WALKING ON THIN ICE

coffee cafe art - foto by smith

Flesh

Like love and money
We weave about the focus
A melody of maybe
In silent forest ritual
Growth duration flesh essence

We stand in the snow
Embrace the cold
And leave no tracks
Though we stumble
Frosted amidst redemption

I need a dollar like a dead man
Needs a coffin
Old women stare at my crotch
Suck sun in summer
Seek sin in fall

wall art at nick’s cleveland greasy diner - foto by smith

shadow fact - foto by smith

Three Faces of Eve

Moroi, Moroi
We meet where
The cuckoo does not sing
The dog does not bark
The sacred yew my flesh
The warming gone

Though hidden behind
Paths in the park
I in my city
Am amphetamine hot
And see
Clean Grecian face
In crumpled wrap
Of excrement
On flesh

None descending the stair
Dare call patrons
Matrons of questionable ease
Strip tease
Sand not withstanding
For each beach is the same
Same lame game
Where neither retribution
Nor love of institution
Dare descend dissembled daze
In this garbage of Eden

Bring back the snake

street art - foto by smith

Dudley Moore in defective copy of The Bed Sitting Room - foto by smith

PRIVATE EYE SMOKEY GREY

i come to sip yer honey, honey,
my sticky bee–
internal hive memory

nothing personal, just duty.
howdy duty. by jingo. by golly.
by jolly we’ll be an external

manifestation

of an inner

conversation

we spark the waters
hold ‘em up
do the dirty bop

i need some heart gravy.
give me some heart gravy baby–
lounge lizard rhythm in
polyester time

Lady K & Smith

Lady K, upper right, 20 years ago - foto by smith

being there - foto by smith

jesus crisis is putting up an online library of living poets. he mentioned he wanted to add some of my poems, and a person who has trouble with my existence commented she’d rather have him add dr seuss instead cuz she liked him more than steven b. smith.

lady took offense and left this comment on the critic’s comment.

Dr. Seuss sent me to school,
Steven B. Smith picked me up after class
where we smoked some grass
and did some low class
down town get down

the critic came back saying i was an old coot whose poetry made no sense at all unless one were on massive amounts of drugs.

this is my first time getting called an old coot. seems i should get a certificate or something.

lady came back with:

This is all very interesting to me. I prefer to not say bad things about people (except the government) because I don’t see any use in it. I’ll offer my opinion on things, but I don’t have the intent of hurting or dividing. So I probably come off as obsequious for this reason. Why would I bother to comment or read this if I didn’t like it? I’m all for freedom of expression but I recommend a good dose of common sense.

However I will and I do “get back” at digs. & I love digging into open cans of worms.

Smith is the best poet I’ve come across, and he dares to be aware in a stiflingly square world. He is his own boss. That’s why I hunted him down and married him. He is a lightning rod for controversy yet he refuses to explain himself, maintaining a gated dignity of sorts. But taste is highly subjective, so to each her own. Ironic that you would use Seuss as a kind of counter example, because I admire both - perhaps I like Seuss as much as Smith - I think Smith is more of an “after school special.”

“I actually do think about what people say,” Smith tells me, “but you know, Lady, you can never convert people.”

~ ~ ~

this whole diatribe and discussion can be seen at http://crisisblog.crisischronicles.com/2008/08/21/frustration-and-elation.aspx#Comment

i suspect i’ve had unpleasantness with this person before. i was attacked and vilified by someone with the same name and writing style for something i had nothing to do with. but i’ll leave the story of that nastiness for another time.

fallen flowers - foto by smith

dead butterfly outside the doctor’s office - foto by smith

this has been one of my favorite poems ever since i came across it at loyola college in 1972. it worked for me in my late twenties when i was married, it worked when i divorced and dated, it worked during my twenty year voluntary celibacy, and it works now in my sixties married to my loverly lady.

Danse Russe

If I when my wife is sleeping
and the baby and Kathleen
are sleeping
and the sun is a flame-white disc
in silken mists
above shining trees,—
if I in my north room
dance naked, grotesquely
before my mirror
waving my shirt round my head
and singing softly to myself:
“I am lonely, lonely.
I was born to be lonely,
I am best so!”
If I admire my arms, my face,
my shoulders, flanks, buttocks
against the yellow drawn shades,—

Who shall say I am not
the happy genius of my household?

William Carlos Williams , 1917

i recently read that non-poets, bad poets, or the uneducated should not select and display other’s poetry because they don’t know enough to be discerning. well, i been to school, and i write a few, so i guess this one’s okay.

but that seems an elitist position, more like the educated insiders called academics telling the rest of us how to hear, read, and appreciate. most academics i know write the most boring dry poetry i come across.

sometimes the more you know, the less you know. folk get caught up in famous names and shallow rules and miss the joy of verse. besides, why should anyone be condemned for writing a poem? a bad poem is better than no poem at all, and the worst poet in the world may through practice, luck or inspiration rise through time and life to write the best poem in the world. we all have to start somewhere. i started writing poetry in 1964 years before i ever took a poetry class. my poetry from then cannot hold a candle to what i write now - except for half a dozen master poems.

let the children lead. old farts are too cranky anyway. (i’m an old fart, so i can say this).

there are even cases of folk writing a tremendous amount of well-crafted, self-centered, esoteric, solipsistic, self-witty poems, but for every hundred pieces of waste they write, they create 10 fantastic ones. are we to condemn those good 10 with the bad 90?

poetry requires one to suffer and sit through shit for the unexpected jewel. so does music, fiction, movies, concerts. the cream of the crop makes us all look bad, that’s just the way life is.

and the worst thing those supposedly in the know can do is attack another poet - it hurts, undermines their sense of self, may prevent them from rising to the next level of intimacy. and why would anyone want to deprive the world of another poem? - even the worst poem brings a ray of joy into the writer’s heart. why not attack tv instead, a genuine abomination whose each hour of daily watching increases one’s risk of alzheimer’s.

i say you don’t like someone, instead of attacking them, don’t read them. most poetry is less than perfect be it hearing, reading, or writing. poetry is not for the faint-hearted or the impatient. if you are able to and do want to help another up the ladder, then praise in public, put down in private.

my favorite poet EVER is bob dylan. and i’m still fond of t. s. eliot, though not as much as i was 30 years ago. but i’m more interested in living poets. i’ve listened to a bunch work their way from confusion to enlightenment.

the church of not quite so much pain & suffering says “go thee and suffer less.” what folk seem to forget is its corollary - go thee and cause less suffering to others as well. do as you would be done is the whole of the law.

i’m a poet and i know it cuz my heart flows it my words glow it so if you can’t own it best not show it or you’ll blow it.

broken poem - foto by smith

wall advert frags - foto by smith

in the first monthly sunday open mic poetry lady hosted in june here in oaxaca, 10 folk showed up.

for the second reading, we were in the u.s. for a court date with lady’s dead beat ex-husband, and a local poet said she’d cover for us. she didn’t show, and the four folk who did were unhappy.

in both cases, the cafe was too noisy, and mexicans told us sunday was a bad day for a reading because that’s essentially family day, so we decided to hold it in our home on the first saturday each month. we held our first home salon yesterday, and 2 folk came. had a good time, read a few poems, sat around and talked, and ate the spring rolls, potato pancakes and chutney lady made.

so home salon-wise, we’re starting small. try to put out the word and get more folk next month.

found out one of the attendees, our friend madmanmax, was with poet john berryman (”a major figure in American poetry in the second half of the 20th century and often considered one of the founders of the Confessional school of poetry” per wikipedia) when he committed suicide. berryman told him what he was going to do, max asked if he wanted company, berryman said yes, so max walked with him to the bridge and watched him jump. i asked max how it affected him and he just said “i wished he’d chosen another path.” max don’t think it’s his job to run another’s life.

so, madmanmax roomed with bob dylan in college in the early 1960s, and walked with berryman the night he died. he was also an after-hours club manager and a mississippi boat chef, as well as a serious drug experimenter in his day.

Dream Song 85: Op. posth. no. 8
John Berryman

Flak. An eventful thought came to me,
who squirm in my hole. How will the matter end?
Who’s king these nights?
What happened to . . . day? Are ships abroad?
I would like to but may not entertain a friend.
Save me from ghastly frights,

Triune! My wood or word seems to be rotting.
I daresay I’m collapsing. Worms are at hand.
No, all that froze,
I mean the blood. ‘O get up & go in’
somewhere once I heard. Nowadays I doze.
It’s cold here.

The cold is ultimating. The cold is cold.
I am—I should be held together by—
but I am breaking up
and Henry now has come to a full stop—
vanisht his vision, if there was, & fold
him over himself quietly.

death - foto by smith

acid cat, cleveland graffiti - foto by smith

heading out for a 5 hour van ride to Huautla (WOWt-lah) to see if there’s any magic for us on the mountain. if we find teonanacatl (”flesh of the gods”), we will consume & commune. if we consume & commune, we will change. if we change, who will we be?

love the doors of perception.

i’m keeping my enthusiasm damped for this because i’ve learned over 40 years of drug exploration and 62 years of adventure you can never count on anything happening beforehand - we’ve got to get 7 people together to van 5 hours to an unknown city, find a shaman with mushrooms, etc. if it happens, i’ll be ecstatic. if not, i’ll understand.

here’s a taste of THERE IS A MOUNTAIN by Donovan which he wrote about going to Huautla for mushrooms:

The lock upon my garden gate’s a snail, that’s what it is.
First there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is.
Caterpillar sheds his skin to find a butterfly within.
Oh, the snow will be a blinding sight to see as it lies on yonder hillside.

i’ve shed my old smith skin hundreds of times along my 22,762 day way, each time for a truer shell to grow within - rather like a spiritual hermit crab moving from small restricting shell to better fit. this time i plan to go to the other side, look back at my me on this side, see what can be discarded, what can be enhanced, what can be healed, what is broken.

here’s an LSD dream i had in the 1990s in cleveland - in my dream we conquered death, but then the rivers filled with fish who wouldn’t die until there was no room left for the water, so we brought death back:

Gods

The gods died.
But for the fish
We brought them back.
Returned mortality
To the horse’s eyes,
Gods to antique brass.
My voice raised
In bell and chime
Laughter light on lip.

2006 collage for Lady - foto/collage by smith

me, 1946 - foto by smith

leaving on a jet plane in the morning heading south of the border down mexico way. last time we went thataway it was to start a new life. this time we’ll be returning home to our mile high city in the Sierre Madre mountains with low humidity and temperate clime. and a happier people too. they’re poorer down there, but their lives seem richer, happier, more tranquil. of course i’m observing from the outside there and the inside here in the u.s.a.

but enough of that - can’t blog in the morning because we’re leaving before the cock crows, so here’s a silly ditty i wrote for lady.

Baked Apple Cream Kisses

Baked apple cream kisses for you my love
For your giggle wiggle wondrous why

Creamed apple baked kisses to you my dove
From your hair below to those above

Baked kissed apple cream I’ll then apply
To your skin within, without, and try

French kissing your wiggle giggle for I’ve
Apple creamed baked kiss in you my love

Head to toe side to side all the in between
Cream kissed baked apple in you my Queen

Lady with smith art tee-shirt (soon to be 4 sale) - foto by smith