Hit Me Running

Don’t sell me funeral plots
on late night television
if the end is already in sight

am I supposed to pull the sheets up to my neck,
count to zero,
smile, and cease?

no

keep your pills, in all their pretty colors:
celebrex, propecia, allegra, lipitor, zanex, viagra
keep them for scrabble
keep your rogaine, your facelifts
keep your death insurance
keep your graveyard reservations

hit me running.

let me go down swinging

make it a sport:

give me a ten-minute head start
and an obstacle course.

place a beautiful girl on the far side of a mine field
and whisper, “she wants to kiss you”

target me on my feet
dodging doomsday’s in slow-mo bullet time

let me duel the grim reaper in a poetry slam

but let me lay where i fall
let the buzzards and coyotes
pick apart my bones
don’t stuff me and sew me up
waste my estate on alcohol for my wake
not formaldehyde
instead of wood for a coffin,
build me a funeral pyre
and set me ablaze like a pagan-warrior-king
sing songs,
roast marshmallows,
get drunk,
and recite your poetry
by the time we’re done
the grim reaper will beg for a vacation

i don’t have to win,
but let me believe I have a chance at immortality
even if the probability is one a billion.
those are good odds
if I’m the one

those who believe in death will die first

if I believe I’m going to live forever,
if I believe I can fly
I just might

so from the chickens before me,
sucking in their pot-bellies,
grooming their comb-overs,
I’ll craft wings from their plucked feathers
reach cruising altitude alongside Icarus
but outrace the sun

light doesn’t have the speed to catch me

these lungs won’t stop breathing,
these cells will break open replacements
this heart will beat out of sheer will
to last longer than timex or twinkies
and endure eternity
just to see how this story ends
and whether
the hero gets the girl
or a bullet to the brain

I will hold onto immortality
by my fingernails and the skin of my teeth
past the all epochs and ages and armageddons
so I can see if the end
begins the beginning all over again
or does the whole thing backwards
or upside down with inverted colors
or just stops
like in the Twilight Zone,
one second before the apocalypse

but my bet is that i
will finally sober up
take my medication
set the alarm
roll over
and turn the television off

Spinal Language

SPINAL LANGUAGE
(For Christmas)
give me a tattoo
deeper than skin
on the bones of my spine
onto the surface of every vertebrae
in every human tongue
tattoo their word for “poetry”
so that no language feels foreign anymore;
so that each human voice
can speak a word in me

let Arabic and Hebrew
sit side by side without throwing stones
let Cantonese and Hindi characters
link hands to hold Swahili and Hutu in a hammock
let Basque and Zulu finally touch lips Vietnamese
while Navajo rests it’s head on the shoulder of Malay

we speak six thousand tongues
but i’ll endure the pain and the time
so no human voice can speak to me
without being felt
down to the bone

let African syllables
share space with European articulations,
Asian morphemes,
and Aboriginal pronunciations,

line them up and engrave them
like an organic barcode written in Braille
readable by the worms that will one day convert me back
to the religion of dust and ash
that we believed in once
before this cult of flesh and blood
brought us out from clay
to play brief characters in the rain

let them taste the flavor of our words
let them consume poetry
and give it back to the soil
so the earth can feel the weight of our words
and not forget us
when we extinct ourselves
like the species before us

carve the last word
in morse code
at the base of my spine
so that I can hear the rhythm of the word
in my hips when i sleep
.--. --- . - .-. -.--
let dots and dashes spread
across all my bones in a virus of comprehension
so if i lose my voice
I can still speak a word
by tapping my fingers,
pounding a drum
or changing the rhythm of my heartbeat
to speak with my blood

imagine

six thousand tongues
playing my spine
in 33-part harmony
making a symphony of me
with a melody that reverberates
up my spinal cord
echoing louder and louder in the tunnel
amplifying the compounding music
all the way to the base of my brain
where it detonates
and resonates inside my skull
ricocheting
six thousand new expressions
for the same word
with the voices of six billion singers
into my six trillion thoughts
until I can take no more chaos
and their song explodes from my lips

offering the world
a moment of synchronized understanding
of one song
of one voice
of one man
for one instant

before the world blinks
loses focus
and listens to the echo
slowly fade away

Ex-Girlfriend Haiku #31

all I really want
from you is a reason to
be nice for a change

Election Year Mudslinging

Must be read in the voice of a political attack ad.

Christopher Lane
claims he’s right for America,
but what is he really hiding?

do you think you know
the real Christopher Lane?
since Mr. Lane moved to Arizona
republicans retook the white house
and both houses of congress
since Mr. Lane moved to Arizona
3 million Americans have lost their jobs
the economy has faltered
and we went to war in Iraq
where are the weapons of mass destruction, Mr. Lane?

Christopher Lane won’t tell you
about his connections to Enron
the dot-com bubble
the space shuttle Columbia disaster
the earthquake in Iran
or the breakup of Ben Affleck and J-Lo
what are you hiding, Christopher Lane?

Christopher Lane went to china last year
he claims it as a vacation
was it really?
or is Mr. Lane a dirty red communist?
what is he really hiding?

Christopher Lane seems to ask a lot of questions
he has a poem called “how many more?”
and one called “can you spare some change?”
and his first book was called,
“who is your god now?”
Lots of questions, Mr. Lane
but I think the American people
deserve some answers
why won’t you answer the questions, Mr. Lane?

lets look at some comparisons:
both Mr. Lane and George W Bush are from Texas,
both Mr. Lane and Jeffrey Dahmer wore tennis shoes
both Mr. Lane and Unabomber Ted Kazinski
lived in a trailer in the woods
both Mr. Lane and Napoleon stood 5 foot 7 inches tall
both Mr. Lane and Adolf Hitler ... had facial hair

so why would you trust Mr. Lane?

what are you hiding Mr. Lane?
why won’t you answer, Mr. Lane?
it’s time to get tough, Mr. Lane
and answer the real questions of America:
who is really financing the NORAZ Poets, Mr. Lane?
where is Osama bin Laden, Mr. Lane?
how did you vote in the 2000 election, Mr. Lane?
will the Mars Rover discover water and the evidence of life, Mr. Lane?
did you put the "Bop" in the "Bop-Shu-Bop," Mr. Lane?
do you “got milk”, Mr. Lane?
what was Willis talkin’ ‘bout, Mr. Lane?
where were you on the night of November 31st, Mr. Lane?
what is the square root of
twelve-thousand-nine-hundred-eight-three,

Mr. Lane?
why won’t a woman sleep with me, Mr. Lane?

until Christopher Lane answers these questions,
America can’t trust you –

but who can they trust?
who should win this slam?

Christopher Fox Graham
he’s good for America,
he’s good for Arizona,
and he deserves at least a 9.7


“Hi, I’m Christopher Fox Graham,
and I approve this message.

The Peach is a Damn Sexy Fruit

the Peach is a damn sexy fruit
if I could love a fruit like a woman
I would love a Peach
strong but soft
sweet but tart
the fuzz tickles my nose
and the sticky dewiness
is finger-licking good

you can keep your apples
Mr. Johnny Appleseed
that turn brown in minutes

you can have your bitter grapefruit
the blinder of eyes at breakfast

tempt me not tomátoes or tomătoes!
cucumbers and zucchinis
those transvestite fruit
masquerading as vegetables!
for shame!
be true to yourselves!
do not deny that you were born as
and will always be fruit!

Coconuts require hammers, screwdrivers, or stones
and I am not into fetishes

Raspberries are too fragile
and can not love my volatility

Strawberries went corporate and sold out
now just fruits of the Man

Bananas are too exotic, too high maintenance
I have no patience for their ego

Cherries are but pop culture prostitutes
in everything from couch syrup to antacids to condoms

give me truth!
give me tenderness!
give me consistency!
give me a Peach!
give me Peaches!
give me millions of Peaches
Peaches for me
millions of Peaches
Peaches for free

you can eat a Peach voraciously
diving into juicy goodness
dribbling down your chin,

or eat it slowly in slices – one by one
you can nip off the skin
bit by tender bit
in a slow seduction
and tongue and suck it to the end

or you can rub that Peach into your face
eating it like a drunk starving monkey
and leave the orgasmic dew
on your cheeks and lips for hours

when complete,
no matter how consumed
you have the core
as a reminder that we are all the same
beneath it all
when our flesh, youth, and vitality are gone

yet...

you can bury the Peach core
to be born again
because the Peach embodies hope
because the Peach embodies life
the Peach is a message
the Peach is sensual
the Peach is you and me
the Peach is a damn sexy fruit

Copyright 2003 © Christopher Fox Graham

Letter to my tribe

You never know
what may happen
how fate plays games with our lives
rolls the dice
cut chords or ties them
speed bumps, heart attacks, or heart breaks
the way the words and worlds
shake this fragile etch-a-sketch existence

sixty years is nothing
in the blink of the eye of the earth
cities gone in minutes
remember Pompeii?
and yet we have trouble
with 4-letter words
like miss, love,
and hope
it takes holidays, accidents, and funerals,
to bring souls together
like we were meant to be,
to say what we should have said
when we had the chance
before we stand at graves
or on seashores
or staring out into open skies
with wrinkled eyes,
whispering, "remember when?"

in days before chat-room romances
Technicolor campfires
depressed fireside chats,
before the pomp-and-circumstance of the parliaments,
royal courts, basilicas, cathedrals
before churches
before warrior houses
before town halls,
kin gatherings,
and the great rituals

before it all
the family,
the campfire,
the speaker
was the word,

the thought beneath all our skins,
that although we could never conquer it all,
or understand it all
or even see it all
we could know each other's words,
know their kiss, touch, and caress
and enjoy the birth
dancing, loving, living, dying, and death
like we were meant to be
a tiny tribe
on a tiny world
where we all share a common name
and the word

Cut out my heart and leave it in a gin and tonic on top of a Dave Matthews Band cd

This is beauty,
the way skin bounces off clouds
shouted to a thickened sky
of a heaven too tired to listen
and I feel a step closer to god
when i contemplate our creation

you know we were made in the image
of a drunk deity
who didn't know her/is right from her/is left
tried to shorten our days with death and plague
but we kept coming back
till s/he woke in a hangover
and realized what s/he'd done
was a little, um, crazy at the time
a little short on the why’s and how’s
of how we came to be
left us between two dead soldiers of Sam Adams light
on her/is best friend's neighbor's kitchen counter
'cause s/he was watching her/is figure
tries to hide her/is face in the bar
when we come staggering through,
asking to use the phone.
and begging the bartender to serve us the wine
of the vine that softened judas' loyalty
then asking the gravedigger to bury us
close enough to count raindrops
of the days till judgment
when pulled from the soil like treasure
we can recall our days before it all went downhill
and convince the final judge
that we're worth sparing
worth including in the finality
then sing a song
soft enough to make the towers crumbles,
tarnish those pearly gates
and force the whole mess
to come crashing down
when heaven falls
the boom will resound through history
in our heartbeats,
and the echoes will come 72 per minute
there,
put your hand on your sternum
can you feel the echo in your chest?
the end has already happened
now we're just words arching toward that final
"the end"
before the acknowledgements,
index,
and afterward from the publisher,
characters on a page.
and tonight,
I glimpse the reader's eyes

Wanderer

Side stepping the truth
The poet kept his feet moving
Across the steel and stone
Wandering the back of the fallen colossus
Searching for words that wouldn’t bite back
Like the mosquitoes of the world he came from
Words that didn’t suck blood from his skin
Words that didn’t drain him
Words that didn't itch when they left him
He walked through open fields of wild sentences
Moving in great herds like buffalo,
And packs of phrases hunting lonely consonants
Down by the water’s edge
Clichés clinging to tree branches
And the skies filled with flocks of vowels
Flying south for the winter
He found only one word that didn’t harm him
One word he could keep as a pet
Hold it close to his chest as he explored
Until it grew and became his lover
One word that asked for nothing but affection
And to be kissed softly by moonlight
He knew one day it would kill him
Slit his throat while he slept
Or drown him down by the river
Where fragments swam alongside words
Of forgotten vocabularies
But he was happy
As long as it loved him

How Do You Feel?

i feel like a skin tree
roots that uproot at a moments notice,
limbs that stretch toward to sun
warmed in the morning kiss of sunrise
fingers entending beyond imagination
and from their tips
ink drips new blood
thoughts falling like acorns
to bury themselves in the minds of man
to sprout new poet trees
new poet-trees
new poetries
new poetry
in the image of me

I Want to Conquer the Sun

these hands stay idle too long in a day
they should be freed from this wage slavery
so they can lewis-and-clark the crevasses of my skull
and pull out the stories hiding in the shadows
but without a reason, why write?
bored soldiers grow bellies without a war
the sound of shrapnel and artillery
keeps the skin thin and trim
just like the art of this poet
gnashing teeth and cutting words
the better to invade minds with,
i'm not content with norman beaches
or the hills of anzio
i want to conquer the sun

dream deferred

i smelled you on my skin today
sugary sweet
as if you had slipped in while I slept
traced footsteps on my eyelids
left before I woke
no notes on the nightstand
no kisses on the cheek
no lipstick “I love you”s
scrawled on the mirror
wandering specter of
the poltergeist of my haunted head
you creak the stairs
flicker the lights
and appear in reflections
an apparition of my past life;
a past wife that mysteriously disappeared
and now haunts the halls
like a Jane Austin novella

your absence is unbearable
so I’m inventing the technology
to clone you from your fingertips
duplicate your smile
from the one tattooed to my lips

but replicating your motion proves a complication
because you are anything but tame
salsa and samba
shake your hips
like a sidewinder
though I never saw you dance
but the venom of that vision
makes my limbs limp
don’t suck the poison out
it hurts
how I love it
it hurts how I
love it
watching you toss those hips
like a South American coup
every other second

Lorca and Neruda
spin in their sonnets
because the were born too late
to know you
Pablo keeps asking for an introduction
and Federico is full of false promises
begging to see your skin

but only I know
how you are three shades more bronze than me
a color that does not exist except on you
so I’m spending way too much time
trying to match your complexion
like they do paint at Home Depot;
soon it will cover every inch
of every room in my house

only I know how to read the cartography of your back like a treasure map
charting a course starting at your neckline
meandering down your spine
to the basin of your back
just above those vicious hips

only I know the imprint of your aroused aroma
and could bottle it as ‘Arizona nights’
but Hilfiger and Klein couldn’t pay me enough
to surrender a drop of your scent
I told them Tommy cologne on day-old skin
and cold tortillas fresh from the fridge
once reminded me of you
the same way warm bread
makes one recall grandmother long gone
or peaches bring back the morning
after you traded your virginity
for whatever this is called …
but their marketing departments
said that analogy wasn’t economically viable

it doesn’t matter
because you never made sense
like freeway speed bumps,
dehydrated water
a Republican with a soul
or martyrs who would rather burn than lie

you’d think a burning saint
would smell like ambrosia or lavender
but they reek like your arm
brushing against the carburetor
indistinguishable from a sinner’s skin

the difference between that scar and a sign
is interpretation compounded by time

which means we’re a circumstance
and a coincidence
closer to god than we thought
which is closer than I’d rather be most days
so close, in fact,
you can almost smell it

Adriatic Haiku

I have never sailed
along the Dalmation coast
do the boats have spots?

CFG loves the Cop who busted him [smile]

Last night I went to hunt down KuK to wish him a happy birthday. Couldn't find the bastard, dagnabit.

En route, I scored a chimichanga at one of the 24-hour Mexican food restaurants that speckle Phoenix.

Inside, I found Sergeant Rameriz, the Tempe Police Dept desk sergeant who was on duty when I got arrested last year. I smiled, he smiled, I asked if he remembered me. He said he did, "you were the drunk kid who was giving astrology advice." I had been giving advice to the officers on duty about when they should have kids compatible to the personalities of them and their wives. He asked if I'd been in trouble since and I told him no. Sgt. Rameriz told the officer he was sitting with that I was "some wild entertainment" that night.

Guess that even drunk and belligerent, Christopher Fox Graham is charmingly entertaining. Yay me.

My First of Many Kat Sanford Love Ballads

Sedona was great. I rolled up north with my ever-present hetro-companion KuK and his friend Kevin. Now Kevin and I have had a unique relationship. He and KuK were friends long before I met the boy and on the first night I met Kevin, we got incredibly drunk at a bar and I hit on his wife. With good reason, he wanted to kick my ass, but as time passed, he came to realize that I'm just a drunken moron, not a moral-less pervert.

In any case, we rolled up to Humbolt, Arizona, just outside Dewey, Arizona, which is outside of Middle-of-fucking-nowhere to visit KuK's mom. She is delightfully crazy and no longer on her meds. Crazy, but in a fun way.

We went to the swimming hole on Oak Creek.

Karega from Houston, Texas was the feature. His performance was off, and he had to restart a few times, but his material was good. The audience adored him.

The slam was long but good. By pure fate, three of the four weakest poets went first and were cut after round one. Scores were all over the place. In round one, some scores were as low as 4.5 but there were some 10s. Craziness.

Rounds 1 and 2 were cumulative; round 3 was a fresh slate.

There is an Honour mystique I try to live by. There are 3 types of slam poets:
Virgins (i.e., "I've just written my first poem, now I must slam it. I say 'goddess' 'thee' 'thou' 'faith' and 'love' 90 times." Often these poets don’t come back because they’re blown their life’s load in a single shot.)
Regulars (i.e., "I slam on occasion because it’s Tuesday and I’m here. I write a little. They often do well in a single venue, rarely venture out, and sometimes get features here and there.”) Regulars have a job and write poetry on the side.
Stars (i.e., Member of National Team, tour regularly, travel to other venues, sometimes states away. Can feature anywhere, have big repertoires, chapbooks, and network on the national level.) Conversely, all stars write poetry and have a job on the side.
All poets started at the bottom and all have the potential to rise, if they work hard. In a perfect world, all Stars have an equal shot to beat each other in a fair slam, and all Stars beat all Regulars, etc.

David Luben from Prescott had told me before the slam (quote), "I can't believe I'm on the same stage as Christopher Fox Graham. I'm honored. I've be listening to your CD for months." Now that threw me. A compliment that also doubled as veiled self-doubt about his work, which is great, by the way. His humility was honest, but now I was bound by my Honour to beat him.

Additionally, from Flagstaff was Aaron Johnson, whom I had judged in a Speech and Debate tournament in Glendale. I introduced myself to him erroneously thinking we’d never met, then he told me I gave him a low score in his S&D round, but my comments were good. He’s buddies with Tony D, and has a performance style reminiscent of Tony D and Nick Fox, though not as good as either. Many Speech and Debate poets are comfortable with the highly stylized performance style they’re taught. Once they break from that, like Josh Fleming and David f. Escobedo have, and as Tony D is beginning to, they become comfortable in their own skin, they seem more natural and most honest. Their writing becomes more natural and most honest too. So both these boys put me in a position of 'slam authority' in one fashion or another. So this wasn’t just a fun “let’s do whatever” slam. My reputation as a good slam poet was on the line. You can't get beat by a protégé on your first battle. It ruins the Honour mystique.

I had eight pieces I was fiddling with through the whole first round, planning my strategy. Humor was doing okay, but then one poet's humor poem about a family reunion tanked and threw me off. Jessica XXX from Prescott/Arcosanti did a serious poem and scored high, and young David Luben from Prescott did a humorously ironic piece about not wanting to sleep with fat women, instead preferring anorexic model types. Being a bigger guy, the piece was powerfully ironic, then got serious at the end. He scored a well-deserved 29.0 and was in first.

So I had to meet or beat his 29.0. I was lucky enough to go last so I had 13 poet performances before me to base my choice on. At that point, I had whittled my eight poems down to five to select. In the end, I went serious with a poem I’ve never slammed north of Anthem. I picked it because of the four, it had the most ‘you-must-pay-attention-to-this-line’ lines. One of those pieces where every line is interesting and poetic and has no fluff or filler building to some great final line or idea. I too scored a 29.0 and tied for first.

I shook hands and made pleasantries with all the poets whose work I liked, which was almost everyone on stage. David Luben and I, now broken-in congratulated each other. We both knew that we were the top gunners in the round and the battle was between us. Like two equal champions of rival armies, and both aware of the Honour code. No holds barred in round two.

Because round two technically didn’t matter at this point, because the dramatic variation in scores meant I could score as low as a 25 and if everyone else pulled a 30, I’d still make round 3. So I could afford some risk.

Ten minutes before the slam, I wrote perhaps the silliest, stupidest, funniest poem. This was my round two piece. Scores were higher and the mood was tenser. So I pulled out this poem and scored a 30.0 Perfect score on a ten-minute-old poem giving me the top score in round two. Jesus H. Christ.

Suzy La Follette cleansed our palate between rounds.

Round three, all guns came out. Jessica XXX went first and pulled a 29.8 with a piece about appearance. Shit, she set the bar. The next three poets didn’t even come close, and David Luben’s poem also scored well beneath this. His piece was good, but he had other works to pull from that could have taken the round. It was a risk that didn’t make it.

I went 5th of 6th and slammed with another new poem, though I had written it two days before. I was still writing parts through rounds one and two. I thought it went too long, but was under the mark, and took a lot out of me. One of those ‘I-will-collapse-when-I-sit-down’ poems. I wasn’t looking too seriously at scores and thought I only scored a 29.7 (10, 10, 10, 9.7, and a 5th score). I felt great about the slam and could tell I touched a lot of people in the audience. I could feel the emotion reverberating back to me during that poem. But I figured I took 2nd, so I listened to the last poet Rebekah Crisp finish the round with all the pressure off. Turns out that 5th score was actually a 9.9 meaning I won by 0.1.

Christopher Lane offered a victory poem, but I couldn’t top my round two and three poems that night, so I offered it to Karega who did his best piece of the night.

After the slam, this irritation a blue beret caught me before I could take to this cute girl I had seen in the back of the audience. I couldn’t break away and watched her pass by three times. By the time I could negotiate a smooth way out of this verbal trap, she was gone and my heart was broken. Dammit!

We headed back to Christopher Lane’s for bonfire and conversation. Almost all the slammers were there, but I ducked out to talk to Akasha, Lane’s amazing fiancé. Eventually Christopher Lane, Suzy La Follette, and Karega were inside the trailer talking poetry, poetic theory, and audience reaction while the other slammers were around the bonfire.

Only Kevin, KuK, Jessica XXX and I spent the night, all curled up the trampoline, so by morning, we had all slid together. Tight quarters.

The four of us went to breakfast (Akasha and Lane went to work at dawn), then went to the swimming hole. Cold as fuck. Back at Lane’s, we went down to the creek, hopped on rocks, crashed and then got thrown out of a wedding reception by the father of the bride. Fun, fun.

I wish Katie Wirsing had been there though.




Yesterday, KuK and I snuck into Harkins and went theater-hopping again.
Once Upon A Time in Mexico. Sucked. They tried too hard to complicate the plot and just seemed like a dry fuck with mariachi music. Just go see Desperado again.
Matchstick Men. Nicholas Cage is fun to watch ‘cause he has the character down. Con movie with a double con that we saw coming about halfway through. Worth the $6.50 (if you pay it).
S.W.A.T. Cop flick. Action flick. Formulaic plot. Character actors:
Young hot shot with chip on his shoulder
Badass, streetwise chick
Family man who gets shot
Greedy cop who turns traitor for the money
Token Black buddy
Go it alone leader who rival his boss but knows his team rocks.
As long as you’re not expecting anything new or innovative, it’s not a bad movie though. Also worth the $6.50 if you pay it.

They Held Hands

On a commonplace Tuesday morning,
not unlike that Sunday morning
60 years before, destined for infamy
they held hands as they fell

It was a working Tuesday
a date on the calendar
a morning like the morning before
but now they found themselves
standing on the window sill
of the 92nd floor
overlooking the city
and they felt weightless

They were not thinking
about the cause-and-effect history
of textbooks and CNN sound bytes
they weren’t debating the geopolitical ramifications leading up to that morning
he had decaf
she had a bearclaw and an espresso
and they talked about Will & Grace

jets impregnated buildings with infernos
and now the fire was burning
and the smoke was rising
and it was getting hard to breathe
even after they smashed the window out
the inferno was swelling
it had reached their floor
their stairwells were gone
and the options now
were to burn
or to fall

when the human animal realizes death is inevitable
psychologists say we want control
over those final moments
choosing suicide over surrender is a healthy reaction
because we choose to accept annihilation
rather than letting it choose us

So on one side
is unbearable heat
roaring flames
acrid smoke
and screams of the suffering
On the other side
fresh air
suicide is the final act of free will
that keeps the consciousness intact
even as it is destroyed

but they were not thinking about psychology
they were not thinking about terrorism
the debate about responsibility,
retalaiation,
wars, flags, and Patriot Acts
can wait until September 12th
this morning belongs to them
because they did not have a tomorrow
the true terror of that morning
is to know what they were thinking
as they decided then whether
to burn
or to fall
now, imagine having that conversation
with the stranger
sitting next to you:
The barricade at the door is on fire
the extinguisher is empty
we are blinded by the smoke
and on the windowsill of the 92nd floor
we wait until flames lick our clothes
before we lean forward
and choose that moment to fall
others who fell were scrambling
or screaming or on fire
but we held hands as we fell

survivors of falls from extreme heights report
that falls are slow-motion transcendence
and the experience is almost “mystical”

I don’t know if they felt “mystical”
I know it takes
1 …
2 …
3 …
4 …
5 …
6 …
7 …
8.54 seconds to fall 1,144 feet

just enough time to say a prayer
or regret a memory
or ask forgiveness
or say goodbye
or wonder how the sky can be so perfectly blue
on such a beautiful morning

I Fell In Love Soooo Many Times

Current Mood: sleepy
Current Music: Tool "The Grudge"
This is the obligatory post-Nationals post. I'm not sorry for the length. This is my journal, dammit.

TUESDAY


I showed up not knowing exactly how I would volunteer at Nats. I wasn't on any list despite being confirmed as a bout manager or emcee weeks earlier. I wound up getting a solo Bout Manager slot at 8:30 Wed Phyllis's; volunteered for Mike Henry's slot Bout Manager slot at 8:30 Thurs at the Subterranean upstairs and volunteered as co-Bout Manager with Rusty Russell's at the Subterranean upstairs Thurs at 10:00.

We went to Eitan Kadosh's party on the first night and drank and partied until late. The highlight, obviously was Klute's face dive into the grass out front. Tony D [info]italianpoet and I hunted for his car, then hunted for Eitan's house, then hunted for The Klute. Had we been sober, it would have been simple. However, being loaded, it was less than so.

WEDNESDAY


The first bout I had was between DC-Baltimore, Ft. Worth, and Orange (CA). DC/Baltimore SlamMistress Delrica Andrews took a shine to me early on because she was new to Nationals and eager to watch a Nationals bout. Orange took the lead early and never let go. By the third round, DC/Baltimore had a slim lead but was knocked into third by Ft. Worth. Their SlamMaster raised a protest over a pair of judges, suggesting that they were writing down poet's scores to predetermine the winner. Both I an the emcee Cynthia French disagreed. The two women were loaded, and their scorecard which we got back was scribbled across. They hadn't even written down names, let alone teams. Also, there is no reason for them to not write down their own scores, if even to keep themselves consistant. Later, I spoke to Ms. Spelt and Phil West [info]pinata about the protest, who politely referred to it as 'The Education of Ft. Worth Protest'. Bout 10 Scores.

Afterward, I stayed for the Oakland, Minneapolis, Mesa slam held in the same venue, hosted by emcee Ms. Spelt from Vancouver and BM Nikki Patin from Chicago. Not reading scores between rounds threw a lot of hardcore slammers in the audience, but I can see their point; the show was 30 minutes behind schedule and the owner Clem (a great guy BTW) was riding them hard. Bout 17 Scores.

Afterward I headed to the Erotica Slam at the Subterranean but the venue was packed and the bouncers had stranded 100 poets out front. I bounced and hooked up with [info]theklute and Tapestry from Oklahoma City, who was competing as a Storm Poet.

I partied late into the night bouncing from room to room, finally meandering home around 5:00 am.

THURSDAY


The next morning, Thursday, [info]theklute scored a limo to pick up his girlfriend [info]spacekadette. Funny enough, I didn't see them until the next day. I headed down to Filter for the Protest meeting but the venue was closed. En route, I scored a great Elmo t-shirt for $1.34, that I paid in dimes and nickels. I met up with the scorekeepers from the night before, one of whom knows Keith Bruecker from Monterrey, California. After scribbling down standings and networking, I scored some lunch with the Vegas crew and Jill from Vancouver.

Despite years of miss contacts, Andy Kenyon does exist, and she's dope. Her girlfriend is crazy cool, scrambling around with a camera, snapping away. I met them at pre-registration before we headed to Eitan's, then had lunch at a small restaurant across the triangle square from the Chopin Theater.

Andy and I went to the GLBT (formerly queer) reading hosted by the amazing Daphne Gottlieb and Ms. Spelt. Adam Stone (Boston-Cantab) rounded out the event with a haiku - an excellent seque as I caught the head-to-head Haiku immediately afterward. Ed Mabrey, Hillary Thomas, and Matthew John Conley trounced Lucy Anderton soundly, but the judges, well, hmm.

My second night's bouts were are the Subterranean, upstairs. Got there early and prepped stuff while 5th ranked NYC Union Square took out 25th ranked Ozarks (a unique team) and 52nd ranked Alaska. Bout 25 Scores.

Both Marty McConnell (Union Square) and Corinna Delgado (Alaska) broke my heart. Marty McConnell always breaks my heart. Her poem about the imperfections and nuances of her body ... why can't I move to NYC and live in her closet? Or maybe under the bed. Just come out when she wants someone to talk to.... I'd be the best boyfriend ever; she'd always be right, I can cook, I'd only talk when she wanted me to, and I'd massage her feet after a long day.

sigh


Next, I had Ottawa, Del Ray Beach, and Winston-Salem. By 8:30, Winston-Salem still hadn't arrived. Nikki Patin, the emcee, and I were shifting through the PSI Handbook to know what to do if a team didn't show up. Turns out, they were stranded out front due to an issue with an underage poet and a missing ID. Also, they were stoned as fuck. Why they didn't send up just one poet to check in ... who knows. In the end, Del Ray Beach won and Ottawa took second. Winston-Salem came in a distant third. A potential protest occurred when one Winston-Salem poet read solo, then read another piece while a teammate beat-boxed. While they don't have to specify who wrote the piece, it is a little, um er, suspect. Fortunately, Mariah Summers was the only one who noticed and felt no need to protest as her team won. Damn dirty hippies.Bout 32 Scores.

Next up was 24th ranked Albuquerque (with a 2), 37th ranked San Antonio (with a 2), and 49th ranked DC/Baltimore (with a 3). A strong win by either Albuquerque or San Antonio could have given them a shot at Semi-finals. Tense. The emcee was Michael Brown. The coach for San Antonio was Phil West and on Albuquerque's team was Danny Solis. Having these three old school giants of Slam in the same room was great, but a little unnerving. I did feel honored to be their bout manager, but I knew it was going to be tense. First, it was a little tough to get an honest, healthy mix of unaffiliated judges, but I think we did well. Second, I had to watch the competitors and Michael Brown like a hawk, on the off chance that someone who do or say something worthy of a protest. A few of Michael Brown's comments could have been a little biased and one of the teams did make an honest protest, but he clarified himself soon thereafter and the bout went off without a hitch. Bout 42 Scores.

Despite being hosted by Nick 'Self-Righteous' Fox I stayed for a good portion of the SlamMaster's Slam, but eventually could stomach no more and bolted. The DC/Baltimore crew offered me a lift back to the hotel, and while I waited, I went inside and scored a pair of Cape Cods from the downstairs Subterranean bar. And fell in love with an off-duty waitress Josephine.
Riding shotgun, we headed back. Saw the infamous (and way exaggerated) 'lesbian orgy' in Urbana's room. I spent the night in Montevallo's room playing poetry tag.

FRIDAY


I woke up the next morning when Indigo Moor called.

Man on floor. No problem. Must be Adam Stone[info]akamuu. And that must be Star[info]thisistar on the window sill. Right?

An hour later, I roll over and look at the floor.

That's not Adam Stone. Who the fuck is that?

An hour later, An hour later [info]theklute wakes. We have no idea who this man is, so we wake him.

The boy is a Boston kid named Phil who scored a room key from Adam Stone. Though we didn't kick him out or anything, and even let the boy use the shower, he was noticeably uncomfortable until we arrive by cab at the Chopin Theater for the day's events.

First up, the amazingly fantastic Group Piece showcase. I love group poems, even bad ones more than most solo poems, even good ones. I wanted to catch the Latino/a showcase. Being from Phoenix and the atmosphere and neighborhoods in which I grew up, I often feel more comfortable in Latino neighborhoods than white ones. But a few of my friends were reading in the Fifth Wheel Slam and promises are promises. Why do they have to double book things like this? Glad I stayed. There was some tight shit.

I bolted down to the Semi-finals at the Subterranean (3rd New Orleans, 6th NYC-Urbana, 11th Denver, and 14th NYC-Nuyorican). For a much better review.

I adore Denver's Katie Wirsing with all my heart


Hopped the poetry trolley over the Metro Theater for Individual finals. I left [info]theklute and the crew I was with to find out who won the other three bouts and chat a little, then I planned to head back. The Metro opened up two ways and I stayed between the bouncers for just a sec. After glancing at my 'volunteer' ID, one bouncer said, "you workin' here tonight?"

"Um, yeah," I replied, then he let me in before they technically opened the doors. Yay karma.

Of the indies, I enjoyed Alaska's Corinna Delgado (7th) and Vancouver's Shane Koyczan (2nd). I ripped up my throat for Flagstaff's Suzy La Follette (6th), but she choose some of her weaker material to read. If nothing else, I can always say I knew her when.... According to Las Vegas' Andy Hall, Indy Slam Champion Mike Mcgee from San Jose is the first pure comic poet to win nats. Nifty. We need more humor. But the whole time, I kept wishing Josh Fleming was up on that stage going toe to toe. San Jose's SlamMistress Karen was in tears out of joy. That made me happy.

And what the fuck with Soul (I mean Robert, i.e., Bobby) Evans? Good performance, shitty poetry, but someone would have shot him by now for the crap he's pulled.

Back at the hotel with Corinna Delgado, security kicked us out of Vancouver's room so we gathered about a hundred people in the Ohio Room and hallway on the ground floor. Drinking and smoking until 5:00am....

SATURDAY


Despite the great sideline events I saw and the bouts, and the random poems in random places, the single best, single most entertaining event was the Nerd Slam, held at Quimby's Bookstore and hosted by Shappy. Hilarious from start to finish. The highlight was the poem "Muppets are Awesome". Fuck. That shit was über-tight. I would have gone to the African American Showcase or the Hiss Slam had they been held nearer to the Wicker Park venues instead of BFE downtown. Why the University?

Back to the El train, Tony D and I stumbled across an actual Saturday afternoon Chicago block party. I'm game. Got myself some chips and free keg beer. Yay Chi-town.

Walked to the Navy Pier with Albuquerque. Danny Solis gave me the best compliment of Nats in reference to my Bout Management. He said, "You were a much better Bout Manager than Michael Brown was a Host. I'd give him a B-. I'd give you an A+." That made my week.

Well, Finals. Hmm. I liked the opening. Super. But where were the Black, Asian, and Latino voices in the opening? There were what, 3 Black poets on stage and no Latino or Asian poets? Despite that, the play back between voices reading snippets of famous slammers was great. But shoot Nick Fox. In the face.

What's irony kids?
[young boy raises hand in the front row]
"Is it when the giants of Slam do a 30 minute opening about how points aren't the point, the point is poetry then Marc Smith brings out 6 foot high score boards so we can keep track of the scores?"
That's right, Timmy! Here's a cookie.

Finals was all down hill from there.


I need not expand on that nor the hosting, except to say I liked Mike Mcgee a lot. He should have had a little showcase. I also like the first poem. I liked it less repeated 10 times. Someone should have lynched Carlos Gomez for the "what Black men, where Black men, why Black men..." poem. I was a little tee'd of by it.

It seemed to me that the 10 poems about the oppression of the Black community (a topic that should never be ignored in such a large, open forum and deserves a place in a Finals night Slam) were just another way to make a buck (or score more points) on the backs of the oppressed Black Community. Did anyone else get that feeling? The first poem was moving. To an audience that may not hear that voice, it may have moved some. After 10 poems, I felt so distanced from the topic that they blended into a congealed mass of repetitive prostitution of an idea that I can't even remember who did what or who was on what team. Highlights were Los Angeles's group poems, Austin's Genevieve Van Cleve, and Austin's amazing group poems about executions in Texas which I had seen earlier at the group poem showcase. Looking back at my program, none of the other names stand out. Finals should not be like that. They should be the best of the best. Inspiration, humor, drama, love, romance, and angst personified. Three poems and only one (bad, misogynist) love poem? Fuck that bullshit.

Oh, crap kiddies! We gotta hurry to catch the fireworks!
Who gives a fuck?! I came 1,500 miles and blew $1000 to listen to goddamned poetry.
Set 'em off under the tent for all I care.
I want the Word.


AFTERPARTY
Blew $60 on 5ths of Vodka, Rum, and Southern Comfort and spread liberally at the hotel.
Stayed awake all night.
Made out with Kat from SF/Berkeley. Great kisser.
Saw Buddy Wakefield make out with Daphne Gottlieb. That rocked.
I also got to hang out with the über-amazing Katie Wirsing from Denver.
I hope I made a good impression, 'cause we could be friends for decades.
I kissed her too [blush]. All kidding aside, I could love her forever and ever.


Slept repeatedly on the floor of the airport.
Smelled like a beer soaked ashtray.
Slept on plane too.

Came home happy.

Writing poetry now....

Blunt Club y Hip Hop

Current Mood: mellow
Current Music: NIN "the Wretched"
Dropped by the Blunt Club at PI last night with KuK and Tony D, as a nice little break before the Sedona Slamboree this weekend.

The place has some good air, tight rhymes, and cheap beer. Tony D got hammered but performed well. A dude from Philly dropped a political piece with some great rhythms and rhymes that set the night off because another performer was from NYC. Spitting lines about dissing the flag and suggesting 9-11 was a hoax ... not a good idea sometimes. This NYC first off started shouting, then a full on mooning, then lost it at the end, violently shouting and punching the stage after the kid finished. Ah, the power of words.

From fuckin' out of nowhere, Mike 360 showed up from Albuquerque. I met him in ALB and Seattle when he was big ball of hate, damn-the-white-man rage, and he totally missed the point of slam. Have a good time. He's lost the militancy, still has an edge, and his political poem was beautiful. Tony D reported having heard the same poem in ALB and their regional tournament. What a flash.

I did "He Needs it Bad" for Tony D. I could milk it without a time limit. It's always a crowd pleaser but not a particularly good poem; it's just a list performed over the top. But it was something good to leave a first time impression with the hosts; being able to play off previous poets. I scored 2nd place and won some tickets to a DJ contest.

Seeing the Drunken Immortals was cool because it's been a long time, but after the hip-hop I heard in St. Louis, Detroit, NYC, and Chicago on the Save the Male Tour, the locals are dull and repetitive. The bass was too hot, the treble too low, and there were no original beats; it was 3 minutes of the same rhythm with rhymes thrown over, like a pack of kids rapping to a CD or the radio. If you're a live band, fucking use it.

Leave for Sedona in 2 hrs.

Dean

the Beats never spoke to me
Ginsburg, Burroughs, and Kerouac
sat alongside
Donne, Milton, and Sidney
in the list of poets I'd read
to graduate
but not read to enjoy

Academic and historical
the Beats were rings in the tree
that started with the Word
and ended with me
there, right close to the edge
close enough to know someone
who knew them
2 degrees separated over a beer
from Kerouac
3 from the rest
i thought i knew them
enough to forget them

then Neal Cassady cold clocked me

and I become the third silent musketeer
cavorting on the road
with Sal and Dean
starving hysterical naked
with those angelheaded hipsters
sleeping on the roof of the car
beneath mexican nights
loving women in moments
who'll can't comprehend our madness
continually criss-crossing the country
looking for a home we'll never find
or fit into

the Beat Gate
is not poetry on a page
in college classrooms
but poetry at 2 am
after a fifth and a sixpack
and Newport 100s littering our feet
while two Word-lovers
take turns reading Howl at full howl
and the words swim
in the alcohol chaos behind our eyes
swapping our stories of the crazy shit
we did as kids and would do tomorrow
cause we both know
the feel of jail bunks
when to throw a punch
or take the hit
and the fear of becoming our fathers

happiness is the dream requiem
after the drug enters your blood
or the silent thanks
when you wake the next morning
and realize you're not dead
yet
everything in between
is a delusion by marketing departments
or filmmakers
nod your head and smile
nod your head and smile
miss the fucking point

the Beats opened their minds
and opened ours
by letting us accept a world
where freed conversations
get us closer to the Word
and make this cesspool of boredom
bearable
because when Dawn sheds off
the bedsheets of herself
and we can count three pack of cigs
two empty 40s
and not a drop of shuteye
since we saw her last
but instead recall meandering stories
winding through our histories
like we meandered across the map
the Beats break forth into our skins
like madman archangels
and the best minds of our generation
win one more battle
against the destruction of complacent time
that swallows us one by one by one
leaving nothing behind
but scattered graffiti
on apartment walls soon painted over,
or drunk poetic pronouncements
of the way God sees humor
shouted to blind sky
while the fallen slaves sleep
then wage for wages till they fall dead
of broken hearts and bulging prostates
while we, the bastard children of the night
sing of our sad songs
down another shot
and drive to another bar
as a conglomeration of brothers and sisters
breathing and breeding
staying a few steps ahead of the reaper
above the poverty line
and endlessly fighting
against unrealized and unrealizable hopes
of our parents and parent's parents
back to the first failure
of the First Boy or First Girl
that original sin that has doomed us all

but with the vanguard Beats
and bottles of booze breaking us free
from the frames that hold us here
from rules and rationalizations
[that don't mean shit in the long run
or when you think about it]
we can see the lives we should had have
if we were still angels
we can hear the Word clearly calling
but can't clearly comprehend the message
but there are enough of us
who hear it, who love it, who drink and join the dance
and interpret the echoes in our own way
and paint our pasts into the present
struggling to keep the drip-drop passion
alive one more day
till at the end of the end of the end
one of us may shout it all out
or write it all down
and make sense of the mess
we've endured since the beginning
before "let there be light" was shouted
in a thousand different simultaneous tongues
and the last of the last of the last
drunk and beat and in love
will speak back the Word
to the only ears listening
and then smile from ear to ear
as it all comes crashing down

Kerouac and coffee

Current Mood: energetic
Current Music: U2 "God Will Send His Angels"

While sipping coffee on my patio this morning, I finished Jack Kerouac's "On the Road." I kept waiting for something dramatic to happen. Nothing did, and perhaps that's the point. In that respect, it was more real life - just like a travel journal. But I think the major reason I wasn't real excited is because I've done most everything Sal Paradise has, with the exception of Mexican prostitutes.

driving cross country on a whim
going to Mexico with no money and no guides
hooking up with beautiful women with beautiful souls in a Bohemian kind of way
having crazies and/or druggies and/or wanted/convicted felons as friends
falling in love with the endurance of mankind in the barrios and ghettos of America
stealing cars, running from cops, getting arrested
recreational drug use
writing, dancing, writing, loving, writing, driving, writing, talking, writing

I've done it all at one time or another. maybe in 1950 when no one had done it, it would have really appealed to me.

The real reason I picked it up is that we have the same birthday and I wondered if we thought the same way. Astrology and shit. We do, by far, maybe that's why my life seems relatively parallel to his. We do see the world a lot more beautiful than many other people do. And we're in lot with the mad, twisting, sweetly blind mass of mankind.

House of Paper

boys are the carbon copies
of their fathers
chromosomes filling in the 'why'
do we do the things we do
patterns of patterns
of past behaviors
and here were are at square one
and I wonder if Adam was as fickle as I am

i swear i could be better than i am
when the chance comes
i could to be the superhero
the warrior
the badass
the protagonist
but post-modernism is cynical
and i'm still stuck in the epilogue
of my adventure
waiting for the author the set the world in motion
scribble down the first few lines
that ignite the conflict
of my epic-yet-to-be written

and i'm getting antsy
page one sucks ass

my imagination
is playing cards at gunpoint on page 68
racing jet planes on page 122
fist-fighting the billion-man Chinese army on page 181
curing a plague on page 254
dodging bullets on page 365
and telling the girl i met on page 9
that I want to marry her on page 909
but we have 500 pages to get to know each other
and 1,000 pages after that to love each other
till my deathbed confession on page 3269
that i did it all for her
'cause she was the great adventure

i don't want to die
as the secondhand, hastily-assembled sequel
to my father
sequel to his father
sitting dog-eared on a bookshelf
with the rest of them
squarely between diatribes
on genetics
and fate
hunkered down in low class used bookstore
tettering on the brink of bankruptcy

when my story ends
i want to be an endcap at Barnes & Noble
Borders will celebrate me
with an entire week of book signings and readings
Changing Hands will rake in the dough
I'll dropkick Harry Potter
Warner Bros. will fight for the movie rights
they'll bring Stanley Kubrick back from the dead to direct
because Steven Spielberg would just fuck-up the ending
i'll be an AOL keyword
a breakfast cereal
a fully-posable action figure with kung-fu action
i'll be in happy meals
on t-shirts, shower curtains, and bedsheets
and after Armageddon,
my story will inspire the survivors to rebuild
then i'll fade away
take up a nice retirement home
alongside Gilgamesh, Beowulf, the Iliad, and the Odyssey
talk about the weather
and complain about whippersnappers

only a footnote
in a C-minus high school paper
will mention the those carbon copies
of my failed fathers
but everyone everywhere
will know the name of the girl