Oh, my friends.
This was not an easy one for me.
I don’t know if I’m too distracted by the chaos that is teens plus work plus summer.
Or if I’m just intimated by Kay Ryan.
But this month’s “In the Style of” poems — sheesh!
If I had a fainting couch, I’d take to it!

So I tried a couple of different poems as my muse (aka, mentor text) and the one I came closest to not-hating is this one. It’s based on a poem of Ryan’s called Turtle that starts like this:
Who would be a turtle who could help it?
A barely mobile hard roll, a four-oared helmet,
she can ill afford the chances she must take
in rowing toward the grasses that she eats.
Mine is called Egg, and goes like this:
EGG
By Liz Garton Scanlon
After TURTLE, by Kay Ryan
Who would be an egg who could help it?
An off-kilter globe, wheel with a wacky rim,
tight-rope walker who can’t stand up for herself.
All soft-hearted on the inside but not on her sleeve –
there is no sleeve, no reach nor grasp nor opening –
nothing saying here’s who I am and how I feel.
Just this flattened wheel, matte gaze, blank slate,
hardened shell-like-stone sheer limestone cliff
of a face — strong, long and serious. Contained.
Until, from deep within, a knock like a heartbeat
only sharper, clearer. More pointed. And the illusion
cracks wide open, into cries and downy wings.

Read the fantastic poems by my pals here:
Tanita
Andi
Kelly
Laura
Sara
Tricia
And it’s Poetry Friday here!
Happy summer, friends!