Pantoum

So I've played around with structure more, and this time I bring you a pantoum, a poem similar to a villanelle in that it has lines repeating. I'm too lazy to explain the structure, but you'll see the effect it makes. Anyways, this poem is about the day that I got a blade in my leg that almost cost me my career at the ripe old age of 9 -1 day. I have taken a lot out of the experience, but I decided to focus on the theme of lack of control of outside circumstances, which I definitely learned the hard way. Fun fact: the first line I wrote was "And the slice." Not that you really care...


The ice all in red dresses,
I cannot forget the sun rising.
The day I learned too much
Does not remember easy.

I cannot forget the sun rising.
The way the ice teaches
Does not remember easy,
But what is real pain?

The way the ice teaches?
Not really by choice,
But what is real pain:
“We fear what our habits can’t control.”

Not really by choice,
I’m not so fond of jumping, but I figure
We fear what our habits can’t control.
Mine, I suppose, is that I fall.

I’m not so fond of jumping, but I figure
We all have regrets.
Mine, I suppose, is that I fall.
The ice becomes accustomed to our picks.

We all have regrets,
How blades travel where they aren’t supposed to.
The ice becomes accustomed to our picks
And the slice.

How blades travel where they aren’t supposed to.
A glance I never wanted to make.
And the slice.
I will never forget the floating as I fell.

A glance I never wanted to make,
The ice all in red dresses.
I will never forget the floating as I fell,
The day I learned too much.

Unpublished Material, ©2011 by Cali Digre

Pleasant Arena

Our next prompt was to write a poem about a place that has significance to you. Of course I picked Pleasant Arena. This poem is a huge departure from what I've written in the past. Just trying different ideas.

Everything I know about life I learned at Pleasant Ice Arena

I know from a bottle cap in the vending machine we were forbidden to use
That a cow can go up stairs but not down.
Grasshoppers and spiders can cross-breed.
We call them “sprickets,” and it’s good luck if you squish one
Trying to put your skates on.
“Fungus” and “among us” are good rhymes,
Though I wouldn’t like to divulge where I heard them together.
It takes three toe picks in the ice to dig out the rusted paint
That falls from the ceiling like tetanus confetti.
I found one in shape of a blob once. So did a lot of people.

In the summer I can still smell
The compost site, divided by the parking lot,
And how we would sit on the hill for hours
And guess what people had thrown away.
The fourteen hundred and seventy-seven steps
From the front door to the nearest Bruegger’s
Go by more quickly when you’re holding someone’s hand,
Still cool and somewhat damp from a session of falling.
They go by slowly when he moves to Florida
And you realize the little bastard still has one of your magenta gloves
And it is probably infested with ringworm from being in that bag
That always smelled like bread, in the bad way.

I learned that the more you fall, the less it hurts,
That sometimes there is a God,
But only after a damn good session.
You’ll have better results with the innards of a spricket
Smeared like oil on the sole of your tights.
The other times the only thing you can feel is your blade carving,
In that soft growl, resonating across cement walls,
Making your mark on the world before it is wiped clean by a zamboni.
That doesn’t matter. Just start over again.
The paint on the ceiling restarts its celebration every ninety minutes.

That happiness is in a Snapple bottle
I hid under a yoga mat for a year
And then found this August, and finding out
That I don’t really change all that much.



Unpublished Material, ©2011 by Cali Digre