Cast Wide for Third Eye

It’s got to be

real early

before cab brakes

whistle like clarinets

and the corner bum

snores Sam Cooke

The darkness

of these early hours

used to draw the eye downward

wary of cracked pavement,

looking for the sure step

but there’s less of that these days,

the sidewalk is smoother—

maybe not so many broken windows

I’m not sure it speaks to progress

because, well—

The school kids will soon start

their morning march

And I know for a fact

that their classrooms

are split still:

cleaved wide open

Hey, Ms. Johnson,

what do you have to say

to tri-lingual kids

who used to slalom

open manholes

in their strollers

like stock car racers?

I don’t know if this is progress,

or that we’re just more

eager to apply

lipsticks to pigs’ lips

Listen: can’t we just dispense

with cosmetics?

We’re a lot less eager

for the gastroenterologist,

optometrist;

stay away from the guts

don’t need to correct vision

where can I look for collective wisdom?

Workshop Result: Magnetic North (updated)

Magnetic North

All my books have missing pages
now fastened to the plaster,
or grafted onto my skin:
mile markers and compass needles both—
the snapped branch
that can put you on my trail
if you care to follow me
through the brush
and the thicket

Don’t worry:

I’ve cleared the thorn bushes,

laid planks across streams,

and built bridges over

roaring rivers

You’ll need to be running

at full bore
to leap frog

super-highways
that stretch serpentine—
mountains high,
valley's low

Pick your way through the decades,

I’ve a route mapped for you:

I know it intimately,

been there and back too many times!

Yeah, I'm living whole lifetimes over here

three or four at a go!

Even so,

when you tell me—sometimes—
that you'd like to take a look, sometime

I have to steady my breath

like it was my very first time

So I need you to hurry, just this once

and I don't care if it's only curiosity

that finally wins out.
I don't need to see your calculus:

You are here!

Unbutton my shirt and travel overland

the length of my spine—
Seine to Seville

Woodstock to these city streets

You are right here
and I bet you stay all night.

---

My good friend Megan S., herself a really engaging writer and phenomenal poet, offered a constructive critique. Here's some of what she sent:

[referring to the poem's beginning] ...the words link up and do something nice, but i feel like they need more anchoring.

...there [are] so many great phrases like "stretch serpentine" and "pick your way" even though i wish the pick your way part were more visceral. yeah, maybe that's it. the poem starts laying itself down like [particular] train tracks and then around the middle it seems to become these [other, though similar] train tracks you are aware of having imagined and you start going, well this is what else is in my head...and i just want more train tracks to lead to the calculus part which is for sure more steel and bolts. and the end is the last bang of that hammer, which is great, i love that couplet.

Do you think I addressed these concerns without fundamentally altering the original piece (posted below)? Also, any other perspectives out there? I would very much appreciate the commentary!
  

Workshop #1

Let me pitch an idea:

I need spaces where I can gather with other writers and glean some sound criticism of what I offer here. Propinquity of space is unnecessary; perhaps, internet anonymity will even facilitate more honesty. What do you all think?*

I wrote this on the train today. It has a way to go, but I'm pleased with the start.

Magnetic North

All my books have missing pages
now fastened to the plaster,
or grafted onto my skin:
mile markers and compass need both--
the snapped branch
that can put you on my trail
 if you care to follow
through the brush
and the thicket

Leap frog super-highways
that stretch serpentine--
mountains high,
valley's low;

pick your way through the decades,
yeah, I'm living whole lifetimes over here
three or four at a go!

You tell me--sometimes--
that you'd like to take a look,
sometime.

But I don't care if it's only curiosity
I don't need to see your calculus:

You are here:
unbutton my shirt and travel overland,
the length of my spine
Seine to Seville

You are right here
and I bet you stay all night.

*[note: I am fully aware there are very few of "you" at out present juncture. That's okay; I'm coming for you.]