< calming down >

[rayheinrich]

you could write him a not and put it in the washing machine

       
            Matching, Wet and Dry, Large-Capacity, Stainless-Steel Prayer Wheels

"Lose"

Thank you

"loose" double entendre'

Obviously, but I didn't want to make milo feel bad.

made my day. I'll be re reading this all through it.
Your poems don't come out the right way on a mobile screen - it's all those extra spaces.

Below's a copy with most of the spaces taken out.
Does that work better or is it the formatting in general?

< Calming Down >

I was a frantic young poet, so afraid of forgetting some genius phrase
or other that I carried a piece of paper rolled tightly around a pencil
everywhere I went just so I'd be able to catch those words before
they flew away.  (I remember regularly picking papier-mâchéd bits of
that paper out of the clothes dryer.)  

Michael McNeilley (poet and friend) would see me like this and say:
"Calm down, if it's that good, it will come back to you." It took a few
years, but I came to realized he was right. What a relief: I could look
around, notice everyday stuff, not have to worry about making poetry
out of every damned thing in sight.

Years later, I said to Michael: "It doesn't all come back, does it?" He said:
"No, but you believed it long enough to calm down, didn't you?  Besides,
it doesn't really matter if you lose it, there's always more."  
I calmed down again.

Michael died 14 years ago, so I can't say to him: "There isn't always more,
is there?" But I know what he'd say: "No, there isn't; but you believed it
long enough to calm down, didn't you?"



This reminds me of when I first realized what my sister
(a photographer) had been telling me for years:
"You can experience 'now' or take a picture of 'now', but you can't really do both."