have you danced
too much already, beloveds?
did it all when you were young
and had the legs for all night music,
the lungs to scream and raise your arms
toward the summit of your favorite song?
haven’t you aged into rest and being satisfied
to have the dark bright memory
of how you moved along the walls
of the basement club with the dirt floor corner,
the college bar with the lights out
on the long unused top floor,
the unlocked stairway up,
the corner full of the mushroom scent
of lovemaking and trepidation?
haven’t you danced yourself to a point
where you don’t need to dance any more
than maybe one more spin
through one more memory
of fresh human touch
filled with the expectant danger
of rejection, or maybe just your body
not being able, not being close
to able to shake your leg or your ass
as you once did, the ecstasy of fast,
the ecstasy of slow, the ecstasy of
memory, the replacement of current
sorrow with a memory of sweat?
beloveds, don’t you wanna dance
all the way to the end of your time?
Tag Archives: poetry
Toward The Summit Of Your Favorite Song
Coal Tar Blues
Revised, from June 2022.
As if to spite my being human,
I’m rusting.
Age, diabetes,
long lack of self-care —
I soak myself in coal tar
for flaking on the surface,
the scent filling every space
in all my rooms; then
take pills and talk for
my internal disrepair,
each breakdown with unlikely odds
for repair.
Nothing about any of this
is temporary or acute.
Chronic is my name,
now — we speak of conditions,
not illnesses; talk of status quo or
increase and not of progress.
Coal tar and skin creams —
odors of one failure
to treat myself
correctly, or so I tell myself.
Others say buck up, it’s not
a fault or a punishment, you
needn’t club yourself with that one,
no matter how good it feels
to feel that bad at times —
and indeed, there is a sort of blessing
in the hours after
I step out of the shower
onto an apparent path
to normalcy;
but then I lose my way as I start
the day. I tell the others,
you think so? Then come live in here
and tell me I’m not right
to feel such guilt for becoming hollowed.
I need something to come alive
in my old center, to build
there as I fall apart.
Comes a point when everything done right
is still not enough, and hope
becomes not a right but
a privilege, just a way
of passing time before time laughs
and then kills; as the scent
of sulfur becomes so strong
you can’t tell
whether it is coming from inside,
outside, or both.
Obligatory Christmas Poem, 2022
The signs
they hold up
say
homeless
helpless
hopeless
Many include a sketch
of a Christmas tree or say
Merry Christmas as well
They stand upon
the entrance ramps to
malls and big box stores
where shoppers have to wait
to get into the lot and when
a signer passes their car
they look away or discard
a quick buck out the window
then roll it up
to keep private heat
and the hallelujah chorus
in the car
and no better than that look at me
dropping a heavy metaphor obviously
onto this from on high
as if it ever matters what parallel
anyone draws about jesus
blah blah blah
joseph and mary
blah blah blah
no room at the blah blah blah
merry christmas
or whatever you got
to offer
in light of the sight
of her wet blue eyes
above her sign
his beard
combed out for the season
above his sign
the people
queued up
below commerce’s sign
tomorrow never comes
without posting a sign
of its arrival
regardless
of hopeful prophecy
blah blah blah
Play It As It Lays
The bones
were rolled for you at birth.
They chose your great adversary:
maggots, melancholy, militia…?
You decide
what’s next:
double down
or bow and fold.
How you come
to your war
once you’ve chosen
your battlefield
is the battle.
Is history’s gamble, not yours.
Listen: the house
is snickering.
A Razor And A Ring
cleaning out
an old apartment
(new to you)
unremarkable contents
of the cheap and shallow
medicine cabinet
include a straight razor
with one massive nick
in its rust-flecked blade
bottle of iodine
wood-shafted cotton swab
on the glass shelves lined
with folded paper towels
as stated
unremarkable
except
for a kid’s ring
plastic shank
set with plastic gem
centered by itself
on one shelf
imagine that kid
now an adult wondering
where her ring had gone
although it’s more likely that
she doesn’t remember
at all
her onetime treasure
left behind
for you to find
in an old apartment
(new to you)
you will
soon enough
toss those abandoned artifacts
into the trash
as you prepare
the place where you
are going to live
to be your own
a new place
to leave your stuff
when you go
Happily A Worm
I think I could be
happily a worm
if I was not so terrified
of ending up drowned
on a concrete walk
after a storm
Forced to leave
dark soil
surrounded by roots
where I’d been
most grounded
or worse
desiccated upon
a blacktopped driveway
where even
the slightest sunlight
could take from me
my pink life
and leave behind
my dark leather corpse
Even the robins
will not take that
Will leave me instead
to disappear bit by bit
into a trail of ants
bearing me
down the hatch
into their small volcano
of a home
in the sand
along the fence
I could be happily a worm
if I knew I’d be
remaining
forever or for at least a few seasons
away from all
grounded and blind
underground
The Poetry of Place: Formal announcement of the workshop
This will serve as the formal announcement of…my first virtual poetry workshop!
“The Poetry Of Place” will be held via Zoom on Sunday, January 22nd, 2023 at from 2 PM to 4PM EST.
In this workshop, we will look at how incorporating vivid, arresting sensory imagery can stimulate and energize your writing. We’ll look at examples of such poems and at some ideas about why this kind of effort is vital to The Work regardless of genre. (While we’ll be focused on poetry, you can use this information in long fiction, short fiction, etc., just as easily.)
Although the workshop will include some writing exercises and opportunities to share, it’s not primarily designed to be a generative session; I hope that instead you’ll leave with some ideas and a sense of what is possible when you “ground” your own Work in a strong sense of place.
For the record? I’ve got 30+ years of experience as a trainer and workshop facilitator for various corporations, non-profits, and government agencies, but this will be the first time I’ll use those skills for a personally developed topic. It likely won’t be the last…
The cost to the general public* is $35.00 for the session, payable through:
Venmo:
@Anthony-Brown-95
(if asked for a # after that, it’s 4124)
or
Paypal:
tony.w.brown@gmail.com
Last day to join up is Friday, January 20. **
I’d love to see you there. Drop me a line through here or at the above email address with any questions.
T
*Patrons of my Patreon site in the $10/month or higher tiers may attend for free.
** For security reasons and to help prevent Zoom bombing, I will send participants the Zoom link once payment is made or (for Patrons) once a confirmation message is sent to me on the site.
The Poetry Of Place
I will be running a poetry workshop, open to the public/free to members of my Patreon site at the $10/month level and up, on January 22, 2023. Time and Zoom link TBD at this point.
The link below will get you to a video that explains the workshop and what we’ll be striving to accomplish.
If you are not a Patreon member, the cost for the workshop is $35.00, payable by Venmo. Send me a message for the link.
I’d LOVE to have people there who are regular readers of the blog, so…let me know!
Thanks,
T
The New Tattoo
A new tattoo on my mind.
Simple banner: “I Am A Bad Person.”
Placement yet to be decided.
Naked body in the mirror:
across my chest, above my heart?
Others could easily see, and I would too.
Would the message sink in from there?
I look myself over again.
Down my dominant forearm
where it would remind all
of my strength and weakness at once?
Ah, but then I could pull my sleeve down
and no one would know. So,
forehead instead? Maybe doubled
in reverse so that my mirror
would tell me the tale, too?
Do I want that level of
awareness? Instead of that
perhaps two banners,
one on the bottom of each foot.
I’d walk that message everywhere.
It would not be obvious to others
but I’d always know
what was haunting my steps.
Maybe I’ll just keep it quiet and run the banner
right across my lower gut, right above my privates.
Only those close enough to already know
would ever see. By that point
it might mean nothing to them
and might only bring a quick pang for me.
Talking About The Night
Originally published in 2002 in my chapbook, “In Here Is Out There.”
Original title, “Talking To My Son About The Night.”
I have been thinking:
what do I tell my children about the night?
Something wicked these days
stirs in the night,
and I cannot lie to them
and say shh, be still,
all is well,
we are safe.
Instead I will tell them the night
contains both darkness and light.
I know the light may also hide darkness,
but I shall hold back on that, at least for now —
so what shall I say to them
of darkness in the night?
I will say darkness is a young man
holding a knife to a lamp.
He adores how it may separate
skin from flesh, sinew from bone.
He knows
that when it is sharp enough
he shall see the body’s coherence
fleeing before its edge.
Darkness is a woman
leaning out of her window on her elbows.
She sees something she does not favor.
She slips out the back door
to carry her gossip
to the slaughterhouse.
Someone there will take the news
to the mechanics who will adjust
the wheels of the juggernaut
for maximum kill.
On her way home
she will wipe her face with a stolen liver.
Behind her she will leave a trail
of rumors and cartilage.
Darkness is a gaggle of children
trapped in a dream
where they are made to suckle straws
filled with their own blood.
They purse their pale lips,
draw the red up, columns red rising,
red cresting in their mouths,
falling red into their stomachs,
such sharp nourishment,
such a simple lesson:
living through the night
requires such a meal,
a simple meal for a simple terror.
They have learned to devour themselves.
We stink of rich meats, phobias, fires,
restless pride, secrecy.
We inhabit our stereotypes,
slowed to the speed of custom,
houses crawling with indignation,
ferocity unbridled by logic,
atomic proverbs to live by —
a man decides to force himself
on the next random passer-by,
a boy slits an ancestor’s throat;
we shake our heads, we cry out
for the light and get the darkness,
violent, clean cut, simple, fast:
darkness is thinking that we can live forever
by living this way.
And after that? After that,
what can I possibly say of the light?
I will say to them that it is slander
to speak of the night and only note the darkness.
I will say to them: children, my children,
look at the stars.
I will say to them: children, my children,
whenever you despair of this world,
lie back
and look at the stars.
I will say yes,
there is horror afoot in the night,
but always, always,
we have the stars.
I will say that one star
may singly pierce the darkness
but that one star cannot cut through
the darkness alone.
I will say that there is
light beyond the darkness.
I will say, children, my children,
if ever you despair, remember these words:
I am a star, and I do not
shine alone.
Whoever Shall Take It Up, Remember Me
The struggle to bypass the pain
of pressing strings to fretboard
is too much to bear now so maybe
it’s time to stop the music
long enough to allow
for an amputation of my
left hand if only to see
if the ghostly nerves
of the missing piece
can play without pain
I’ve been told this
makes no sense but sense
has never guided me
all that well in pursuit
of my absolutes
and if anything is
an absolute
then the need to play
is as absolute as
the need to write
and speak and
there are other needs
and surgeries to consider
but first things first
First the music then
the dance
Wondering
if I start at the base of the neck
to cut myself free of all ailments
will I become whole and if not
what parts will remain alive
and for how long
What will my music become
What will my dance become
Who shall take up my guitar
Working Title
I’ve written a book I now pray
will never be published
Working title “Goddamn”
Subtitle “Fuck”
You think I’m joking
but in fact the profanity
is the least offensive thing
about that book
I thought I was sweet
until I wrote it
but the brain of one
who could write such a thing
(where the title and subtitle
were the least deadly words
the cleanest and sweetest
I could use to proclaim the rest)
that brain grows from
a bitter root and I’m sitting
with all that means
in my little room
The air reeks from it
Disturbance on paper
Common vulgarity
announcing common dirt
I wanted more of my work
I demanded less of me than I was
What have I got to show for it
when “Goddamn: FUCK”
is likely to be my legacy
unless I burn it and start again
Unless I burn myself down while
praying I’ll have time to start again
Blue In Sound And Hue
The place where I begin my work
rises from blue in sound and hue.
I ease its lock open each morning
and go into blue shade and blue whisper.
Sometimes I cannot leave until
the stubborn lock releases me.
Those days I cannot leave until
I agree to leave a portion of me there.
The place I go to keep working
might be brighter, might be — not.
But it will be blue, too.
A progression forward, a run upon a fretboard,
a waiting for the light to change. It may blaze
or sputter, but it will be blue.
The place I go to rest is dark enough
to let me sleep. It’s deepest blue
in pang and and riff, deep enough
to shake me through and soon
I am up and pulling
on work clothes, looking for
the key to the place
where I begin my work, the room
of blue, of sound and hue, of pang and riff,
of everything I thought I left here yesterday
and the day before and the day before that:
things whispering from concealment in the shade.
Poison, Venom, Infection
There’s danger
in poisonous lands and water;
simply being there
and breathing
is enough to make you
sicken and die.
There’s danger
among the venomous;
if you know
where to look
and how to armor up
you may walk there but
if you
blow your cover
and your armor fails,
a single sting
may get through
and be enough.
There’s danger
where the infectious
roam free, spewing
plagues and slipping germs
past your defenses when you thought
you’d done enough.
You can’t stay safe inside forever;
you are going to have to leave
the safe house one day.
Down the block, all over the country,
you see houses with trouble flags
and deadly yard signs.
Is the air around them infectious?
Are your neighbors in fact venomous?
Are these signs that the whole damned world
is poisonous and this is what
a mass casualty event looks like as it begins?
Are you enough for whatever comes next?
Leftover Chores
The dishes from
last night’s dinner
fill the sink and
whisper, “lazy…”
Blankets left
unfolded in a basket,
waiting to be put back
on the couch to protect
the upholstery from
cat hair and spills and warm you
as needed; there’s a cat already
sleeping on them, of course.
Just this once, maybe,
leave everything as is? Sure.
That’s you. Unfinished business.
You are that. Guilty as charged.
You are the One
grounded in worry and incompletion.
Every letter of your writing is unfinished.
Your hands quit on you
long before your guitar did.
Your bridges smolder but look
safe enough to recross. Of course
there’s a government to topple
and a culture to unlearn
but with furniture to protect
and dishes to do where will the time
come from? Not from anywhere,
it appears. Chop wood and carry water,
then drop the armload on the way
into the hearth and home and
spill the water where it will leave
the biggest stain. You have
formed around looking at
leftover chores and saying
it’s enough to have started,
but you know better even as you
lie back and close your eyes to it all.
You know sleeping will heal nothing.
It’s been forever since you made it through the night.
Dark Matter 