Sunday, April 12, 2015

Adam Gottlieb, "Poet Breathe Now"




POET BREATHE NOW by Adam Gottlieb

everybody’s got something to say about poetry
           because rhymes peak in meaning shedding light on our unspeakables
           for an ample example
           take the other day when i sat not knowing how to write a poem
           and assuming I was fruitlessly booming the thin air
           I yelled and spat my frustration:

how do I start?
           and my dog looks up from her water dish and says
           “I hate to encroach on your ‘artistic space’
           cuz I know you're like ‘in-the-zone’ or whatever,
           but if you really want my advice here it is”
           and then my dog says

“poet breathe now –
            because it’s the last thing you’ll ever do for yourself.

poet breathe now because there’s a fire inside you that needs oxygen to burn
            and if you don’t run out of breath you’re gonna run out of time

poet breathe now because once the spot gets packed
            you gotta save that air for screamin, your --
            inhalation takes saviorisms to sky-highs
            you gotta go with the flowin of your own voice, poet.
            breathe now because once you spit you won’t even need air
            you'll be rockin rhymes respiratory,
            you’ll breathe poetry baby.

you breathe now and you’ll never forget that breath
            you got --
            pulsasive passages passing the mic
            and hot hallelujahs when verses you write
            and your sin is your savior your song is your life
            and your words are like wonders to wandering fifes pipin ceremony:
            poets you man, words you wife
            and your honeymoon orbits around your love like metronomic metros
            keepin time to the heartbeat of your heavenly drums –

poet breathe now because you might have something to say
            because peace might depend on your piece
            because you breathe
            and that air might help your brain tell your heart to keep pumping
            one more cycle and that blood might help your lips form one last word
            that hits the audience hard –
            because we are all made from the same elements
            and we all breathe the same air
            so celebrate our mutual recipes of existence
            by persisting to stay alive
            ducking sageless luckless ages
            like intellectual hippies!

when you take a breath
            the universe rings out like circular beats –
            landing planets are seraphim
            storms are spit –
            stars are soul candles!
            and you breathe like chest rebounds
            even when all hope seems lost
            our sounds pound mics
            like hope-stars
            like “we’re still here” hollas!
            we make angels of our nightclubs,
            bards of our bums,
            outlooks of our outcasts
            and infinity of our sums,
            we are the children of empathy,
            the pathos of slums,
            we heal like Helios
            like cyclical drums
            we enlist life from listless
            and sometimes
            even get things done

poet breathe now
            because once you start your piece
            you can die behind that microphone
            and
            death may be breathless
            but poetry’s deathless
            so breath be
            our savior
            eternal.

poets breathe once with me now

that’s one poem we all wrote.

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