Long Smokestack Poems
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Beneath the city the river fishing is good.
I roam with tackle and pole below those wiggling tapeworms
Wound around the cement underbelly of bridges
Devouring the guts of the city’s glamour
Down here where shadows are long as green moss
And the voices of old black dudes echoes to casts
“Damn motherer, you crossed my line!”
Splash.
To catch catfish on a wad of bread is a worthy fight.
It takes shoulder chest and wrist and it’s not just the fish
But the current of the Grand River pulling us over
That sucks us in like a Thanksgiving ladle
Into a whirlpool of brown gravy spilled on a dinner table.
The trouble with catfish is that they swallow the hook
Beyond the use of pliers
And when they’re too small
We cut the line
With a lack of guilt like Old Testament God
Throwing the creature back
Hoping for a miracle.
Logs are tipped over along the gooey shores
And upon them painted turtles sleep
Sunning like leprosy sores.
Even from down here in the cool mist umbrella from summer
We can see the smokestack vapor
Twisting overhead like a genie rubbed from its lamp
Thin at its head thick at its feet still stuck in its copper mother
Arms outstretched like a Christ-cloud spooking the sun.
There are other mysterious pipes
Lips rust red as strawberries
Bloomed from the banks dripping silver
While mouthing a lullaby
To the muck
Like a whore at the end of her exhausting shift.
A railroad bridge rattles to life
Swollen by the axles of its returning soul
A freight train pounding out the Blues
A rhythm meant for bass and drums
That part we don’t sing
But the swing that keeps our foot stomping
And in that noise
Software girls flutter about like orange ribbons
Untied from the hair of the downtown towers
Drifting along the river trails at lunch
Jogging in pony tails and pink shorty shorts
Fingertips stuck into their cotton ears
Ever on the lookout for us
The creeps.
The trick is to not make eye contact
I mean us with them
The fishermen the engineers the long forgotten wrenches
Screwing cranks turning knobs yanking hooks from helpless fish
Drilling the pylons through chemical gold
That holds up this magnificent city.
28 Cracks In The Ceiling
I take my red-inked dagger in hand
And succinctly spew its secrets for all to see.
28 cracks in the ceiling, and I lost count.
There’s a storm moving out of the west.
I can smell the thunder and
The titillating turbulence of tintinnabulation.
An old lady sits cross-legged and knitting,
Waiting for the sweating sun to sink.
“I was just a girl in 1925… and now…”
The endless strained faces out there
Tell stories of death, disease and depravity.
They know the eternal worm is the other one
In this passion triangle.
28 cracks in the ceiling, and I lost count.
Snakes frothing in suburbia.
The megabytes of Zanzibar jettison out naked bone chips.
Later months and trivial dimes.
Smokestack realizations in a tent.
Church buttresses holding up my whining soul.
Green Edsels down in San Pedro.
Michelobs and round sassy broads fingering erect nipples.
With a Susie in each arm
He lights a cigarette in honor of grand appeasement.
Sensuous sinews entwine effervescently.
More loose chicks in short skirts,
Pouting and scamming.
Times are hot in the old town tonight.
Music and misery, wine and wickedness.
Stubborn clocks disarm with water-resistant influx.
I was a princox in petticoats.
We met at a Tastee Freez at twilight.
28 cracks in the ceiling, and I lost count.
The restless night had ended
abruptly. Caught between dreams and
consciousness, the town was arching towards
the sprinkled light of dawn. A perpetual regularity
reigned over the dusty path that led wayfarers and commuters
alike in and out of this forgotten cluster of humanity. Somewhere
out there, a man cursed, and, as if to answer, a woman laughed. A
repetitive metallic clang—the whines of an iron plate being hammered upon an anvil—
twisted with a dog's tedious, short barking to form a discordant ladder of dread, telling how the day might turn out. Punctuating that were the weary shouts of
the night guard. An advice. A message. “Awake! Morning is here.” “Awake!
Morning is here.” A woman walked beside countless others in a long, silent
procession. Steps measured and heavy, hardly disturbing the dirt, eyes ever
forward, locked at the sunrise. Life hadn't been kind to her. At forty-five she
looked sixty. It was just her luck that age had been frivolous enough to come
early, and sketch a crude lesson at cubism across the pages of her skin. The
grey streams on her hair had become a roaring river of high
monsoon. The frozen, dark pools of her eyes had given way
to the smokestack dullness. On that day, like the day prior,
she had woken up with honks of a garbage truck out on the
street and drunk the cheap, inky tea that she
had made for herself and her son.
Bathing under a valveless tap, she
had put on her helmet, and set out.
The siren from the jute mill had blared
with an obscene loudness and promise.
She had to answer. She squared her shoulders
and trudged on, reeling back into the open maw of her
her slow, almost languid death, like a cassette on rewind.
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Date: 31 / 12 / 2016
Lincoln Special
Abraham Lincoln’s Funeral Train
Ma, pa, and I dressed in our Sunday outfit, excited for the “Lincoln Special” to come up the track as we stand at the train depot.
After departing Washington, D.C., on April 21, 1865, the black-draped train bearing President Abraham Lincoln’s coffin, spent nearly two weeks winding its way through 180 cities and seven states before reaching the assassinated president’s burial site in his hometown of Springfield, Illinois.
Buck boards and horses with their riders running by dust clouds form, covering everything with dust, I sigh. Making us use our handkerchiefs as we cough and pace beads of perspiration causing tiny streams down my brow and face leaving thin streaks in the brown dust.
A great swell of the blackest charcoal smoke billowing smokestack, whistle blowing steel wheels against the rail cause a braking, screeching, vibrating sound; locomotive coming up the rail into view, like a charging black rhino. A massive moving machine, carrying Abraham Lincoln, a fantastic sight to take in.
Many made the journey to pay their respects.
“Lincoln Special” also served as a publicity boon for George Pullman, who lent the use of his new, luxurious sleeping cars for the comfort of passengers traveling from Chicago to Springfield after Lincoln’s burial, orders took off for Pullman’s sleepers, which featured polished black walnut interiors, chandeliers and marble washstands and made overnight travel much more enticing for passengers.
11/9/2021
Railroads, A Historical Glance Back Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: BJ Legros Kelley
Riverboat on the Mississippi
Folks dining on scrimp, grits, and cornbread
Drinking booze and gambling like crazy
Going to Bourbon Street just ahead
Down in that Cajun Queen, New Orleans
The big paddle wheel keeps on rolling
Down to the Cajun Queen of the Gulf
Where the real money is unfolding
And a thousand green bucks is small stuff
Down in that Cajun Queen, New Orleans
The big paddle wheel keeps on churning
Black coal keeps that steam boiler humming
Noxious fumes from the smokestack blowing
Nightlife on Bourbon Street is jumping
Down in that Cajun Queen, New Orleans
Cathedral spires standing very tall
Off Canal, near downtown Bourbon Street
Near a hotel by a shopping mall
Where folk are getting some daytime sleep
Down in that Cajun Queen, New Orleans
They wait for night, ‘til just after dark,
To find the places of blues, jazz, and rap
A swamp of raunchy acts, joints, and bars
Folk can get caught like mice in a trap
Down in that Cajun Queen, New Orleans
World War 3
When war again breaks out in Europe
and the culture that was, is a smokestack
that drifts in foul air
Not that art matters, if any survives, they
will be busy finding food and shelter
the winter will be long and hard, Britain
will be a hole in the sea, fir for fish,
I will seek sanctuary in Ushuaia, the most
southerly place in Argentine
It was there a world-famous violinist fled
when during a concert, lost his trousers
and Europe laughed.
a place where two great oceans collide
clearing the air and foul debris
I will visit the violinist to see if he still
plays, and if he has no radio tell him of
the tragedy, if he feels sorry for Europe
he is a good man, but if he gleefully laugh
his embarrassment has made him bitter.
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Feelings of despair dredged from the murky dephths of my past
Hoisted through my corroded conscience's porthole
Reconnoitering barge of restitution pushes despondent thoughts through my inner being
Then tows the shame and guilt of my depraved condition to mind's hatch
The murky dross of yesterday's sins seeps deep into my addled psche
The residual guilt oppresses my soul
The brackish bilge of cankerous jealousies trolls through my grieving spirit
My trembling hands grasp the anchor of remorse but slip into the deeper moor of penance
Earlier missteps have my struggling feet sinking ever deeper in the quicksand of hopelessness
The smokestack spews nautious fumes from the froward deeds of my virile youth
My shaky rudder teeters as the raw sewage of past debauchery overwhelms my senses
Sailing my sinking yacht to the edge of sanity and rational existence
Carried along by the unsettling currents of inconstancy and vacillation
Docking in the harbor of reclamation and recompense
Energy’s Suffocating Gallop
by Odin Roark
Ancient blood soaked sand
Plumes its sticky residue
Beneath rapacious hooves
Dust storms of evil stampeding beside pipelines
Goad flow to tankers
Where ubiquitous black gold addiction
Steers toward pervasive profit-docks
Behind sweat lathered greed
Winds of historic baggage
Tether their historic words and song
Blessings and curses
Exciting swirling vortexes
Windmills of molten fire
Entitlement’s rape and pillage of breath
Of pores once absorbing purity
Evil’s global bubble
Appearing as mankind'
Robed in white zealotry
The blinded hawk-minds
Embrace the Middle East predatory contaminant
Wallowing in solipsistic riches forgotten
Awake only to pick tomorrow’s gluttonous prey
The world turns on turbine propulsion
With oceans bowing to its slavery
Delivering liquid smokestack suffocation
Silent killers preparing ghosts
Of time’s new-century-plague
Ignored
As oil gorged tankers find port
Release their pandemic sleight of hand
A destruction as innocent as rabbits from a hat
Charms the ignorant
Beguiles the wannabes
Wheeled transport
Delivers the demise of children’s hearts
Left to take a number
Unaware there is no lottery
Only loser-consciousness
Adult indulgence clinging desperately
To evil’s mane and tail
As it whips gullible eyes
Into cataract submission
Alien life hovers above
Grieving the minions destined
To find black energy’s ashen dust
Sprinkling its fool’s gold
Upon a barren planet
Like Root Beer Diamonds
smokestack lightning on the pomona freeway
plays their twangy sound brimming with desire
tan mexican cheerleader rides in a ’46 chevy
passing neon hamburger stands in walnut city
passing the silver taco trucks parked on main
they clang like bells in a distant temple of god
she say she want pozole beans and coca cola
her brown eyes sparkle like root beer diamonds
her dark skin enfolds me with unimagined force
the stars above my cruising machine wink at us
they know of our holy genuflections in the dark
the ‘46 chevy parks at javier’s mexican canteen
smokestack lightning plays their twangy sound
plays it on 8 track plastic brimming with desire
her sweet salsa voice puts my soul in handcuffs
her straight white teeth and wet lips enslave me
we sit close at a back table in the dim darkness
her brown eyes sparkle like root beer diamonds