|
a poetry reading in Long Beach
although I have lately been listening a lot to a hillbilly gangster rap group called “Boondox,”
I am not a big slam fan… and well, I do have a phobia about meeting arts people, so,
I have no involvement with the local poetry community…
on the other hand, I am a poet, and have published hundreds of poems and drawings
in 15 countries and all over the USA… years ago, when I first began publishing poetry,
after many years of continuous submission and rejection, I began to make contact with poets,
editors and artists who were involved in some of the same journals that were using my work
(none in Minnesota-however)… as those who know me are aware, I am age 62 and have worked
all my life at working class jobs and my wife works for an airline, so I can fly for free…
as a student of pre twentieth century European art, I have used these flight benefits
to travel all over the world to look at art that interests me… and occasionally,
when I feel up to confronting one of my phobias head on, to meet the poets and
editors who I have gotten to know via mail and later e-mail and who seem simpatico…
so, two days ago, on Saturday morning, I got a flight from MSP to LAX, spent the day visiting
my kids and grandkids in Riverside, CA and then drove to Long Beach to hear a reading
by Gerald Locklin who I had briefly met during my travels in previous years at poetry readings in
Toronto, San Francisco and New Orleans and RD (Raindog) Armstrong, who as publisher of Lummox
journal a few years ago had used a number of my drawings and who is now operating Lummox press,
publishing poetry and is a more or less successful Long Beach area underground poet… and who
I had not met…
“flight MSP to LAX”
big plane… lots of empty seats
riding first class,
on an employee pass…
the GE engines roar up
a whirlwind
and our huge metal tube plunges
into the ass of the sky
from 2000, 5000, 10000 feet,
Minneapolis is splotched with lakes
like scabs on the face
of a rural Midwestern meth addict
until we break through into sunlight.
and an
old song about clouds
is stuck in my head
the reading was at a cool used book store called Open Book on 4th Street in Long Beach…
“impressions of a reading at Open Book in Long Beach”
Phillip K. Dick on the shelves
and Joni Mitchell singing about
clouds… records
and writing
and later words actually
spoken whirl
in the dusty Long Beach air
a girl with long hair and fiery
laughing eyes
takes my money and
hands me change
and
a smile that hits me like
airplane tires exploding
in the sun
after the reading, I got back in my rental car, drove back to LAX and got back to Minnesota
at 6 a.m. via the famous “red eye” overnight flight… from MSP, I caught a bus to downtown
St. Paul and after waiting an hour, got the bus that goes five miles east to my house
in Maplewood.
“back to LAX”
my eyes roll across the dusty floor
through spilled coffee
and
out the door…
like a cockroach among the ladybugs,
I have to leave… I have to
become another metal mole on the 405…
I see swirls of lights that
William Blake could not have imagined
in his wildest dreams
of heaven and hell… yellow sparks
in the night and cars
everywhere but no
people… no legs or lips…
no hair or hips…
just electrons firing photons
through
red plastic and tricks of memory…
imagine Francois Boucher standing by
the freeway
with his wig blown sideways… with his big
palette
and tiny brushes painted with
road dust… imagine a horrible teal
green seeping through
the craquelure of
this oily vision
vast shards of unbroken
plate glass are mirrors and
I guess Joni Mitchell was right that
smoky
clouds
are angel hair
but where
in this tangle of
cartwheeling street lights and
spasms
have the angels
gone?
it was pretty chilly downtown in St. Paul, but luckily I had my winter coat and hat so had
a pretty comfortable hour on the bench in the very deserted early Sunday morning downtown
of St. Paul, sleep deprived, reading a novel.
norman j. olson is a poet, artist and civil service worker.
Since publishing his first poem in 1984, after many years of submission and rejection, he has
published hundreds of poems and drawings in 15 countries and all over the USA. He worked
in a factory printing telephone books from 1968 to 1988 and since then has worked at civil service clerical jobs.
Web Site
Email: norman j. olson
Return to Table of Contents
|
