So, live streaming my poetry writing session on YouTube went well. It was pretty much exactly what I wanted: A few folks popping in to listen/read, and a good amount of interaction. I think it was mostly three watchers at any given time, so for a first time, I think that’s a success. I got about thirteen poems done, even though a few need edited. What I learned? Have a few ideas ready to go before I sit down. I didn’t start writing until about a half hour in. Anyway, it was fun goofing off online. It’ll hopefully be a weekly thing. Here’s what matters though. This is what I wrote in the two hour live stream. Enjoy!
1.
deep, unending voluptuous mountains
beat down hell on those
between
the town slides hard
mud wreaks havoc
tears hearts
saves not you
does the basement
the basement kills
unlit, soggy
unfocused earth
beneath those mountains
beneath that town
the town gets up and
swims away
2.
sweet drips fall to the concrete
from the lips of my soul
blood drawn from the stellar break
in them
sweet falling life
onto the crusted sidewalk
you’re aloft
floating above
I can’t see
anymore
a crowd huddles in to
beat their heads together
shoutout their game plan
at one another
looking down at my sweet
sugar
call an ambulance
call a news station
I take the beating
I take the breaks
I lose the sweet drops
You can have them
3.
she watches her love depart
from a hole straight through
her chest
to her back
that man reached in with his
cracked dry hands to pull it
yank strings of sticky
love
he coiled them on the soil
at her feet
taking his time to remove it
the love
it stuck to his hands
and his boots
her love stuck to
the next woman he fucked
but she, hole in chest
didn’t lose all of it
ropes strings
threads fibers
it latched onto the inside of her rib cage
grew over years while she watched
others roost
her ribs became meaty
where he left them bare
where they bathed in life
where they sought repair.
4.
we can do something about time
it’s frosty grip on our stomachs
when it launches us into
orbit around black sun
past black moon
through pin hole stars
we can fix that
without elaborate technology
with electricity
bounding between stones
on the earth
time will combat our
effort
to gain control
our frosty grip on his gut
launching it about
the violet universe
through alcohol clouds
but he cannot win.
5.
her naked feet on the cold
granite
of the king’s balcony
dance about
though she moves not
with a man
the dark of the morning
conceals her shame
she knows none watch
and her feet cannot stay warm
bed that is ivory granite
blanket that is honey suckle night
embraces the torch
burning in her gut
ash falls
charcoal stains the ivory stone
she combusts
in her want
6.
his blazing cliche burned a hole in the stage
aged brown perique pulled fine strands
from his lung
the stage, afore his mansion
in the swamp
invisible under ash
and crispy leaf
and fence
revealed by his track
his arc in the debris
his arm
his leg
the strands
nothing pulled
nothing moved
the old man lie
breathless on the ground
where he had delivered
his final speech
7. – titled: I like David Lynch movies
I like David Lynch movies
I like David Lynch T.V.
I liked the David Lynch Documentary
don’t try to convince me
he didn’t murder
David Foster Wallace.
8. A poem about cars
driving through the city
its steel mill
late morning
bbq sun
late for everything
a crimson light
halts my commute
ghosts stand in the shadows
of an alley
see me
step onto the asphault
approach my civic window
reach their fingers
cracked dry black
through the slit
he speaks
“TAKE ME OUT.”
he speaks
“TAKE ME OUT!”
I fly past the crimson warning
out of the mill
to the hills
out of the town
every mile
we meet again
stepping onto the asphault
from the stream
from the trees
from the next town
into the slit
he sits
he turns to me
he speaks
“THANKS FOR THE RIDE.”
9.
tree tops burst into sight
as the boy falls back
his arm bursts into mist
as the trigger pulls back
bird shot breaks skin
gasoline puts hair on your chest
and will burn it off
“they’ll burn you”
the other boy says
those tree tops glow
against the gray sky
and the blood in the boys eyes
now the ash in the boys eyes
the blackness of the boys eyes
10.
my house
wood and tall
sits in a field
in a valley
on the coast
above raw gold
under baby blue skies
my river is dry
my forest is cut
they became my house
forged sons and a girl
no pollen this year
or last
no flood
no food
just dust
wood hasn’t rotted out
gold sits worth what it’s always been
there I sit, worth nothing
11.
lobsters boiled red swim
i boiled red tan
no one can touch that red
because of how I grew up
my grandfather shot folks
in the jungle
boiled red on acid
orange on TCDD
his father shot folks, too
in the woods
cured leather in the trees
pink on mustard
I haven’t shot folks
in the city
but i’m boiled red
like that lobster
and takin care of
my girl
12.
Beulla met a man
met him at the bar
Beulla took him home
they drove his truck
Beulla fell in love
as they fell through the door
Beulla got down
and licked on his cock
John met a lady
first time at the bar
john took her home
in his truck
he didn’t like her car
John knew she’d go
as she stumbled down drunk
she sucked on his rod
he put it in her trunk.
13.
on southwestern wind floats
rusted sand
through Corona
Beulla and John
walk home from
the motel
shielding their eyes
with their cuffs
the wind picks up
carrying green electric fire
trinitite mushrooms flash
above
shards of hell fire
speckle John’s collar
dew drop gather on his hair
worm into Beulla’s eyes
This last one needs a bit more work. Maybe Beulla and John will become my recurring characters. I don’t know. Hope you liked it. Let me know if you have any suggestions and I hope you join me for my next session!
A. M. Langston 
Leave a Reply