AD.


Rich Patterson on guitar, Tabatha Predovich & Christopher Shillock on mics
Lady’s & my art on wall – foto Smith

Road Running

After dripping 5 bags of blood into me
Doc 2 turns to 1 and 3 and sez
“Where’s it going? Where’s it all going?”

3 shrugs
“I donno, let’s try one more and if it doesn’t work
we’ll go in and look.”

Not exactly what I want to hear.

But the 6th worked
and the 3rd day I rose again and walked home
perpetually sober.

Told Mom it was insect blood, animal, snake,
female blood moon blood immense menses
blood from turnip rock
blood in track of my own track and trek
Neal Cassady, Dean Moriarty
revisions of Cody
blood sweat and tears for fears.

And is true
there’s a blood rush in road running
pushing the line
seasons of Willie Nelson
and Road Runner too
doing his Wile E. Coyote don’t be do.

And a dash of James Brown’s get down old school
feelin’ good dancin’ fool
thickened with Trane’s blue water
feelin’ pain but pushing gain for gain again
on the go man go van go land go
of buzzing fuzz
pedal pushed low
so fast is fine is flux is flow
for find mind ride on the Mobius Strip
of Cleveland Minneapolis Cleveland road rip & reading
hip lip trip
1,576 mile long loop leap
last 13 hours at wheel
in 765 mile road real deal.

— Smith, 5.29.2013

We had a magic 4-day trip out to Minneapolis to read in the Slam Factory in the basement of the Gamut Gallery with Christopher Shillock, Tabatha Predovich, David Daniels, and Scott Vetsch.

Two days driving out and once there it was go-go-goville. Minneapolis is a few thousand folk smaller than Cleveland but it’s hugely alive, vibrant, so Chris took us everywhere in the morning then afternoon we accompanied Lady to the World-Wide Monsanto Protest in St Paul then back for dinner and by the time I was to read I feared my magic might be gone, I was dragging my feet, falling my face, croaking my voice, slurring my words, but it all flowed fine, at least for me.

Special thanks to JP who set up the Slam Factory, an underground art and music driven venue. This flows back to the old Beat basement coffeehouse milieu.

yesterday post:

Well I haven’t lost my road run moxie after all. Drove from Minneapolis MN to Cleveland OH in thirteen and a half hours – 766 miles averaging 57 mph. Neal Cassady would have been proud of me, especially since we made 3 gas, 2 piss, couple coffee, 8 toll, lunch, dinner and snack stops along the way. Plus Lady drove 3 hours and she obeys the speed limit, so you can imagine the fine edge of running 10-20 mph over the limit while constantly looking for cops, which is difficult when night falls and you lose your clues. Went through 3 radar traps at 9, 10 and 13 over, but they didn’t bite. Was a good 4-day road run and reading. We met good people and read at a great underground venue, thanks to poet host Christopher Shillock.

Poets are crazy. Who else would drive 1,576 miles round trip to read for 45 minutes?


Claus Oldenberg’s 1,200 pound Minneapolis cherry – foto Smith

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