Ed Ochester & Jan Beatty

Ed Ochester is living.

That was the thought that often crossed my mind while reading his book Unreconstructed. That doesn't mean that I think he is some thrill-seeker that eats animal testicles, jumps off high cliffs, and never sleeps. It means that I know he is human. That he worries his loose tooth with his tongue, that his cat watches his testicles as they float in the tub water, that he had a little infant son who sang. His poetry somewhat reminds me of Charles Bukowski--although I don't see Ochester as a womanizing drunk--in that simple, beautiful moments in life are captured...be it while roofing a house, listening to a bitching wife, thinking about Joyce, or (my absolute favorite) watching a blind child eat crocus. I liked the poem so much, I'll share it here:

APRIL, NEAR THE SCHOOL FOR THE BLIND

I come up to

a column of blind children,

two by two, holding hands,

led by their teacher,

out for a walk in the sun

and four have fallen behind,

stalled at a garden where one

has picked a crocus and

is tearing at it with his teeth,

tasting crocus, delicately,

chewing and tasting, and

the teacher halts the group

and runs back to yell

what are you doing?

will you please

tell me what you're doing?

*

I have a passion for the senses. I adore the sensuist writers/scholars such as Diane Ackerman. Also, this poem is very useful for my thesis where one of my major focuses is the act of "stopping" or "pausing". Poetry itself embodies the act of stopping to pay attention to it, but I like going a bit deeper than that by actually embodying the act much like how this poem does. Not only is the narrator of this poem pausing to observe these blind children, but the poem itself is about pausing. The children pause (or stalled) and are thus left behind, almost in a different world. One child consumes the crocus, for he is sensing the essence of the crocus since he cannot experience it through sight. He also, perhaps, experiences it more intensely through his other senses (like taste!). And how I love the ending where the idea that this child is in another world is even more noticeable, for the teacher is appalled and questioning much like how we question why dogs, if they have such a great sense of smell, must get so up-close and personal with disgusting things. Right? I loved this poem.

Ed Ochester also reminds me of the former poet laureate, Robert Hass. I suppose it is because of his ability to walk on the ground in his poems, but capture ideas that are not on the ground. Another reason Ochester reminds me of Hass is the solitude in these poems. In most of these poems, the narrator is very hermit, but peaceful. Some poems speak to a specific person, be them friends or long-dead poets like Basho, the "father" of the Haiku. Basho was a wandering hermit, as well. Both Basho and Ochester have in common that they prefer their solitude, but at the same time, they are not alone. Ochester writes in "Poem for Basho", "How one of the pleasures/of silence is finally/returning to your friends."

The format and technique used in this poem is very important, as well. It is divided into small haiku-looking stanzas (I did not research it, but perhaps Ochester did write this poem in a form that is related to the haiku, like the hokku or waka) that capture small moments. The "point" of a complete haiku is to capture a small, brilliant moment. The first line, supposedly, must contain the subject of the poem. The second line must contain action, and the third line must tie everything up in a tight, amazing conclusion. Typically, in ancient Japanese haiku, the theme revolved around nature. But rules are meant for breaking and changing, I suppose.

I'm sure that what most people noticed about Ochester's poetry is all the pop-cultural references he uses. These references are further proof that Ochester treads on the same ground we do. And literally! He writes about Apollo and Leechburg which are towns adjacent to where I lived! I was in Leechburg today, as a matter of fact. It's nice to see a local "Pittsburgh" poet not just write about the big city for once, but the spindly, in-the-middle-of-nowhere towns that a lot of us can relate to.

There is a poem in here that I love, and maybe Ochester (or his editor) loves, for it is at the very end of the book. The poem also relates to our class, for he is speaking to Shiva's son Ganesha, the Hindu god of Good Fortune and wisdom. I like the parallels in this poem, between the narrator and Ganesh. There is the image of one-tusked Ganesh with is missing tusk and there's the image of Ochester, worrying his loose tooth while driving away from Birmingham. There is also the image of rice repeated between the two of them in their separate worlds. The final line in the poem: "oh cripple and fool and holy one" confuses me in a way that feels right. Is the narrator calling himself these words or is he still talking to Ganesh? Interesting.

Jan Beatty's poetry is very physical. I love the poem "Red Sugar" and how motivated it is by body-fluidity--like there is some serum inside us that makes us move, decide, and live. The poem itself is fluid just the same. And she gave this serum such a good name...red sugar...sweet, but you still cannot help but think of some special blood. It is very sexy. I loved this excerpt:

...I heard it once

when I was waitressing, something

made me turn my head, made me

swivel to look at a woman across

the room, wasn't even my station,

but the red sugar said, go.

This poem in a way fits in with the theme of our class, if you stretch it a bit. Beatty invents this body-molasses that makes our decisions and weighs like ocean-water on our plans and thoughts. It is like she is inventing a myth for us to follow. It seems child-like in a way, like this red sugar is something her mother might have warned her about or told her stories about. It almost seems like an imaginary friend, as well. There is a very disturbing quality to it. I like it.

Her poem "The Day I Stripped" is also very good. It is yet another sexy and dark poem that enters the fantasy and consciousness of a young woman, yet again. When reading this poem, I felt I was becoming her, which is a very interesting technique. In this poem, the narrator feels she is becoming a stripper, but realizes that she is not through the intrusion of an outside character. I am going through the same scenario when I read this poem. I feel I am becoming the narrator, but the narrator eventually reminds me that I am not her. I was so drawn into the poem, that I was stripping my own identity.

I like the disappointment there.