Posts tagged ‘typewriter’

July 20, 2013

Sitting

by jhon baker

Waiting at the music school my son attends for him to finish an hour and a half of lessons. There is nothing to do except scan Facebook, Twitter, and search around for news of the coming apocalypse (there is one isn’t there? There is always one coming down the pipe.). But, the coffee never lasts long enough and there isn’t entertainment going on in the waiting area of the school for any length of time – though this time I get to restring a guitar and make an unintentional dollar.

As noted above – I’m on twitter now – I am officially a twit or one who twits or whatever. Follow me or not  – @JhonZBaker  – I’ll not be offended if you do not or cannot or will not.

I refuse to be offended personally by anything – because no one fucking cares.

 

and outside it’s storming

 

temporary black out

and the keys on this machine hesitate

and stop momentarily.

 

my heart jumps as I am in the middle of a poem

and will be left sitting in the dark

with only drink and silence

 

and no poem

 

but the lights flutter and return

and the machine hums again

scenting the room with ozone

 

it’s January in Chicago

and raining, with intermittent thunder

and lightening keeping the cats awake

July 3, 2013

When the coffee maker starts on fire

by jhon baker

I don’t post much but there isn’t really all that much I want to say. I’ve been doing a lot of reading lately but the concentration has been one pointed and into a realm that I don’t want to harp away at on my blog – see the previous post – but I need a new roof as this one has failed me (still thankful to have one), a new washer because the old one had failed me (so did the new one which I am receiving a replacement for today), the basement flooded and we are drying it out ever so slowly before relaying the carpet, and the coffee maker lit itself on fire of which we are using a back-up until we get around to replacing the old one.

It is important to always have a back-up coffee maker that gets occasional use to keep it working properly.

I haven’t been putting much out for publication either, though I spent the first few months of this year writing and a lot got written. I am wondering how it all turned out mostly. I am never a good judge of my own poetry – I either think it is all crap or all beyond compare – depending on my mental state and state of medications. At the moment I cannot recall the last submission which is still waiting in the wind for acceptance or denial and it is bad form to have simultaneous submissions which I have done and there is a handful of poems with multiple publishing credits. I’ve been hoping no one noticed and I don’t think anyone has. So, I wait for this last batch to be rejected or accepted before I start to send out more.

some poems

 

some poems take years to write

some only minutes

every other poem is in-between

and none so far has taken more.

 

like Bukowski, Williams, O’Hara

I am a writer of poems

short poems

long poems

most a few in-between

like all creatives I am

notoriously unreliable in action

chasing down the inspirations

with a stick in one hand

a pen in the other

months of missing my prey

and weeks of eating well

and growing fat

 

but I write on this IBM Selectric III

and drink coffee like it was religion

no longer getting drunk or drugging

my days away

and slipping into the nightgown of poetry.

now they all come fully dressed

with ten fingers typing

furiously in fits and starts

mostly done during the day.

 

I am nostalgia interrupted

a willful resemblance of another time

before my iMac and laptop dominated

my final drafts and submissions

email rejections or acceptances

 

I haven’t stamped an SASE in years

or walked to the mailbox hopeful or dreadful

waiting to throw away another poem

such as this.

 

– Hoc Scripsi

 

My beard is long and the shampoo that we are using makes it wiry. it is too wet to ride my motorcycle today. I am waiting for the new washer and I hate to wait. Not that I am impatient, but that I am interested in doing other things while my son is at camp and I can do other things. Tomorrow is the annual holiday of our independence (in the USA) and I don’t do much to celebrate it – even when invited to a party there are other things I’d rather be doing. I’d rather be writing even though I’ve no ideas and, for the moment, the inspira has found other avenues for its own expressions.

April 21, 2013

a luddite in the 21st century

by jhon baker

I have a subject in mind

but that isn’t what this poem is about.

 

Judas Iscariot, and I’ve been writing him

for months

but that isn’t what this poem is about.

 

drinking coffee and listening to the symphony

with projects that need attention all around.

at one time I thought I would stand while writing

to allow the body to sway into part of the meter.

but now I just sit here and type.

BANG BANG BANG

on the keyboard of a typewriter

a luddite in the 21st century

attracted buy the trappings of Steve Jobs innovations

but preferring to still use my old IBM

but that isn’t what this poem is about.

 

I’m trying to reach Judas Iscariot through song

to no avail, through prayer

but I don’t believe.

a hard poem to write and little is known

so I make it up and type on

BANG BANG BANG

really striking the keys though it makes no difference

to the imprint on the paper

but that isn’t what this poem is about.

 

later today I will rewrite this poem into my iMac

computer that’s sitting twenty feet away

and wonder why I didn’t write it there in the first place

but I know I know I know

and I will sit here again tomorrow and do the same thing

with coffee, symphony music and projects all around

that need attention that they will not receive.

but that isn’t what this poem is about.

 

what is this poem about?

I don’t know.

January 22, 2011

Post 300 and it’s nothing special.

by jhon baker

I like to write letters. I like to write them with my 1983 IBM Selectric III. It is not that I am of another, former, school or that I feel this connection to other notables who used similar machines, I simply get more out of the experience as it is tactile, auditory, visual, visceral, emotionally invested, and so on – This is my pleasure. I also get from this a poetry of substance as poetry often fills parts of the letters, written as I type and sometimes good and sometimes not, the whole process lubricates the synapse and fingers. Allows new ideas to come.
So, this I propose – I have had a few pen-pals the last few years but I am down to my last and she is no longer able to respond to my letters, she is reaching the end of her life, I already miss her terribly. My heart breaks even to consider a world without her direct influence. I am not looking for a replacement, there could be no replacing my current, when she goes into a place where there is no pain, I believe that I will continue to write to her anyway – I’ll just have no-where to send the physical letter to anymore.
I would like to have other letter friends, communicating in the old way and helping the USPS (if you are in the Americas) or who ever does your post at the same time. Would there be any takers among you? You do not need a typewriter or even nice paper. Long hand works well as does printed out from the computer. The key is that it is mailed and it is thought out somewhat. The key is a quality communication.
If you would like to write to me – I will respond, it will be typed, it may have poetry, there may be misspelled words and bad sentences – there may be disorganized thought and sporadic insanities – one can never tell. But it will always be honest and unvarnished. Also, sometimes I draw on the paper if it sits in front of me long enough before getting into an envelope. Not that I can draw worth a damn – but it may be interesting.

Any takers? if so, e-mail me and I will give you my physical address. I promise any sent letter will garner a response be it one sentence or four pages of them. Who knows – this may become a thing.