Thanks to Frequency Writers, I’m creating poetry with a more academic, experimental approach. Here’s my first time writing a Cento.
Here are my source materials:
1 “My Life by Water” by Lorine Niedecher
2 “Unicorn Believers Don’t Declare Fatwas” by Nada Gordon
3 “A Thousand Virgins Shout Fuck Off” by Elizabeth Treadwell
4 “Some Pink in Your Color” by Amy King
5 “Fragment 1: Sea-ward, white gleaming thro’ the busy scud” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
6 “To the Swimmer” by Countee Cullen
7 “Clotilde” by Guillame Apollinaire, translated by Donald Revell
8 “Repose of Rivers” by Hart Crane
9 “They Come” by Cathy Park Hong
10 “Latero Story” by Tato Laviera
“A Cento to See You” – July 2015
1 Rabbits – 1
2 Linseed-eyed and broad of face, 9
3 We douse ourselves with flame retardant 9
4 And douse the town to flame – 9
5 a tarred prehistoric castle. 9
6 Heaven why? 3
7 My life, 1
8 My heart, goes out to you of dauntless courage and spirit indomitable 6
9 Into my heart, grown each day more tranquil and peaceful, comes a 6
10 struggling, 6
11 gnawing, 1
12 fierce longing 6
13 my hands shelving themselves… 10
14 is squandered by night. 7
15 Salivating on my index finger, 10
16 a balloon of such gravity I ache for stars in a jar, 4
17 congested with putrid residues, 10
18 pointed toward 1
19 wasps, whose love reminds me of fireflies tonight. 7
20 Several times a day I touch evil rituals… 10
21 of the soft 1
22 and serious – 1
23 seaward, white gleaming thro’ the busy scud 5
24 Rise up and ride in 9
25 my shore, 1
26 raided. 1
27 Now as I watch you, strong of arm and endurance, battling and 6
28 Along each town we pass 9
29 How much I would have bartered! The black gorge, 8
30 A craving for shadows 7
31 As we eye from afar, 9
32 we rave and rove and gore 9
33 where gloom has lain 7
34 Between love and disdain. 7
35 Road’s a batter of blood and dust 9
36 So many soldiers on the brink of their lives returning! 4
37 And willows could not hold more steady sound… 8
38 Our shadows meet 7
39 with an outward stroke of power intense your mighty arm goes forth – 6
40 We hear other deaths in flames. 9
41 And finally, in that memory all things nurse; 8
42 I have read a guide to success – 10
43 Opened in gardens 7
44 Giving 1
45 to wild green 1
46 Tyranny; they drove me into hades almost… 7
47 So worry about something more important 2
48 what to encounter… 10
49 like getting hit in a collision between 2
50 Dry blood infectious diseases 10
51 of a cancerous cell… 10
52 Indigestions somewhere down the line… 10
53 The cherry blossoms of August… 4
54 I can’t imagine the heart anymore 4
55 Oddly enough, there is a 2
56 Hold, I say. 9
57 Did you know I’m in this hospital bed? 4
58 Whose pulse is worn down with an IV to the head. 4
59 Someday I might become experienced enough 10
60 I’m not. I’m in the same light you stand in, 4
61 Till age had brought me to the sea. 8
62 After the city that I finally passed, 8
63 Passed too fast, nearly in the flash of Rose 9
64 Guts – 3
65 Now that it presses my ribs apart, 4
66 From my territories 10
67 To make it big 10
68 But I cannot use rubber gloves… 10
69 Where cypresses shared the noon’s 8
70 Posts on, as bent on speed, now passaging 5
71 Spring’s 1
72 Flags, weeds. And remembrance of steep alcoves 8
73 A town of shacks painted kiwi green 9
74 Ride into a town of tires stacked 9
75 To offer “technical assistance.” 10
76 Stamp the earth rind down. 9
77 Shuck our boots and nap on. 10
78 We are all Snow Birds atop 4
79 Moonlighting at night as a latero 10
80 Moonlighting until dawn by digging 10
81 that in order to get rich 10
82 “I have to sacrifice myself” 10
83 (Are you writing your name?) 3
84 The pond I entered once and quickly fled – 8
85 Now floats upon the air, and sends from afar 5
86 Are we still talking to the same god? 4
87 We are from the world above, 9
88 We can never rest. 9
89 And now you must follow: 7
90 I am thinking of publishing 10
91 A wildly-wailing Note – 5
92 Arts and letters… 1
93 Slimy grease blood hazardous waste materials… 10
94 Such heartbreaking “I love you O My God” 4
95 And though my lips would speak, my spirit forbids me to ask, 6
96 “Are you here from the world above?” 9
97 Two – 1
98 Are you here from the world above? 9
99 Are you here from the world above? 9
100 Is your heart as true as your arm? 6
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