LIVE
Daniel Rounds is a poet, activist, and applied sociologist based in Sacramento, California. After pursuing studies in social theory, political economy, and social movements at the political science and sociology graduate programs at UCLA, he left the academy to work for organized labor. During his career he has worked for various environmental, social justice, and labor organizations as well as in the legislative and executive branches of California state government. His previous books eros zero (2017) and some distant lateral present (2014) were also published by Ad Lumen Press.
[the sum of it: first reprise]
energy. and earth. and breath. and thought. these composed and placed atop the surface of the page not for a sense of juxtaposition, but rather, with a relationship of extension in mind.
think of stones arranging people in time. think of the Earth thinking you into its sequence.
there are fire and honey narratives. there are cloud narratives. there are also wood and water narratives. and therein storms will drift. or float. ideas will float in ether above or amid stories of folded paper airplanes.
and so ideas and images, combining to fit the page like a frame drawn around the empty nothingness of now, the shape of the frame, somehow expressing and encompassing life, even as life just goes right on happening.
richard lopez is an unaffiliated poet living with his wife & son in the back of beyond. he walks five miles round trip to & from his office job in downtown sacramento. recently published books are breeze by marton koppany (c’est mon dada; 2022) [collaborations of haiku paired with visual poetry by marton koppany], the e-book black spring/black summer (windowpane press; 2020), t. kilgore splake (an interview w/ richard lopez) [windowpane press; 2020] & as a co-editor of the two-volume anthology on the anthropocene, the end of the world project (moria books; 2019). richard has recently published poems at the journals the tiny & otoliths. Ongoing projects include an introduction & interview with the poet jonathan hayes’ collected poems, ghetto sunshine, & by becoming a total e-poet by stubbornly blogging at reallybadmovies.blogspot.com. richard invites you to stop by & say hey.
shane macgowan [1957 - 2023]
these are the ordinary things we love
i.e. gazing into the face of our beloveds
folding our clothes after taking them out of the dryer
the sound of an owl in the oak in the backyard
the opossum on the porch looking for kibble
& that laughter tempered by a tune
one we know by heart & heard a thousand times before
older than we care to admit
& yet as new as a calf mewling for milk
we know you poeta after the concert is over
& we walk to our cars for the drive home
stepping over puddles & guided by discarded gum wrappers
this town is made ours once again
dirty yes dirty as your music echoes in our ears
& we can hear that laugh as raw & honest
as cigarette smoke breathed deeply into the lungs
heh heh heh heh heh heh heh