Four Poems by Jack Phillips LoweHere are four poems by Jack Phillips Lowe from his chapbook So Much For Paradise, available for $3 check made out to John Berbrich, Boneworld Publishing, 3700 County Route 24, Russell, New York 13684.A Heady Drug Authority is a heady drug, as addictive as nicotine and as destructive as alcohol. Authority wields deadly side effects. It blurs eyes, allowing them to see only the short return, not the big picture; the pair of hands and not the whole person. Authority sharpens tongues and dulls ears; grows balls as it kills brains. Worst of all, authority shrivels self-esteem, sparking a jones for justification that's only quenched by humiliation. Authority is the great assifier of the world. Some Wish It Was For The Wind The last time I visited Chicago, I walked all the way down Madison from Canal Street, and then south along Michigan Avenue to Congress Parkway. This was a good 30-minute trek. not once was I asked for pocket change. Nobody tried to sell me one single copy of Streetwise. In fact, the only homeless people I saw during the whole trip were outside the train station in the vanilla suburb in which I live. Do you hear that howling? some wish it was the wind. It's actually two voices, crying as one: another American myth expiring from terminal Reality, and another Crucial Issue dying from neglect. Safe In Heaven? I'll bet now, Jack Kerouac wishes he hadn't prayed his way into Heaven. About now, he's probably tired of Allen and Bill dragging him onstage to read with them, resurrecting the fame that destroyed him. About now, he's probably haunted by the 4 women who shadow him like a Greek chorus, demanding vindication, satisfaction, confirmation. And now, he's probably disgusted with standing outside the golden gates of the high class neighborhood that God reserves for saints. It probably churns Jack's guts as Gerard presses his face between the gilded bars and blows raspberries at his older-younger brother. About now, he's probably depressed by the way Heaven's filling up with Yuppies, who assault Jack with stories about how earning those millions on the stock exchange also earned them the heart attacks they died from. He's probably sick of these squares telling him that they loved his Gap ad, and asking him, "What book did you write again?" About now, Jack probably sneaks out alone among the clouds, pulls forlornly on a bottle of near-beer (for Heaven is dry), and looks over the edge of Eternity. He jealously peers through the stars, past the Earth, and down into Hell, where Charles Bukowski sits quietly in an air-conditioned bar, sipping mug after frosty mug of genuine malt liquor that Henry Miller keeps sending to his table. Open-Mike Night It was open-mike night at the junior college cafeteria. only 9 people showed up: the ho-hum English professor who organized the reading, with an eye toward winning tenure; a June Cleaverish housewife, who had just graduated from the professor's "Creative Writing 101" class; 2 drama queens from the Theater Department; 3 beer-soaked jocks looking for laughs; a ghostly white-bearded man who sat in back with the vending machines; and me. The event was doomed from the start. The professor served up a poem he intended to be "an answer to Wilfred Owen's "Anthem for Doomed Youth," and also a commentary on Clinton's policy in Bosnia, using the musical structure of the Italian sonnet." The professor used many important-sounding words, and made some effective gestures. Returning to his seat, he grinne dfrom ear to ear, sure that he made his point -- whatever it might have been. Next up was June Cleaver. Her saccharine ode to evening, which actually rhymed "far" with "star," dragged us deep into Hallmark Card country, and left us there. The drama queens followed her. One of them resembled Winona Ryder, and like her, made up in enthusiasm what she lacked in skill. Each wore a self-impressed smirk as they emoted away any insight or charm to be found in the lyrics of the Meridith Brooks song, "Bitch." They were oblivious to the silence that greeted the end of their performance, for they plugged each other's ears with fawning adoration. Then, just as I thought I was witnessing the death of poetry as I knew it, the white-bearded man rose, and strode purposefully to the podium. He wore a plain gray suit and a slouching felt hat. His hair was long and as white as his whiskers. He exuded an ethereal but healthy aura. He looked familiar, but for the life of me, I couldn't place him. Now at the front of the room, the man stripped off his coat, revealing a starched white shirt underneath. He carefully rolled up his sleeves, and rested his thick arms on the podium. He lifted his head, took a deep breath, and in a rich baritone voice, began to recite: "I celebrate myself, and what I assume, you shall assume, For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you." It was him! It was actually him! The poetry god had pitied us, and had sent his archangel Whitman down to stop the travesty at hand. I turned and looked at the others, to see the gleam of true poetry in their eyes. But the professor's eyes were glued to the papers he sat grading. June Cleaver had averted her eyes as she sat listening, on headphones, to a tape she's made of her own reading. The drama queens took their eyes off each other long enough to agree that Whitman's delivery was "flat." The 3 jocks, who had dutifully heckled everyone, stared silently at Whitman as he spoke. Only they seemed to be getting anything from the poem -- that is, until Walt reached the part about "And plunged your tongue to my bare stript heart, and reached till you felt my beard…" The jocks jumped to their feet in disgust, and pelted Whitman with beer cans until he was forced to stop. The reading ended then and there. Quietly and separately, everyone wandered out of the cafeteria and into the night. I decided I was through with poetry readings. Gatherings like that, in which everyone comes to read, but no one comes to listen, in which no one recognizes true poetry when they hear it can only destroy the art they were meant to preserve. And as I crossed the parking lot, wide and far, taunts and jeers echoed throughout, As 3 drunken jocks kicked Whitman's ass by the light of the evening star. HOME PAGE & ARCHIVES
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