On Friday two of my prose poems appeared in the new issue of Umbrella Factory.
Yesterday four of my prose poems were published in the new issue of Avatar Review.
new poems published
Posted by sean on June 17, 2012
https://sd-stewart.com/2012/06/17/new-poems-published/
pine barrens
Yesterday I rode my bike to Lake Roland, a favorite Friday activity for several years. As always, I entered through the pine barrens section of the park. This unique area speaks to me; the sweet pine fragrance in the air and the low volume of human traffic combine to make an ideal haven for this solace-seeking pilgrim.
Here is the beginning of the trail leading into the pine barrens:
I have been paying more attention to the abundant insect life while out in the woods. I don’t know if the Odonata species (dragonflies and damselflies) this year are more prolific but they’re catching my eye more than usual. I tried to capture a few shots before my camera’s battery died. The photos are unfortunately not so clear because I digi-binned them (i.e. used my point-and-shoot through binoculars). It’s incredibly difficult to keep my camera hand steady while shooting through binoculars. I would love to get a nicer camera, but that’s going to have to wait. There are 177 confirmed Odonata species in Maryland, and I can now identify two of them. I have a long way to go, but plenty of time.
Note: there are a few basic differences between dragonflies and damselflies. In general, damselfly bodies are narrower, while dragonfly bodies are thicker. Most damselflies also fold their wings over their bodies when perched while dragonflies keep them spread out. Damselflies also have eyes that are clearly separated, while dragonflies have eyes that are close together, and typically meet in the middle. Of the two species below (the first two photos are male and female of the same species), can you tell whether they are damsels or dragons? No cheating with Google, either…
Common Whitetail (Libellula lydia), Male, Lake Roland, Baltimore County, MD
Common Whitetail (Libellula lydia), Female, at Lake Roland, Baltimore County, MD
Ebony Jewelwing (Calopteryx maculata), Male, at Lake Roland, Baltimore County, MD
Posted by sean on June 16, 2012
https://sd-stewart.com/2012/06/16/pine-barrens/
slug convention
The other night while out walking Farley I came upon a slug convention on the sidewalk. Needless to say I was delighted. There were three slugs in attendance, fanned out in positions facing each other. What were they discussing? Based on their relaxed posture, I theorized that this was more of a social gathering than a formal proceeding of one of their professional associations. Perhaps the slugs were reviewing their plans for the evening. Undoubtedly those plans would involve incessant oozing across the surface of my front porch, as evidenced by the many shiny crisscrossing trails present there each morning. Farley showed no interest in the slugs, likely due to their lack of movement. And even if they had been moving I suspect their slowness would’ve bored him. He has no appreciation for the subtleties of motion. The slug life is no life for him.
Posted by sean on June 14, 2012
https://sd-stewart.com/2012/06/14/slug-convention/
old dreams
Excerpted verbatim from dream journal:
7/14/09 – Was looking at faces of famous figures projected on the wall and each had a message to give. Walt Whitman appeared in black and white. He says, “The country is totally fucked now. I tried to warn you with my poem but you didn’t listen.”
10/4/09 – I died but in this dream world after you die you continue to walk around and be active like a live human being. This allows you to finish up your business on Earth, like making out will, etc. I can’t remember how I died but I was young, like the age I am now. I remember riding on a train and G___ came to meet me; he was kind of watching over me. You have two weeks from your point of death before you truly die, so there is a lot to do in a short time.
Quote from dream on 9/27/10: “See to it that anarchy is restored.”
Posted by sean on June 13, 2012
https://sd-stewart.com/2012/06/13/old-dreams/
destroyers despoil, dessicate…desecrate
Destroyers come and go, leave splinters stuck in flesh. The invisible ones so hard to tweeze. Bathe in alcohol, seek where it burns. Trust rusts, cowers in your heart’s dark corners.
The well-dressed destroyer is hard to spot, but look for the smile. It’s crooked and false. Talk seeps like oil, slick to the ears, popping with heat. We drink it up, let it drip down, leaving holes in its wake.
Enter the fixer with boom and detergent. Too late to scrub. Too late to contain. Casualties cauterize the causeway. Volunteers move in with murkier motives. High tide beckons, we retreat to the hill.
Those despoiled blend in with the rest. Open their arms like mechanical dolls. Destroyers long gone, wreckage wake trailing, hidden from view but for a few.
I want to retrace the lines—help consecrate, recreate, rehydrate the husks.
I know that smile.
Posted by sean on June 12, 2012
https://sd-stewart.com/2012/06/12/destroyers-despoil-dessicate-desecrate/
can you fit your leg in your mouth?
Sometimes I’ll turn around and my dog will have almost his entire leg shoved in his mouth. This gives me great pleasure. His entire body is just one big toy to him. Don’t even get him started on that pesky tail.
It’s hot here and I remember now how I tend to lose my faculties in this type of heat.
Dream journal entry from last fall:
“I took a nap in the afternoon. I dreamed a fly flew in my mouth and I woke up choking on it. I fell asleep again and was dreaming about eating sesame sticks out of a bag when I realized there were flies in the bag and I may have eaten some. I woke up and there weren’t any flies around. It’s November.”
I vaguely remember that flies in dreams have a certain meaning but I’m afraid to look it up because I think it might be bad. I rarely try to analyze my dreams, although I’m not averse to the idea. I just haven’t explored it much.
Posted by sean on June 10, 2012
https://sd-stewart.com/2012/06/10/can-you-fit-your-leg-in-your-mouth/
our small furry friends in dreams and waking life
I had to slam on the brakes to avoid hitting a rabbit tonight. I’m so sick of automobiles. Death traps they are. I’m not well-suited to them.
Today I read through sections of my dream journal for the first time in perhaps forever. Here’s an entry from May 2010:
“I could understand what squirrels were saying. Apparently they have jobs like us and were discussing a colleague. It was actually quite boring.”
My process for dream journaling involves retrieving the notebook from my bedside table as soon as I awake. I try to approximate automatic writing as near as possible. The result is extraordinary; when I look back at entries I often have no recollection of writing them. Frequently there are editorial comments on the dream that I’ve entered during the recording process. A lot of these are simply question marks indicating my confusion about the presence of a particular person, theme, or action in a dream.
I often have horrific dreams, many of them set in post-apocalyptic settings (usually due to some form of environmental collapse). In an entry from April 2010 I complained about not remembering my dreams lately. The next morning yielded this entry:
“Well, I got what I asked for. Gruesome dream during part of which I was standing at the bottom of this chute. People at the top were throwing down these plastic bags, some of which contained blood and other fluid, and others that contained chopped up body parts. Sometimes the bags would break open. Disgusting.”
Dreams such as these leave me shaken. But dreams also bring welcome visitors from my past, such as my dearly departed cats. Waking from these dreams leaves me warm inside.
Lately many of my dreams have been set in my hometown, a place I haven’t seen in almost 20 years. It’s made me curious to visit.
A common thread in my dream journal is the periodic desperate comment that I haven’t been remembering my dreams. Dream-life is so important to me, and when I lose that connection to it waking life appears dimmer than usual. I also feel that dream-life and waking life interact. Sometimes the two are so bizarrely different, but as I keep track I see a seamless passing of themes, of characters, of settings between the two worlds. There is a path between them that I know is worth traversing.
Posted by sean on June 10, 2012
https://sd-stewart.com/2012/06/10/our-small-furry-friends-in-dreams-and-waking-life/
revoke my car privileges and drop me in a field somewhere, please
Rarely do I feel compelled to deconstruct my entire day in the space of a blog post, but today was um…special, shall we say? It started out normal enough. Armed with an unexpected day off, I crossed county lines with field glasses in hand to search for field birds. I had good intel on locations for breeding birds, and made haste for them. With windows rolled down, I heard the telltale robotic jingle-jangle of a Bobolink and navigated over to the shoulder. Out of the car in a flash, I first thought I’d been fooled by a nearby mockingbird attempting to hog the spotlight as usual, but then the bobolink himself flew overhead, tinkling and jingling to his heart’s content. He flew across the road and landed in a field, affording me adequate looks to get the day started off on the best foot. Nemesis bird comes home to roost! I moved on. I drove the country roads for about an hour and a half and found the birds to be generally cooperative. I saw and heard all my target birds for this trip. Meadowlarks were plentiful and I got a couple of stellar looks at them. Horned Larks were not as plentiful but I did spot a couple from a distance, and heard them elsewhere. I found a singing male Dickcissel perched on the exact section of power line where I found one last year…could it have been the same bird? In addition to these birds, I was also treated to great looks at several American Kestrels.
As I began to wind down my time, I returned once again to the site of the initial bobolink sighting to see if I could cop another look. As I navigated the car onto the opposite shoulder this time, the right front end suddenly sunk into a hidden ditch. When I got out of the car, I saw that the back left wheel was about 3 feet off the ground! As I assessed the seriousness of the situation, a man in a box truck drove up and offered assistance. We tried moving the car with him sitting in the hatch for balance (he was sorta stocky), but that didn’t work so he offered to seek out a farmer down the road with a chain, or failing that to call the sheriff’s office. While waiting around, I watched a bobolink groom himself while perched on a power line. Unfortunately my concern about the car impeded my joy at witnessing this scene. About 20 minutes later I was about to give up on Box Truck Man and call a tow truck when simultaneously the sheriff showed up and two country dudes in a big pick-up passed by and offered to pull me out. Within minutes they’d hooked a chain to the frame and pulled the car out. Country folks rule! I thanked them all profusely and decided to head back to the city after so much excitement.
I needed to pick Em El up and shuttle her downtown for a meeting but I had some extra time so I stopped to check on the birds at another favorite location. There I found expected Prairie Warbler and Hooded Warbler, although couldn’t get a visual on the latter. Many singing Field Sparrows, a perched Turkey Vulture (usually they’re circling endlessly overhead at this spot), a singing White-eyed Vireo, and other usual suspects rounded out the mix.
Once downtown I killed more time (die, time, die!) by finishing Darkness Visible and continuing with Paris Spleen, drinking espresso, and getting yelled at by a probably schizophrenic man. Somehow I think Baudelaire would’ve appreciated the scene. Unbeknownst to me, while all of this fun was taking place Em El’s car was being towed because I failed to read the red highlighted part of the parking meter that said No Parking Between 4-6 PM Mon-Fri. Yes, this is common knowledge to those who frequently drive and park in the city. However, I’m like a deer in the headlights when I get downtown behind the wheel of a car (really bad simile in this context, I know). I don’t know the rules, man! I’m a cyclist, for god’s sake. I haven’t owned a car since 1997 or something (if you’re curious, it was a Plymouth Valiant that sat in my driveway for a few years after I used it to move to Virginia [it looked like this, except crappier because it only cost $400]). Anyway, I guess the cycling gods were raining down holy fire and brimstone on me today for driving too much lately. Maybe I deserved it, but damn, those cycling gods are harsh. Of course, no thanks to The City of Baltimore, either, always taking and never giving!
As we waited in line to pay the obscene $272 required to get the car back, I attempted to lighten the mood by telling Em El that at least we can chalk this up as another quintessential Baltimore experience (along with other special things, such as becoming the victim of a crime and receiving wildly inaccurate water bills). After all, you haven’t really lived in Baltimore until you’ve waited 45 minutes in the tiny concrete bunker under the interstate overpass with all the other suckers preyed upon that day by the blood-sucking savages commonly known as tow-truck drivers.
As if all this wasn’t enough, immediately after Farley ate his dinner tonight he barfed it all up in various places around the house along with all the water he’d drank in the previous 30 minutes. By that time, I was about ready to hurl myself off the deck in search of sweet unconsciouness.
To sum up, my joy tonight is all tangled with misery and weariness.
Posted by sean on June 7, 2012
https://sd-stewart.com/2012/06/07/revoke-my-car-privileges-and-drop-me-in-a-field-somewhere-please/
d = rt
Rain-washed city at night I welcome you. Empty streets and silent skies fall into step. Green grow the shadow trees. Beneath your leaves, I untether my fears, not even knowing if it’s safe. It might not matter.
Morning yawns open, its breath dry and breezy, this heat island cooled for now. Scudded clouds on blue, white shreds of a humid shroud shrugged off. Suspend seeking sustenance to gaze on bareness before you. I always see(k) it.
Distance equals rate times time plagues time travelers and distance runners. How far outside the circle I stand. Is it distance or time that matters. I can never get that straight. Distance being relative, for some meaning time. I hate math.
Twist the word wrapper at the ends of meaning like hard candy in cellophane. Suck it down to syrup, feel the rush. Spit back at the spitting sky, for its taunts fall on us with no reason. Stretch your hand out, fail to pass it through the clouds. These best things remain out of reach. What we have are objects on the ground. What we have feels arbitrary. I don’t want it.
Thoughts control, alter our actions. I sung that once. In youth we state the obvious. Of course they control; of course they alter actions. What did I know. I was a crippled distance runner. I was a failed time traveler. I was standing in the rain, spitting, waiting for the morning, candy melting on my tongue. One day dawn broke.
And now there is this. An equation to tinker with, variables to solder: a space behind me to fashion into organs of my own truth.
Posted by sean on June 4, 2012
https://sd-stewart.com/2012/06/04/d-rt/
spotlight on bobolinks!
Male Bobolink in breeding plumage, Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge, Volusia County, Florida.
Image Courtesy of Andrea Westmoreland, licensed under Creative Commons
Somewhere in a field just north and west of here a bobolink sings. If I quiet my mind enough I can almost hear it, even though I’ve so far only heard recordings. Sometimes called rice bird, butter bird, skunk blackbird, or meadow-wink, the male bobolink sings a jubilant song that has frequently been likened to the robotic voice of R2D2 in the Star Wars films. Unique in many ways, the bobolink is one of only a few species that goes through a complete molt of its feathers twice each year. The male bobolink in its breeding plumage is a most striking bird! Yet through molting for the winter it comes to resemble the much drabber female.
Twice each year, bobolinks undertake one of the longest migrations of any songbird. They winter in central South America and spend their breeding season in the northern United States and parts of southern Canada. Originally a prairie-dwelling species of the Midwestern U.S., bobolinks adapted to breeding on agricultural land and were thus able to expand their summer range. Once killed by the thousands by rice farmers in the southeast U.S., these birds are now considered to be beneficial to American farmers due to their primarily insect-based diet during the breeding season. However, loss of farmland and changes in agricultural practices over the years have led to a steep decline in bobolink nesting habitat. Meanwhile, on their wintering grounds, a shift toward rice production has made the bobolink an enemy of South American farmers. Regrettably they are not protected there by law as they have been in the United States since the Migratory Bird Act of 1918. In the past bobolinks were also served as food in restaurants, and continue to be a delicacy in Jamaica, where they earned their “butter bird” nickname, a reference to the heavy fat content of the birds when they arrive there on stopovers during their long migration.
The bobolink has long been a nemesis bird of mine, along with a few other field-dwelling species. As one who rarely travels far to watch birds, I am restricted to what habitat is nearby. Unfortunately, appropriate field habitat is not plentiful in my usual birding grounds. Searching for field birds also typically involves a lot of driving around and pulling off on narrow road shoulders in an effort to catch glimpses of species that seem to thrive on playing hide-and-seek in the shelter of their grassy living quarters. This is not my preferred method of birding. That said, there have been recent reports of bobolinks northwest of here, and I may set out this weekend once again to find this elusive and intriguing bird.
Posted by sean on May 31, 2012
https://sd-stewart.com/2012/05/31/spotlight-on-bobolinks/
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