Public Transit Poetry

So there's this poetry contest here in St. Louis where they pick 15 poems to be displayed inside local Amtrak cars. I'm going to submit a few un-critiqued poems, which I'll probably have to hand-deliver since they're due in the office on Monday, and I only just went over some potential poems to turn in and made sure they fit the maximum 15-line limit...Is it just me, or is hand-delivery border-line creepy? I get to be almost-late and pseudo-stalkeresque. Story of my life.

FYI: Sean Keck, BC '07 was one of the winners last year.

Here are the poems I'll probably submit. (Posting them here instead of on our G-Docs account is so in-your-face.)


Covered Bridge

You made yourself a covered bridge:

Red walls, white roof, beams flaked with sawdust,
Weather-scraped, painted like seasons
Of rainstorms have rolled down upright panels,
And stood: soaking, drying, standing.

A steepled roof, scent of hay can trick the mind,
Red lumber can still the heart:
Shelter to take us over the stream, and over, on.

But I can hear the whitewater stones,
Tramp the grass, feel it rise in the soil.
I know the creak of air through floorboards,
The absence underneath. Please

Don’t build me a barn for passage.
I’m four legs, one mouth in still drowning water, and
The river’s home to me.



Toasting the Flood

The flood comes for frittatas and stays to wash in the sights.
To work for once, the Venetians walk through water.

Meanwhile the gondoliers docked
At half-submerged café tables
Toast the morning off, glassfuls
Scooped from the waist with well-
Tuned wrists, gray water high
Over taut ankles, and stones
Over more water, spilling the flood
Into itself:

Alla salute di Venezia, the floating city!
To our Atlantis, may we go down together—
When the world turns over,
They’ll need boatmen below, they’ll need
Those men that know the way.



Inauguration Day, Hampton Overpass

To the man made of January ash
Standing in the crushed-us dust cross
Roads, at night, the gaping
Hole where old Hampton Bridge used to be, a question—

Him foot prints freezing as a Polaroid
Turns to focus, the lamplights go out
On the town, this stretch of midtown
Where the overpass went under and came down—

Him at the imploded span, deserted
To the search for lightning conductors
Amidst concrete cylinders, almost praying
For dissolution—oh, let bulbs overrun their rims,
Whittle us to our central spinning—a question—

Does the breath, waiting to be breathed, have to ask:
How do we get there from here?



...So, let me know how you all are doing with writing, jobs, life, etc. And if you think I should adjust these poems before Monday at 5 p.m. Any advice welcome.

Single White Male Seeks a Writing Career

Whoa. It seems that I have gravely misled you. I know almost nothing about freelance writing.

The only thing I can say is that I am a fan of Craigslist for many reasons. It's not only the ads for free beige toilets that have won my affection; there are also two sections that list writing jobs. One lives under "jobs" the other under "gigs." This is where I found my one ill-fated writing assignment. Coincidentally, I also found my real job, my last 3 apartments, and my beige toilet on Craigslist.

Free-style (what what)

Hey Tom --
Can you post some tips for beginning freelancing?
I want to start submitting to local papers/websites while I'm working my 9-to-5 (which is, thankfully, no longer Borders. I'm in the Biomedical Engineering department at Washington University now, yeehaw).

I know I addressed Tom specifically, but don't be shy, feel free to join in everybody.