Poetry constellating here

Something is constellating here," said the Jungian lecturer, years ago when I begged to be allowed to listen to a talk intended for therapists. At the time I was not only fascinated by Carl Jung, I was captivated by Jungian language. "What do you mean ‘constellating’?" someone asked, while I craned my neck to better hear the answer. "Constellating" is when a series of things – facts, events, ideas – for some unknown reason (or serendipitously, another Jungian favorite) start grouping together in a patient’s life or even in society and culture. You ponder this cluster of seemingly unrelated things or dots and try to connect them so the picture (something definable) can emerge.

I think that somewhere on my family’s universe, poetry is constellating. My daughter, Panjee, recently helped host a poetry conference. She and her sister Risa appear to share a growing interest in poetry. I, on the other hand, started teaching writing this year. In my workshop called "The Joy of Writing," poetry happens quite spontaneously as a result of the process integral to the course. Never formally trained in poetry I adhere to the standards of the book on which my course is based, which basically says that if it expresses what you feel, sounds and reads wonderfully, and makes the writer/poet happy, it’s poetry enough for us. I confess though that I am thrilled when the piece presents the mundane poetically. The following are examples of what I mean.

My Body Is Plastic Carmencita Abelardo

My body is plastic and I as ubiquitous.

I think, talk, eat, breathe plastics

can never imagine my thermoset body

in any other form, shape or size.

I am the result of the favorable balance

of all the mechanical, chemical and

thermal properties of life. My body consists

of carbon, oxygen, hydrogen,

nitrogen, chlorine, sulphur and fluorine.

I see myself amongst the long molecules

of polyolefins and polymers clustered, branched

or chained. I cannot see my thermoplastic self

in any other place but in the synthetic world

of plastics where I can be all the exciting colors

on the Pantone chart, and more. From the deepest red

to the light, very warm feel of the pearlescent,

gold, and silver hues.

My plastic self has been continuously processed,

softened by heat, hardened from pressure

moulded into God’s desired form.

I have been through the best and worst

subjected to the melting point of 280 degrees Tg*

until my body and soul polymerized and

like processed resin I emerged stronger, tougher,

transparently crystal clear, victoriously durable.

The plastic world is where I cyclically revolved

every second, minute, and hour of every day

for 35 years and there my plastic self

will continue to exist eternally

refusing to be dissipated

by the temporary and the illusory.

My plastic body will ever be

an omnipresent speck in the universe.

I will never melt away, never be swiftly dismissed

or condemned into the oblivion.

My body is plastic – meant to last forever.

• Tg refers to the glass transition stage where the melting point of resin is achieved, given the right combination of heat and pressure.

Menchie Abelardo is an industrial engineer, an authority in plastics. Her poem debunks the notion that engineers cannot write poetry. Boboy Consunji describes himself as a "suit" in qan ad agency, meaning he isn’t in the creative part but rather in the management part of the business. Who would guess that from his poem in response to an assignment called "Beautiful Tyrant"?

Onion Boboy Consunji

So beautiful yet so bruising.

Your penitentiary purple heralds more pain.

A tear is shed as I slice through your rich swirls.

You sting though I don’t really suffer.

I feel like a corpse being wheeled into cremation.

I’m burning, about to break into smithereens,

while deftly chopping you into pieces.

Now I toss.

I sprinkle you with pinches of salt and pepper.

And how you brighten up my salad.

You’re a cool complement to alfalfa, bean, cabbage, carrot.

You refresh a bowl of ruffled produce.

As I bite into you, I smile in sorrow.

O dear onion, yours is a terrible beauty.

"You teach poetry to corporate types?" someone incredulously asked.

But, of course. Tehnically, poetry is demanding. No other form will move you to look for the precise word. It is here that most people realize they need to build their vocabularies. Poetry is disciplined writing even when the form is free. Also poetry communicates so beautifully. If we communicated so carefully and so beautifully with each other within the corporation or at home, life would have so much more quality.

Anyway, poetry seems to be constellating in the sky above us. I think we should smile, embrace it, welcome it back into a world that so badly needs megadoses of poetry.

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Please send comments to lilypad@skyinet.net or check out www.lilypadlectures.com for information on writing classes.