Make A Living As A Poet: Giorno Event Live on the Web!

Friday, February 08, 2008

Giorno Event Live on the Web!

Starting with the John Giorno event at the Bowery Poetry Club on Saturday, February 16, 8:00pm - 9:30pm (East Coast time) we will begin to broadcast select events live on the Internet! To honor this ground breaking poet the Bowery Poetry Club launches BPC LIVE!

Bowery Live Web Shows

NYSCA, DCA and Bowery Arts and Science National Treasures Presents: JOHN GIORNO, JAVIER COLIS, JULIAN BLAINE-

John Giorno (b. 1936), New York poet and performer associated with the counterculture movement and New York School of poetry of the 1960s, and friend to artists such as William Burroughs, Robert Rauschenberg, and Andy Warhol, revolutionized the way poetry is written, presented, performed and disseminated. His contribution to American literature has involved the attempt to link poetry with other media. Giorno Poetry Systems, begun in 1965, and later Dial-a-Poem, incorporated the use of electronic and multi-media to create new venues and a broad audience for the spoken word. www.ubu.com/sound/dial.html

Death by Taxi

In New York you die in taxis.
A little yellow death.
The honking of crows.
Black puddles, putrid flapping.
Only there are no crows.
They must be pigeons, blacking up.
They honk convincingly and the traffic
begins to flow and breathe again.
You are in his arms. He is loving you alive.
You see the light. It’s a green light
For God’s sake try to make the light.
It’s flashing and the crow dogs are barking
in their little park runs.
Only there are no dogs.
They must be jackals in wiener dog coats.
Your death will make the news.
The paperboys are swooning,
“Extra! Extra!”
“You’ll never guess who died in a taxi!”
Stuck in traffic unable
to get to even the closest
Starbucks. Only there is no coffee.
It must be dead black water,
like an old Doobee Brothers song
surprising you on the radio.
But that’s not radio and the cabby
isn’t singing to you, he’s singing
to his cousin about the Knicks in Urdu.
He keeps shouting the chorus,
“Knick Knock, Knick Knock.”
He has no idea you are dead.
Now here’s the riddle:
do you tip when you’re dead?
You can’t take it-whatever!
Still it seems a little rude,
to keep driving
into the subway token sun,
slipping through its square hole,
while all your passengers
are rattling a hoarse mackerel breath
almost a whisper,
“Horse Head Nebula”
and step on it.

Make A Living As A Poet

Friday, February 08, 2008

Giorno Event Live on the Web!

About Me

Blog Archive

Poetry Links

Death by Taxi