Diary Entry 202: Does the Dog Die? / Regis Reed

Diary Entry 202: Does the Dog Die?

Regis Reed

I want to write a poem about ideation. I want to write a poem about thoughts. I want to write a poem that makes no sense and makes sense and makes cents, because I’m poor and love word play. I am pausing this poem to make a dystopian playlist, so stop here. Get a drink. I have returned. You wouldn’t know either way if that was true. It is true. It is two hours and nine minutes long; it has thirty-three songs on it; when you were 33 I remember being so small. I remember being so small. And you were 33 but you have grown and I have grown and now I am so tall your little arms do not hold me like they used to. I want to write a poem about the grief of a child. I want to write a poem that captures all the wants I wanted in childhood, one that births dreams into realities. This is a dystopian poem. This is a dystopian poem because I am a dystopian poet and I am returned. This is diary entry 202. You should look up the other 201. You should look on ‘does the dog die.’ You should know the dog does not die but a funeral is still held.

I want to write a poem in conversation. I want a conversation. I want to build a world out of words that fits all the things that don’t fit into this one. I want to fit in your little arms. I do not. I do not know what that means–for me, for us. I do not know. I do not know. I don’t know, but back to the playlist and the two hours and the nine minutes and the thirty-three songs. I am a builder. I am a creator–creature–crater. Space rocks are not special outside of our planet. When they hit the ground they are special. Do not read into that, it is not a metaphor. You wouldn’t know either way if that was true or not. But you might think, huh, this poet has written that phrase twice now. You might think a lot of things about this ideation-obsessed-thoughtful-no-sense-making-sense-making-cents-(because-I’m-poor-and-love-word-play)-childgrieving-want-capturing-dream-reality-birthgiving-DYSTOPIAN-poem-(because-I-am-a-DYSTOPIAN-poet)-diary-entry numbered 202 after my favourite number, after that now-olderthan-33-year-old person’s birthday, after 201 dead dog entries, after it all. After it all. After it all. After.

In this Dystopian poem–and I will pause here to tell you that I am capitalizing Dystopian simply because I can and not because of what you think and not at all because there has been a narrative switch, it’s just that this is my Dystopian poem and as a dystopian Poet I can make these language rules…

(After a long-winded CONVERSATION between one person and no other persons, because I am a dystopian Poet and in this poem I get to choose who is speaking)... In this Dystopian poem I am back in the house that is not my house but might have been my house and, because a metaphor is needed here to keep the poetic sense, the house that is not mine is an ocean. Can you feel the beating of the waves? Let me take you there. It is: dark heavy, seal-skin clouds and eerie gray, the kind of brewing witches do–you get that, don’t you? That kind of beating? Black like you’ve never seen the surface, blue like the sky should be, like the sky isn’t. Like it might have been but who looks up, you’ll trip over your feet. Like it might be but we’re at sea now, we’re on the DYStopian ocean and–

A quick interlude here, for the theatrics. The word dystopia is comprised of the latin root dys, meaning bad, meaning badbadbad, and utopia. Do you know what “utopia” means? I do. Do you know what a key part of the definition is? I’ll tell you. It’s an imagined place. And for my fellow poets, but not the poets of this poem, I’ll add that I used “comprised,” not “com- posed,” in my description. Look up the difference. I’ll wait. I’ll grab a drink. Nevermind, I’ll just tell you.

Comprised conveys containment, composed referring to a combination. A mesh. Hold onto that. You’ve got to Hold it. I am a captain-captive-Poet and this is an ocean poem. There is no land, because the water loves poets and the land loves space rocks. There is a boat (and the boat is a bed in a small room, where the furniture is big, because the 33-plus-year-old picked it up on the roadside without thinking but with arm wrapping love). And the boat is safe on the ocean with its hissing spray and tear-salt showers,

but the boat has long run out of fuel,

and the boat-crewmen have all been eaten by the captive-captain-Poet.

But where does the captive-Poet go when there are no boat-crewmen and the arms (the wrapping, the loving, the holding, the not-enough-but-enough-but-okay-but-tried-theirbest) arms arms arms….

When the Poet is all alone on the bed-boat in the

house-ocean in a DYS-topian poem. When I am

having one person conversations.

Don’t you know conversations are between?

How lonely.

What a lonely-little-sad-grown-up-dream poem.

What a dystopia, and I will pause here.

I will say the dystopia is lowercase.

We’re coming down, aren’t we?

We aren’t

space rocks.

There’s formulation here.

We aren’t special.

The dystopia–

It doesn’t know itself without pandemonium, that panicked sea.

You get, it don’t you?

I want to write a poem that you get.

You get it, don’t you? Diary_Entry_202_Does_The_Dog_Die___End.