Today's poem is a cento, a "collage poem" made up entirely of lines from various poems in Ross Gay's newest book, Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude. This one’s entirely on me, I can't blame anyone for the prompt but myself. The poems go up here around midday. Here's a little to keep you going till then: 

The Way Back Up from Down

You’re right, you’re right

there’s a puritan in me

tumbling through the

never again

which was dragging my hands along its belly.

I can sometimes make these scribbled artifacts.

My name in the dust on the pews.

And can I run

to the dark

from nothing

from the slow honest tongues of horses

from my mother’s sadness

that’s been there forever?

I'm feeling pretty good about this one since I've never done a cento before. It's sort of a cross between a crossword puzzle and a Rorschach test. I started out by collecting a whole bunch of lines and then trying to see where I could combine them into something like a sentence or a meaningful collection of phrases. Then, somewhere in the middle my own mind started to make patterns, and then I went back in looking for more material to encourage that line of feeling. At the end, I’m not sure it’s a poem in its own right, but it was very interesting to work with, and I got to know a little more about Ross Gay’s wonderful book of poems.

And for my next trick.... But you'll have to come back tomorrow to find out. They're still taking donations for the wonderful Tupelo press here. They'd love to hear from you (and I would, too).