AD.

WALKING ON THIN ICE

Arachniphonia


poetic inspiration

Arachniphonia

A tarantella is a dance,
while a tarantula is a spider.

If I get the latter on me,
I do the former.

– Smith, 4.30.2014

There, that may do it, I’ve written and posted a poem a day for 7 months, 212 days. Will keep writing a daily poem just to see how long I can stretch my record, but not always posting because it’s time for something else.

Here’s a video of last Saturday’s Writing Knights Press poetry reading. Starting at the one minute mark, I read 9 minutes of Lady because she was sick and couldn’t be at Mac’s Backs, followed by 20 minutes of me — youtube.com/watch?v=2IioY7nATJY&feature=share&list=UUtZdSsHhVd2aLqF7VlPqqgw&index=1.

Watching this I see I need to work on performance pizazz because I’m not interesting enough. Also realize I shouldn’t read 16 brand new poems in a row because I don’t know how to read them yet, so for next Monday night’s reading at Mahall’s I’ll intersperse a few classics.


processing a poem a day

Lollipop Op


Mouse Dreams, 36″ x 48″ x 24″, 1991, Steven B. Smith

Lollipop Op

Pastels and chiffon
and fuzzy pink sweater
unbuttoned with my teeth
leaving small breasts blooming
in heat of unrelease
in servitude to looming
decade dating daunt
scared to steal a kiss
if ever came the chance
afraid of the affront
but secret torso touching
in the slower dance
down in rec room basement
slow moving on the floor
stealing side cheek kisses
hoping for much more
leaving late night wishes
as misses outside door
way before French smooching
and doing dirty bop
she was my teenage sweetie
my lovely lollipop
so do the twist and walk the dog
and shimmy ko-ko bop
when the princess kisses frog
I will angle op
move to better whether weather
brighter down the dawn.

– Smith, 4.29.2014

At the hospital yesterday to see if I could salvage my shoulder, I took these shots of my “Mouse Dreams” sculpture which has been standing in the hallway of the Women & Children’s wing for 23 years, same number I’ve been sober. Drank myself to death in 1991, woke in that hospital, and 3 days later when I walked home found I had been offered a commission for their art collection. It was my first sober piece.

With the pedestal, the top of the mannequin’s head stands about 6 feet tall.

The kids love it. So do I. I figured they were miserable enough having to be at the hospital so I tried to cheer them up.














Mouse Dreams, 36″ x 48″ x 24″, 1991, Steven B. Smith

no go

No Go

Take out pocket key
look at right one
put wrong one in

– Smith, 4.28.2014

Lady woke me from dreamscape too soon. We were being chased by two agents in cheap suits, Mr Big and Mr Small. They wanted something off my camera, but I didn’t know what. Mr Big sat down with me and tried to convince me to turn it over without trouble but I wouldn’t. He was big and looked deadly, but he was talking kindly to me, no threat of force or violence; it was Mr Small who felt truly dangerous. Mr Big sat his camera device down on the table as he talked, then suddenly everything was gone and Lady and I were marching through wilderness with a group of people, being led by a young thin long haired blonde woman. I put my hand in my pocket and found I had Mr Big’s camera as well as my own. I rushed to our blonde guide and tried to get her attention but she kept talking to the others and ignored me, so I levitated until I was floating in the air sideways with my face right in front of hers and said “You need to listen, pay attention to me, I have what they want. You need to contact Mr Big and Mr Small. I can get us out of this.” It was odd I always said Mr Big and Mr Small since it was Mr Small who was in charge. She rushed off to contact them and Lady and I started playing with Mr Big’s device when I figured out how to make it work and we started watching a long video. Nothing special about the video, just landscape, but there were a lot of videos on the device and I knew one of them would tell us what was going on. Suddenly the device popped out a 6 inch spring, and when I handled it it metamorphed into a 30 foot stand holding a gigantic 50 foot tube-spring angled up toward the floating spacecraft in the sky and we were going to be catapulted through the tube into the craft . . . which is where Lady came in and woke me, so for the second recent remembered dream, I was wakened just before revelation.


alien ship

Electra


Electra

Electra

Ain’t no sinner sicker than a sinner in the Lord,
no viper bite more bitter than when
daughter turns on mom.

Or what sister thinks of dad.

– Smith, 4.27.2014


subconscious

Main Street

Main Street

In an old five and dime
in an old college town
a seed stand sings me a song

forget-me-not mourning bride
bachelor’s button periwinkle
dwarf jewel double gaiety
mission bells cheerio
sun gold crackerjack thrift

I take a walk in the park
and a toke in the temple
re-singing their tune in my tone

– Smith, 4.26.2014

Bee-ginner Kit

Bee-ginner Kit

Got the beehive head
and the beehive hands
and the beehive
got the beehive tool
and the beehive feeder
and the beehive smoke
got the beehive wax
and the beehive frames
and the beehive veil
now all we need are the bees
after we paint the box
and build the stand
and read the books
and attend the meetings
and beekeep apprentice
we buy 10,000 bees next spring
and bee-gin.

Kit includes:
one 9 5/8 dove tailed box, telescoping cover,
inner cover, screen bottom board,
ten 9 1/8 frames,
ten sheets of waxed Rite Cell foundation,
helmet and veil, hive tool, feeder,
hobbyist smoker, gloves,
$162.50.

– Smith, 4.25.2014

Hey Lady, plug your planner so we order our bees this November, because this spring’s late orderers are bee-less.



MAY WE HAVE

MAY WE HAVE

Peace in the swinging outta bed,
peace in the laying into

Peace in the deep
and shallow waters
of sleep

Peace splashing,
ablutions

Catharsis and then peace

Peace and then
catharsis

Peace through catharsis

Peace in the sweating,
peace in the washing off

Peace fired into our strong metal
made with responsible practices

Peace worked into the kind knit,
gentle, easy needles

Kinks worked out, evaporated,
transformed

Peaceful forgiveness, patience
with ourselves
and others

Peace in the whatever

Peace in the working, singing, calling
and talking

Peace in the hearing, waiting, watching
being still

Peace in the mindfulness,
epiphanies and
recognition

Peace in the sudden awareness
of breaths

~ Lady

Back Alley


skyhand

Back Alley

People get lost in nooks,
the nooks and crooks
and sometimes the crannies too,
not granny crannies or booker nooks
or even crooked crook crooks
but kooks and cravings and unwashed bathings
and the flat footed vagaries of too cooked arteries
of oft farted smarteries
leaving lust in the dust with the rest of the rust
which cause such a fuss
for those of us before the fall
too tall to get small
in their nooks and untalleries calling unvoluntaries
to race for the rest instead of the best
such is life in the alley in the belly of the valley
in this test of the beast slouching from east
wondering away from the why.

– Smith, 4.24.2014

I published 21 issues of Artcrimes, an art/poetry journal, from 1986 to 2006 and will likely add issue 22 somewhere down the line . . . I lost $20,000 of my own money in the process.

I looked them up on Abebooks.com, a rare books site, and found three listed for sale.

Artcrimes vol I no VI November 1988 – $75
although they seem quite confused about this one – publication date and number indicate me as editor of #6, but they list Chris Franke as editor and he was #7.

Language’smyths 17: An Artcrimes / 60 years of Poartry, 1995, edited by Lang and Smith – $46.70

Artcrimes #20: Sea of Forgetfulness 58 illustrations, 46 poems, 57 artists, 100 pages, 2002, edited by Wolfe and Smith – $10


alleyman

The Bro Grin Tales


Oozy

The Bro Grin Tales

I’m itchy she says as she turns and squirms.

You must be one of the seven dwarfs, I inform,
there’s Itchy and Squirmy and Dirty
and Oozy and Gooey.

We always wondered which was worse
Oozy or Gooey
but I choose Oozy
cuz who knows where that stuff comes from
it’s such a curse
for Gooey’s just sticky
while Oozy’s much worse.

Then there’s Doozy and Boozy both losing to floozies
who flutter their butter and churn em to utter
wild cries of the sexual in the midst of the mutual
on their mad nights of ritual.

– Smith, 4.23.2014


Doozy

Out at the In-laws 9


Lady’s Dali

Out at the In-laws 9

I look at my notes
and there’s no poem here
except everything’s a poem
we’re all poems
coupled in free verse rhyme
like the time I dated a poem-poem girl
who dumped me when my palms grew hair
but that’s not fair
not here
not there
for here the near is Easter flair
out in in-laws’ lair
with charoset smear
on matzo crackers near
kosher ham and jam and beer
and most excellent potato salad
made like an Irish ballad
in Leprechaun home
which is closer to poem
but no fell jell which is swell
since Lady says tell
“big sloppy doggie walkie”
of Miles the dog of humongous mass
and tail-wagged ass
and largest heart of love in charge
in house of folk who drink and talk
and laugh and eat and fly and walk
most holidays and daze between
as life flows around in streams
which whirl in forge of poem when done
but missing much
especially such the sun bathed face
and fire sculpture burned
and piano played at stately pace
and madness of return
so no I know there’s no poem here
it’s all been done and gone
yet bend in near and shed a tear
for one lost song gone wrong

– Smith, 4.22.2014