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The Exquisite Corpse - A Journal of Letters and Life
Edited by Andrei Codrescu
ec chair poetick kultur anti-amthropomorphism
gallery zounds the making and unmaking of person
new economics of late capitalism
diaries and memoirs translation and her retinue
working class sweat
the corpse reads classics letters the book of revelations and epiphanies
the making and unmaking of person
Poetick_Kulchur

In the Hospital Where Coltrane Died
by Eric Torgersen

ET ode pour l'election de son sepulchre

born in the hospital where Coltrane died

skipped second grade wrote poems in third
started the Hawk Club at Sunquam Elementary
(hung a dead crow from a tree & put up a sign)

started Melville Model Mashers

walleyed sixteen-year-old class scholar
Half Hollow Hills High Class of 1960
(denied Golden H Award)

unloved in college--undergraduate
(poems imply otherwise)

bowed to Haile Selassie / Ras Tafari
stood next to Malcolm shook Bobby Kennedy's hand
(not Jesus not Mother Ann Lee not JFK's hand)

saw the Doors live saw Howlin' Wolf
Paul Blackburn Stephane Grappelli
(not the Beatles not even the Stones not Dylan till later)

saw Auden's grievous Job-face
witnessed a drunken Berryman event?
(no Hart Crane no Dylan Thomas)

started the Sullen Art
tried looking the poet

started teaching
started marriage
started Poems of the People

started waves
started marriage again

tried not looking the poet
tried decades in peaceful obscurity
tried son husband father American

invented o-talk and other talks
tiny songs for tiny daughter
sung free unremembered not written down

thought it enough to live and do the work
(wrong from the start)

had secrets of course

had secrets
of course not told here

(pretty fair secrets)

 

 

 

home archives submit black market comrads hot sites search ec chair peotick kultur anti-amthropomorphism
new economics of late capitalism gallery zounds the making and unmaking of person
diaries and memoirs translation and her retinue
the book of revelations and epiphanies working class sweat
the making and unmaking of person the corpse reads classics letters

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