OTIS
OTIS
The homes on Otis Street are not my homes.
They are not the homes of the people who call them home. For my money,
they are the homes of the people of the whole earth.
My entire life I have wanted to own a home on Otis Street.
I know a woman who owns one with her doctor husband
on Otis Park-- a cul de sac
off of main Otis.
Her backyard is a sea of wind
that her children surf
till dusk. When they spill off their windboards
the grass stains on their knees
resemble Africa. I have never wanted to own a home
in Africa.
The Congo is too hot for me; Johannesburg, too pasty.
My entire life I have wanted an Otis elevator
that goes up and down the shaft of my body
so I can get off at my heart
and poke it in the guts,
unload my luggage at the left eyeball
so it might see better
if I scattered it with stuff.
Neither of these desires has ever come to fruition.
For two years my wife and I owned a home on Old Lane in Claverack, NY.
It was in the middle of a cornfield.
When the crows came
there were more of them then there were of us.
The wind blew like freight trains and stalagmites.
On Otis Street
the higher up you go
the larger the home.
A Victorian attached to another Victorian
takes up three acres, right there, at the top.
It’s painted burgundy with white shutters.
The homes at the bottom of the hill are modest and green,
some are brandy, some with two bedrooms.
The way to get from the burgundy to the brandy
is to step into a VW Beetle
that resembles an Otis 350
with the grand prix of pulley systems
then hit all the buttons.
It hurts to be poor.
Ask the people in Africa,
the ones in Nigeria who have lived in the Delta region.
The oil has been spilling there for 50 years.
Fifty years.
Take that Gulf of Mexico,
Exxon Valdez Alaska.
Ha.
The Nigerians who live there
bathe in rivers that make them dirtier than they were before
they stepped in to get clean.
When I think about this
my hands shake.
I want to airdrop five hundred thousand Otis elevators
onto their hills and valleys
that will lift them out of the sludge
and carry them on the wind,
surfboards of the wind,
to Otis Street in Newton, Mass.
where I can show them these homes and say, Pick one, anyone,
and I’ll give you the keys.
Imagine the culture shock.
Imagine the water.
so is "wicked" enough said?
ReplyDeletethis carries me across continents, across cultures and drags me up and down the levels of society.
its current and its cool.
the only thing that made me flinch was the hand shaking.
cheers Matthew
:)
Corrina
Matthew,
ReplyDeleteI really like this poem. I love how you play with Otis- the street, a car, the elevator.. and then take the elevator inside the body. I love that. The transitions seem seamless and wonderful
At first I read the second line to read- "they are not homes for the people who call them home"-which could have worked too- there you might have been making another statement about how a big house doesn't necessarily constitute a home. But that wouldn't have been consistent with the first line of the next stanza- " My entire life I have wanted to own a home on Otis Street" unless you were going to go on to address the difference between how it looks from the outside ( what people imagine, long for) and how it is often different from the inside. But maybe thats another poem.
This is a beautiful poem about inequity, about uneven, even unfair distribution of wealth- and you address it so intriguingly.
The line "It hurts to be poor" didn't have the same credibility for me as the rest. The narrator feels, for the first time in the poem a little preachy. I don't have the impression the narrator is speaking from personal experience about poverty.
I googled the Delta region and learned that there are often not even roads to the towns from which the oil is being extracted- while those benefitting from it are enriched- there is not compensation, nothing given back to those from whom it is taken. Maybe more than it hurts to be poor- is something about how it feels to have something confiscated without compensation- its like a theft really- maybe the narrator can speak about such an experience and then go on to the stanza about the Nigerians- just a thought.
Also, maybe instead of my hands shake- My fists clench or tighten or curl or pound a table- I don't know some image that shows angry hands- shaking hands makes me think of kids hands flailing up and down- or shaking helplessly, but this narrator is angry. The narrator has attitude that is great. I think the hands should be firmer.
I love the second to last stanza- and I love the end.
Thx for sharing this wonderful poem. Lori
Hi Matthew,
ReplyDeleteI like that this poem seems like relaxed musings, whimsy, dreams, a blasé narrator and the reader are being taken wherever "Otis" and musings will go -- from the simple wish of owning a home straight to Africa where it draws a more bleak picture/comparison with the oil and the lack of escape.
The wants/desires of the poem are intriguing as well, first simple and then something more powerful and transportive: a home on Otis Street, an Otis elevator, never (wanted) a home in Africa, want to airdrop Otis elevators in Africa.
I like the whimsy of having an elevator riding in one's body. Even this stanza is a want/wish for better sight/feelings -- the third stanza beginning: "My entire life I have wanted an Otis elevator".
I love that the wind is so fierce that it "blew like freight trains and stalagmites."
I love this line: "The way to get from the burgundy to the brandy".
Ultimately, as a reader, I don't want the musings of this narrator unless there is something more transportive for the narrator and as well as the reader. I feel that once the narrator has shocked me with knowledge of an oil spill fifty years old that people have to bathe in even today, I don't feel the flights of fancy and "Otis" imaginings at this point. I feel a disconnect of musings vs. the horror. Is that what you wanted? If that's the case, I want a clearer picture of disconnect of the narrator with his daydreaming/musings.
I imagine the narrator of this poem out in a hammock, under a tree on a hot 90+ degree day like we are having in the northeast US today, sipping on mint tea, just letting "Otis" rule and roam while the heat and sway of the hammock do their work on the words, but as a reader I want more from the narrator. I don't feel I can be lulled by the final gentle wish to "airdrop five hundred thousand Otis elevators". It feels too ineffectual and inappropriate at this place in the poem (perhaps earlier?). I want this narrator to fall out of the hammock in a cold sweat on Otis Street or in an elevator crashing to the basement -- something, anything. I want the narrator to be as shocked as I was as the reader. I don't want solutions because the narrator can't solve it anymore than I can, (but sharing awareness is powerful). I don't want him to go back sipping tea, rocking in the hammock, musing solutions. Having his hands shake is too subtle for me. I want the elevator of the second stanza: "so I can get off at my heart/and poke it in the guts". I want the guts. That is what has just happened to me as the reader. I think once you have the big reveal of the old untended oil spill you can't go back -- I'm awake, I'm horrified and maybe that's the end of the poem -- the narrator sharing that horror/awareness.
Hope this helps and as always, take what works for you and leave the rest.
Thank you for sharing this wonderful poem,
~Suze