Daydreaming About the Design for my Chapbook Cover

This poem is an exercise inspired by the 'First Thought, Best Thought' writing theory of the Beats. I basically just recorded a shift at work as it happened with some personal observations and memories folded in for good measure. It's a stream of consciousness thing to be honest, and not meant to be anything more than that. This poem will not be included in the chapbook, Wild Taste, as far as that goes. Fair warning: there is a bit of dirty language in one section of this poem. It's over fast but it even surprised me a little bit when I re-read the poem.

According to Folklore, a Long-Missed Friend Will Return

Notes from November 7, 2017.
A yellow jacket flying around the hood of my car and a bird singing I can't identify, but it's familiar, I haven't heard it since my childhood. I can smell wet gravel on the driveway and hear it crunching underfoot as I walk to end of it where I'll wait for the bus. I hear that bird song from somewhere in the oak scrub across the street. This morning that sound is visceral, it literally throws me back in time. A lump in my throat forms for a childhood a long ways behind me and my long gone mother who I miss so much.

April, 2019. The bird singing in 2017 was a chickadee.

Adventure Diary: August 9, 2018

In August of 2018 I was between jobs, so my wife was working extra shifts and I spent a lot of time with our children. I have, in fact, always spent a lot of time with our children because I am a modern dad--I love my kids, I love my wife, and I believe if both parents are working out of the house then both parents should be parenting. I think it should have always been like this, but just because it wasn't doesn't' mean it can't be now. During this time between jobs I tried to write a daily journal entry. I took the kids to places in Wintson-Salem, where we'd recently moved, so we could learn about the city and find things we'd like to into the future. 

Libraries Have Everything

I've always spent a lot of time at libraries. When I was young my grandmother would take me to one or two of the libraries in the Lucas County system. I loved the Holland and Sylvania branches. She waited for me to browse the rows and stacks and spinner racks full of books. I read the whole Oz series in just a few weeks. I borrowed the same couple of books about dragons and knights over and over again. I read The Mists of Avalon far too young, and Salem's Lot, too. Over the years I borrowed thousands of books. The sad truth is I probably only read hundreds of them.

Station Identification

My name is Michael Kocinski. I'm an amateur poet; a citizen scientist; a casual gardener; an advanced doodler; a cook, a father, a husband; a sometime tutor; an aspiring naturalist; and an utter failure at life. I dream of writing a novel. I have enough poems to collect as a manuscript. I want to learn to play the banjo and speak Sign Language. I want my kids to have a better early life than I had but I don't know if they do; I won't know until one of them is 41 and writing a blog about his or her shit parents.

More Like NOvember, am I Right?

Today I did something I haven't done in many years. I left my house, walked to the woods, and walked right into overgrowth. I didn't use the path managed by my wife's uncle and his bright orange Kubota. I didn't take my phone, a pen and paper, a child, or a walking stick. I plunged into thorns and fallen leaves ankle deep and I wandered. I tried not to look for anything, since it's NOvember after all, and what I really want to see, animals like snakes (I especially and foolishly look forward to finding a copperhead in these woods), turtles, salamanders, and frogs, have all gone to ground for a little while. Well, wait. I don't really know for sure. You see, I'm in North Carolina now and I don't know the laws of hibernation here. It's been cool, and rainy, and NOvember for about eight days now. And if the wild animals around here are anything like me, they hate NOvember too, and will sleep through it if possible. I know I would. 

The Four Chambered Heart, a eulogy for my mother.

My mother died on January 19, 2017, nine days before her 64th birthday. My dad asked me to write something to say at her funeral because I'm the poet in the family. To be honest, I was reluctant to say anything, knowing full well I wouldn't be able to put my whole heart and intention into the words I needed to describe this woman I loved so much. But I did because my dad asked me to, and he's done almost everything I've ever asked him to do for me. How could I refuse?