Her Daughter's Eyes by Jessica Barksdale Inclan

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Yesterday was the last day of my writing group's "poetry boot camp."  While the thought of writing a poem a day and critiquing one might not seem like a big deal--and at least on the first day, I didn't think it was--it was.  There is a certain mind set that is poem and not "novel."  There is a poem heart that is poem based and not plot based.  I think it comes when we settle into a thought and allow ourselves to come at it in a nonlinear way.

Actually, I don't know what the prescription is for writing a poem; I just know on boot camp days that I have to sit down and write one.  And I wrote 6, the arc going from what I thought was a decent poem to one that was truly bad and one that actually plagiarized myself (my critique partner that day noticed it was eerily like a poem I wrote in 1994). 

But for me, going into poem mind and heart and probably soul is a very useful exercise, one that shakes up my linear plot motions and movements.  One that brings me back to images and symbols and metaphors.

Here is one last poem from the boot camp.

Spinning

In the strange garage of the old French

house, I found a stationary

bicycle, the pedals

loose, the seat a hard

plastic wedge.

Every morning

I rode, spinning nowhere

as I read novels

in a language

I can barely speak.

One the story of a woman

with horrible neighbors.

I still don’t know

what they did to her.

Outside, the holiday August

weather full of sun

and particulate matter.

In the garage, gloom

through a leaded window.

My husband would

hike in the forest,

along the ridge,

come home with tarts,

juice, tales of the baker’s

daughter with the big smile.

Over coffee, I’d have no stories

he wanted to hear,

my thoughts on home

and how once we got there,

I would leave him.