Friday, August 09, 2024

Stone Soup Croutons, 8-7-24: To a Beat Already Old


Stone Soup Croutons is a weekly poem I write using lines and impressions selected from Stone Soup Poetry'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.
 
I also have a book collecting the best of my first year of poems. Click here to purchase it.

Chris Vannoy gave us a good dose of beat poetry Wednesday. It was nice to listen to his reading this morning after a rough night. Helped to shape this week's poem.
 
That's all I want to say about it right now.

Thanks, Chris. Hope you stop by and visit.

Thanks for reading. 


To a Beat Already Old
 
Forsake having children
you'll always disappoint.
 
You were born in the
wrong place. That's it.
 
Your parents did okay,
you think. That's all 
 
you should say on record
before taking nearest river,
 
sweep away, nevermore
ignore shadows under ivory.
 
No jobber jog from family's 
house to one down street.

it's your moving day. Trade
river water for jet fuel in 

Los Angeles, where your 
own fault lines fade. 

Accept your best poem
will never match gardener's

ungrowable crop, the cab
driver's empty backseat. 

Find a partner crazy enough 
to curb Bukowski's elbow.

Sleep to learn how to breathe
electricity instead of dead air.



Special thanks to Bil Leiws, Richard Spisak, Edward S. Gault Jan Rowe, Robert Fleming, Mark Lipman, Ethan Mackler, James Van Looy and special feature Chris Vannoy.

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