I am going to the WXPN All About the Music Festival tomorrow. I have been looking forward to it for months. It is one of the great, good things in life. $5 a ticket. I've gone most of the years I have lived in Philly. Tomorrow, I will see/hear some of my favorite locals, including Mutlu, and the big acts, Indigo Girls and Patti Smith and her band to close.
Strangely enough, I found a poem today that I wrote around November 1980. It talks about Patti Smith in a rather oblique way. It is about a friend of mine who was murdered in November 1979. We used to listen to a lot of Patti together. Anyway, I typed up a copy to give to her tomorrow. There is a members meet-and-greet thing with XPN, and I am willing to stand in line. I had planned to say hello anyway. I don't want her to sign anything or anything, but she has been very important in my life. So I will give her this poem:
Do You Remember Patti?
In the apartment of mushroom-colored doors,
Swing back and forth incessantly
Ushering in Swedes, gossip and baked dishes
The room with one too many windows
Elves swayed and talked about the movies
The leaves fell and the wind would rush up from the river
Telling horror stories about New Jersey
Until Linda would protest
All light not meant to be taken that way.
The frog in the silver shrieking radiator
The magic wand near the rabbit on the bed
He would wake her up early on a morning to be slept late
Let's make cookies on the counter, watch something on TV
Do something wild as long as it is late
Escape into albums near the middle of the afternoon
Soft kisses in the living room before the doors swung open again
He never did return the albums.
So much for poetry
No more old hymns
he died in a room at one-ninety Claremont
A great place for parties
Athena making John and John making piss
Now another year is over
Tossed up bricks in the snow
Read Auden in green grass
Black thoughts can rest assured
Faint pink marks on the upper arm
and bruises around the neck killed Russell
They buried him in Florida
And I won't go to any more parties, but I do.
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2 comments:
I like this poem. The imagery is vivid and the slight humor deadpan ("telling horror stories about New Jersey"). The last stanza is my favorite, I think, particularly the image of tossed up bricks in the snow. Don't know why that sticks with me, but it does. It's an ambiguous image, since if it is referring to the after-effects of a New Years Eve party, it might refer to violent puking ("tossed up")...but maybe I'm totally off on that one :-)
A sad poem, but I like sad poems best.
Well, Patti had to cancel the meet and greet. She went to visit Walt Whitman's grave, via public transit, and the drummer got lost. I forgive her. I feel like I still gave her the poem.
I finally realized after 25 years that it's ok that I never got over Russell's death. That sounds weird, but I thought I would, that at some point it wouldn't hurt. I am glad I can remember our friendship so clearly, even though I still cry thinking of him.
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