#beatpoem

With a love a madness for Shelley Chatterton    Rimbaud and the needy-yap of my youth                      has gone from ear to ear:              I HATE OLD POETMEN! Especially old poetmen who retract who consult other old poetmen who speak their youth in whispers  saying:-I did those then              but that was then              that was then- O I would quiet old men say to them:- I am your friend                       what you once were, thru me                       you’ll be again- Then at night in the confidence of their homes rip out their apology-tongues                        and steal their poems.

18 years old.

Seattle was gray and damp.

Shocking.

Pants were soaked up to my knees.

Shakespeare.

Opening night of the Tempest, I was Caliban. The monster. The wretch’d thing. The bearded lady in our dark circus.

I paced the sidewalk with long silver acrylic nails. Nails I was committed to every weekend for four weeks. Nails that were my choice, I was a true artist after all, dedicated my craft and those nails made the character, they were the piece de resistance, the glue that tied everything together, the claws on my eagle that would soar through that theatre mesmerizing our audience... I was sure of it. And when I put it like that, who could argue.

I was walking my nerves off... Smoking a cigarette... Trying not to poke mine eyes out. Pacing. Pacing. Pacing.

Thinking about...

My first line,  

“There’s wood enough within’”

Yeah... It was going to be perfect.

Pacing. Pacing. Pacing. Oooh, I don’t like that smell.

A witness to my anxiety was near. A man with one shoe. His armor an assemblance of layers. Cloth and plastic. His luggage, the same. The smell in his wake was astringent. Too sharp for my nose to smell, I turned my head askance, but just askance enough so as not to offend...

I listened to his beat as he traversed through my world... Step. Step. Chhhshhh. His cloak dragged as he walked.  Step. Step. Pause,

“GIRRRRRRLLL. YOU GOT BIRTHIN’ HIPS”

Wait, what? I turned to find him staring, directly, at me.

“YOU BOW LEGGED AS HELL!”

“Excuse me?!” I said, “Can’t you see that I’m about to perform! This is my moment, I am Caliban, this is opening night, I will be in front of 99 people, or less, why would you ever say something like that to ME? In this moment?!” I said ... in my mind...

“YOU BOW LEGGED AS HELL!”  

“Uhhh Excuse me?” I said ... for reals.

“Mmm!” He said and turned away from me.

Step Step. Chhhssshh. Step. Step. Round’ the corner he went. Smell lingering.

His words played o’er in my mind, “Birthin’ Hips?” I caught my reflection in the glass doors. “Bow legged as hell?”

Two things occurred to me in that moment.

1. That I was a woman. That one day I would most likely push a human out of my very own body... And if this street oracle was correct, if this smelly soothsayer hath foretold in truth, hopefully I would do it with ease...

Beam

Bam 

Boom

Beam Bam Boom

you'r tractor Beam locks in on me

Bam i'm caught

my heart goes boom boom Boom 

Beam Bam Boom

Beam 

Bam 

Just because he's a ginge. 

Ginges are good.