My Beatles and a Lady: Norwegian Wood

This is the first of a series of poems that I'm making which incorporates songs from The Beatles. I try to mix the song with my experience, and others, giving it some new meaning. They are not supposed to be a version of the song, but rather one inspired by the songs themselves...

Apologies to The Beatles for this frail attempt
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I once had a girl, or should I say,
she once had me.

In every nightly sway
her electronic laughter, I play.
I pluck, intently I listen,
her notes and I, all night,
I try to have her music, her song -

Rewinding, Pausing, Imitating,
She in quarter note marching,
notes how vibrant, bouncing in every ledge,
it all rings even in my sleep.

I want all her tones singing from underneath me!

Emanating from my hand,
my fingers criss-crossing
this lennon fretboard of love.
And I will fall fast asleep
not able to have her,
not being able to decipher
her chords.

I so want to have her
But Oh! I couldn't see her,
Oh! I couldn't have her.
Oh! I could not sing her song
Much less play her tones.

I am all hers, and she
is mine only in stereo.

One guitar day, in my guitar dream:
There she was and I was singing:

She showed me her room,
isn’t it good,
norwegian wood?

And when I awoke I was alone,
this bird had flown.

My Beatles and a Lady - And I love her

i was twelve when i met her
and in b-side owned her Song.
in my room-world i give her all

i will fold in slumber in loving her tenderly,
violently, in her i get angry, mad as Mad can be,
i will not lose her, I said.

if you'll see my love you’d love her too,
tenderly, violently, you'll see her and hear her,
pretty soon you'll sing her Song and more,
walk with her to the park, and more, watch movies,
play cards and more, count moles and more,
and more and all.

soon another one like you, like me,
will love her, sing her Song,
shake their heads and sing her Song all day,
until, dark, is the sky, and without, stars,
in her you'll get angry too, and fold and Dream.

in our sleep with this love of ours never fading,
we find each other, many days thereafter,
many others, the dream awakens, we find stars,
in loving chorus, unison adoration,
mosh-pit veneration,
we enshrine our room-worlds
into Songs.

awake, we begin to love the same woman
and delight in sharing her with the world.
in that sense, thus, we awake as Lovers.

My Beatles and a Lady: In My Life

"Dedicated to the Beatles,
René Magritte, and this certain Lady..."

There are kisses I remember
Though some have gone, some remain
Still, I am kept reminded
of their works.

All these places in my head
All kisses and all their shades, hues and sorts:
Rivers, Dorm Rooms, Schools, Deserts,
Tropics and Beaches, and their Dark Nudes,
Farms, and Church and City Squares,
Theatres and Orchards and Sunflower Fields ---
Oh! All my life they are loved!

How is it thus, that with all these
There is one kiss, I dare not compare:
The reddest of the red, the rose
that fills the red room, that seemingly
impossible painting, painted with a kiss?

I critique and say the worst of
every lip's strokes, speak of daubs
too fake, and whine over forged angst!
All too tasteless for me!

But how, with all these creations
is a fruit of labor: a kiss
but not a kiss,
a treatise of rainbows
too unreal to name.

In my life, I have loved only this kiss.
My memory lives with this explosion of redness
And from which, I remember all the other colors.

........
Please see these other related poems
from way back in June:

My Beatles and a Lady - And I love her
My Beatles and a Lady: Norwegian Wood