by Eric Nixon
Lost In Thought
A Poetry Collection
by
Eric Nixon
Cover image and design by Eric Nixon.
© 2012 by Eric Nixon
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be copied, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any process without first obtaining written permission from the author; the exception being a reviewer who may quote brief passages with appropriate credit.
That being said, I’m pretty flexible with fully credited adaptations. Please contact me if you are considering adapting or remixing any works contained within this book.
All situations depicted in this book are products of the author’s imagination and may not match any reality known to otherwise exist elsewhere.
Published by Eric Nixon.
[email protected]
EricNixon.net
Dedication
This book is dedicated to my brother, Todd Nixon, who was an amazing source of help and support during the period when most of these poems were written.
Thank you.
Author’s Forward
Hello and welcome to Lost In Thought, my second poetry collection!
In the early 2000s, I was desperately looking for an outlet for my creativity. I first tried drawing; my pictures were ok, but not great and were maybe on par with what a kid in high school might draw. That didn’t work to alleviate my need to express my creativity, so I tried something different: the guitar. In the end, I could never get the hang of it so it fell by the wayside as well.
Some point soon after the guitar thing, I came across a few poems I had written ten years earlier, when I first went to college. I thought I’d try and give that another shot…and, in the process, I (re?)discovered an ideal outlet for my creativity.
From 2002 to 2005 I wrote just over 700 poems. In 2004, I saw that I was writing all sorts of poems, but not doing anything with them, so I got a few of my favorites together and self-published my first collection, Anything but Dreams.
Since then, I completely stopped writing poetry and instead opted to work on a science fiction novel I’d been tinkering with since I was in middle school. The other 600 poems from that time period just sat in my computer, totally forgotten and gathered pixel dust.
In 2011, Garrison Keillor read a poem from Anything but Dreams, “Riding The Red Line,” on his public radio program, The Writer’s Almanac. At the time, I was hard at work researching and writing my novel, Emily Dickinson, Superhero – Vol. 1. The validation I felt hearing Garrison’s distinct voice read my poem, combined with the heavy dose of Emily Dickinson I was getting with my book, inspired me to pick up the poet’s pen and start writing again.
Throughout 2012, while I was happily writing both poetry and Emily’s superhero adventures, I kept thinking about my 600 unused poems from a decade ago. Mostly, I was afraid of them…there were so many of them and so few of me. In the summer of 2012, I finally worked up the courage to jump into that dusty folder in my computer and slog though them. After a few weeks, I had read them all and came to the conclusion that there needed to be some serious editing/purging because there was no way in hell I was going to let most of them run free in the world.
And so began the Great Poetry Purge of 2012.
When the dust settled not many remained. The surviving 102 make up this collection. Here are their numbers by the year they were written in:
1992 – 2
2002 – 22
2003 – 47
2004 – 27
2005 – 4
My previous collection Anything but Dreams, contained 105 poems all selected from this same era. That means I deleted almost 500 poems. Yikes! I tossed them for various reasons:
Too political – I guess I used to be a lot more into politics than I am now. I might express a view here or there, but I figured with the terribly divisive nature of things these days, most of these poems would just serve to annoy and anger people.
Too personal – A lot of these were about people I know and were made up of deep secret kind of stuff…the same things that probably should have never been committed to writing in the first place. Deleted.
Too sexual – The “dirty” poems I put in Anything but Dreams were more erotic. These were flat out raunchy.
Too awful – The ones under this category either sounded too forced or were too rhymey.
I think editing is important. After looking back on that giant treasure trove of poems with the separation of several years and a clearer head/heart, I was able to judge my works between what was good and bad. Had Emily Dickinson faked her death and later discovered that all of her poetry had been published, I bet she would have been upset at not having had the chance to properly edit her work.
When I fake my death, I don’t want to look at some “posthumous” collection of my poetry and think, “Why is this crap in here?” I’ve taken care of that so just the good ones survive.
As for missing those five hundred poems, I wouldn’t worry. At the rate I’m writing new poetry, I’ll have replaced them in a few years.
Thank you for picking up this collection, and I hope you enjoy it.
Eric
December, 2012
P.S. Most of the notes written after poems were written at the time the poem was created. In a few instances, I added notes in 2012 as I edited them.
P.P.S. In the notes, I occasionally mention something called “Line Ideas.” That’s the document where I have always created my poetry. I put my non-complete poems in there, which are basically ideas, fragments of thought, and lines of poetry. There they sit and wait for me to complete and move them to their own documents. During the early 2000s, Line Ideas was often over thirty pages in length. Currently, it’s about eleven.
Table of Contents
1992
A View Shared
The Blanket
2002
June
Inconsequential
In The End
July
Past The People
Trespassing On Your Sensibilities (Gerund One)
Each And Every
This Is
Until Today
Postcard Pretty
Why They Stare
October
Problematic
Four Years Gone
The Rest Of Forever
Carelessly Lucky
November
Divot
Swim Swim
From Scratch
Home
No Receipt No Return
Beautiful Day
December
Zebra
A Small Carry-On
Hold Tight
2003
January
Lonely Lunch
March
And Here Are Their Shoes
Forgetful Poet
April
Untouched On The Dresser
Winning Streak
Abusage The Usage
May
53 Pounds
Sunshine Up There
So, My Friend
June
Two Sets Of Beads
Dumb-Ass, Stupid-Shit Fucker
July
Endangering Massachusetts
Who You Are
I Can’t Wait
August
Constant Glaring Imperfections
When Pigs Fly
Electric Vacation
Continual Constant
Dead End On A One-Way Street
September
Woodstove?
Quiet Oxidation
33336
October
Moonlit Contrails
Swear Barrier
Violated The Unspoken Rule
&
nbsp; Putting On Wet Clothes
Writing Is Life
Seasonal Lag
Small Town Strip Mall
Mind The Importance
Lemon
Off In The Foggy Somewhere
Clifford Remains
Fulcrum
Hedgehog Water Bottle
Simple Salsa Excursion
November
30 Is The New 20
Spooned Deep
11:11
Second-Guess
Fruit On The Bottom
December
Bigger Man
Living The One Way Ticket
My Style Is Now
A Big Step
One Year Ago
2004
January
Building The Facade
Pisces Drowning
Pavlovian Conditioning
The Girl Who Cried Crutch
Tried And Sampled
February
Embering Pile
The Winter That Wasn’t
Experiences Of A Hotelier
March
Glue Trap
April
The Numbers Before
May
Drowning In The Cloudy Twilight
Infection
June
Fresh Cut Grass
Way Too Long
Sapped
July
Made So By The Moment
Swept Along By The Calendar
August
Contrast To The Crispness
The Greatest Poem Ever Written
September
Eclipsed
Last Finger Fell
Drink The Giggling Murmur
In An Aisle
October
The Heavy Shadow Of Uncertainty
As We All Will Tonight
May The Best Of Luck Be Yours
2005
Right Of Way
What Is Going On?
Smile And Enjoy
A Stranger Wrote Me
1992
A View Shared
I needed something
I wanted something
I missed something
Her.
But I can’t see her
For she is there
And I am here, away
Still the need continued…
Popcorn.
Yes, that’s what I need
So I put on my
Jacket
Said goodbye to my
Roommate
And walked out the
Door
Made my way thought the maze
And outside I went
As I walked I felt it
Autumn
It was determined to announce
Itself to me
The wind blew
I zipped my jacket
Autumn laughed at my feeble attempt
And chilled me just the same
The air smelled like crisp, clean
Leaves
Crunched underfoot
All of my senses acknowledged
Autumn’s presence
And conferred with each other to double check
But the answer remained the same
To my right, the sky
Radiated the last of the pale light
To my left, darkness encompassed all
In the middle, hiding behind a cloud
Was the moon
Too shy to come out as it was
Peering down on me
I didn’t know if I was the cause
Of its bashfulness
Maybe it was too cold
So it wore the cloud to keep warm
For whatever the reason
There it was, behind (in) the cloud
Looking at me
So, under the vigilant eye of the moon
I entered the building
Walked across the lobby
And entered the store
I asked
They gave
They asked
I gave
I left
With popcorn in hand, I entered the twilight
I walked across a field of grass
But something seemed out of place
The smell around me was foreign
To here and now
It was the smell of freshly cut grass
It didn’t belong
To here and how
Whoever cut it must have done so
In defiance
As if to shout
“No, wait, don’t give up!
Summer exists
Can’t you smell it?
It’s a warm time smell of
Spring and Summer
Do you remember it?
(please say yes)
I know you do
Now, won’t you continue to live it?
(please say yes)
give me a chance
don’t put me away for a year
I’m still here!”
But the pleas were cut short
By a bone-chilling gust
And the crunch of
Leaves
Popcorn
I turned and walked
Into the darkness
South
The glassy blackness of the pond greeted me
Reflecting the artificial yellowness
Of a nearby building
With ripples cutting the light
And quacks cutting the silence
The ducks floated
I walked to the edge
Where a form floated
I threw some popcorn
Which disappeared
I threw more
Which attracted others
I threw more
And more came to visit the
Altruistic biped
With half my box gone
I bid farewell to the
Floating feathered forms
And started walking
Movement caught my eye
And I turned to see
The ducks clambering onto land
Asking for more
Popcorn
I threw more and left
Ignoring the cries of protest
I walked
I munched
Only a small section of sky
Was lit, and even that faded
As the shade of darkness was pulled
I watched
I walked
I munched
I reached to the box
And I thought about…
And I missed…
And all thoughts were consumed by…
I forgot about the coldness because of…
I was oblivious to all that surrounded me…
My only thought was of…
Her
A car or a tree
Right now they were
The same to me
Something made me look to the moon…
Which was no longer hiding but out
In the open with blinding white light
A view shared by
Her
As she, at that moment, looked up and thought of
Me
Eyes fixed on this object, which belonged to
Us
For a moment
My thoughts returned to her
Until I somehow ended up in my chair
Here
Unaware of anything but…
I got pen and paper and began to write…
Her
A letter, and this poem
September 29, 1992
Amherst, Massachusetts
The Blanket
My alarm greeted me to another new day
I awoke, rose
And looked into the grey
I stood and froze
As my gaze focused on a beautiful scene:
Everything was white
Not the bright green
As I had left things
The previous night
With a blanket of purity
For all had been smothered
Into a state of obscurity
The whiteness covered everything
Its purity was made anew
With richness like a king
And the cleanliness of spring
My thoughts then returned to that of you
November 18, 1992
Amherst, Massachusetts
2002
June
Inconsequential
Want to kiss her
Need to kiss her
But don’t
But can’t
But shouldn’t
But want to so bad
The frustration
The anticipation
Is overwhelming
Is overpowering
But I need it
But I want it
More than
Anything
More than
Anything
Just a simple kiss
Trivializes it all
It’s so much more
You just don’t know
When our lips finally meet
The explosion of emotions
Love
Lust
Longing
Passion
Rip through our bodies
Time stops being important
Everything else just melts away
Everything else is inconsequential
Just us
Just now
Nothing else
Nothing but us
June 6, 2002
Chelsea, Massachusetts
In The End
Thinking
Alone
Drinking
Alone
Which is worse?
One always leads
To the other
The only one
Who wins
In the end
Is sleep
Meaning
The only one
Who loses
Is you
June 30, 2002
Chelsea, Massachusetts
July
Past The People
Staring out over the ocean
Captivated by the motion
And beckoning of the waves
The seeming infiniteness
Spread out before me
Seems to be calling
I pull out my pencils
And begin to sketch
My Discman blocks out
All the mindless chatter
All the prattling banter
That surrounds me
Drawing is creating
It’s a quiet outlet of
Expression for me
I look up and see