Defiant Old Men

I'm still going through the prose poems from 20 years ago. Here's one I particularly like, as I'm slowly becoming one of those defiant old men myself. I'm not as lively as they are in this poem--lots of creaks and groans as I'm stumbling out of bed in the morning.

TEN OLD MEN CHANTING

Long 'o' and 'e' words rise in my throat on a day
like this, wet and warm in mid-winter. The snow
is heavy, and these words--green and tight as poplar
twigs--have their own earth weight. A crow flying
over gives the 'o' sound praise, and the chickadee
gives praise to the 'e'.

These are the vowels of the earth, that go on
breathing after death, floating in abandoned
dictionaries like proud old men who have given up
nothing, and move about their huts chanting the
old words loudly, lively and defiant in their praise.

(Copyright 2007, Allan Cooper)

Water Turning to Wine

I recently found an old computer disk that contained a sequence of prose poems written around 1988. I had it transferred to CD, and started making tentative revisions. They were originally part of a sequence of 20 entitled Leaping Across the Bridge. I like them, because they were my first real attempt to write ecstatic poems. They seem a bit thin now, but sometimes less is better. One of the poems, "Water Turning to Wine," is printed below.

WATER TURNING TO WINE

New snow fell through the afternoon, so slowly I
hardly noticed it. Now my feet kick up an inch of
powdery snow as I walk toward the house.

Inside me there are abandoned warehouses, fields
untilled for miles, tables prepared where anything
could happen. And water turning to wine, the body
changing to accommodate the growing spirit.

(Copyright Allan Cooper, 2007)