THE WEAKERTHANS - CIVIL TWILIGHT

My Confusion Corner commuters are cursing the cold away
As December tries to dissemble the length of their working day
And they bite their mitts off to show me transfers, deposit change
and I can’t stop finding your face in their faces, all rearranged
and angry like you never were;

And I ease us back into traffic
Dusk comes on and I wonder
Why I’m always remembering you
at civil twilight

For the most part I think about golfing and constantly calculate
all the seconds left in the minutes, and so on, etcetera
Or recite the names of provinces and Hollywood actors;
Oh, Ontario! Oh, Jennifer Jason Leigh!
This part of the day bewilders me

Streets slow down and ice over,
Dusk comes on and I struggle to stop,
To stop to stop thinking of you
at civil twilight

Hey, every other hour I pass that house,
Where you told me that you had to go
I wonder if the landlord has fixed the crack
That I stared at, instead of staring back at you;

My chance to say something seemed so brief
It wasn’t. Now I know I had plenty of time
Between the sunset and certified darkness
Dusk comes on and I follow the exhaust from memory up to the end

At civil twilight
At civil twilight
At civil twilight
At civil twilight

STREET DOGS - FINAL TRANSMISSION

He had just turned nineteen yesterday
Wanted to be a school teacher someday
Came from a small and modest town
Had never before traveled abroad

He signed on the promise of a college fund
Pop and Mom begged him to stay at home
The last time they saw him was at an airport
He hugged his distraught mother a final time

He went abroad to serve when he was only nineteen
Reality caught up with him, stole a heart full of dreams

He’s never gonna get a chance to chase all those hopes
Lost them all amidst this war and smoke
Can you hear the sound of youth negated?
Watch on TV names are taken
Mother, Mother
My final transmission

Parris Island was plain hell on earth
Got gunny yelling at him, “better prove your worth”
Moved on to Baghdad about six months on
Caught an IED today, now he is gone

He went abroad to serve when he was only nineteen
Reality caught up with him, stole a heart full of dreams

He’s never gonna get a chance to chase all those hopes
Lost them all amidst this war and smoke
Can you hear the sound of youth negated?
Watch on TV names are taken
Mother, Mother
My final transmission

Dad and Mom, I am your only loving son
Hid a written final transmission under my helmet
Love you both in heart and mind
A better set of parents no boy could ever find
Weep for me and say thy prayers
Remember me through all your years
Only got to serve for six months on and
If you’re reading this I have passed and gone

So I harbor my final request
A letter in my memory please send
Off to the President and all his men
Begging him with others to bring the troops back home!

He’s never gonna get a chance to chase all those hopes
Lost them all amidst the war and smoke
Can you hear the sound of youth negated?
Watch on TV names are taken

He’s never gonna get a chance to chase all those hopes
Lost them all amidst this war and smoke
Can you hear the sound of youth negated?
Why are all those young lives taken?
Mother, Mother
My final transmission

No, I didn’t forget.

ARS POETICA

A poem should be palpable and mute
As a globed fruit,

Dumb
As old medallions to the thumb,

Silent as the sleeve-worn stone
Of casement ledges where the moss has grown—

A poem should be wordless
As the flight of birds.

*

A poem should be motionless in time
As the moon climbs,

Leaving, as the moon releases
Twig by twig the night-entangled trees,

Leaving, as the moon behind the winter leaves,
Memory by memory the mind—

A poem should be motionless in time
As the moon climbs.

*

A poem should be equal to:
Not true.

For all the history of grief
An empty doorway and a maple leaf.

For love
The leaning grasses and two lights above the sea—

A poem should not mean
But be.

  — Archibald MacLeish (1892 - 1982), American poet, professor, and political activist.

Thursday’s early morning storm provides the inspiration for this week’s edition of Poetry Friday.

Spring Snow  

A spring snow coincides with plum blossoms.
In a month, you will forget, then remember
when nine ravens perched in the elm sway in wind.

I will remember when I brake to a stop,
and a hubcap rolls through the intersection.
An angry man grinds pepper onto his salad;

it is how you nail a tin amulet ear
into the lintel. If, in deep emotion, we are
possessed by the idea of possession,

we can never lose to recover what is ours.
Sounds of an abacus are amplified and condensed
to resemble sounds of hail on a tin roof,

but mind opens to the smell of lightning.
Bodies were vaporized to shadows by intense heat;
in memory people outline bodies on walls.

  — Arthur Sze (b. 1950)

From The Redshifting Web: Poems 1970-1998, published by Copper Canyon Press, 1998. Copyright © 1998.

Remembering

The years, their months
turn, grave and slow, their
fall and spring, again.

Mountain flowers, mountain leaves and
each time’s new.

Sometimes I sit alone
and smile upon the child I was,
in memory now distant
and a friend.

— Yuan Mei (1716 - 1798), Chinese Poet.

GREEN DAY - WAKE ME UP WHEN SEPTEMBER ENDS

Summer has come and passed
The innocent can never last
Wake me up when September ends

Like my fathers come to pass
Seven years has gone so fast
Wake me up when September ends

Here comes the rain again
Falling from the stars
Drenched in my pain again
Becoming who we are

As my memory rests
But never forgets what I lost
Wake me up when September ends

Summer has come and passed
The innocent can never last
Wake me up when September ends

Ring out the bells again
Like we did when Spring began
Wake me up when September ends

Here comes the rain again
Falling from the stars
Drenched in my pain again
Becoming who we are

As my memory rests
But never forgets what I lost
Wake me up when September ends

Summer has come and passed
The innocent can never last
Wake me up when September ends

Like my fathers come to pass
Twenty years has gone so fast
Wake me up when September ends
Wake me up when September ends
Wake me up when September ends

ALKALINE TRIO - WE’VE HAD ENOUGH

In the shadows where the heads hang low
You hear voices as the wind blows, asking “can’t you see?”
Reminding you to breathe
It’s only time before it catches up to you and all your broken luck
I found a better way to get even with my memory

That said, we’ve had enough
Please turn that fucking radio off
Ain’t nothing on the air waving the despair we feel
NO!

In the darkness where the angels cry
Give us water, give us back our eyes
Our bed’s this concrete floor, and it’s all we have left to live for
A day we’ll never face
We’re only second-handed, sick and lonely
Fighting back the tears and every urge to Van Gogh both our ears

That said, we’ve had enough
Please turn that fucking radio off
Ain’t nothing on the air waving the despair we feel
That said, we’ve had enough
Put “Walk Among Us” on and turn it up
Ain’t nothing on the air waving the hatred we feel
NO!

In the shadows where the heads hang low
You hear voices as the wind blows, asking “can’t you see?”
Reminding you to breathe
It’s only time before it catches up to you and all your broken luck
I found a better way to get even with my enemies

That said, we’ve had enough
Please turn that fucking radio off
Ain’t nothing on the air waving the despair we feel
That said, we’ve had enough
Put “Walk Among Us” on and turn it up
Ain’t nothing on the air waving the hatred we feel
NO!

This is our biggest fear
The only tunes that we hear
Come via antenna through your car raid-ee-uh-oh-oh-no

That said, we’ve had enough, we’ve had enough!
That said, we’ve had enough, we’ve had enough!