That Congo Beat

To Vachel Lindsay

moonman, mad mad, brother, uncle, I feel the sand in your hair

I feel the ancestral sea licking your toes

selling words for food,

your homeless wandering belief

in spoken word power and engage

                                                                       (spoken staccato disinterest ? )

your poetry and mind sound

rushing through me like some wild 

African river,

       living, breathing, 

whoosh whoosh roar                                                    (shouted

roar whoosh whoosh                                                      ecstatically )

whisper sentiment

whisper sorrow

and invite innocent children to dance in the sweet rain

of your words, improvised stanza of movement

                                                                                   (chants - sings )

we share the same night the machine - like thrum thrum

thrum thrum thrum a squawk of gull

                                                           ( ratatatat

                                                                ratatat )

Ah, Vachel, you fool, you drinker of poetry, you pioneer of 

moon madness of vowel and drum beat that beat

man, those f*****g beat cats supplicate themselves

at your all singing, all tap dancing feet, ( a howl , in city lights, )

                                                                                ( tappity tap tappity tap,

                                                                                   like a forest draped in glass,

                                                                                        in the wind, )

and Lorca lost in New york the King of Haarlem with a big spoon banging that congo beat

                                                                                         (  badaboom badabin boom )

your sounds resounding in -

in Spanish stallion eyes

                            eyeing the hills

              the wind,

                                                         ( sung with  flamenco guitars

                                                                 - ennui - )

hearing the same beauty and noise

          in turning mechanical poetry world

                   thunk     thunk     whop

                                                                       ( whispered

                                                                     like sparrows

                                                                  quietly fleeing

                                                                                    the night )

eons apart

gazing the same dark sky

dreaming each other into being                               ( conch shell - sea )

Reviews

[John Alexander McFadyen]

Ya made me work fir this wan fella. Had to Google the dude and like many poets and writers a tale to tell indeed. This ia a great tribute in emulating his unique style gram and celebrating his most famous poem. A great read. "They tried to get me; I got them first!"

[gram linski]

I do like the fact that you had to work for this, John, you being a lazy b*****d, haha, he does some amazing moon poems I think you might like, ,your last line sounds a wee bit like pre meditated murder, all the best for the end of the world as we know it, slange, ya bas,

[Eilis]

The rhythm of this poem sets the mood, and maybe if I want to read it as such it can be about connecting through rhythm. And the sounds and how they bounce off of one another. But I also feel this importance of connecting poet to poet. From Lindsay to Lorca to linski. The ways words move through time and space to create connections that go beyond the kinds of things we experience in work or everyday. The mind-connection that maybe doesn’t even require an actual acquaintance. Just the recognition that we are cut from the same cloth.

The offbeat characters, or maybe the singularity, of Lorca and Lindsay seem to speak to how much difference can become a unifying factor under the right spell. How we can see ourselves in others regardless of how different we are. Or how far apart in time.

I really like the sweep of this poem, Gram. The way it moves between your signature music and the deeper ideas of artistic significance and finding something kindred in unexpected places. It’s a very cool and (strikes me as) somewhat spiritual poem. The spiritual nature of art itself that can help us to transcend many things. Even time.

[gram linski]

hey, Eilis, hope you are well, aye you are right about the poetic connections and how they reverberate through generations, and like minded, ( fuckminded ) haha, souls that find each other , we are all the disconnected, with each other, but the nature of poetry of Lorca's sparkling unicorn suns to Vachel's chiming bells of moon struck madness, to my mad rants into a callous uncaring night, haha, but aye there is a linear thought, the same thought between poets and spiritual nature,
always appreciate your keen insight and kind words, take care

[jacob erin-cilberto]

We are just poor poets trying to make a dime with our words, homeless, poemless.
I love the reference to Ginsberg's "Howl" and to "City Lights Books"---
Ferlinghetti's book store..
Used to play bongos...would have liked to play them along with this poem...
This one moved me...my feet, my brain, my emotions.

[gram linski]

glad you got the rhythm of this j. can hear your bongos, they sound similar to mine, haha, the trick is to get the feet, brain and emotions in time