Friday, June 29, 2018

Stone Soup Croutons, 6-28-18, Space Out



Stone Soup Croutons is a weekly poem I write using lines and impressions picked up from poems overheard from Stone Soup's open mic readers and features. I figure out a title (and sometimes the rest of the poem) later. You can read the other ones I've done since 2015 here. To paraphrase Lorne Michaels, this poem doesn't go up because it's ready, it goes up because it's Friday afternoon.

Another week, another open mic. Hated missing last week's gathering. People have been coming back, and this week I got to say hello to more people who haven't been around in a while. I hope this trend continues. Sadly, no Stone Soup next week. It took me a decade to learn, but having Stone Soup close to Fourth of July is never good idea. I'll be too busy to come anyway. I'm glad I got to do one more poem before the end of the month. Once again, thanks for reading.


Space Out

Blond boy trance dances
own groove in street
to stop moving away
away from sunniest spot.

Those near bus stop name him
after their middle fingers,
normally reserved for road,
not while waiting for sentences

to be commuted up river to work,
a cross around each of their necks
to get them through customs,
all holding a kidnapped Jesus

made from the bones of thousands
of Detroit bodies lost while
looking for work. Each busser
jumps off whispering Geronimo

hoping to genocide the next
eight hours, unaware of what
is buried below them, and they
dig themselves deeper each day.

And blond boy escapes by
dancing in place until madhouse
moves out from around him,
and the day starts over again

to his gentle pivots in a single
circle, biorhythm gives birth
to what the city hears as its
first good morning all day.


Short but sweet again.

Last week's list, saved by James Van Looy, for continuity.

Special thanks to  Steve Warren, John Lane, Jan Rowe, James Van Looy, Julia Vogel and Nancy Messom.


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