This is the official blog of Northern Arizona slam poet Christopher Fox Graham. Begun in 2002, and transferred to blogspot in 2006, FoxTheBlog has recorded more than 670,000 hits since 2009. This blog cover's Graham's poetry, the Arizona poetry slam community and offers tips for slam poets from sources around the Internet. Read CFG's full biography here. Looking for just that one poem? You know the one ... click here to find it.

Monday, September 14, 2009

Frank O'Brien video, Sedona Poetry Slam round 1


Frank O'Brien is a 20-year-old student at Coconino Community College, focusing in the general studies and pre-nursing. Originally from Phoenix, O'Brien entered the slam poetry scene in fall 2007. He traveled to Madison, Wis., in 2008 and to Orlando, Fla., in 2009 as a member of the Flagstaff National Slam Team.
O'Brien is now an active poet and administrator of the FlagSlam Poetry Slam in Flagstaff.
Sedona Poetry Slam, Round #1, Poet #5.

Photo courtesy of Jessica Guadarrama

Gary Every video, Sedona Poetry Slam round 1


Gary Every's career has followed many diverse paths including geology exploration, carpenter, chef, piano player, punk rocker, dishwasher, photographer, mountain bike instructor, soccer coach, bonfire storyteller and just a general bad example to society as a whole.

It is perhaps as an author that Mr. Every has gained the most fame. Published nearly a thousand times, he has four books to his credit and more on the way.

Sedona Poetry Slam, Round #1, Poet #4, July 17, 2009.

Photo by Jon Pelletier/Kudos

Markus Eye video, Sedona Poetry Slam round 1


Markus Eye is a Sedona poet and photographer. Sedona Poetry Slam, Round #1, Poet #3, July 17, 2009.

Ed Mabrey video, Sedona Poetry Slam round 1


Ed Mabrey is a two-time Haiku National Slam Champion and 2007-2008 Individual World Poetry Slam Champion.
He has been a member of and coached several winning Rust Belt Regional Poetry Slam Teams out of Columbus, Ohio. Mabrey has released two books, "From the Page to the Stage and Back Again" to critical acclaim and "Revoked:My GhettoPass(ivity)" which was a limited release item.Maybrey has released two CDs of his own work, and has been on projects with other artists and DJs.

He is the founder of Black Pearl Poetry based in Phoenix,
Sedona Poetry Slam, Round #1, Poet #2

Mikel Weisser video, Sedona Poetry Slam round 1


Son of a nightclub singer, Kingman slam poet Mikel Weisser. spent his teens as a hitchhiker. Since then Weisser has gone on to receive a masters in literature and a masters in secondary education, published hundreds of freelance magazine and newspaper articles and political comedy columns, along with seven books of poetry and short fiction.
A former homeless shelter administrator, contestant on "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," and survivor of his first wife's suicide, Weisser teaches junior high history and English in Bullhead City. He and his wife, Beth, have turned their So-Hi, Ariz., property into a peace sign theme park.
Sedona Poetry Slam, Round #1, Poet #1, July 17, 2009.

"To The Girl Riding Shotgun" Sedona Poetry Slam video



To The Girl Riding Shotgun
For Montana and Sarrah Wile


across this home country of rednecks and ranchers
the pages of my ancestry
turn backward to days
running barefoot over vetch and stones
when i stood much shorter
gracing the sweetgrass with elbows and shoulders
instead of the strained fingertips of today
memories flood back when i least expect them
lessons learned, loves lost,
childhood games and their innocence
before i translated the rules
and learned how to break them

the silhouettes of familiar landscapes
eagerly welcome me back as if they're the tourists
revisiting a boy they knew in their youth

these green wheat fields of farmer tans
these western hats signaling oncoming howdys
these selfless smiles from strangers
this countryside
this is home

a boy i knew once lives here
we shared the same name
wished on the same stars
jumped the same cricks together
and left the other behind
when we cut the cord
leaving him in the Rockies
while i wandered the deserts

we see each other still in dreams
and play tag with fawns, calves and cubs
that have yet to learn
our parents play predator and prey

he still plays on the hillsides i long for,
beneath fir trees overlooking the valley that once held me fast
along the yellowstone artery carving a canyon
our ancestors will see from orbit

his house is over the ridge,
somewhere
down this dusty stretch of gravel,
somewhere
in the shadow of flax and sweetpeas,
somewhere
i know the outline of the farm like a thumbprint
can pick it blindfolded from all the others
simply by the sound of the breeze
but the roads still seems unfamiliar
though the map clearly says it's here

and to the girl riding shotgun
all this land is as new
as it seems to me mostly
as i wait for the memories in bottles
to find me lost in this sea of rolling hills
beneath blue moons rising red in the blood of harvest
sometimes we're both awash anew in these fields
National Geographic anthropologists on assignment
deciphering a dialect with a common vocabulary
in others
she is only a passported traveler while i am timeless
standing swallowed by the sunset of red fields
touching my family's livelihood in the grain
reaching roots down deep into the land
that we love as a mother

bud lights, rodeos and Hank Williams
rise up from the soil
in the aftermath of a solid spring shower
as honky-tonk two-steps,
broad-rimmed stetsons
and a vigorous fiddle
shake free the alfalfa baled back home
and for a moment in the dim lights
old men remember being cowboys
while cowgirls look for old wives they will become

to understand montana
you must travel it by road
knowing that distances are measured in days, not hours
every stop is a must-see
because haybales are the only signs of human habitation
no matter what town you visit,
there's always a drink waiting at The Mint,
where the bartenders call you "hon,"
even if they know your name

lost locals identify themselves
by family name first
in the smallest towns
to which your bloodlines tie you
in Montana,
family comes before the man

here, where death and life are cyclical
we learn young to converse honestly
because each visit
may be the last
until the hereafter
words are ties that bind

that boy i once knew
i see now grown up
behind the wheel of every beat-up Ford
that passes us
the girl riding shotgun learns
that the difference between
redneck and revolutionary
lies in the chance taken
by my parents
before i could even spell "poet"

that boy sees me, too
behind the wheel of every out-of-state plate
knowing that this boy looking for home,
somewhere
is on the interstate,
somewhere
dreaming of catching up,
somewhere
where the beer is cold
the jukebox plays only johnny cash
and on the drive back down country roads
the breezes bring back memories
on the parachutes of roadside dandelions

Sunday, September 13, 2009

Sedona flood photos by Misha Saez

Misha Saez, who works at Tlaquepaque, shot these two photos of the flash flood damage shortly after the waters subsided on Thursday 10 Sept.
"I caught Superman sitting, with a shellshocked look on his face... it all happened so fast, he didn't have time to act!"
"and this guy really went out of his way to avoid those pedestrians!"

Saturday, September 12, 2009

Diocletianic Persecution Haiku

Diocletianic Persecution Haiku
How did I get here?
Girl said, "I don't date pagans"
Skirt chasing ... fatal.

As lion chews thigh
I wonder if Christian chick
will finds me as hot

My plan is simple:
Let lions eat dudes praying
hope they all get stuffed

Being eaten alive
seems more cruel when I find that
it's still pre-season

Try telling Christian
that his death will make Sportscenter's
"Plays of the Week"

In Coliseum,
Fans with popcorn and peanuts
think "how ironic"

Lions eat Christians ...
at least it's quick. I mean,
bulls eat Mithraists

I wonder who was
the Bill Buckner of lions?
There must have been one.

Friday, September 11, 2009

Slam Tutorial: Rely on Your Grandma



"Grandma's Got it Going On (Rise and Shine)"
By Shane Koyczan



Every day, Grandma would come into my room and I would hear her say-
Rise and shine, the world has a whole 'nother design, there’s
someone
out there
some where
young man.

So I rose and I shone put on my shoes and I was gone.

See, Grandma bought me my first phone, she said Don't bother calling the people who care, call the people who don’t.

Don't bother calling the people who have taken up the fight, call people who won’t.

And I learned at a very young age where my grandma’s rage came from: The entire congregation of God. Never ask grandma about God.

I'd argue with her everyday and all she'd say was, Go down to the store, buy some light bulbs. And when you run out, buy some more.

Because the light at the end of your tunnel needs to be maintained.

You can't let it be stained by "their beliefs are better than your beliefs" and you can't agree to disagree because they're fucking wrong!

It's not the strong who have gotten lazy, its just your vision is a little hazy- you're not sure what it is you want but what you've got is all you need.

It falls to greed.

For every hypocritical church-goer who won’t walk past beggars because they can't spare a dime, Grandma says fuck them.

I don't speak to God because I think God's a tyrant.

And yeah, it struck me as strange every time I walk past a brother that stops to ask me "Hey, can you spare some change?" because yes I can. You see, I don't carry change around in my back pocket; I don’t wear it around my neck on a chain in some locket.

I keep change on the tip of my tongue so I can climb the rungs of a ladder to a better place; I forgot about saving face, Grandma told me save your grace.

I keep change in the tip of my pen and it seeps out every now and then as bursts of anger that make me think, maybe the writing on the wall could use a little revision.

Grandma told me stop trying to calculate the difference between people, people don't need division. Gotta stick together, gotta love each other, father brother sister mother uncles sons and aunts, forget about the chants the cheers the jokes the tears after two thousand years you'd think we'd know by now!

Grandma said We will only find equality in our number of tears.

And she was right because I don’t know what injustices you've suffered based on size sex race religion or the political pigeon shitting on the shoulders of us versus them like in Bethlehem when a man said Hey, I could be wrong, but why can't we all just get along?

No.

So we nailed him to a tree. See?

Justice isn’t just isn't, it just is.

And I can't change it, you can’t change it, so we just gotta try to rearrange it and if at all this miracle got the chance to work would I see people the way they see me?

Because seeing is believing and if you see what I see you wouldn't want to see anymore. But I’ve got a little surprise in store.

For every man who looks upon me with judgement in his eyes, there’s a woman looks upon me with wetness in her thighs.

I'm the world’s greatest overweight lover.

And you might just laugh and you might just gulp but my bones are big for sticks and stones and names just piss me off and Grandma told me, Young man you cant be concerned with whatever it is that they've got the only reason they think they're beautiful is the same reason they think you're not. And Young man, you have beauty beyond measure you are a treasure entrenched in this earth, you can’t let strangers determine your worth, Rise and shine.

So I rose and I shone, I put on my shoes and I was gone.

See, Grandma bought me my first phone, she said, Young man from time to time I too need to smile, would you do me a favour and keep me on speed dial.

Yes grandma,

I will.

And still to this day I can call her up and can hear her say It’s a game, you play, you win, you play, you lose, you play.

Rise and shine the world has another whole design, there’s someone out there somewhere but young man if you are playing to win the first thing you have to do is apply within.

Slam Tutorial: Imagine Human Behavior During a Tragedy

This poem was inspired by seeing a single image replayed on video the night of Sept. 11, 2001. Two people, presumably a man and woman, holding hands as they fell from one of the World Trade Centers in New York City, N.Y. It haunted me more than other images from the attack because of its premeditated rationality as opposed to a reactionary act of desperation.

I haven't seen the image since and sometimes wonder if I just imagined it. If I knew their names and who they were, would it change the nature of the poem or my performance of it?


They Held Hands
by Christopher Fox Graham

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"

then 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 our 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,
retaliation,
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

Rain gods wouldn't destroy CFG's Sedona, right?

Nothing like shamelessly taking advantage of a tragedy to further one's political career.

Vote CFG!

In 2012!

(Hope you all saw my photos up on NBC Channel 12 and Channel Fox 10 tonight).

Thursday, September 10, 2009

Sedona Flood photo #48, map & video


Map of the damage to Tlaquepaque.

I shot this at the far end of Tlaquepaque near Plaza de la Fuenta. Sorry for the brevity, but I wanted to save batteries for the later photos.
Traffic begins to get back to normal. Anyone can use these photos. E-mail me at foxthepoet@yahoo.com for the full originals.

Sedona Flood photo #47

The entrance to the Tlaquepaque parking lot. Anyone can use these photos. E-mail me at foxthepoet@yahoo.com for the full originals.

Sedona Flood photo #46

Looking toward the Tlaquepaque employee parking lot beyond the caution tape. I heard one of the employees earlier state that she was quitting in a week and didn't have any insurance, so she's doubly out of luck.

Anyone can use these photos. E-mail me at foxthepoet@yahoo.com for the full originals.

Sedona Flood photo #45

Looking toward Los Abrigados. Anyone can use these photos. E-mail me at foxthepoet@yahoo.com for the full originals.

Sedona Flood photo #44

The car shoved against the side of Oak Creek Brewery. Anyone can use these photos. E-mail me at foxthepoet@yahoo.com for the full originals.

Sedona Flood photo #43 Oak Creek Brewery


Anyone can use these photos. E-mail me at foxthepoet@yahoo.com for the full originals.

Sedona Flood photo #42

About six inches of mud. Lots of art ruined. Anyone can use these photos. E-mail me at foxthepoet@yahoo.com for the full originals.

Sedona Flood photo #41 Ruptured gas line

The ruptured gas line, shut off at this point. Anyone can use these photos. E-mail me at foxthepoet@yahoo.com for the full originals.

Sedona Flood photo #40 Patio de Las Rosas

This is the center of Tlaquepaque's Patio de Las Rosas, looking north. That thing in the middle is the 7-foot tall elk on its side. The caution tape is up due to the gas leak, caused by the car. Please not the yellow "FLT" sticker on the upper left of the license plate: a tourist rental.

Anyone can use these photos. E-mail me at foxthepoet@yahoo.com for the full originals.