Winter Memories, Summer Poems

This morning, I've been a writing a poem, just for the joy of it.  The joy is part of my poetry process, but I'm usually looking for a poem to have some deeper meaning.  This morning, I've been remembering how intriguing it is to collect images that go together, without straining to put them into a larger context with a deeper meaning.

Of course, the fact that I college images that "go together" undercuts my collaging images just for the joy of it.  Let me explain.

I've been trying to write a poem about what happens when Cassandra, who can foretell the future, decides to stop predicting political news.  I've been writing it as I've made cookies for counselors to help them celebrate Christmas in July and waking up each night trying to figure out when the last cricket stops singing through the night.

This morning, I started a new document, a Cassandra poem with no larger purpose than to put some Christmas images together.  In the poem, Cassandra makes cookies for counselors and thinks about hot chocolate.  I remembered the cocoa in dented metal pitchers that was part of the breakfast table in the camp experiences of my youth.  I put those details in the poem, the rain and the wet earth and the smell of hot liquids and powdered eggs at breakfast.

I also had a memory of clearing off a car windshield with cookie cutters after a youth group gathering to make Christmas cookies.  It was the first time I had heard a Tom Petty album, but I can't remember which one it was.

That detail made me remember all the youth group teen boys who had arguments about why "Stairway to Heaven" was the perfect song--well, they weren't arguments, because they all agreed.  I put that detail in there.

Now I'm taking a break.  The poem could talk about climate change.  Those surprise snows seem a feature of a different geologic age, but perhaps surprise snows are the future in a climate that is increasingly unpredictable.

But maybe a poem doesn't need to have that kind of exploration weighing it down.  I do see one of my flaws as a poet is to try to make the symbolism carry more than it can sustain.

I'll keep thinking about the poem, but for this morning, I wanted to record my joy in having memories that prompted other memories and my happiness that I remembered to start a new Word document, just to see what might happen.