Monday, April 09, 2007

"Why I Take Good Care of My Macintosh Computer," by Gary Snyder

Because it broods under its hood like a perched falcon,
Because it jumps like a skittish horse
and sometimes throws me
Because it is poky when cold
Because plastic is a sad, strong material
that is charming to rodents
Because it is flighty
Because my mind flies into it through my fingers
Because it leaps forward and backward,
is an endless sniffer and searcher,
Because its keys click like hail on a boulder
And it winks when it goes out,
And puts word-heaps in hoards for me, dozens of pockets of
gold under boulders in streambeds, identical seedpods
strong on a vine, or it stores bins of bolts;
And I lose them and find them,
Because whole worlds of writing can be boldly layed out
and then highlighted and vanish in a flash at
"delete" so it teaches
of impermanence and pain;

And because my computer and me are both brief
in this world, both foolish, and we have earthly fates,
Because I have let it move in with me
right inside the tent
And it goes with me out every morning
We fill up our baskets,
get back home,
Feel rich, relax, I throw it a scrap and it hums.

7 comments:

  1. Well, you might roll your eyes at me, but...

    And because my computer and me are both brief

    It should read,

    And because my computer and I are both brief

    A small grammatical error, for me, is like a jolt of painful electricity in the middle of any piece of writing, poem or prose. I was enjoying the poem until I got to the mistake.

    But that's me. Grammar Nazi.

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  2. I loved this one.

    Do you ever read Billy Collins? I posted part of his "The Introduction" and "The Trouble with Poetry" on my site but I was afraid to post the whole poems. What's the copyright rule about that? I imagine you would know.

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  3. Because my Macintosh computer didn't love me as much as I loved it,
    I had to buy a new one

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  4. I confess I thought of you in posting that poem, Lisa.

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  5. I read this poem a couple of days ago, and it keeps popping up in my mind. I love it when good writing just won't leave me alone.

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  6. I've written a poem about my mac too, this was a great one. My poetry workshop is actually tonight. I love the whole poetry month thing.

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