Student poems inspired by Catherine Pierce’s Famous Last Words
My students in an intermediate college poetry workshop this fall 2012 semester read and discussed the poet Catherine Pierce‘s book Famous Last Words. Their take-home “exam” on the book was to write either an imitation of one of the poems or a cento using lines from the book. I’m inviting them to all post their poems here in the “comments” section, specifically so I can show Catherine just how terrifically her brilliant poems worked to help draw some amazing work from these talented students. Enjoy the comments–and read the book!
14 Responses to “Student poems inspired by Catherine Pierce’s Famous Last Words”
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November 28th, 2012 at 7:18 pm
Attachments
You are my dinosaur chicken nuggets.
My lucky socks
unmatched. You are my tomorrow.
I name you falafels, spatula, bag of
stratosphere stars.
I name your eyes
my lightening bug jars.
Never go, my unworldly earthling. Stay
and keep me high, my Farris wheel eyes
are aimed at your sky. Saying something
new is like finding fossils. All the more
reason to admit that I love
dinosaur chicken nuggets. You are my
side walk chalk, my concrete, my cape.
You keep my everything locked
in your heart chest. You’re my little Frodo phrase
If you ask me, I will take the One Ring.
You are my nerd lover. Never forget
me, my hard drive. Never run away,
my cheetah, my energy drink.
Oh, dear squawking parrot, dear X marks the
spot, dear pirate ship, just promise you’ll call me
treasure until we are both skulls and crossbones.
November 28th, 2012 at 10:45 pm
“Pressure” (Imitation of the poem “Conscience”)
“Two men were arrested after a woman disappeared in the Peace River in Arcadia on Sunday. According to a witness, a woman was standing on the ledge of the Morgan Park Bridge and a man identified as her boyfriend was encouraging her to jump.”
–NBC Online
That evening, I pushed you
further than I intended,
into liquid space, into something
we weren’t prepared for. The moon
a flittering milk smudge. You
screamed, gravity refused to
catch you. I didn’t
know you couldn’t swim,
didn’t know your family
neglected to teach you
not to listen
to men like me.
All I knew then, the jest
of falling, the candor
of surprise, your body a rounded stone.
I can’t talk to police,
iron wrists, cruiser window
against my head. I don’t care
if they call me cold,
if they wrap me
in weights, in chains, in orange scrubs.
They can’t know my dreams,
your face a balloon, your morgue
tray a bed, fingerprint bruises
on your neck, the river’s signature.
November 29th, 2012 at 3:01 pm
In Which I Imagine Myself Into an Anime
after Catherine Pierce
Walk with me along the sloped riverbank,
between a Shinto shrine and Tokyo Tower.
Ignore the tentacles. I’m looking
for my sister; short, squeaky, eyes
drawn like painted Easter eggs.
I live under ramen booths
and over action lines. Can you
hear me scream over the loud
colors? My hair a purple pinecone. My body
trapped in three repeating frames.
November 29th, 2012 at 4:19 pm
Imitation of “In Which I Imagine Myself Into a Film Noir
In Which I Imagine Myself Into a Godzilla Movie
It crushed my studio apartment with a gnarled,
bleeding toe and I doubt it even felt the
edges of a picture from when I visited Taiwan
or the shards of the urn with grandfather in it.
I scream Kill that thing! from a fleeing
taxi but cry when it roars angry because
no one fired mortar rounds at my
feet for strolling the Chianan
Plain, for being a tourist.
November 29th, 2012 at 5:44 pm
Cento a.k.a. The Pilfered Poem
The Heaven I Hope For
We were meant to wear beasts’ pelts.
now we hide behind cheap harmonicas and cheaper daiquiris,
Once we were voyagers
Now, we seldom tremble, seldom howl
We were in a deep wood, once.
And we weren’t afraid.
It isn’t forgiveness,
It isn’t grace
It couldn’t be saved
You’ve left me wanting nothing
But you’re no gentleman,
So simple to kill what we don’t understand
The game is nearly over and you’ve just realized you’re late
your single hawk wheeling overhead,
you could blaze with the ghosts you’ve lost
their former selves luminous
they need you still
Leap into the sea,
You will not drown.
Drive the car into the ocean
Smash the phone
I want none of it
It’s morning now, wake up, it’s morning
I sound frantic. I’m not. Does that worry you?
Open the door so I can see the mountains.
Over there – see? – dawn.
November 29th, 2012 at 7:34 pm
CENTO
This is a Love Poem
We know:
The hotel bathroom is covered in cat fur,
It was too late for you,
We will be famous,
And can’t fit through small spaces.
Leave your hat on
We’ve got plans
What do you see, sleeping?
On the sand, the most classic of shapes.
The hairline fracture.
She still wants to be a muse,
You think I’m nothing more
And of course you take me home
Every time.
What I love is to be behind things—
So much light
I can watch you
Did you plant the ugly ones again?
Gross, you say
Next, you must understand
In making words, we make a life
They were chosen for a reason.
We stuff our pockets with cigarettes and cherry candy.
November 29th, 2012 at 7:36 pm
IMITATION
Endearments
You are my ice cream cloud. My lucky
freckle. You are my fortune
teller. I name you future, toothpaste,
antenna. I name you lantern. Never
go, my homing beacon. Stay
and keep me sane, my fuzzy
jumpsuit, my barre. It’s difficult
these days to say something
new. All the more reason to indulge
you, my wine spritzer, my kidneys.
You keep everything humming.
You’re my little French word, my
Merde, my quick, hopeful
nasal curse. You’re my sunroof.
Never forget me, my quadratic equation. Never
run off, my Amtrak, my hot air balloon. Oh,
dear dictionary, dear education system,
dear ladder to the gods, just promise
you’ll call me eternal
November 29th, 2012 at 8:05 pm
Cento after “Famous Last Words.”
Missing
She longs for your cracked
hands on her, always a lightning
sky behind each kiss. She collects
change in a jar and performs Elvis
tunes in Portuguese. Voices like
water, like light through leaves. But
worry, the tidy pool of blood on the 7-
Eleven counter and the hotel bathroom
is covered in cat fur. Do you know how
many have ended this way? When they reach
the graves, the sky sweats. Let them think
it was selfish. It’s torture.
There’s more to tell about the girl,
but it’s better not to know.
November 29th, 2012 at 11:21 pm
An imitation of Catherine Pierce’s
Endearments
You are my peach-tree. My fluffanutter
cheeseball sandwich. You are my angel
pie. I name you eye-tooth, hair-tie, life-saving
floatation device. I name you mozzarella. Never
leave, my Band-Aid. Stay
and snuggle, my bath suds,
my geyser. Isn’t it difficult
these days to say anything
new? All the more reason to coddle
you, my cucumber, my lip-
balm. You are my little Spanish phrase, my
media naranja, my delicate chemical
facial peel. You’re my creamsicle.
Always remember me, my Crunchwrap Supreme. Never
run away, my medicinal marijuana, my tweezers. Oh,
dear deep breath, dear honeysuckle,
dear everlasting twitch, just promise
you’ll call me the morning after.
December 1st, 2012 at 3:58 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpsjM8tODk8&feature=player_embedded
December 1st, 2012 at 11:02 pm
Empty Eternity: A Cento
You are cartoons interrupted by war
breaking the sky
into pieces.
There’s nothing at all
inside. America,
teach me how to strut.
It’s your trickery I love,
your sleek underhandedness,
your suit the bluest.
It’s torture.
Bones of glass, my fragility
kept me suspended.
You’ve left me wanting
nothing.
I never stop
going away, a suitcase
full of wit and half-formed
tales of woe. I’m the hush
she doesn’t recognize, announcing you
like fanfare.
At sixteen, I was illegal and brilliant. I had secret
hysteria. I was unformed
and total. Not the end of the delirium,
a lightning sky behind each kiss.
Be careful
with your memory.
We had teacup faces and cyclone minds.
The cat-girl’s heart opens into the street.
You wanted to drift up into the cask
of stars. (She knows there’s no place
for salvation.) It isn’t forgiveness
she seeks. She spoke
in rapturous archaisms.
The hairline fracture
on a slowly swaying bridge,
against the lake’s glass-blue glare
voices like water riddled
with missing nights and vacancies.
The queen whose word
is wicked, who conjures smoke
and poison. You know the forest
in the dark. We know
we will be famous, former selves
luminous and gone.
You’re scaffolding, mere frame
of yourself. Know that reason and never
speak of it.
I will sleep like a woman
underwater.
He holds his breath to follow
under and down.
He’s seen his share of dying.
Stay and keep me warm, my wooly
glove, my teapot. In dreams, annoyances
are epic. Yonder the sun sets, molten,
unhinged. Never my red mouth
in close-up, this careful lipstick
blood, like stained tulips.
Leave your hat on. It casts
a distinctive shadow. You inspire
intrigue, not disgust.
Don’t forget
to sleep. What do you see?
Make it up. (Let him die cinematically.)
In making words, we make a life.
How else can we live forever?
December 2nd, 2012 at 11:33 am
Exclamation Point to the Period
after Catherine Pierce’s “Apostrophe to the First Gray Hair”
O silent stain of solitude whose blossoming
I anxiously await –
You are the week of merciful rain
washing away chances of jaundiced dandelions.
The sweet scarlet letter written
to unprotected women cursing Pearls.
The initial burst of Christmas lights:
lifeless, and bright.
December 2nd, 2012 at 8:36 pm
Love Poem to Misery
(Imitation of “Love Poem to Fear” by Catherine Pierce)
Every morning at 3 AM, I’m jolted
awake, painfully cold and damp
and frightened only to find you
sleeping beside me. You are the clingy
shadow I can’t get rid of. You always appear
again at breakfast, adding an extra spoon of
bitter to my coffee and making my cereal
tasteless. You are the mockingbirds I want to
choke because they always sing and flutter
when I step outside. Even the air seems
stale, like the day old lumps in the road
you force me to notice aren’t crumpled shirts
or piles of leaves but a lone kitten that stepped
out too soon. I cry for it. I don’t want to lose
my own to you. But you reappear
with your sweet lips on my ears, tie me down
with tender memories and push against me
my own anxieties. You try sticking your silver
tongue down my throat but I untangle
myself from your grip and promise to run
with the moon until I am swallowed whole by the sun.
December 5th, 2012 at 11:18 pm
Hey, poets! Catherine Pierce couldn’t leave a comment here (she was prompted for her USF netid), so she asked me to put this up for her:
Hi, everyone–Katie let me know about this site, and I just wanted to say how much I absolutely loved reading (and watching!) these poems, and how honored and impressed I am by the work here. Really–reading these has made my day. I wish you all well with your future adventures in poetry!