Saturday, July 12, 2003
Certified Shore
How lovely is their sailing
atop the humidity that we fail,
even in with our heads and hands
in this unfashionable gossamer,
we fail.
Abbreviated halos of children in the surf
scatter like pebbles from their own chucking fists
scaring the girls in the game that evolves into
sharper silences, withdrawls, and martyrdom,
even though these young eyes like solar physics
can already levitate, pierce, or wrench human interiors.
The coast of Long Island flees around the Sound desperately
as if the need to contain the saltwater with a hug
was geography's patient erotic act.
When we rumble into the surf with our whistles and ovular sunglasses
to teach the kids how to maneuver safely in this element
maybe we wonder to forget about origins and honor,
to rub against drowning and stare at what borders us permanently.
How lovely is their sailing
atop the humidity that we fail,
even in with our heads and hands
in this unfashionable gossamer,
we fail.
Abbreviated halos of children in the surf
scatter like pebbles from their own chucking fists
scaring the girls in the game that evolves into
sharper silences, withdrawls, and martyrdom,
even though these young eyes like solar physics
can already levitate, pierce, or wrench human interiors.
The coast of Long Island flees around the Sound desperately
as if the need to contain the saltwater with a hug
was geography's patient erotic act.
When we rumble into the surf with our whistles and ovular sunglasses
to teach the kids how to maneuver safely in this element
maybe we wonder to forget about origins and honor,
to rub against drowning and stare at what borders us permanently.
Friday, July 11, 2003
death in humid weather
The internet connection in my room/dorm has crashed, again, and coupled with the death of cable for the last 5 weeks (which has actually been mostly benificial), I am hermitized again.
The School's library computers connect, so I'm in the stuffy upstairs computer lab just a few hours after the termination of Camp Week 1.
Of note:
I spent Wed. and Thurs. in a seminar to become a Certified Pool Operator (good for 5 years), a liscense that declares my competency with various filtration systems, pumps, chlorination and alternative sanitation methods, bathing codes, pool maintenence and operation, and various other controlled aquatic skills. I was originally worried about the math involved, but for naught. All's good, I got a 95 on the exam.
The Camp is easier for me as a lifeguard/pool manager than for, say, the counselors who have to drag a dozen kids from station to station, keeping track of backpacks, water shoes, glasses, whines, moans, attitudes, appetites, and small bladders. The Guard staff is very decent, with only one abraisive/condescending individual who is relishing, to our chagrin, in a small amount of power granted her as "Aquatics Asst. Head." Expect future bitchings re: her.
Since the pool construction is yet underway, all swim activites took place down the road 2 minutes at Short Beach, aka locally "Little Africa." Teaching swim lessons in the ocean is fun, as long as I have my sandals. North Shore beaches are rocky and, as I discovered today, crabby. I also always naively assumed that swimming in the ocean would leave me and my hair feeling "ocean-fresh" and "natural." Actually, the saltwater just leaves me feeling grimey and caked. Oh well.
Work continues on what might become my first original play, although at this point its completion is iffy. There is a Long Island Playwriting contest, but the entries are due July 20th. I have a concept and a good deal of different fragments of writing, but nothing cohesive. I believe it's free to enter, so I might as well send something out. It's somewhat an attempt to show a state of mind, or a parcel of relates states of mind, through a series of vignettes of young women as encountered by a young man somewhat like me (since "write what you know" is some of the most accurate advice I've ever tried), and it incorprates some of my recent attempts at poetry, as well as some recent prose (parts of which I might try to post here sometimes soon).
I found a camper who seems to enjoy Stratego as much as I do, and we've played a couple rounds when I've been free. He's a quick kid, probably 10 or 11.
The internet connection in my room/dorm has crashed, again, and coupled with the death of cable for the last 5 weeks (which has actually been mostly benificial), I am hermitized again.
The School's library computers connect, so I'm in the stuffy upstairs computer lab just a few hours after the termination of Camp Week 1.
Of note:
I spent Wed. and Thurs. in a seminar to become a Certified Pool Operator (good for 5 years), a liscense that declares my competency with various filtration systems, pumps, chlorination and alternative sanitation methods, bathing codes, pool maintenence and operation, and various other controlled aquatic skills. I was originally worried about the math involved, but for naught. All's good, I got a 95 on the exam.
The Camp is easier for me as a lifeguard/pool manager than for, say, the counselors who have to drag a dozen kids from station to station, keeping track of backpacks, water shoes, glasses, whines, moans, attitudes, appetites, and small bladders. The Guard staff is very decent, with only one abraisive/condescending individual who is relishing, to our chagrin, in a small amount of power granted her as "Aquatics Asst. Head." Expect future bitchings re: her.
Since the pool construction is yet underway, all swim activites took place down the road 2 minutes at Short Beach, aka locally "Little Africa." Teaching swim lessons in the ocean is fun, as long as I have my sandals. North Shore beaches are rocky and, as I discovered today, crabby. I also always naively assumed that swimming in the ocean would leave me and my hair feeling "ocean-fresh" and "natural." Actually, the saltwater just leaves me feeling grimey and caked. Oh well.
Work continues on what might become my first original play, although at this point its completion is iffy. There is a Long Island Playwriting contest, but the entries are due July 20th. I have a concept and a good deal of different fragments of writing, but nothing cohesive. I believe it's free to enter, so I might as well send something out. It's somewhat an attempt to show a state of mind, or a parcel of relates states of mind, through a series of vignettes of young women as encountered by a young man somewhat like me (since "write what you know" is some of the most accurate advice I've ever tried), and it incorprates some of my recent attempts at poetry, as well as some recent prose (parts of which I might try to post here sometimes soon).
I found a camper who seems to enjoy Stratego as much as I do, and we've played a couple rounds when I've been free. He's a quick kid, probably 10 or 11.
