there is a small cooperatively owned grocer in an old mill up from the courthouse circle where gather every eight weeks or so a group of not so dissimilar individuals from ages four to sixty-four.
there from the hours of 4 p.m. to about 7 p.m. (small town rules) those so gathered spoke their piece and listened, drank and played, climbing rocks in the front yard and quaffing wine under the unseasonably warm January sky. the sun set and nobody got hurt.
there is a link to a description of the event here.
there were kids reading their poems and grownups reading their poems and those in between, including yours truly. a sample included below.
there will be another open event on 24 March. check out the Chatham Marketplace website for specifics.
here is a poem:
noise:word
what happened to the word?
the word is a dog is a god in a dust mote in a spiral generated just now on a screen by anonymous foot traffic is the noise outside is the noise overhead is the noise inside every part of this corpse we inhabit short term
the word is all that is inside sometimes and I try to chase it out with spots and beasts and law and threats of violence and TV and music and drink and paper and paper and paper but sometimes the only thing that works is sex
the last time is the first is the fist in my stomach is an imaginary ring just out of reach on a free merry-go-ride that never stops
the damn telephone rings again another noise I would rather do without answer it answer it answer it just hearing it is already an answer of sorts so I turn up the volume sit closer to the screen look harder at another machine and more noise comes out I need to bathe myself in it
bad for me bad for my ears bad for my posture grows hair on my soul turns morality inside-out skins ethic and eviscerates livelihood boils culture with entrails of money and paper and loves smoke
the sky is acoustic is tiles overhead is soot is old stars is collecting in the corners and hiding from even the dim lights and the word reaches out to the sky and strokes the beating flesh of night strokes with fire and all is already warm and the fire turns the words into char and the char is bagged and sold off bottom racks in quick stops off 2-lane hiways and crammed down the throats of ugly stained men with gun racks overhead and crumpled soft packs in the floorboards of their quivering saucers
the word is a dog in heat is a rut is a shallow grave at the end of a nameless cart path off a seldom visited road is a postal scale lying in the bottom of a water damaged trunk on a low table of cinder blocks and door and everything’s a quarter and covered with rust and nothing will ever have a home again just a trunk
the word is carried off along the Eightfold Path in 8 individual televised pay-per-view survival scenes where the audience may witness all they need for a modest fee the paper and the plastic never far from the tittering bitch-box
blue light singing siren stench over all
of sex and juice pour it over me no me first no me first no me no wait there’s plenty to go around which credit card will you be using today?
and each off note is another blunt nail in my last good ear is another stripped screw in the bottom of my box with the dress Pandora was wearing when she was last seen and the noise we all hear might be crying might be choking might be another mystery inside another box somewhere somebody oh please somebody open it up before we all get sick
the word gives me a headache
sometimes the phone rings and i do not answer it
flee
cover your ears
unplug it if you still have access to a cord
the noises and words are sunshine and atmosphere and gravity and that’s enough said about them.
