I.O.U.

By Wim Coleman

To read the poetry of Wim Coleman is to venture into an intimate realm of humor, whimsy, intelligent flights of fancy, and cautionary tales—all told in a uniquely singular voice. He expertly weaves these pieces together to form a colorful tapestry of human experience enriched by great personal depth. I.O.U. is at once an immersive and expansive work by a master poet at the top of his game. —Rollin Jewett, playwright, poet, songwriter, singer, actor

Wim Coleman’s poetry pulls us into his unique vision, a world of light and dark, giddy with magic and somber with truth—a world of mystery, relatable self-reflection, and a depth of feeling that’s all-too-human. He has a masterful assurance with words that can be revisited and savored with deeper meaning, over the passage of time.—Jim Uhls, screenwriter, Fight Club and Jumper

Whether exquisitely detailing the intricate dismantling of a bedroom dresser by his precocious adopted daughter or chastising the criminal assault of corrupt worldly powers on the integrity of our human experiment, the poetry of Wim Coleman always uncovers the astonishing wonder at the heart of all things human.—Nicholas A. Patricca, playwright, Professor Emeritus at Loyola University Chicago

• Language: English
• Publisher: Adelaide Books Publishers
• Release date: Feb 5, 2021
• ISBN: 9781954351639

Wim Coleman

Wim Coleman is a playwright, poet, novelist, and nonfiction writer. His poetry has appeared in many publications, and his play The Shackles of Liberty won the 2016 Southern Playwrights Competition. Novels that he has co-authored with his wife, Pat Perrin, include Anna’s World, the Silver Medalist in the 2008 Moonbeam Awards, and The Jamais Vu Papers, a 2011 finalist for the Eric Hoffer/Montaigne Medal. Wim and Pat lived for fourteen years in Mexico, where they created and administered a scholarship program for at-risk students. They now live in Carrboro, North Carolina. Both are members of PEN International.

Book preview

PRAYER

Let the pebble learn from the wave

the art of its own shaping.

Let the wave be freed

of its bondage to the tide.

Let the tide know its own power

and yoke itself to my prayer.

Let my prayer take the shape

of an airborne dragonfly.

Let the dragonfly remember

its long-ago flight into stone.

THE WEDDING DÉCIMAS

for John and Ash

August 23, 2014

"A man’s maturity—consists in having found again

the seriousness one had as a child, at play."

—Friedrich Nietzsche

1.

Blind foolishness is our light;

our petrified wisdom is dark.

We gather here not to work

or pursue some insidious ought

but to beckon back lives remote

as children at serious play.

May everlasting play

transfigure this loving two

into children renewed—and so

together now: Let us play.

2.

It’s true we came from clay

and unto clay shall return;

but here’s a thing to learn:

during our during we stay

always and always clay

in quantity ever precise—

no lessening, no increase,

but always and always changing,

always and always in motion;

you can’t be the same clay twice.

3.

Now this is how play feels:

You are twin globes of clay

spinning supple and free,

yet-to-be jars or bowls

upon twin potter’s wheels

whirling alert and astir—

and yet with no potter near.

So sculpt yourselves hands to touch,

arms to gather in reach,

all to shape and adore.

4.

An empty jar made of clay

is the vacant brain of the fool

yawning and hungry to fill.

Look in the jar and see

what’s not yet there today

but might be there tomorrow—

manifold rainbow-worn pebbles,

sand sifted from capricious capes,

wine pressed from unwary grapes,

or some other treasure of folly.

5.

May the world watch as you play

that others may go and do likewise

and myriad eyes be transfigured—

opaque eyes, eyes of clay

dormant in power to see,

latent in life crystal clear,

gems-to-be blissful and sheer;

and may you crave play everlasting;

and may your child mentor your shaping;

and may your child dare you to dare.

POSTPONEMENT

Jade tree with big knuckles

and thick polished leaves

go tell the California ivy I can’t

pay back the sadness I borrowed

until the L.A. River flows

as ample and hubristic as the Nile

until monoxide fumes outdo

the lilac in dire sweetness

until the San Andreas Fault yelps

out its climactic subterranean scat

shattering glass steeples of commerce

into bright shards of kindness

no not until your January

buds blink themselves into

a tsunami of pink blossoms.

FOR MONSERRAT (APRIL 1, 2002)

You’re doing it again—

unscrewing wooden knobs from all the drawers,

applying the deftest degree

of push and tug,

of yin and yang,

of pitch and yaw,

negotiating the clockwise and the counterclockwise turns

just like a four-year-old safecracker,

listening to the tumbling mechanism through your fingertips.

The knob drops off,

and with your little thumb

you push the tip of the screw

till it drops backwards through the hole.

There’s no putting the knob back on—not now.

Soon there won’t be a drawer in all the

house that can be opened.

The loss is more than you can know.

That one holds the family silverware

with the initials JMH all over it

(which doesn’t mean it wasn’t made by Paul Revere),

and also an album with alligator skin

full of antique picture postcards of Niagara

bought by my grandparents on their honeymoon

(before the falls had moved so far upriver).

And nestled in another, loosely wrapped in crinkly classifieds,

is a signed photo of Mark Twain (my ancestor by marriage

to a great-great grand aunt four times removed).

The inscription (something to do with the utmost urgency

of putting off till tomorrow what needs not be done today)

is too faded to see—which I’m told increases its value.

And that one’s brimful of my toenail clippings

dating back to when I was your age—a priceless stash,

since just the single nucleus from a single cell

of that defunct and chitinous mass

is all that’s needed to replicate

the chromosomal conscience

of my Gallic-Gaelic-Nordic Anglo-Saxon race.

Have you no respect for the