Studio8 - Uniting the Arts

from Kennedy to 9/11
was a blink in the eye
on the dollar bill
the poets that were around
when that first event went down
were writing through the meaning
of how that was changing
of what literature in America is
which is the world is a tissue of lies
or it is a truth seeking to find some
words written with art and thought

we always compare poetry and great authors
to what we are handed as far as history goes
the poems and novels reflect what was really
happening, like Poe who looked deep
into the dark heart of this nation

to understand this it takes standing back
from what we have been told in school books
and since television came along
how so much disinformation
has been reinforced

to get the real history, the irony
you have to listen to the words
of the native Americans
who had no notion of propaganda
or the slaves that picked the cotton
or built the railroads or subway

the story of how Poe died
swept up in some subterfuge
strangely captures how dark political
forces move behind the scenes of
everything we are lead to believe
Poe lived his story...

the poem that survives the the dark ages
that survives the unholy war

the poem that survives the revolution
that survives the civil war
the great war and the not so great one
survives the drug war
that survives the school teacher's dirty looks
and the nun's ruler
the witch hunts, gypsy hunts and the Spanish flu
the poem that survives the airplane glue
the poem that survives censorship, and cover ups
and survives the blues

and the poem that survives what Poe knew
and all poets who tell it true

Once again beautifully written, another I would be honored to own. You are a magnificent poet.

Jessica, when I made myself into a poet, I was nineteen years old,it was 1970 one year after the late sixties, I was a hippie when that word still held some meaning, in other words I was caught up in the whole psychedelic wave. I also was in marches against the Vietnam war. I saw the world was in trouble, and I had the draft hanging over my head. I left home and moved to northern California and lived with my musician friend from high school.I was trying to go to jr. collage but I really did not like the education system. I met a poet one night in the town I was living in and he showed me his poetry and his books, after that night I decided I was a poet.

What a strange road it has been. I had no idea where it would take me, but I knew it was who I was. No matter how I try to describe the process of becoming a poet, the bottom line is I became a poet because I saw how messed up things are. I knew that I would never fit into society and be a normal person that believes that the powers that be have our best interests at heart. I forced myself to be a poet because I did not know how to do anything else, when I started out I just made myself write, no matter how little I knew what I was doing, but I also began to read a lot of poets and writers. After awhile I was reading on open mics, and meeting other poets. Where I lived there were a lot of poets and poetry was in the air. What a different time the early seventies were, it was a time when it felt like poets could change the world. A time many years before computers came along, and you could go down to the poetry reading to find out what was going on, because it was the poet's time.

Many of the poets I read and a few even met are gone now, those early wild poet days are gone, those years when poets ruled are gone, those fleeting years when great poets who nobody will ever know walked the streets and the more famous ones too, you will never see poets reading on the street again and asking for spare change to buy read wine, you will not see poets standing on street corners reciting poetry to the moon to any anybody that passes by, because that time has passed. The message went out into the world to tell us what was coming down the pike. Crazy poets no longer
speak to the stars in the middle of the city night to anybody who comes to listen to them recite.
Well, I am sure there are still some out there trying to keep it alive, but the era of the poets was before technology took over our lives, it has been a good thing for awhile that poets could meet on the internet, but there are hardly any sites to meet on anymore, Studio 8 is a well made site, and hardly anybody comes here to write, and I can't find any other site that is well made and packs in the poets. And a well made site like Algonquin's table the owner thinks its his sand box and allows people who use poetry for an ego trip. Poetry is anything but an ego trip, poetry is about being selfless, it is about being like a Buddha with a bowl on the road. We all are on that road, and we all have something to say in our own way. Viva la difference.

Well said.

Very well said. We should bring back the street poets.

I don't know if we need street poets to come back
I rather think their time has passed, because
the world has changed so much, the street poets
were the manifestation of a different time
they were there kinda like angels or signs of the times
their voices were floating through the day
to remind us who we really are, not just consumers
street poets remnants of the bards, keeping the records
of human out in the open, whose words clear the air
by catching our attention for an eternal moment
as we pass on our way to our destination