What exactly are those things in the windows that suggest a tree's branches (upper panes) and a tree's roots (lower panes)? At first I thought they were some kind of hat tree or tie rack, but two of them? Is it just decoration?
Actually, on re-reading, it does almost sound like I start out riffing on Eliot or something ("What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow / Out of this stony rubbish?"). That is funny.
Not bad. What about cutting the last 6 lines? Then it ends with a pop on the quote. Or find a way to make us think of other deaths without saying it yourself. You're almost there, I think.
Not sure - kind of like last 6 lines. Possibly insert after "swimming shadow from the big maple"? Rather than "We have seen the fungus," "We see the fungus" maybe with an adjective to describe the fungus??
They are growing, taller and taller, ugly scaly branches, short sharp ugly green needles.
My piano room. Mine. My piano. I am here in it, pictures of dead husband dead son-in-law failure widowed daughter mentally ill son. How do I deserve this pain? What did I do wrong? Grandchildren, my grandchildren on the piano with me. Healthy, smart, clean and clear.
My piano. I chose it. My piano room, small, mine. I choose the tongue and groove classy paneling, the yellow wool carpet, the green and yellow curtains and they work. Like my mother chose for the living room in the cottage and every spring Amy wipes it down with water and Murphy's Oil and polishes with wax and she plays the piano in the music room "I want to go to Julliard" she says but I know she is not good enough it is not a practical vocation and now she is aimless, widowed, 2 toddlers, her son born after his father died and why can't she be the laughing daughter so young, so helpful?
Photos on my piano that I play every day, of my grandchildren, of my children's happy weddings, of their healthiest happiest moments because of course those define them.
And now JT my "bagman" is long dead and I have been alone alone and the pine trees have begun to grow, so tall. So tall.
But at the cottage with the same tongue and groove paneling in the living room that Amy cleaned and polished my siblings came to me for hospitality, for meals, for cocktails. And then there was Scott and they shunned us, all of us, as if we had not fed their children breakfast day after day all summer when JT had no teacher's income and my brother and his wife slept in, no food in the cupboards and I fed my own family meatless dinners so we could afford 3 extra mouths for toast and honey and cereal and milk every single morning and what could I say I loved them but could not afford them.
And they cast us off. Shut us out. Because Scott is mentally ill. They reviled us.
And every day I play my piano here in my piano room and the pine trees reach up but feel like they are reaching in.
And the new neighbour says the pine trees must go they shade my backyard where I want a pool for my grandson and I am relieved to be rid of these monsters, planted long before my time for whom the street was named that suddenly are growing their scaly needly branches into my brain.
Wow... I do talk a lot about rhythm (I'm realizing of late!) but the rhythm here is so very strong--it's reaching into my brain (pulling it out through my nose, surely). Well done.
The long paragraph "But at the cottage..." --the second sentence is a wonder, building building. Followed by the one line of four shorts. There's a sense of madness and logic weaving together, and always the piano and the pines...
So interesting: the way we are left with the knowledge that only now that the neighbour wants the trees gone will they go. We are privy to that secret relief of the voice of the piece--that they will at last be gone, and that is what she has wanted, but it will only happen now! It add a deep piece. Why has she not spoken? had them removed? they are such a part of her...
These are first thoughts on first read. But I'll post for now, and mull further! Thank you for sharing.
I keep coming back to this in my thoughts. Yes, the rhythm is working so well. But a part of me wishes each thread was teased out; it truly is dense with layers--information, characters, years/decades of Time.
Makes me think of Elizabeth Smart's By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept--in which she somehow maintains just this kind of poetic rhythm and depth. If you continue, can you please post in the "scene" workshop?
The thought of playing the piano (ah, that first typed as paino!) with all those photographs scrutinizing--that alone could be a scene.
In fact I was trying to get into my mother's mind in one of the fixations she exhibited before we realized she had dementia. Suddenly the trees that had always been there, friends to her, were frightening creatures that she was convinced were growing taller and taller every time we saw her. Yes, there are so many more stories about what happened under those trees - in fact the street on which I grew up was named after those trees - as we grew up, when my mother was in full control of her faculties. Perhaps, you are right, something to expand upon,
I should/could have been alerted to the dementia piece by the rather manic rhythm!
You're making me think, and see again. I was--quite possibly--fixating on the mention of the mentally ill son a few lines in, and not thinking about the possibility in the narrator herself! Wow...
As winter approaches, light washes out early. Shadows grow long and moody. Streetlights droop dull moons over empty streets. Skies are suspended, starless, depressed and waiting.
I walk by that 2nd floor apartment where that sick tree still stretches its dark shadow across what once were our walls. We had our final argument there. Like two angry cats we scratched at each other.
That tree was never healthy. Even in the summer, its growth was ill and stunted. Barely producing a handful of leaves from it’s knuckled branches. Nothing worth raking.
We backed off from our fighting that night. Both considering our wounds. Two black angry outlines framed in the pane. Too dark to continue.
I suppose we became resigned. We knew it was dead. Next to the tree was a notice. The city would be removing it.
"Shadows grow long and moody." Starts with a given, almost a cliche, ends with a perfect twist.
"Streetlights drop dull moons..." Another good one. The fight/realization of dead relationship is intriguing - maybe just develop a little bit more? Like the twining of the dead tree and dead relationship. The angry cats is a bit jarring in the tree/shadow/dead images.
What exactly are those things in the windows that suggest a tree's branches (upper panes) and a tree's roots (lower panes)? At first I thought they were some kind of hat tree or tie rack, but two of them? Is it just decoration?
I believe I'm missing something - whose flow of words do you like, Mary Renee Jackson?
This is embarrassing - I thought he was writing a poem but he was commenting on the picture 😂 ha! Sorry, Frank.
Sorry, I don't know how things are done here!
Actually, on re-reading, it does almost sound like I start out riffing on Eliot or something ("What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow / Out of this stony rubbish?"). That is funny.
Oh very good...
This is how things should be done.
It's always good to be mistaken for "writing a poem!" :)
Don't be embarrassed - Frank Dent should be flattered that you took his query as a poem!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
Those are the "window bars!" Sorry for the delayed response--I've been out most of the day.
There, on the dining room
floor, a windswept tumult of
swimming shadow
from the big maple.
She is dying.
We have seen the fungus growing on her roots,
brown bouquets in the Fall,
precursor
we believe
to her own fall.
Plans must be made for
removal
though she is beautiful
in her newly trimmed boughs
and comforting
providing midday shade and a
kaleidescope
thru which to view the turning sky.
In the Springs we have seen her
copious offspring helicoptering down
a besiege on the land.
Her land.
"I know she must die,"
I think,
"but I did not want
to be the one
to see it."
Which is what we might think
of many deaths
while beholding these light and shadow
flickerings
here today
and gone tomorrow.
Not bad. What about cutting the last 6 lines? Then it ends with a pop on the quote. Or find a way to make us think of other deaths without saying it yourself. You're almost there, I think.
I like your suggestion a lot. (I tend toward the didactic, so this is helpful!)
Not sure - kind of like last 6 lines. Possibly insert after "swimming shadow from the big maple"? Rather than "We have seen the fungus," "We see the fungus" maybe with an adjective to describe the fungus??
I like how, in the opening, the tree is brought right into the home. Followed by "She is dying".. and the "she" resonates.
As for cutting the last bit, the last two lines might be cut--the thought is already there. "Flickering" might also be an end.
Thank you for posting, Mary!
They are growing, taller and taller, ugly scaly branches, short sharp ugly green needles.
My piano room. Mine. My piano. I am here in it, pictures of dead husband dead son-in-law failure widowed daughter mentally ill son. How do I deserve this pain? What did I do wrong? Grandchildren, my grandchildren on the piano with me. Healthy, smart, clean and clear.
My piano. I chose it. My piano room, small, mine. I choose the tongue and groove classy paneling, the yellow wool carpet, the green and yellow curtains and they work. Like my mother chose for the living room in the cottage and every spring Amy wipes it down with water and Murphy's Oil and polishes with wax and she plays the piano in the music room "I want to go to Julliard" she says but I know she is not good enough it is not a practical vocation and now she is aimless, widowed, 2 toddlers, her son born after his father died and why can't she be the laughing daughter so young, so helpful?
Photos on my piano that I play every day, of my grandchildren, of my children's happy weddings, of their healthiest happiest moments because of course those define them.
And now JT my "bagman" is long dead and I have been alone alone and the pine trees have begun to grow, so tall. So tall.
But at the cottage with the same tongue and groove paneling in the living room that Amy cleaned and polished my siblings came to me for hospitality, for meals, for cocktails. And then there was Scott and they shunned us, all of us, as if we had not fed their children breakfast day after day all summer when JT had no teacher's income and my brother and his wife slept in, no food in the cupboards and I fed my own family meatless dinners so we could afford 3 extra mouths for toast and honey and cereal and milk every single morning and what could I say I loved them but could not afford them.
And they cast us off. Shut us out. Because Scott is mentally ill. They reviled us.
And every day I play my piano here in my piano room and the pine trees reach up but feel like they are reaching in.
And the new neighbour says the pine trees must go they shade my backyard where I want a pool for my grandson and I am relieved to be rid of these monsters, planted long before my time for whom the street was named that suddenly are growing their scaly needly branches into my brain.
Wow... I do talk a lot about rhythm (I'm realizing of late!) but the rhythm here is so very strong--it's reaching into my brain (pulling it out through my nose, surely). Well done.
The long paragraph "But at the cottage..." --the second sentence is a wonder, building building. Followed by the one line of four shorts. There's a sense of madness and logic weaving together, and always the piano and the pines...
So interesting: the way we are left with the knowledge that only now that the neighbour wants the trees gone will they go. We are privy to that secret relief of the voice of the piece--that they will at last be gone, and that is what she has wanted, but it will only happen now! It add a deep piece. Why has she not spoken? had them removed? they are such a part of her...
These are first thoughts on first read. But I'll post for now, and mull further! Thank you for sharing.
I keep coming back to this in my thoughts. Yes, the rhythm is working so well. But a part of me wishes each thread was teased out; it truly is dense with layers--information, characters, years/decades of Time.
Makes me think of Elizabeth Smart's By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept--in which she somehow maintains just this kind of poetic rhythm and depth. If you continue, can you please post in the "scene" workshop?
The thought of playing the piano (ah, that first typed as paino!) with all those photographs scrutinizing--that alone could be a scene.
In fact I was trying to get into my mother's mind in one of the fixations she exhibited before we realized she had dementia. Suddenly the trees that had always been there, friends to her, were frightening creatures that she was convinced were growing taller and taller every time we saw her. Yes, there are so many more stories about what happened under those trees - in fact the street on which I grew up was named after those trees - as we grew up, when my mother was in full control of her faculties. Perhaps, you are right, something to expand upon,
I should/could have been alerted to the dementia piece by the rather manic rhythm!
You're making me think, and see again. I was--quite possibly--fixating on the mention of the mentally ill son a few lines in, and not thinking about the possibility in the narrator herself! Wow...
Scratched
As winter approaches, light washes out early. Shadows grow long and moody. Streetlights droop dull moons over empty streets. Skies are suspended, starless, depressed and waiting.
I walk by that 2nd floor apartment where that sick tree still stretches its dark shadow across what once were our walls. We had our final argument there. Like two angry cats we scratched at each other.
That tree was never healthy. Even in the summer, its growth was ill and stunted. Barely producing a handful of leaves from it’s knuckled branches. Nothing worth raking.
We backed off from our fighting that night. Both considering our wounds. Two black angry outlines framed in the pane. Too dark to continue.
I suppose we became resigned. We knew it was dead. Next to the tree was a notice. The city would be removing it.
I so like how you evoke the shadows of the fighting couple. Along with the visual, that resonates.
And the consonance in the opening lines...! And the "droop dull moons"--good!
"Nothing worth raking" is a line that says so much about the persona's emotional space on this... and the city coming to remove...
"Shadows grow long and moody." Starts with a given, almost a cliche, ends with a perfect twist.
"Streetlights drop dull moons..." Another good one. The fight/realization of dead relationship is intriguing - maybe just develop a little bit more? Like the twining of the dead tree and dead relationship. The angry cats is a bit jarring in the tree/shadow/dead images.