Shaggy Attic Craft (poem)

by Stephen J Frankenberry

So a new dVerse Poets prompt was this here in this link to the site and the latest challenge … to write something maybe imagined being written in stone, to write a poem, as Rita Dove was commissioned to do for the Folger in D.C. (again, check the link for explanation) for a walled entrance that addresses and welcomes visitors into a space of your choosing …  if necessary, give us a couple of lines prefacing the poem as to what type of space the poem is welcoming us into.

Well, this is from the buying of a house 16 years ago with an ex and the Attic of the place and what was left there and what eventually became my blog. Not that I hadn’t written anything before, obviously, but I just hadn’t found a spot to house them yet, literally Frankenberry’s Attic to start with then ..

Shaggy Attic Craft

Its carpet was old

shaggy  

littered with left beads

bits of string and cloth

leavings surely missing

what their sacrifice had become

for new cloth

in the Attic of an old house

bought with new promise

once

someone created here

as soon did I

In this Attic of an old house

bought with new promise

once

but faded as love can

move on

though Attic

remained

then

to any place

where words continue to create

themselves

like crafts

with beads

bits of string into whole new cloth

did

once

just now where this shaggy mind’s

Attic would find them

take them

with

to talk in craft

of words

littered with beads of thought

bits of letters, simile’s, synonyms, allusions, delusions

above the shag

strung into whole new cloth

13 thoughts on “Shaggy Attic Craft (poem)”

  1. Beautifully crafted, Stephen. Really love how the Attic imagery/metaphor, which begins as a place, ties down the surreal elements of the art of collecting, creating, stringing words then transmutes to a space carried with you where the craft continues to make “whole new cloth.” An inviting space because unlimited with “beads of thought,” “just now where this shaggy mind’s/Attic would find them.”

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  3. Ahhh, thank you so much Dora. Yeah, what started as just that actual physical Attic for writing (and eventual escape) turned into a mental spot I could carry with me and have and I thank you so for noticing and giving me unexpected reason to write that out that beginning. Much appreciated. And I do always wonder of the crafter in the attic before me.

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