Boring for poetry (day) 2012

Okay, so tomorrow is National Poetry Day here in lil ol' Aotearoa. Here's a press release if you're the kind of person who needs one of those to believe things like national poetry days exist (or if you want to see a list of poetry events happening tomorrow).

Some pre-reading for the day:

Pip Adam's review of Geoff Cochrane's latest collection (she feels much the same about GC as I do, but says it far better than I could).

Hera Lindsay Bird's left-right combo (part one; part two) on her favourite poets.

How I commemorated National Poetry Day last year.

And here's a poem I wrote last year when I was feeling more dull and inarticulate than normal. It was first published in the beautiful but short-lived journal Pasture from Kilmog Press.

Boring

The Orange-Yellow River is filled with young people

calling Come on democracy!

as if it were a soccer team.

I am not here to swim. Can’t you hear

the noises from the streets in my stomach?

I’m boring for joy.

*

I knew a girl,

her clothes were on fire

for a life of quiet understanding

but she had two orange boyfriends

skating in her heart’s first event

who were all: yeah, yeah, you know.

*

The Yellow-Orange River is filled with young people

calling Come on bureaucracy!

as if that would affect me.

Yeah, nah, I’m busy folding and unfolding

the heavy creases of, uh, life.

I’m, like, boring for joy.

*

We all encounter

problems on the hard shoulder.

If this is not the case, my bad —

there’s green space in my weakness,

space for walking, and perhaps a garden.

But no, my love. Oh, oh yeah, my bad.