Slide
Ice sloped and far away
sax slipping down bourbon
ride the notes
and slide
easy
yeahhh
Numb the cut
of this landing
Sliiide
Lazy blue smoke
wraps notes like kudzu
down on the levee
laps like the river
against walls that hold back
the brown flood
Sliiide
Market Street scents
garlic and old silver
pull lazy feet down cobblestone
Cover this blues with blues
and let me
slide easy
Old jack and new lace
taste of sugary sweat
slips over bare skin
and the riverboat paddles
keep time with this moment
Slide me on down
Big Easy
Slide me on down
as only you can
rock away yesterday
Cradle of Jazz
Tomorrow is sleeping
fuck it
Slide me on down
Slide me on down
.........................into blue.
Old songs and rough seas
and clocks with no hands
[it has to be hard being perfect]
blind clairvoyance
wears shades
makes edits at midnight
rewriting each scene
and forging Dante's name.
[Portia, where are you now?]
I know the stronger
the wind against it,
the more likely the door
to slam when it does
close, and
when all the roadsigns
say "dead end"
you'd be a fool not to
turn around.
[Yes, it was I
who took the barricades down]
Old songs still have meaning
and rusty blades
cut as deeply as those
shiney and new,
but if you need blood
to oil hinges,
I am glad to bleed
for you
[No time is the best time for scars]
"Do not go gentle..."
I'd rather not
go at all
I wish I could
have brought
you with me
but some journeys
are best
done alone.
[I did take your smile, I'm sorry]
So just take all my pictures
down off your walls.
Please stop turning
them upside down,
for when
gauze-wrapped and swaddled,
with coins on its eyes,
reason often
looks just like
madness.
[But, please, can I keep
this one smile].....
Oak Trees
You were a tree,
bigger than the ones
that skinned my knees
when I climbed them,
great timbers of shoulders
and solid oaken limbs
always willing
to bear gap-toothed mosquitoes
atop great sacks of grain.
I, scrawny Hannibal, crossed mountains
upon your back.
I cried for the moon, once,
and laughing Colossus,
you reached up
and placed it
in my wanting hand.
When the bus to Wonderland
departed
and left me sleeping,
without even a morning cup of coffee
you woke,
harnessed all the horses
in the whole galaxy,
dried my tears with laughter,
as we grew wings through the darkness,
streaking the stars in pursuit
of the deserters,
swooping down upon them, phoenix-like,
in the grey and misted dawn.
I forgot to kiss you goodbye, then,
and I cried when I opened
the cold fried chicken lunch
and found your magick ring,
the one that held the keys
to all the doors in the world,
because I was afraid I might
not keep it safe until I could
return it,
token, into the hand of
my champion.
I regret that I only had time
to tell you once,
how much I really loved you,
before you forgot my name.
And I regret, that when
you hid behind the door
in fear of my strangeness,
ghost that I was,
I did not seek you harder....
I should have kept
your magick ring......
Love Storms - 30 page poetry chapbook
email W. Laura Alleman for more info
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Hi. My name is W. Laura Alleman. No one, remembers what the W. is for and only my chidren, who are various and sundry, ranging in age from 21 to 4, of whom, thank god, only four entered this world through my vaginal canal and of whom, thank god, only four still share this rambling monstrosity we call a house, call me Laura. Almost everyone else knows me as "Phant", "Phantie", "Phantom", Phantomheart", or "Oh my god, there she is again." I am old as dirt (47), although I think by the time dirt is that old it has mostly been recycled into worm poo, so I guess I am holding my own faily well, because I haven't completely turned to shit, yet...at least, I don't think so. My husband, however, might argue that point...Oh, yes, I do have some of those husband thingys, one current, several previous, and I also have a big gray tomcat who likes to rub on my legs after he goes out whoring around the neighborhood.
I began my long and illustrious university career in Louisiana in 1971 where I majored in Psychedelia, continued my education in California, where I studied Street Bands and Washtub Base Techniques, returning to Lousiana to collect the various assortment of three letter tags that I can hang at the end of my name when the mood strikes me, and the stack of framed documents that collects dust on the top of my hutch. After trying on several different careers, from greasy spoon waitress to oilfield truck driver, I settled into the teaching profession where I spent fifteen years filling my students' heads with literary bullshit and social activism, and from which profession I am currently taking an unspecified leave of absence to decide what I want to be when I grow up. And that brings us here, to The Hold, where I am going to attempt to drive both our devoted readers and our eminent editor completely insane with my flagrant and often incoherent ebullitions and my penchant for erratic and remonstrative ramblings. |
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