Community College Press, © 2022 Scott Owens.

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Scott Owens travels through life in this solid, substantial collection of poems, Prepositional. He is coming from it, being of it, finding its deep inside and its dark under, discovering its thrall over and above. And as Scott sees through and into life, he invites us to accompany, to courageously push things forward.

As the newest in a long line of books from a prolific poet, this collection yet seems to be an inflection, an exhalation of breath long held. These poems walked a long way to take their seats here. Some are new but all have been selected to become new. Or maybe it’s their relationships to each other that have grown new, as Scott explains in 13 Ways of Prepositions: every way a squirrel can be / in relation to a tree. These are poems about poetry, its art, its craft, but more so the arising of something greater out of something lesser. These are poems about students and teaching and being a student; these are poems about family ties in every Venn you can imagine. All these poems have gathered here, though, for a common purpose: to water the seeds of relationship; to somehow connect with each other and with you and me, their readers.

When I finished the last poem and laid the book down, this is the reverberation I still heard ringing in my mind: “The world is a wonderful place. You are a wonderful person. I’d like the two of us to sit down and share something of these two wonderful facts.”

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Words and What They Say

Some say you can’t tell anything
from the language that people use,
that Eskimos in fact have no
more words for snow than we,
nor Anglo-Saxons more
for cut, stab, thrust,
and the fact that our words for animals
when we eat them, beef, pork,
poultry, all come from French
doesn’t prove they’re better
cooks or bigger carnivores,
any more than 23 acronyms
for laughter shows that texting
teens just want to have fun,
but when I hear my carful of 2nd graders
from Sandy Ford Montessori School
making up names for the sun,
and the moon, and the stars that only
come out when you’re camping and the fire
goes out, and you turn off your flashlights
while our mother holds you in her arms,
I can’t help but believe
that not only is there hope for us all
but that the hope we have
is strongest when we find a way
to put it into words.

Scott Owens
from Prepositional, New and Selected Poems, Redhawk Publications, The Catawba Valley Community College Press, © 2022 Scott Owens.

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Of

Poetry is contrary to productivity.
Poetry encourages idleness.
Poetry stands at the window
because it is curious about the flowers,
this flower with its yellow fringed face
around its one brown eye.
Poetry stands at the window
because it is curious about the trees,
this tree with heart-shaped leaves,
some turning yellow in the first
days of fall, some fallen off and still
the limbs reaching up to the sky.
Poetry stands at the window
because it is curious about the sky,
how it got there, where it goes,
what it’s like where it ends.
Poetry wants the window down.
Poetry walks back and forth
through a field going nowhere.
Poetry thinks it’s okay to look
at the same sky day after day,
sometimes minutes at a time,
sometimes with no other purpose
but remembering blue.

Poetry refuses to follow the rules
of efficiency: get in line,
speak only when spoken to,
never say anything that would embarrass your mother.

The first poem ever written was a drum.
The first poem ever written was a foot
tapping on the side of the crib.
The first poem ever written was a rope
slapping the red clay playground
of William Blake Elementary School.

It is not necessary for poetry
to be beautiful
though sometimes it is.
It is not required of poetry
that it be profound
though it rarely closes its eyes.
It is not expected that the face
of poetry be etched with tears,
the hair dripping with sweat,
the mouth expressing awe.
Poetry owes nothing to anyone.

Still, poetry wakes up each morning,
walks to the edge of the world
and jumps, believing one time
it will fly, believing one time
the dive will not end, believing one time
an answer will rise from somewhere beyond.

Scott Owens
from Prepositional, New and Selected Poems, Redhawk Publications, The Catawba Valley Community College Press, © 2022 Scott Owens.

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Redhawk Publications; The Catawba Valley Community College Press;
2550 US Hwy 709 SE; Hickory, NC 28602.
Prepositional, New and Selected Poems by Scott Owens.

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