...But for the Thoughts Running Through My Mind

By Kevin J. O'Conner

The eighth collection of poems by Kevin J. O'Conner. Arranged in six sections—Alphabet Poems I and II, Scenarios and Observations, Shadorma, Grief, and In My Bubble—the book contains a total of 94 poems, among them 'The doors on the right will open', 'Bill Bixby tongue twister', 'Quest of the missing blue Peep', and ''Be safe out there.''

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kevin J. O'Conner
• Release date: Feb 6, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370715381

Kevin J. O'Conner

Kevin J. O’Conner (56) is not your typical poet. After 30 years of writing only sporadically, Kevin J. O’Conner returned to poetry in 2013—first as a creative exercise, then for the therapeutic benefits. Since 2015, he writes every day, exploring the craft of poetry through monthly writing challenges—‘my ongoing effort to write something that doesn’t sound like something I would write’, he says. Kevin’s poems explore isolation, memory, life’s small moments, and the experience of starting over at ‘a certain age’—always with an emphasis on straightforward expression. As of Spring 2019, Kevin has published eleven collections of poems, the latest of which is WISHES SOMETIMES HAVE CONSEQUENCES, plus four volumes of ‘love notes’ to the days of the week. His poems have also appeared in Raven Chronicles, Spindrift, The CDC Poetry Project, Lament for the Dead, and the anthology VOICES THAT MATTER, and as part of the Clay? VI (2016) exhibit at Kirkland Arts Center. When not writing poetry, Kevin can be found copy-editing documents from far-flung places, attending open-mic readings, designing books, and contemplating what to cook now that he is tired of soup. He lives in Bellingham with his mom's neurotic cat, Cleo III. (updated 28 October 2019)

Book preview

In my never-ending struggle to write something that doesn’t sound like something I would write, I give myself a different writing challenge every month.

For the month of November 2016, I settled upon what I refer to as alphabet poems, for lack of a better term.

This challenge had three rules:

1. Starting with the letter A, each poem will bear a title that begins with the corresponding letter in the alphabet. Thus, the first poem will have a title starting with A, the second poem will have a title starting with B, and so on.

2. The title has to come first—because I usually write the poem first, then come up with the title.

3. The poem will contain the number of lines corresponding to the letter’s position in the alphabet. So, the A poem will have one line, the B poem two lines, the C poem three lines, and so on.

Aperture

If opened up enough, will the light blind Heaven?

Burn to a crisp—one hour on medium-low heat while the dryer and dishwasher drown out the fan over the stove so you forget that you’re cooking anything, flip, repeat.

This, of course, is the answer to the age-old question,

How do you make a hockey puck out of a pork chop?

Cohen Deathwatch 2016

The darker he gets, the more we like it

After all, he’s seen the future—and it’s murder

Meanwhile, I hear democracy is coming…

The title of this poem is a reference to the tendency of reviews of each of Leonard Cohen’s last three albums (Old Ideas, Personal Problems, You Want it Darker) to connect the lyrics to his advancing age, and to speculate whether or not the album would be his last. As it turns out, they got one right: Cohen died four days after I wrote this poem.

Doubting the earth

She’s getting hotter

wetter

more tempestuous

We worry that she’s trying to kill us

Everything happening now could have been avoided

In the real-life version of The Matrix

(the one that got rejected)

a man named Jesus took a blue