Desire Street July, 1995 cyberspace chapbook of The New Orleans Poetry Forum established 1971 Desire, Cemeteries, Elysium Listserv: DESIRE-ST@BOURBON-ST.COM Email: Robert Menuet, Publisher robmenuet@aol.com Mail: Andrea S. Gereighty, President New Orleans Poetry Forum 257 Bonnabel Blvd. Metairie, La 70005 Programmer: Kevin Johnson Copyright 1995, The New Orleans Poetry Forum (17 Messages for July, 1995) ------------------- Appointed Rounds by Mary Riley These are my daily appointed rounds, my dogwalk land An observation post of sorts, I tip my hand to the old men prognosticating Together on the stoops. They remind me of the few sweet green fronds I've seen in some old yards Up North where I am from, the baby tips of century old asparagus Roots set down so old, faces pale green new. Here, I see addicts at their best and worst, and hanging out In the middle of it all, an alchemy of languid youth who live By all youth's odd rule that everything is Funny, I no longer cringe beneath Their see- through- you gaze but do ask myself is that High laughter grief? And I see the church people who walk in stern belief, and Peep in windows to see if we Are at home for sermons, which for a quarter donation Can be accompanied by a pink sunrise printed on pulp paper, I have myself been awarded a small tract or two of Salvation by them. And the Christian's flip side, The Afro-Centrics who Murmur together like ancient Semites as they Escape into their incensed rooms, To quietly Eschew us and our aromatic Frying meat for just as aromatic steamed rice and vegetables, They re-wrap themselves like gifts for a still To come magi, emerging like suns, in Kinta cloth each morning. And as I walk I hear and chide myself, "God I sound bitter today!" The way I carry irony by the neck through these old looking streets, Like the men who carry their Booze bottles wrapped Discreetly in brown bags. Holding even that behind one hip, As they imperceptibly bow and let the white lady pass. ------------------- Double Vision Three by Bonny Crumley-Fastring Home I She wolf sighted Nebraska prairie hills, traveling north, less than three hundred feet from the side of a red rented Toyota. She runs through ditches where Purple Loosestrife grows, across hills where wild oats break in waves, past trees, Russian Olive, silver-gray leaves blown bellysideup running free, carefully. II How high's the water, Mama? Thirty feet and rising The sigh stopped me right outside Chilicothe, Iowa, ROAD CLOSED IN THIRTY MILES. "You can't go no further north, Miss," the gasoline station man yells, so he redirects me around closed roads, closed bridges, down graveled secondaries, ditches bloated to the rim with brown water. I don't even stop to pee trying to beat Grand River's crest. The directions, west on 10, north on 13, west on 36, kind of sideways stepping like my fiftieth birthday slipped up on me. Stan snapped a polaroid of my birthday celebration. In the picture I'm tasting a half gallon Swiss Almond Vanilla, sucking its sweetness from my fingers, a patch over my bad eye, drunk, with the same half dread, half delight, I feel trying to beat this flood. How high's the water, Mama? Forty feet and rising "Can I get across the Missouri?" I ask at every country cafe. I imagine all the rivers in Nebraska rushing to join waters in some ever greater source, the Niobrara, tearing down from pine country, The Elkhorn, spilling over into the Platte, The Platte, no longer dreaming but pushing down the Missouri, heading South, While I go the opposite way. That nagging question, which place is home, or more precisely, where will they bury my body. "Put my ashes in the river," I tell my son from the next pay phone. This river has swept across plains and down for millions of years making a north-south connection, a line of pain and pleasure, a line that holds the intensity between two points of equal need until it's become home. Fast, slow, day, night, season after season I've traveled this river, even now, racing the river's crest. How high's the water, Mama? Fifty feet and rising. ------------------- Earthquake Country by Mary Riley We cannot be made it seems Upheaval proof, I read the headlines About yesterday's earthquake in Japan, 2,000 dead and the number of people climbing, climbing, since the war, Still climbing, crawling out of the rubble, Dead or half dead or three quarters dead, With disbelief, still shock bound, Of trouble always just around the bend. * I climb myself out, down From my precarious loft bed, It rocks and yet it is a place I can feel high, Above it all, quake proof, I shall pray there tonight Just before sleep, for Japan's suffering And my own to end soon. * Last night I visited a gentle, pastoring place, The host introduced a visitor from Zaire, He sermonized, linking crises, like earthquakes With sin, though his voice was soft Clothed gently in his Colonial tongue, French, then translated by a Countryman, come to live her now, Hunched over, a larger, older man Beside him on the bench, Who seemed to pray a second for himself before Translating his new friend's next thought. * And we the others there, polite Americans, took only silent, inward issue With this pastor's, (to us Too sin-fraught view), preferring to dwell Instead on his torn country, his softness, the Gay songs he made of our old hymns sung later, Accompanying himself on our electronic keyboard, Expertly choosing a beat, Latin, Waltz-time, organ... And this, made all the more sweet by being at last In his native tongue--------------. * I thought then, hearing his, his countrymen's deep voices, And that man's wife, traditional female, hard-edged African voice raised Sharply, joining these her Brothers' rich song (She'd said little to that point) perhaps God sent us here to travel far and wide, give birth to the throngs now waiting Outside Eden to endure, earthquakes, wars, fatal differences, Hardship, terror, even divisiveness not as punishment But knowing his creation wasn't after all Just a dream, but the real thing Hand made, each head turned out according to its won kind, This complex beast, Which got itself created in God's image, Could only rise to upheaval, aftershocks shaking God's Man-given tribal ways With clever, seismic instruments, dancing, following A long line of dancers to the holy cities, and taking mad scientist Note, getting it all down amidst the chaos, so we'd always have it all, From our origins to our downfalls, and then we'd start from there To understand our maker. * The very way the reverend from Zaire Uttered the closing prayer and Heard God speak to Him between the lines, He told us after the amens, how God said, "Yes someone in this room is going through Some heavy times" Is struggling, still error bound, But at the very least Not all alone, Peopled with voices still strong enough to scream, And scheme, scream, and whimper Raise arms, hands fingers, nails, tap, tap, tap, Hear faint cries of "Christo! Christo!" echo Through the rubble, and await that Joyous cry, Worth anything to make, The faithful seeker's cry is heard, "Found, I found one, quickly the stretcher, Over here..... And still alive!" ------------------- Faith & Plasma by Stan Bemis In my gut, I've always been piss-leery of needles, but now I eagerly await the needle, hoping I'll pass the inspection at the plasma center. Recently, for inspiration, I've been reading "The Meaning of the Death of God," a little remembered theological movement from the age of Camelot I keep the book on top of the toilet & after being ushered out of Wendy's or Shoney's waterlogged from nursing a bowl of soup or a biggie drink for hours thinning my blood I cramp myself up against the window & read the pages from the light cast on the words by my neighbor's flood my own electricity having been cut off Free stays by my side, an additional shadow finding kibbles & bits scattered on the floor from a time when I could feed us both I can't really talk to him about Van Buren's Wittgenstein-influenced linguistic analysis of the Gospel or Altizer's commerce w/Blakeian dialectic & it isn't just because he's a dog the Deicide theological movement is dead God is dead, long live God Sometimes, as the rain glistens silver falling from the rooftop sliding past where I stand I'm reminded of the loneliness of an Edward Hopper painting. Sometimes my neighbor plays his radio. The other day at the Center I sat across from a beautiful woman having her blood drained, also. we smiled at each other. What the theologians were wrestling w/ was Bonhoeffer's question, how do we speak of God in a secular fashion, what is the meaning of Faith in a post-Christian world? It was Van Buren's contention that we don't, & it was Altizer's contention that we jump joyously into the void. I told the woman when I left, my plasma had run faster than hers, that looking at her, seeing her beauty had taken away the pain of the needle jammed up inside my arm, & she said thank you. ------------------- Visit to the Graveyard by Andrea Saunders Gereighty From a sense of duty I go every Saturday To visit Camp Gris-Gris where we once lived. Regular, like a ritual baptism, I water plants Renew air fresheners, remove trash like the Housekeeper of Lake Pontchartrain. I sweep up pigeon droppings crusted like Barnacles to the veranda. The Maine buoy bells call like funeral tolls. These visits remind me of going to the graveyard. A child dressed all in white like a first Communicant, I'd frolic in black-eyed susies Near tombs where mother planted, dug and watered. I reminisce: this pilgrimage I make weekly To a house empty like the haunted hull of a Tomb; the pier bleached white as a spectre wooden like my face when I left you after The battering. Empty sockets of lights Stare indifferent at me, no accusations Just a simple sadness like the face of my mother When she says "you don't visit enough." And you.... You have never returned I recall, "the readiness is all" Shakespeare stated though I believe you've burned the bridges fast like the fire that gutted camp Lori. Do those burned bridges haunt you Like your memory follows me, Incessant as the sense of loss in a cemetery. ------------------- Imagine Spring to Winter by Kevinn Poree The butterfly knocks On the catapillar's door As the Fairies bathe In the sun Then the winter Snow makes the air cold As ice pixies dance With snow flakes. ------------------- It comes down to this by Christine Trimbo Ice slides down my throat, a lit cigarette, small torch in the fading light, smoke curls around the mirror, wisps around a neck. I have parcelled my heart and sent it in envelopes across this country, to Oregon, California, the North. My words real as bullets. But I do no damage, the dissection uncovers nothing. What I am left with is a cocktail, the lowlit room; I think you can't begin until you rip the phone from the wall and hold your head in your hands. Love your pain like a daughter. Sit with her. Remain tender, curse slowly those who make you feel... ------------------- Last night you dreamt of Manderly by Robert Menuet You speak through the Hygeiaphone, ticket in hatband; climb aboard the Hummingbird, window seat, linen antimacassar snapped to leather back, then detrain. Rebecca is piped in throughout the station; streamlined, its shop displays Balenciagas beneath the sign: Odalisque. Next to the window a chrome staircase; man in cutaway beats woman who draws luger. You go for help. The young stationmaster guides you to an empty space, dull green. He doesn't know what it was used for, but you do: the Colored waiting room. Wait there. ------------------- Melian's Pram by Bob Rainer Melian hummed a planxty as she pushed Tamara's pram over the clods in the praty field, and Tamara slept through the morning, past the old turbine house, through the elder abbey, round the courtyard of whitewashed buildings full of the late harvest, through the gardens where the Old Man in his kilt painted his flowers and dreams, and under the massive siege gate, and never knew that what her mother was pushing was so in her blood and bones and so much a part of them both. In the great main hall of the castle, Melian's youthful sisters flowed about in their wisps of gowns, blossoming in their prime, though but a decade old, still filled with the stuff of women. Their beauty would have once comanded a dear price then to shine no more than a decade, to be so spent and tired as were the elders in the abbey which the scavenging Stranger once declared unfit for ships' masts. Like the giant curving elders in the abbey, the older sisters held onto life in their bent, dry form. Such was the legacy borne by Melian and her sisters, and which Melian had unwittingly passed on: Soon to beauty, Early to age, Life a book, Youth a page. And Tamara slept while Melian and all her sisters knew that she was one of them. ------------------- Morning by Athena O. Kildegaard Morning turns up motes and awkward shells of cockroaches. He says to her the niceties required by dry toast. They kiss, lips tentative, and he leaves, closes the door into her silence. The dirty dishes wait like silent children. She wants this loss that comes unexpected to leave, wants it embedded in the formica instead of in her tongue. The time when she could make her own life, dance in a flannel robe, eat shaved ice in great gobs--has gone without ceremony. She closes the door, drives to work past neighbors already gone, their houses shuttered, turns up the heat and thinks of how, at dinner and after, like yesterday or the day before, was it? they would talk of things that ought to matter. ------------------- Octopus by Bob Rainer The young man lay in the middle of westbound I-10 like a mushy speed bump, only deader -- speed bumps don't let their guts trail out from under them like a dry-docked octopus. His liver hovered under a towel six feet upstream, as if it had been the first to desert the main body. He seemed a quiet lad, not from the way he wore his deadness with such grand aplombe, but from the worshippers who left their cars to approach him and wonder if Channel 4 was on the way. They spoke about him in somber tones and one or two suggested he looked Oriental. His belongings spread out for a quarter mile beyond. Some shifted as the wind blew, but most acted like proper suburbs of a speed bump, remained where they had fallen, intact and immutable. For them, life had been belonging to someone. For their master, life was only the hands that would pick him up and carry him away from under the blanket that now covered him, and his liver from under its towel. ------------------- Response to Richard by Andrea Saunders Gereighty So I ask my friend, my mentor What is it about prose I need to know? Do I explore its entire universe To discover the cause of nebulae or dark holes in space Holes so black they suck I cannot connect to the rest of human consciousness or even my own audience a failed dialogue with death. What of the deranged hag Hacking, disheveled at my door? My umbilical cord extends toward the feeble sun's raw luminance left red in the ignorance of ink two thousand light years ago. Whatever occurs, whatever i happen to learn This I know already, Richard Baby, I can write. ------------------- Time Wasted by Christine Trimbo I have nothing but time to water the plants, watch lace curtains dance, the ceiling fan hums absent-mindedly. My days are spent filling books with to-do lists, proper intentions, boring as celery and less satisfying. But Summer will pass, Stumbling drunk and unzipped, then Hung- over me, pages upon pages of regrets, will wish time moved as slow as the St. Charles Streetcar. ------------------- Visitor by Stan Bemis Your fingers, fishhooks.... I shook with a chill not mutual to the warm blooded woman at my side We walked the same concrete you and I had walked what seems a lifetime ago, now memories a choke chain in my throat. In the suite.... I poured a whiskey and shut the blinds I didn't press my face against the pane afraid, least looking down I'd see your spectre in the dark. Afterwards.... the whoosh, whoosh of the fan blades incarnated your voice --neither the body next to mine nor the pillow could block it out-- you said my name out loud. ------------------- THE POETS OF DESIRE STREET Stan Bemis, originally from California, is an artist & writer. He is a frequent visitor to the Maple Leaf Bar's Sunday poetry readings. He is currently working on a book of religious poetry atempting to, in the words of the theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, "speak of God in a secular fashion." He has been a member of the New Orleans Poetry Forum for some years. Bonnie Fastring is a poet and teacher from New Orleans. Byron Clement is a Bywater resident who walks through the Quarter taking notes frequently. Andrea Saunders Gereighty owns and manages New Orleans Field Services Associates, a public opinion polls business and is currently the president of the New Orleans Poetry Forum. Her poetry has appeared in many journals, as well as in her book, ILLUSIONS AND OTHER REALITIES. Cedelas Hall has returned to poetry writing after a 20 year hiatus. Her works range in subject matter from nostalgia to sex. Kevin Johnson, Piscean, enjoys Tequila under the stars and writes about the physiology of nothingness. Athena O. Kildegaard is a freelancer writer and mother and makes time between for writing poetry. Barbara Lamont writes about fear. Robert Menuet is a psychotherapist, marital therapist, and clinical supervisor. Previously he was a social planner. Obra Melancon does social work with the Office of Family Support and has taught English at Xavier University. Kerry Poree is an electrician from New Orleans. Kevinn Poree is a student from New Orleans. She is 9 years old. Mary Riley is a semi-retired 30-plus-years social worker/child care worker finally taking the time to write full time. Her current project in addition to her poetry is a non-fiction book "A Year in New Orleans" dealing with the paradoxes--the delights--the deaths she has met in her five years there. Bob Rainer is an Alabama redneck who lives in Metairie, Louisiana. Christine Trimbo lives in a house that once neighbored Degas' house. She has two bicycles but no cats. ------------------- ABOUT THE NEW ORLEANS POETRY FORUM The New Orleans Poetry Forum, a non-profit organization, was founded in 1971 to provide a structure for organized readings and workshops. Poets meet weekly in a pleasant atmosphere to critique works presented for the purpose of improving the writing skills of the presenters. From its inception, the Forum has sponsored public readings, guest teaching in local schools, and poetry workshops in prisons. For many years the Forum sponsored the publication of the New Laurel Review, underwritten by foundation and government grants. The New Orleans Poetry Forum receives and administers grant funds for its activities and the activities of individual poets. Meetings are open to the public, and guest presenters are welcome. The meetings generally average ten to 15 participants, with a core of regulars. A format is followed which assures support for what is good in each poem, as well as suggestions for improvement. In many cases it is possible to trace a poet's developing skill from works presented over time. The group is varied in age ranges, ethnic and cultural backgrounds, and styles of writing and experience levels of participants. This diversity provides a continuing liveliness and energy in each workshop session. Many current and past participants are published poets and experienced readers at universities and coffeehouses worldwide. One member, Yusef Komunyakaa, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for 1994. Members have won other distinguished prizes and have taken advanced degrees in creative writing at local and national universities. In 1995, The New Orleans Poetry Forum began to publish a monthly electronic magazine, Desire Street, for distribution on the Internet and computer bulletin boards. It is believed that Desire Street is the first e-zine published by an established group of poets. Our cyberspace chapbook contains poems that have been presented at the weekly workshop meetings, and submitted by members for publication. Publication will be in both message and file formats in various locations in cyberspace. To subscribe to Desire Street via Listserv, send an Email message to DESIRE-ST@BOURBON-ST.COM and put the word SUBSCRIBE in the topic field of the message. You will receive an automated confirmation of your enrollment. Subscription is free of charge. Workshops are held every Wednesday from 8:00 PM until 10:30 at the Broadmoor Branch of the New Orleans Public Library, 4300 South Broad, at Napoleon. Annual dues of $10.00 include admission to Forum events and a one-year subscription to the Forum newsletter, Lend Us An Ear. To present, contact us for details and bring 15 copies of your poem to the workshop. The mailing address is as follows: Andrea Saunders Gereighty, President New Orleans Poetry Forum 257 Bonnabel Boulevard Metairie, Louisiana 70005 Email: Robert Menuet robmenuet@aol.com ------------------- COPYRIGHT NOTICE Desire Street, June, 1995, copyright 1995, The New Orleans Poetry Forum. 14 poems for May, 1995. Message format: 17 messages for June, 1995. Various file formats. Desire Street is a monthly electronic publication of the New Orleans Poetry Forum. All poems published have been presented at weekly meetings of the New Orleans Poetry Forum by members of the Forum. The New Orleans Poetry Forum encourages widespread electronic reproduction and distribution of its monthly magazine without cost, subject to the few limitations described below. A request is made to electronic publishers and bulletin board system operators that they notify us by email when the publication is converted to executable, text, or compressed file formats, or otherwise stored for retrieval and download. This is not a requirement for publication, but we would like to know who is reading us and where we are being distributed. Email: robmenuet@aol.com (Robert Menuet). We also publish this magazine in various file formats and in several locations in cyberspace. Copyright of individual poems is owned by the writer of each poem. In addition, the monthly edition of Desire Street is copyright by the New Orleans Poetry Forum. Individual copyright owners and the New Orleans Poetry Forum hereby permit the reproduction of this publication subject to the following limitations: The entire monthly edition, consisting of the number of poems and/or messages stated above for the current month, also shown above, may be reproduced electronically in either message or file format for distribution by computer bulletin boards, file transfer protocol, other methods of file transfer, and in public conferences and newsgroups. The entire monthly edition may be converted to executable, text, or compressed file formats, and from one file format to another, for the purpose of distribution. Reproduction of this publication must be whole and intact, including this notice, the masthead, table of contents, and other parts as originally published. Portions (i.e., individual poems) of this edition may not be excerpted and reproduced except for the personal use of an individual. Individual poems may be reproduced electronically only by express paper-written permission of the author(s). To obtain express permission, contact the publisher for details. Neither Desire Street nor the individual poems may be reproduced on CD-ROM without the express permission of The New Orleans Poetry Forum and the individual copyright owners. Email robmenuet@aol.com (Robert Menuet) for details. Hardcopy printouts are permitted for the personal use of a single individual. Distribution of hardcopy printouts will be permitted for educational purposes only, by express permission of the publisher; such distribution must be of the entire contents of the edition in question of Desire Street. This publication may not be sold in either hardcopy or electronic forms without the express paper-written permission of the copyright owners.