Month: January 2017

once in every

fire and flame
make me stronger
another chance again
still a lifetime
still i cry

pennsylvania avenue at sunrise
(the orioles, then the vibra-naires—sonny til, george nelson, alex sharp, johnny reed, lloyd gaither—and songwriter deborah chessler, all from west baltimore, began collaborating in 1948 and, according to many music historians, sparked the explosion of rock and roll after getting started on corners and in clubs on pennsylvania avenue)

viewing rooms

nasty business
from a promontory
stands in wet white linen
floats down to ships
on streets and alleys
touring
in scenery and repose

belvedere at sunrise
(the sheraton belvedere, on chase and charles streets, desegregated at christmas in 1954 for a month, before re-segregating at the demand of racist city business leaders)

teamsport

fingers strings steel compress release
balls turn in grace
arc in certainty
bounce in rolling chaos
through portals
past counterstrikes
into destinations
antipathyfree
in run stop pass hold launch strike
force finesse
constitutional policepowerfree
lovely spheres
spinning and flying

druid park from beechwood drive at sunrise
(despite a federal district court finding in 1953 that policy prohibiting interracial basketball, tennis, and golf in city parks was not unconstitutional, city parks were desegregated in 1953—one set of plaintiffs had been prevented from playing tennis together in druid hill park)

call to fascxiom

hoover’s hematemesis
vomited bubbling out windows
down crumblingmortar oxidizedaluminum moldyvinalwood
into buried earthlung springs
mccarthy’s melena
served mysterymeat
in soupkitchen with sugaredwater
largetracing arsenicleadbenzene
nixon’s necrosis
spreading comfortmutation.
wallace’s stent
scalpaling steelsword
excise resist reject from electricbody

wallace statue in druid hill park at sunrise
(dorothy rose blumberg, later convicted and jailed for advocating for better minimum wages and against discrimination and against abuse of civil liberties, was trailed by many fbi agents in 1952 around reservoir hill where she lived, including on her trips to druid hill park)