Eight & 322
8and322@gmail.com
  • Eight & 322
  • News From You
  • Calendar/Sponsors
  • Sports
  • The Nature of Things
  • Arts
  • Opinion
  • Old blog
  • About

Even bad poetry, in the grand scheme of things, has priceless meaning

5/18/2022

0 Comments

 
Picture
What do you do with your lines of bad poetry?

​I rewrite the ones that had a glimmer of a thought, throw others away. I post some thinking they are not bad only to discover that they really are years later when they pop up in Facebook memories. Then embarrassed I copy them to rework.

Sometimes a line or two pops out. Like a sculptor carving marble, I then have to chip away at the poem to find the art within. Some lines end up in snippets of paper buried in my pocket for a few days, some are in binary code deep on a hard-drive somewhere and who knows if they'll ever be seen again.

I have millions of words. Painters paint, writers write. I found a line of a poem on an old bank stub under my keyboard the other day. no idea why I wrote it on the stub and it wasn't even that great of a line. It was an old stub and the date and the amount of withdrawal or deposit(likely withdrawal) was faded beyond readability.

"I saw a sparrow eating bugs off a dead cat and thought about resilience."

Sometimes we even save the bad lines.

The importance of writing bad poetry is that maybe good poetry will eventually come, that if ideas are engraved, even if poorly, someone, somewhere, sometime can witness an unexpected moment of you. The importance of bad poetry is so much more significant than posting a meme or wasting a perfectly good meet up with a friend bitching about the price of gas. In other words, even bad poetry, in the grander scheme of things, has priceless meaning. 

So I write (though these gas gas prices!!!!)

​Is that my....

Of sad eyes peering out behind happy ones,
Beneath the old untouched stones of forgotten roadways,
Beneath the granular of dried mud.

Is that my soul?

It’s a baffled relationship of stars and poet's words, 
Of lovers tongues silenced,
Of a rapping sound repeating.

Is that my heart?

The dirt beneath my nails is my signature,
My bond,
There is a perfect rhythm out there waiting,
The door is open.
I close my eyes and taste the wind.

Is that the depth of my experience?

—————-//—————--

A bitter woman prays in a flowered 70s dress in a house four blocks a way as she listens to sentimental music while hating liberal commie faggots and smoking long filtered menthol cigarettes. 
————-
My old teacher's words I finally heard for the first time today, 30 years later, because it was time finally. 
———-
I cut this grass cut out of desperation to fit in.


What bad poetry do you keep around?
Picture
Picture
Picture
0 Comments

New show in Oil City accepting entries

5/2/2022

0 Comments

 
Picture
Artist Maureen James is once again curating a show in the Graffiti Gallery featuring three-dimensional works of arts, crafts and furniture.

The show will run roughly two weeks with an opening reception set for May 13 from 5 to 8 p.m.

Drop-off for the works are this Friday and Saturday from 10 a.m. to noon.

There is a $20 installation fee for the artists that goes to help keep the gallery operating.

Follow the Graffiti Gallery Facebook page for more happenings at the gallery. They will also be one of the host site for the Oil Heritage Arts Festival.
0 Comments
    Become a sponsor for as little as $25

    ​For display ad rates please email us at 8and3222gmail.com
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture

    Archives

    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    January 2022
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    October 2020
    February 2020
    January 2012
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly