Heart Beat - a prose poem

Heart Beat
---- Big Frank Dickinson

New York City imposed superlatives on him of height, sound, variety, and general bigness. He responded in the typical way by feeling relatively small and then he started to grow with the city. First it was his feet, which were pretty big to begin with but began to approach clown-proportions, and then it was his nose, also longer than that average nose, but it quickly began to droop in a big city kind of way. His voice began to boom and he developed outsized ambitions along with big city appetites. Finally his heart took on ridiculous proportions. He had an empire-state-building-sized heart that towered above all else. It rose slowly and pedestrians threw ropes up on it to hold it down, like Donald Duck tethered down during a parade. It broke free of all bounds and floated skyward - not really the best place for a big heart.

"It's All About Him" - prose poem

It's All About Him
---- Big Frank Dickinson

He called himself on the phone, but his self did not answer because he was preoccupied with selfish thoughts about himself, which caused him to ignore the call from himself. He became upset at having his call go unanswered and refused to leave a message, which he later regreted because he had blocked his own number not wanting himself to know how interested he was in himself.

Of course, he knew who had called anyway - that's when he always called, but refused to call himself back. He wouldn't give himself the satisfaction.

Clouds

Clouds: what do they mean to us - what do we mean to them?

[Photos by Big Frank Dickinson]

Clouds - prose poem

Pathetic Fallacy for Whom?
---- Big Frank Dickinson

The clouds were curious whether the configurations of people, plants and animals on earth told them something about their cloud life. Could it be that what was going on down there, in some way, predicted or mirrored important information for clouds. Surely it could not just be a coinicidence that the day he dissipated (took him five years to get it back together) he saw a man disappear into a house. His aunt never tired of telling him about the day that a sudden upcurrent of wind carried her high into the somethingsphere, and this was just as she saw woman taking off in an airplane - this was much more than coincidence. Earthly signs - portents of things to be for the clouds. Then as the sky slowly cleared and they felt themselves disappearing they looked in vain for signs of sadness below, which was strange because they saw none.

The Chemistry Factory

The Chemistry Factory
---- Big Frank Dickinson

So this is the chemistry factory. How does it work?
It doesn't actually, but don't tell them.
What do you mean?
Well, we catalyze attraction - that's easy; but not happiness.
Why not both?
The happiness factory is across the street; go talk to them.
Don't you talk to each other?
Why should we - our mission is attraction; we don't deal with happiness.
Isn't the person that you are attracted to one who will make you happy?
Sometimes yes - sometimes no; they don't necessarily go together.
How long does the chemical nature of attraction last?
Anywhere from an hour to a lifetime - it all depends.
On what?
On their happiness.
So what does attraction have to do with happiness?
Not much; we have different missions.
Why don't you work together - you know - merge?
We have different missions.

"When You Said . . ." a poem

After reading Hoagland's poem in the post below, Big Frank, following in his footsteps - somewhat - wrote the following:

When You Said . . .
---- Big Frank Dickinson

Babe, what did you mean
When you said that you
Would not answer that
And left it
Hanging in the air
Like empty quotation marks?

When you said - yeah,
You thought we had
Agreed not to talk about
That anymore, I wanted
To insert the
Me back into we.

And when you tell me
You can't do that now;
I want to be then
Or when or sometime soon
To ignore the can't and
Dwell on another now.

Where did the
'I'll think about that' go?
Hope delayed - the possiblity
Where somewhere
We can and do --
Be me with you.

Unanswered Questions

Big Frank is enjoying all the poetry that he picked up at the "Open Book". He got two books of poetry by Tony Hoagland and will include one below from his latest: "Unincorporated Persons in the Late Honda Dynasty".

Address to the Beloved
by Tony Hoagland

Sweetie,
what do you mean
when you tell me to get real?

Do you mean that I should stop
slipping my hand down the back of your pants
when we are out in public?

Or that I should do it more often?
Do you mean I should acquaint myself better
with Baltic state politics?

Or scrape and wash the dishes in the sink
right after we have eaten?
Should I stop trying to flirt

with the whole wide world,
and get down to business,
or the reverse?
Get more health insurance, water the lawn,
read philosophy at night?

When you say "real," are you implying
I need to fire the shrink,
become more austere,
less sentimental about my friends?

Or do you mean that I should simply
stand here,
without being clever or cute,
enduring the light

when what I want is to hide my face
or to crawl inside you like a cupboard
and live on your feelings

instead of my own?

When you say I leave a lot to be desired,
is that a good thing?

When you said you would leave me
to my own devices,

what did you mean? Did you mean this?

Open Books: A Poem Emporium

Big Frank was in Seattle for work on Friday, but did manage to get to a place that he has been meaning to visit for some time, an all-poetry bookstor. Open Books: A Poem Emporium is owned and operated by Christine Deavel and John Marshall. It is one of only two all-poetry bookstores in all of the United States. What a great place! It may be small - only around 500 sq. feet, but within are over 9,000 volumes of poetry, and books about poetry. Big Frank restrained himself, and only bought five poetry volumes by the following poets: Russell Edson, Fred Chappell, C.K. Williams, and two by Tony Hoagland. Below is an excerpt from Edson and Chappell.

L'Amoureuse
by Paul Eluard (translated by Fred Chappell)

Upon my eyelids she stands
And her hair is mingled with mine;
She has the shape of my hands;
She has the color of my eyes;
In my shadow she is swallowed
Like a stone against the skies.

Her eyes are open always,
And so I cannot sleep.
Her dreams in full daylight
Evaporate the suns
And make me laugh and make me cry
And babble babble thoughtlessly.

---------

The Dummies
by Russell Edson

A contortionist had twisted himself in such a way as to be suddenly sitting on his own knee.
His wife said, What's that on your knee?
Embarrassed, the twisted contortionist said, It's my dummy.
Why is it sitting on your knee?
I'm making it talk.
And what is it saying? she said.
It's saying what I give it to say.
But why do you need a dummy, when anything it says you're saying anyway? she said.
Becasue I'm a ventriloquist.
But every time the dummy speaks you both move your lips. So who can tell which dummy is the dummy who's making the other dummy speak?

Big AT&T Dickinson?

Big Frank is selling out. He's being honest about it, but he IS selling out. Why is it that stadiums can sell out but people aren't supposed to. The recent supreme court ruling (allowing corporations to donate as much as they want to political campaigns) is predicated on how corporations should be treated on equal ground as individuals, well then I should have same rights as corporations. So, Big Frank is available. For the right price - and I'm not giving that away up front - Big Frank will change his name to that of the corporate sponsor becoming, for example, AT&T Dickinson, or Exxon Dickinson, or Toys-R-Us Dickinson, or even US Postal Service Dickinson. So, readers, do NOT be alarmed if you return to this blog and find that Big Frank has been replaced by some corporation - it means that Big Frank sold out.

And . . . speaking of which, why doesn't this country and the states within it use this as a way to get out of debt. The name of this country has got to be worth billions, and it could be leased out for a couple of months at a time: The United States of Coca Cola, or the United Xerox of America, or The Microsoft States of America - the possibilities are endless. States could get on this also - North Dakota becomes North Pepsie and Montana becomes Monsanto - but only for very Big Bucks. We could even sell our history - George Washington changed to George Westinghouse and Abraham Lincoln into Abraham Ford/Lincoln. Rights given only for a year or so. I'm sure that Big Frank is only skimming the surface here, but the most important thing is for Big Frank to get a corporate sponsor - so let's work on that first.

Cliches Lie

Big Frank has been thinking more about cliches lately - they have been much on his mind (sorry). This particular approach to them has Big Frank thinking not only are they mind stopping in the way that they prevent an idea, emotion, event, or experience from being examined, but in their very expression they falsify what is being referenced. Here are a few example:

1. "It is what it is." OK - obviously this is tautalogical in that "it" of course always is what "it" is. In other words, the implication is, that what you think it is, is what it is. Well, that might work if you are referring to a mouse ("A mouse is a mouse."), or a wrench ("A wrench is a wrench."); however, it is usually used to encapsulate some very complicated and undefined situation or phenomenon (problems in a relationship, some friend's behavior, or a situation at work). In all these cases, when one says "It is what it is" and you haven't even defined it, or have agreement with the person with whom you are talking, then the outcome is that you both agree on the supposition that what you think (even if it hasn't been confirmed by your friend in conversation) is "what is". How do you know that? Is it not eminently possible that it (any of the above complex phenomena) are NOT what you think they are? Is it not most probable, given the multiplicity of possible explanations, it is most probably NOT what it is in your mind. So, a more truthful expression (in those situations) would be to say: "It probably is not what it is".

2. "It stands to reason." This is a kind of filler cliche that that only serves to introduce something that one is going to say . . . about as meaningful as saying . . . "Hmmmm . . .". What follows is usually (most often) not particularly reasonable or obvious in any way. Usually, in fact, the reverse is true, as in It stands to reason that no sane person would ever agree to have their taxes cut in order to gain more social benefits, or It stands to reason that anyone in my position would do exactly what I have done.

3. "It takes one to know one." This is a catch phrase cliche that is used to indicate that someone who is quick to identify someone of wrongdoing is often guilty of the same offence - in the way that a swindler would be swift to identify the signs that indicate that someone had swindled, or that someone who had been guilty of infidelity would quickly identify someone else who was: "Peggy's husband says that Jim is being unfaithful to his wife. Well, you know what they say. It takes one to know one." Of course, there is no correlation there whatsoever, and the opposite is more often the case - that the one who identifies a wrongdoing has no experience whatsoever in committing that indescretion, otherwise all police would have to have criminal experience to do their jobs!