Sputterpub's Blog

     Be warned: what follows is a really bad poem. I am posting it partly as encouragement to any young poet: yes, your work will probably be as full of itself as this, at first. This is an example of why we must keep at it. I am also posting it as a way of getting rid of it. It feels a little like a gross story; maybe if I say it out loud I can move it out of my head and into yours instead.

These 28 lines got more attention when I wrote them than any others I’ve ever penned. As I recall, the piece was inspired by my passionate outrage about racism, and I loved how much my father loved it, but the praise of others felt wrong in a way I can’t fully explain even now.

I wrote it shortly after my 15^th birthday. Dad encouraged me, maybe even nagged me, to submit it to Harper’s magazine. Their rejection was gentle and not unexpected, and I value it more than the poem. Dad was the one who exposed me to poetry, read it to me, memorized it with me. He’s the one who gave me Robert Service, who presented me with the illustrated Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Dad’s comments were always welcome and his advice was often followed.

It was the compliments of teachers, neighbors, and relatives that made me uncomfortable. I may have been sensing the shallowness of pop liberalism, but I think what really put me off was how easy I found the emotional manipulation. It’s like writing a verse “To Mother:” a sure-fire audience mover.

But I kept Patchwork (and the rejection slip). I learned from the experience. And I still prefer its metaphor to the old melting pot.

We’re all people, all human beings,
Black, yellow, white, red; all of one mold.
All of one cloth, but dyed different colors,
Styled a little different, but all of one fold.

The fold called humanity is the cloth of the universe,
The crease called people in the bolt of life,
The fine swath of satin in a strip of material,
But so like thin satin, split with a knife.

The knife that divides us is simply our ignorance,
Stupidity splits us; it keeps us apart,
Prejudice separates us from our brothers,
How can we fight this; Where can we start?

Let’s start at the bottom, the root of our problem,
The fine, thin, rich satin in harsh-colored threads,
The delicate cloth divided through ignorance,
Our once-fine, light satin, now separate bright shreds.

Now we are trying to splice strips together,
We’re trying to build up a cloth that won’t tear.
But how can we come up with satin from patches;
How can fine satin and patchwork compare?

Perhaps if we start with a new piece of satin,
And blend all the colors and dye it to match,
Perhaps if we did this, the cloth would be stronger,
The color more subtle, more soft than a patch.

And maybe if children could learn we’re all equal,
If we could be taught that all races are men,
Then maybe we’d be a much stronger people,
Maybe we’d be fine, strong satin again.

Aack! I couldn’t resist making sarcastic comments as I typed it out. Too bad I rhymed mold with fold and threads with shreds. Too bad I didn’t work that metaphor. Oh well, the meter is pretty good.

Harper’s sent a little typed note (the envelope was postmarked August 30, 1965):

     We regret to say, after careful
consideration, that we cannot use the
manuscript which you have sent us. Thank
you for giving us a chance to consider it.
     Every issue of Harper’s Magazine
contains material which, like yours, came
unsolicited. However, our editorial space
is necessarily limited and we therefore
have to decline many manuscripts which
are ably written and publishable.
     We should like to comment individ-
ually on those we cannot accept, but the
size of our editorial staff makes this
impossible.

     I wonder sometimes, how much adult opinions about youth are colored by adult experience instead of youth memory. It seems like I’ve known forever that nostalgia is hogwash: remembering the angst of adolescence as “the carefree, best time in life” or trying as an adult to engineer and duplicate holiday traditions that were in truth obnoxious when experienced as a child.

Those admonitions about stretching, about not swimming for an hour after food, about reading in good light? Those are good suggestions for older folks, and unnecessary for kids.

Or what about those 30-something guys whose wives are pregnant, and who say “I hope it’s not a girl, because I remember what adolescent boys are like”…? No they don’t! Most teenage boys are shy or easy for the girl to govern, that way. Most of the time, the young couple go only as far as the female permits. But guys in their mid-30s are still horny and now way less inhibited. Those incipient dads are feeling their own urges and laying them in the groins of well-meaning boys.

The facts, the actual experiences, of me and my acquaintances were not what the grownups warned about then, and not what many of my peers are reminiscing about now. The truth is, kids are more durable than portrayed. Oh we lost a few to automobile or climbing accidents, and drugs took a handful who were close to the edge anyway, but most of us made it through. The nails in the playground equipment didn’t lock our jaws, the strangers didn’t snatch us, we learned from being bullied and from making mistakes, and we had long horizons in which to recover. The boogie-man consequences just didn’t occur.

But it’s different for adults. Grownups have a boatload of experiences (mostly unprocessed) they have to haul around. And they have far less recovery time. If they don’t eat right they will probably experience the sad result soon. If they don’t parent wisely they may in fact lose their offspring. I have been shocked at the severity of the consequences that can besiege grown people.

It may be time for the kids to be the advisors.

I never thought reality would be
as absolute as this, or as abrupt.
Apprentice training showed me subtlety
till recently. Catastrophes erupt
around me: first a child’s unseen death –
by father lost and way too lately missed –
and then a friend is gagged; her expert breath
by passion blown, she’s ordered to desist.

I ponder consequence: I’ve watched the plays
and read the fables, but they didn’t seem
intended to be literally construed.
Of late I am agape. Reactions raze
the crazy actors; consequences ream
their lives. The fates are fell. The runes are rude.

     When I was a teenager during the 1960s, we didn’t have cell phones. There were no personal computers. The Internet hadn’t been built. When I and the other boomers grew up we were in a culture a bit ahead of the good ol’ days of letters in longhand and visits of six weeks, but not much. We communicated by hardwired landline telephones or the U.S. mail.

Our phone system was the best in the world. Our innovators were converting us from a rotary dial to pushbuttons during that decade. I remember the telephone display at Disney’s Tomorrowland; I prided myself on being fast at the dial but no matter how swiftly my fingers pushed that ring around, my brother Steve, standing by my side at the newfangled unit with the button pad, was able to make the connection more quickly.

The fact was, dialers didn’t stand a chance against buttons, speed-wise. Unless the phone number consisted of only low digits, it just took too long to pull that wheel clockwise and then push it back. An 8 or 9 or 0 in the phone number was a drag.

But those dials had been innovative in their time. They’d replaced talking to an operator. When rotary dials arrived, so did the dial tone: the audible clue that the system is ready for you to give it an address. We still call that ready signal a dial tone, even though today’s kids don’t know a rotary phone from an Edsel.

And although kids now connect in more and faster ways, they don’t connect as much as they want. I think this verse, written the summer I was 15, still says something.

The hand now pushes buttons down
That disconnect a busy line,
And then release a dial tone,
An empty hum, a lifeless whine.

The dimming eyes reflect no thought.
They blankly stare down at the phone.
They see their boredom can’t be fought
By what is now an empty moan.

The spark within the unused brain
Can’t understand why life’s a bore.
Why did she seek a voice in vain,
And only hear a hum once more?

Why should she spend her life this way,
Depending on these things alone?
Just kindle flames from dying sparks
And never hear a dial tone.

   I’ve known a number of damaged people in my time. Mostly they were the victims of narcissistic or religious parents and many of them also suffered early loss of a sibling or other close relative with no opportunity to talk, grieve, or understand.

They all tend to be rule-followers. It’s rather obvious why, to me anyway. All kids misbehave, so it’s natural for a child to conclude that his or her misbehavior contributed to the tragedy. “If only I hadn’t …” is not a province exclusive to adults.

Maybe they like me because I don’t follow rules. Or perhaps it’s the disinterested counsel I provide (I’ve been told I can be a tiresome acquaintance but a good friend). I’ve had years to love and observe them.

Sadly, I’ve met a few whose self-protection is so extreme that they aren’t really having lives. They made decisions when they were young, decisions that closed doors to strong emotion, faith, hope and heroism, a choice which helped them survive their youth but which was never reviewed in the arena of maturity and latitude.

After awhile in a relationship with that sort of closed person, I just have to withdraw. It’s too painful for me to continue to witness it, and the future becomes too obvious, too sorry for me to stay to watch.

Here is a 14-line attempt to capture what I’ve seen:

I know a man who won’t allow a laugh
to leave his lips, although he’s been advised
to be amused. He really isn’t half
that serious; in fact he’s paralyzed
by fear of what more pain can do to him,
of what more life can take from him, of why
if God exists and rules He rules by whim
and how, no matter what, I too will die.

He knows a million words and makes no wit.
His gravity sucks every yawn or sneeze
back in, contracts his chest, his knees, his face,
and leaves a pursing mouth appropriate
for nothing but complaint. He cannot tease.
He will not play. He wants his own embrace.