Neither of my parents drank. That was left up to me. But having lost both of them, all I really have in my memory is their approximate shape. Thank you for those words
Aug 5, 2022·edited Aug 9, 2022Liked by Sherman Alexie
I was fortunate that mostly only my father was the drinker. There was one period though when my mother joined him in heavy drinking. I think it was a way for my mother to try to connect. Those times were the darkest, the home felt empty and chaotic. This poem touched that place for me, until I read it I didn’t realize that it what it felt, some kind of husk of life. I am grateful to have read it.
Sherman, I wanted to say something about your poem itself but I am overcome with my own memories of 1973 and my mom’s alcoholism. This scene of her passed out with a bottle on the floor was too familiar to me in 1973, my senior year in high school. I planned it so I could graduate a semester early so I could escape this daily passed out scene and so I did, I used my wings. These sorts of images are indelibly marked inside me so I understood you when you spoke of pain in your introduction to your reading of this poem. I have come to understand that every time I write about mine I gain more self-compassion as well as more compassion for all who’ve weathered such things. Thank you for writing with and through your own pain, Sherman.
Aug 4, 2022·edited Aug 4, 2022Liked by Sherman Alexie
This left me breathless. It is as powerful and beautiful in what it says, as it is in what it does not say. Some emotions can only be expressed through silence. If the two people passed out on the couch are *your* parents then you too are in the picture. But we do not see you.
This is why poetry is so important, and why people fear it.... the ambiguity, the haunting. It keeps coming back to you, to weigh it and interpret it without resolution or closure. Your gift is sharing the stark metaphor which brings both pain and pleasure but always the energy of absorption and interpretation. I'm not sure about the wasps' nest which is sizzling with sinister stings...
This is beautiful and sad, and also funny, and enigmatic. I keep returning to the images. Are they simulacra or husks? Are they emptied of meaning or replicas of what is still nourishing? Are the parents still loving or interlocked in a melancholy posture of previous intimacy? Again and again the simplicity of the images is deceptive. Thank you for this devastating beauty --or is it simply a residue of what is leftover when the vitality is used up?
I have this summer, read two biographies of Raymond Carver and am more than halfway through all of his poetry and short story collections (enmeshed in ‘Ultramarine’ at the moment). I knew Tess Gallagher (Tacoma/Port Angeles) and met Raymond at a reading before his death (August 1988). I am so enjoying Ultramarine that I went to buy a copy on Amazon for a friend, and learned that a used paperback copy cost $ 60. Bucks... Mental note to add my books to my vinyls as ‘valuable’, and why btw, are many hardbacks cheaper than paperbacks? ...
I have been in a broad-backed stormy sea of ‘alcohol’ written about in every form by Carver and his biographers ( his first wife is one), so this morning your 1973 vignette is no longer an eye opening shocker (at least this summer when the whole world is...)...Nevertheless, Bravo! And, Well Done!
I have a poem, Tornados! written about my childhood lucid dreaming and about my parents not so lucid drinking. [see ‘Flamingos’ Jeff Hartzer on Soundcloud; Tornados is one of the 18 soundtracked poems]
I like the picture of the orange rind. It’s hard for me to relate to alchohol stuff because no one in my family drank. One time when I was about eight a drunk man came up to my friends and me. I started screaming and running to the back door of our apartment. I heard my dad being drunk once. A long story. There was only one yay in the elections yesterday and that was in Kansas. All the rest were trump devil idiots. Boo.
As is usual in your writing -- like in life -- joy and pain share the same space. Also, there's your love that is always just so moving. Thanks.
Neither of my parents drank. That was left up to me. But having lost both of them, all I really have in my memory is their approximate shape. Thank you for those words
I was fortunate that mostly only my father was the drinker. There was one period though when my mother joined him in heavy drinking. I think it was a way for my mother to try to connect. Those times were the darkest, the home felt empty and chaotic. This poem touched that place for me, until I read it I didn’t realize that it what it felt, some kind of husk of life. I am grateful to have read it.
Sherman, I wanted to say something about your poem itself but I am overcome with my own memories of 1973 and my mom’s alcoholism. This scene of her passed out with a bottle on the floor was too familiar to me in 1973, my senior year in high school. I planned it so I could graduate a semester early so I could escape this daily passed out scene and so I did, I used my wings. These sorts of images are indelibly marked inside me so I understood you when you spoke of pain in your introduction to your reading of this poem. I have come to understand that every time I write about mine I gain more self-compassion as well as more compassion for all who’ve weathered such things. Thank you for writing with and through your own pain, Sherman.
This left me breathless. It is as powerful and beautiful in what it says, as it is in what it does not say. Some emotions can only be expressed through silence. If the two people passed out on the couch are *your* parents then you too are in the picture. But we do not see you.
This is why poetry is so important, and why people fear it.... the ambiguity, the haunting. It keeps coming back to you, to weigh it and interpret it without resolution or closure. Your gift is sharing the stark metaphor which brings both pain and pleasure but always the energy of absorption and interpretation. I'm not sure about the wasps' nest which is sizzling with sinister stings...
Perfect image for heads notched together, hands woven into one fist and bare feet intertwined. Intimacy out of something torn apart.
This does suggest a new definition to the concept of "still life." Imagine the painting: "Still Life with Orange Peels."
This is beautiful and sad, and also funny, and enigmatic. I keep returning to the images. Are they simulacra or husks? Are they emptied of meaning or replicas of what is still nourishing? Are the parents still loving or interlocked in a melancholy posture of previous intimacy? Again and again the simplicity of the images is deceptive. Thank you for this devastating beauty --or is it simply a residue of what is leftover when the vitality is used up?
Without the alcohol, it would be a beautiful image.
Very gripping.
I have this summer, read two biographies of Raymond Carver and am more than halfway through all of his poetry and short story collections (enmeshed in ‘Ultramarine’ at the moment). I knew Tess Gallagher (Tacoma/Port Angeles) and met Raymond at a reading before his death (August 1988). I am so enjoying Ultramarine that I went to buy a copy on Amazon for a friend, and learned that a used paperback copy cost $ 60. Bucks... Mental note to add my books to my vinyls as ‘valuable’, and why btw, are many hardbacks cheaper than paperbacks? ...
I have been in a broad-backed stormy sea of ‘alcohol’ written about in every form by Carver and his biographers ( his first wife is one), so this morning your 1973 vignette is no longer an eye opening shocker (at least this summer when the whole world is...)...Nevertheless, Bravo! And, Well Done!
I have a poem, Tornados! written about my childhood lucid dreaming and about my parents not so lucid drinking. [see ‘Flamingos’ Jeff Hartzer on Soundcloud; Tornados is one of the 18 soundtracked poems]
Once again, what you are so incredibly adept, making the pain beautiful.
I think most of us are the 'approximate shape' of our whole selves, or at least our hearts are.
The "approximate shape of" is gorgeous phrasing. I love considering the approximation vs. reality of the shape of things.
I like the picture of the orange rind. It’s hard for me to relate to alchohol stuff because no one in my family drank. One time when I was about eight a drunk man came up to my friends and me. I started screaming and running to the back door of our apartment. I heard my dad being drunk once. A long story. There was only one yay in the elections yesterday and that was in Kansas. All the rest were trump devil idiots. Boo.
This is marvelous! I just had an experience with oranges and reading orange poems! I will add this to my collection