"minneapolis" poems
the earth is curved - sure y’all knew that.
but to get to the Northwest,
Interstate 84
ain’t le route plus directe
nope curve north to Ontario,
wave to Bex as I cross over
London and Toronto, also can’t recall
which poet from Rochester hails,
or did they shuffle off to Buffalo?
Crossing Erie, Huron, and Michigan Great Lakes all,
brings to mind
my mother’s birthplace,
Last of the Mohicans,
and the three years I did in the Cleveland Penitentiary,
where sun was illegal and baseball was a pretend play
of cowboys and Indians
but by god, it made me
the penitent fella I am today
Look skyward to Montreal,
yes, there he is, the Leo Priest,
the baffled king,
blessing this poetic meet ‘n greet trip
with a smiling unsurprising
hallelujah
Apparently some US citizens still can traverse O Canada,
even if one forgot their passports,
and are not PNG’s (Persons Not so GREAT)
over Minneapolis shed a tear for Diane,
a poet- gone-missing, and wonder if you reader come from
St. Cloud, Fargo or Duluth, Bismarck or Aberdeen,
surely they still speak poetic English there
in a twangy metering methodology - well, message me asap
wow there really is a Saskatoon!
the pilot asks us to lean left in our seats
to help turn the plane
so we go to Portland and not to Vancouver...
me thinks he might be a touch Rockie Mountain High,
considering we are at 30 thousand something Imperial,
as he walks the main cabin with an oxygen mask and a
huuuuuge grin
see the distant Cascades
through a crack in the shuttered windows,
must be close to “the coast”
(as if, harrumph, there were but one)
ah, words in the clouds, ripe for the plucking
must be getting close to Oregon,
where poets grow on trees, woody words like ****
and log-float poems down the Columbia to the sea
gonna drink me some poets
under the table cause this
trip I ain’t no driving and I am already
“flying” ‘n scribing and arriving
on a high tide and a good wind
Jun 7, 2018
Jun 7, 2018 at 5:47 AM UTC
Rub these eyes.
What a misspent night.
I cast one die, tumbled through to light
aimed away from
where I left you
on a corner, towards a ******
...You know...
Hung my hat
on these stupid hopes,
tried to steer us two on an icy road.
Slid through stop signs,
you stopped speaking.
Anyway, I'm flying out tomorrow.
*Tired as Hell
switch planes in Minneapolis
On the way from Richmond to Montana
This far North,
the snow is never far away.
Last one through
the gate
and still sleeping.*
Slug this Fall
down in airport bars.
A snowbound move, but I got disarmed.
so I aim to
where I came from
Gift myself with what's familiar
...You know...
Out here there's
not a lot of noise.
A few pinned dots between the bullet points.
Here it gets cold,
just a few miles
from the real Continental Divide.
*Head dipped down,
and shoulder leaned windward.
Take two steps, try calling in the morning.
This far North,
some flights can get grounded.
Not much
between
here and Seattle.*
*Heavy coats
and fortified spirits
keep us warm between our vacations.
This far North
no Saints to preserve us.
Not much
between
here and Seattle.*
Dec 30, 2016
Dec 30, 2016 at 11:19 AM UTC
He lives in a time of plague.
The tag team of cholera and dedication killed his father, for all Dr. Juvenal Urbino knows, his father was faithful to both work and love.
The good doctor knew from an early age that his work would be his love, and from a slightly less tender age he discovered that his love of flesh and the body ran deeper than mere science could take him.
He met Fermina Daza in the doorway between clinical curiosity and obsession over her doe’s gait, and as he walked through his heart made room for a new kind of dedication.
He thought his devotion would be equally as precise as his practice.
Fifteen or so years of marriage, between years in Paris they bled together like a Van Gogh after a rainshower, the intricacies of their companionship were jointly held in a contractual cradle, but neither of them felt obligated.
Dr. Urbino was before my time, but my story will know the life of Carlos Mucharraz, Pre-Med major, they both dedicate themselves to their love. I’ve never seen her, but I can imagine Carlos likens her gait to that of a doe. He fawns over her from 17 hours away, for nearly a year.
Like a Texas dust devil, he sends his love through the air to Minneapolis to brighten her phone screen and her day.
They’ve only ever spent time together twice.
I’d like to think of his devotion like a boulder, immovable, but twisters slither across prairies as wicked winds push them towards seas of lust, but I’d like to think his love flew above turbulent skies.
I thought Dr. Urbino as a rock.
He must have thought of his fidelity as a disease. His father died fighting cholera, and Urbino would not let his affliction of faithfulness **** him. He thought himself ill, and the mantra of his practice taught him one thing only: cure.
In a slum of San Juan de la Cienaga, pants around his ankles, holding a mulatto girl’s legs around his waist, he crumbled like stale bread as he plunged himself into infidelity.
This man of granite broke and fragmented, his sin etched a crooked cobweb of fractures into his back, I wonder if the beads of sweat stung his spine, or dulled the pain.
But maybe I should put my faith in dust devils.
Humans may be able to shatter the hardest stone, but no one commands the sky, for it straddles North and South, East and West, Fort Worth and Minneapolis.
Jul 1, 2013
Jul 1, 2013 at 7:20 PM UTC
7:05, it's late September
and mid-continent can't decide
on a season
if it's Summer, Winter
or some patchwork in between
but I've
Decided
Falling on confusion's
not the same as hitting Springy grass
because I've seen
How hard December
clamps its jaws
on those Midwest city streets
--With famished eyes
and with breath howling
tries to find ways into me
So, clothed in shivers, one might stumble
Between bars, snowflakes, and friends
And cloudy skies and clouded glasses
tell you, "you'll never be young again!"
11:30, Minneapolis--
you're sure your ride is late.
Trudge through snow, and mud and asphalt
while skies thicken purple-grey.
And things are much the same in Bismarck
And much the
same in Winnipeg.
Thrusting frigid hands in pockets
restore some blood to aching legs.
"And it's another Midwest winter."
What more is there to say?
Respond to yourself and keep walking
Still miles away from home
Still a decade until morning
Another New Year's spent alone
--and growing old--
Now you remember last September--
It was still 80 degrees!
Now you're caught in Midwest winters--
Release a breath and watch thoughts freeze.
So just wait until next Summer
Your floor heater warms your toes
And it's wait until the next drink
to thraw your throat out: so it goes.
So it goes...
And goes and goes.
But you'll never be young again.
Oct 26, 2012
Oct 26, 2012 at 7:07 PM UTC
A broken clock is right twice a day, but there is no time
at which a broken windshield is useful. In my peripheral
vision, the cracks could be lightning, but Minneapolis
is not as interested in drama as I am. Somewhere, not here,
it is raining. It would be great if it would rain on me
because then there would be a reason I felt like garbage
right now. There's always of course, a reason, but it would be
nice to say It's raining in my head rather than
I have a chemical inbalance in my brain or *I just remembered
that someone I love will die before I do.* All of downtown
is underneath the sky. If you spend
long enough in one place you will eventually be hit
by lightning. Because it's not real lightning
we're discussing here, stay longer and you will
be hit twice. Never move, ever. You might go somewhere
there us no lightning. It might not rain there at all.
Apr 27, 2017
Apr 27, 2017 at 5:23 PM UTC
I. Summer pictures litter her walls
Glitter infestations
Second grade yearbook
And a signed portrait of that one indie celebrity.
What’s his name?
Jimi Hendrix?
Or Rob the Bone Crusher?
Was it that guy from New England?
With the Iced Tea, and the apartment?
You know that really, really big condo.
II. in 1995 you were all hot and heavy
******* and bumping in the clubs
Sinking your teeth into whatever
Or whoever you could find
Like ****** and some of that crystal ****
You said you liked the way it felt
When it ran down your veins
III. I remember the nights you cried
You said you’d feel this way forever
And I said well…probably.
IV. 7 AM, you’re still out clubbing.
Out on the streets like a little hoodlum
Looking for your fix in the alleys
Of a suburb of your suburb of Minneapolis.
Anything you can shoot, smoke, snort or swallow
You’re down.
Sep 18, 2012
Sep 18, 2012 at 4:33 PM UTC
LAST night a January wind was ripping at the shingles
over our house and whistling a wolf song under the
eaves.
I sat in a leather rocker and read to a six-year-old girl
the Browning poem, Childe Roland to the Dark
Tower Came.
And her eyes had the haze of autumn hills and it was
beautiful to her and she could not understand.
A man is crossing. a big prairie, says the poem, and
nothing happens--and he goes on and on--and it's
all lonesome and empty and nobody home.
And he goes on and on--and nothing happens--and he
comes on a horse's skull, dry bones of a dead horse--
and you know more than ever it's all lonesome and
empty and nobody home.
And the man raises a horn to his lips and blows--he
fixes a proud neck and forehead toward the empty
sky and the empty land--and blows one last wonder-
cry.
And as the shuttling automatic memory of man clicks
off its results willy-nilly and inevitable as the snick
of a mouse-trap or the trajectory of a 42-centimetre
projectile,
I flash to the form of a man to his hips in snow drifts
of Manitoba and Minnesota--in the sled derby run
from Winnipeg to Minneapolis.
He is beaten in the race the first day out of Winnipeg--
the lead dog is eaten by four team mates--and the
man goes on and on--running while the other racers
ride, running while the other racers sleep--
Lost in a blizzard twenty-four hours, repeating a circle
of travel hour after hour--fighting the dogs who
dig holes in the snow and whimper for sleep--
pushing on--running and walking five hundred
miles to the end of the race--almost a winner--one
toe frozen, feet blistered and frost-bitten.
And I know why a thousand young men of the North-
west meet him in the finishing miles and yell cheers
--I know why judges of the race call him a winner
and give him a special prize even though he is a
loser.
I know he kept under his shirt and around his thudding
heart amid the blizzards of five hundred miles that
one last wonder-cry of Childe Roland--and I told
the six year old girl about it.
And while the January wind was ripping at the shingles
and whistling a wolf song under the eaves, her eyes
had the haze of autumn hills and it was beautiful
to her and she could not understand.
2.3k
When studying Zen
in Minneapolis,
the Roshi
referred to mind
as a monkey,
but later
in Ann Arbor,
Sunim
referred to mind
as Buddha,
so,
since I like monkeys
and think they are Buddhas, too,
I love the mind,
even if it can be
a pain in the *** sometimes.
Mar 7, 2012
Mar 7, 2012 at 9:04 AM UTC
5/29/20
He had a disconcerting posture, one that
makes people feel uneasy about themselves.
And the days seemed to roll over— obedience to the
incessant pounding of violence and tumults.
Makes the people feel uneasy about themselves
when they lie down instead of uproar. When silence is
the incessant pounding of violence and tumults.
When the hush of a mouth becomes asphyxiation.
When they lie down instead of uproar. When silence
becomes weapons. Days roll over— obedience to the
hush of a mouth— becoming asphyxiation. When the word “breathe” becomes the last one.
Sep 28, 2020
Sep 28, 2020 at 11:28 AM UTC
You spent endless time
at your desk in the sun porch.
After your diagnosis we
turned the porch into
your own personal scrapbook room.
I could tell you didn’t
think about your disease
when you were in there crafting
because of how focused
you always looked when at work;
lips puckered out, oblivious
to the commotion of our backyard.
You were granted God’s greatest gift
to see the end of your
days as you wished.
You did just that.
The memory of you lives on
in all those whose lives you touched.
When you left we didn’t
know what to do with
the overwhelming heap
of scrapbook materials
you accumulated over the years.
They took up too much space
that could be used for other things
like furniture and storage.
Plus, they were hard to
look at without being
swarmed with empty
thoughts and sadness. But,
we didn’t want all these
valuable accessories to go to
waste, forever forgotten.
When it came to deciding
what to do with your
leftover supplies, we knew
we couldn’t toss them out.
We wanted them to carry out
their intended purpose
just as you would have
had time permitted.
The Ronald McDonald House
in Minneapolis had an unused room
they were looking to fill—
we knew that was it.
We donated nearly all your supplies
there and now that empty room
is a scrapbook room bearing your name;
carrying on an important piece of you
so other families can
craft memories into treasures—
just as I carry a treasured
piece of you wherever I go.
May 4, 2015
May 4, 2015 at 7:01 PM UTC
Dear @NewtonFaulkner,
#nextLine
A fictional poem by Mitch Paradise || @niteLifePRO
(First draft/ February 26th/ somewhere between Minneapolis and Denver)
::
It rings, "The UK?
Could it possibly be?"
So I pick that **** up,
guess who's talking to me?!
Recognized #WriteAway
I interrupt by third-word
"#NoFugginWay! Open Twitter: 'Hashtag'
#WontBelieveWhatWeHeard!"
No way this is real, man!
Hashtag: #CanNotBeTrue!"
He says, "Hi, my name's NEWton,
'Hashtag'
I'm a big fan of you..."
I stop. Almost cry,
"#amIreallyThatHigh?"
Or is my personal Hero waiting
on my #nextLine?
He says, "you're quick wit' your wit, @Kid,
Surely you will go far!"
"Thanks, man. You're a writer;
so you know how we are....
How we talk to @ourSelves,
#alMOSTofTheTime!
Envisioning all of our @Idols,
hanging on that #nextLine...
So yeah, Maybe I have
ran this by a few times,
so if that #dayEverCame,
I'd have that perfect #FirstLine
And sure, Maybe I do,
mix it up 'at-mention' @Times,
A little #staged a little #live
bunch of #freestyles and #rhymes...
"Which is it now,
I do wonder?",
he so simply replies,
....
I say, "Honestly, @MrYodaFanGuy?
I'm asked that same question
'Hashtag'
#allOfTheTime....
But, you liked something of mine, Hell,
You could be reading #toNite,
So Keep it surreal, @MrFaulkner,
We'll catch you
on the very #nextLine
Sincerely,
- @Mitch (ThatKidFrom_niteLife)
'Hashtag' #just_a_Shout
from the top of #Cloud9
Feb 26, 2014
Feb 26, 2014 at 8:27 PM UTC
Ate with South Carolina supervisor with his wife and his parents! He is definitely a country boy, but very awesome lead tech! Thank god I been travelling around the states, while seeing the working environment as it is, and I must confess the southerners are truly nice people! I know good people lies within anywhere, but in the north (schools) it made it feel like the south was lagging in that department, and from experiences it's just media giving wrong impression also! It might be because I am only exposed to bigger cities, but thus far people in the south truly feel like a genuine people with good heart!
Aside from friends in Minnesota, which by the way were good people, it was very hard to feel in place with Minneapolis suburb area. I always had my guards up for racial tensions, and mis-treatment from officers for stupid **** but in the south I honest don't feel like I have to prove anything to anyone! I feel at ease, and I feel job market is more equal in here! It might be because I am with fortune 500 company, and their culture is different, but in Target to Best Buy, and even the same company I work for now felt like they were always dividing people in Minnesota. So **** glad I no longer work for retail giants, while don't feel like I am getting segregated! I felt more like a human being in the southern states than I felt in the Minnesota, and mentally it was super exhausting, and emotionally depressing! While I felt discrimination in Minnesota, writing, art, and classical music was always my escape to ease abnormality I felt as a person! For the longest time I felt like the environment was choking the living life out of me, and I was suppose to be the bad guy in Minnesota! It felt like people were always judging for the wrong reason, and you couldn't hide yourself from those judging eyes, while they made alliances to back stab! If south is driven by racial overtone, then Minnesota was driven by undertones!
I feel I belong here in the south, and meeting right people at the right places helps me feel like I'm a human being.
Feb 18, 2015
Feb 18, 2015 at 10:35 PM UTC
1.
Diaphanous dragons disgorge a deluge of diamonds
into the shadowed crevices of cumulus clouds.
Ruby-red sapphires overpopulate the glistening sky
like carbon-hardened locust: gorgeous messengers of the gods.
The Earth wears a crimson helmet, shielded from
the odious absence of ozone above the North and South poles.
Near Minneapolis, John Berryman's wizened body shatters
on the frozen riverbed below the Washington Avenue Bridge.
Angels weep to see him jump, as he waves a vaudevillian goodbye.
The sapphires blanch, then turn an angry, violent violet. Black holes ahead.
2.
Shakespeare and Mr. Bones **** on mortality's skimpy
skeleton of life. Will this broken body be resurrected?
Does it deserve such distinction? Better yet, does its daring,
drunken destroyer? Four hundred Dream Songs nod yes.
Berryman toddled ticklishly toward the last traces of transcendence.
Love & Fame broadcast how terribly his faith failed to trade
daily delirium tremens for the mysterium tremendum.
The God he prayed to demanded a syntax pure, plain.and perfect.
With jolts of jest, He jimmied paradoxes into koans. Berryman
howls for the sound of one diamond scratching the outline of his body on ice.
3.
He left a legacy broader than liquor, lechery and the love-struck ladies.
Lust seeded his fallow lacunae and lazily broke his wife's heart.
Scholarship scooted him to the squeamish, secluded top
of his Shakespearean class: Signal student turns trusted teacher.
Poetry cloned the Oklahoma clown in him. No successors,
no schools, no savvy peers, save Lowell. his fellow manic-depressive.
He dreamed songs of hilarity, humility, history, dehumanization.
Poetry proved serious business until it learned to laugh at itself.
Sapphires crackle under the weight of the creaking sun. They spin a kaleidoscopic rainbow of colors onto Berryman's obituary. Somehow, he has won:
An irreplaceable jewel of the sky.
Jul 23, 2019
Jul 23, 2019 at 4:01 PM UTC
At 10,000 feet we rose through soft, voluminous canyons---
Dark billows whose slow swell was undisturbed by our passage.
At 20,000 feet, the first few glimpses---
Three short days, and the promise of Her full beauty is fulfilled,
And yet She is shy---
Below, patches of dull silver offer glances, graces---
A lake, a river, a pond, a stream---
Slyly She slides, slips from one silken scarf to the next---
She teases with hints---
Then, for three breathless seconds,
She swims boldly before me,
Her bright beauty bared---
All this time, with feet planted on Earth,
I have watched Her rule the heavens
And longed to embrace Her---
And now that I approach Her home,
I find Her down there, where I was---
Still laughing gently---
Still delicate, my deliciously desirable Diana---
Nov 19, 2024
Nov 19, 2024 at 4:15 PM UTC
Who will remember the houses where they lived,
its streets and the moon and the snow of those days.
Who can remember that night that came to them forever
and in his hands that little piece of paper so beautifully written.
Who will remember the glances of his eyes,
perfuming the dawn,
in a world that both certainly inhabited.
Maybe one would remember his hair,
-oh, his soft hair-
and on his lips the kisses that brought them from the sea.
The time went away and maybe it does not come back,
implacable that day
each one found himself,
and they stay forever.
And although all things could not be remembered
one of them will resist oblivion,
that soft liquid with unknown flavor,
it has remained on his lips
like the soft stream of waters,
in love with the sea.
Jul 17, 2018
Jul 17, 2018 at 8:52 PM UTC
R. T. Rybak (third) Verse:
/
Y'all still follow Rybak, right?/
Isn't it wicked cool/
When he puts those verses out on Facebook to give all of us the scoop!
I still subscribe today/
Always stuff I like to know/
I can't remember them word for word but could probably emulate his flow:
"No parking on that side tonight/
Or surely you'll be towed/
If you're driving on The Southide then I think you oughta know /
On Hennepin south of Lake Street/
You shouldn't park for any time/
From 9 o'clock this morning 'til after six o'clock tonight.
And for this inconvenience/
My friends, you'll never know/
How sorry that I am to say, it's time that I must go"
I hit @Slug, @Prince, and even Master @Yoda himself in the verses! They have their own choruses too but you gotta wait to hear them! I'm recording what I got so far in about an hour or so, so I should have a demo for you this week!
This was the original freestyle in #Uptown on Sunday morning:
http://youtu.be/S1DMSLzji1s
#Minneapolis
Mar 19, 2014
Mar 19, 2014 at 10:05 AM UTC
Tonight.
I saw a woman walking with earbuds in--one earbud was in--while conversing over the phone with someone. Beauty overwhelmed her mortal body. A piece of her hair had loosely fallen from the right side of her scalp, and her blonde, beach waves blew in the wind.
Behind her was a man in a coral v-neck. He had blonde hair and the body build of a high school **** Handsome. As the woman ahead of him leisurely strolled the streets of Minneapolis in her athletic shorts, which were outlined by gray stripes and dipped up in the middle of the side of her thighs, the wind seemingly spun the jock's face 180 degrees. His eyes were awestruck and full of alive hope, wonder, and desire. Lust. What a picture.
Aug 7, 2017
Aug 7, 2017 at 7:42 PM UTC
He stood on the "Endless Bridge" in Guthrie Theater,
And looked onward at the old abandon mill district of Minneapolis.
The crescent moon ascended to the glimmer of the city lights
As the nature of the wind pulled his hair back to shed his hidden soul.
The Mississippi River clash against the pavements of the dam,
And the moist from the river felt through the air on the pours of the skin.
Neon lights of the 35W reminded the contemporary architect of modern city,
But the old mill district had it's ever so present among the modern buildings.
In that silence she walked down the aisle from the theater entry onto the balcony,
The silent graceful walk even in heels like a prey of the jungle,
There she stood next to him to reach her arm around his.
He glanced onto her face matching his eyes to her's,
And she pulled the most warm honest smile of innocence.
Upon his gaze upon her dark glistened navy blue dress,
With golden neckless he gave her as their anniversary gift,
And pearl earring illuminated the moon light of nightly beauty.
"You look majestic," barely able to mutter as he faced her side by side,
And his back against the solid balcony wall.
Feb 8, 2016
Feb 8, 2016 at 12:39 AM UTC
The polaroid.
The sidewalks.
Lake Calhoun.
Sleeping in the hot and sticky trunk.
The stars.
Hiding.
Your cave.
Being ashamed.
Saying goodbye.
Seeing the stars.
The paintings.
The polaroids.
The legs draped over the arm rest of the sofa.
Who's feet are these?
The stars of Minneapolis.
The courtyard.
My face.
Your beautiful ****** angel.
The Starlite Motel.
Seeing the stars of Minneapolis.
The cave.
The paint puddles in a Bible.
The most beautiful night you've ever had.
Don't paint anyone else.
Show me the stars of Minneapolis from inside your cave.
I didn't know 'till now.
I just didn't know.
Oct 18, 2013
Oct 18, 2013 at 2:04 AM UTC
There are streets and alleys
downtown Minneapolis
where force of wind
refuse me another step
lascivious, storming breezes hot,
syrupy, and summer-like,
plastered dress against bare thighs
gods of sun and moon
insist
their weight upon my body
and make love
wildly
throughout my soul
Feb 3, 2014
Feb 3, 2014 at 3:07 PM UTC
The former artist formerly known as the artist formally known as the artist formerly known as Prince
Was always my proof that Minneapolis really is in outer space
Any one up for a game of basketball?
How about you and your friends versus me
And the revolution?
Apr 22, 2016
Apr 22, 2016 at 11:43 PM UTC
i'm listening to our breath
and the buzzing of a minnesota mosquito
in my ear
i fall
deeper and deeper
into the pavement
and the grass
and the air
and you.
and it's easy.
there isn't anything important
that i have to do in the morning.
so this can just last.
if you want.
because this is different from anything
i've ever seen
heard
tasted
smelled
felt
before.
it looks like the minneapolis skyline peeping over deepdark water
it sounds like a mosquito buzzing in my ear, alongside your nose breathing
it tastes like the saltwateronmyupper lip
smells like sunshine burnt skin and long grass and sweaty armpits(myfavoritesmell)
feels
like
joy.
Jul 9, 2011
Jul 9, 2011 at 8:24 PM UTC
Spires of ice rise from the emerald sea
Pillars of stone reach out and scratch the slate sky
Black veins move life within her
Her black roots spread outwards
As tenticals in search of food
And within her
Life
A hundred thousand stories
Each one unique
Each one of the utmost importance
A hundred thousand people
With only one thing in common
They live to stay alive
They make art
They invent
They live
They die
They make a home in her
Nov 18, 2013
Nov 18, 2013 at 8:13 PM UTC
I knew it was play time
we were colliding and dancing with the sun
feet pointing towards the sky
just a passenger down for any ride
As we cruised 75 towards minneapolis
I watched your hair blow in the wind
it was like chocolate flowing down the melting icecream cone
that was in my hand
Your eyes caught mine
and we knew that this was a speacil moment in time
we just knew that it wouldnt be something we'd get again.
So we both took it into consideration
stuffed it in our memory bank
I sparked a bowl of danks
we got faded into the leather seats
I grasped your hand untill our pinkies locked tightly
I felt so mighty in this moment
nothing but a couple kids
loving the moment
and the look of the sun dropping into the skyline
because this moment is forever locked in my mind it was the time
that I first fell in love
and was the beginning of something
lost and never found
true love
true love
Nov 29, 2010
Nov 29, 2010 at 10:58 AM UTC