I’m On A Train

I’m riding on a train.
I’m writing on a train.
I’m doing my best to try to do
some rhyming on a train.
I’m riding on a train.
I’m writhing on a train.
I’m doing my best to try to keep
from whining on a train.

jwturner
7.26.2010
on a train

The Poem Store

Walking out of Moscone Center in San Francisco, our group happened upon Zach Houston’s Poem Store.

Zach sits outside with an old typewriter and pumps out poems on ripped scraps of paper. He simply asks what you want your poem to be about and you pay him what you wish. I had no cash, so I borrowed three dollars, including a $2 bill from Ira Serkes and polled the group for what I should ask him to write about. Ginger Wilcox suggested, “Love.” That’s one of my favorite topics, so that’s what we went with.

I was going to just type in the poem he wrote for me, but you really can’t get a feel for the poems he writes without seeing them. So here it is. Thanks, Zach.

michael’s delusion

all around me are simple minds
simple minds draped in the glory of their ignorance
for them, this is truly bliss
happiness is relative
and peace is an abstract
that can only become reality
when the struggle for it is lost
for all around me are simple minds
draped in the glory of their ignorance

jwturner
at Central State Hospital, 1984
Indianapolis, IN
written from what i thought might be the perspective of a patient named “michael”

one of my lost poems