Click on one of these poets to see their bio and poetry Rob Avery / Sam Tolle / Amanda K. Freeman / Thom Kirtzer / Jack Bowman / REMOVED / Anna Kiss Mauser-Martinez / REMOVED / Jonathan Levant / Chris Ritter / Michael Downing /Richard Balint/Scott Stalnaker /Lori A. Keith/ Paul Wright/Drew Perfilio/Amanda Keith/Andrew Blenner/Doug Jerome/JeanAnn Bollinger/
Rob Avery is 25 years old and was born at Wright Patterson Air Force Base. He is a graduate of Wayne High School and the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. He is a filmmaker who loves horror and comedy. He loves strawberry YOO HOO.
ROT by Rob Avery
Why is it that little girls are given dolls to play with? Along with toy vacuums and brooms? Toy tea pot sets, little bake ovens, jewelry sets and toy shopping malls decorate little girl rooms.It's because you are being taught to breed and become obedient housewives.And what about that plastic whore Barbie? All of the dolls are so perfect. This is what you have to be ladies in order to be considered a woman.
Oh! You don't look that way? That's why we have plastic surgery and Jenny Craig.
Why is it that little boys are given guns and soldiers to play with?
Notice that most of the little toy men are made with fist. Is it any wonder that boys grow into men who are violent? Violence is your answer, it is the key. It is because of violent men that we are all free. And when we break or bones it is all okay, our women will take care of us, our plastic perfect Jenny Craig slaves.
Fight a few wars for old GI JOE, AKA Uncle Sam AKA the system that's been sucking us dry for decades. Fat old men, the president and congress whores, sit back safe when we go fight their wars. That is how this country got it's might, you are nothing more than animals born and bred to fight.
They set an example for you to all follow. Give up your soul till you are like them, empty and hollow. They fear what is different, so you , they try to control. Cutting out their so called disease they leave a gaping hole. Were the cancer, were the rot, spread the rot, spread the rot.
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Sam Tolle is 20 years old. He was born in Dayton and attended Dundalk High School in Baltimore Maryland as well as the University of Maryland and Sinclair Community College in Dayton. His father has worked at General Motors for more than 30 years. Sam has also worked at General Motors and other local factories.
THEO'S LAMENT by Sam Tolle
-monotheism-monolithic-take unto these-mono a mono-take these-battle unto self-self Vs self-god self Vs self-god self Vs god self-what a god send!-billions taken-cry cut in silent-deafening silent-cries eternal-throughout history-historic praise-monumentous-praise almighty!-praise from the past-parties departed-quaint-as one might think-nectar-as one might drink-honey-as one might make-words-the poet should take.
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Amanda K. Freeman is a 15 year old student at Fairmont High School in Dayton Ohio. Her mothers family came from England, "My greattt Grandpa came over on the Mayflower". Her fathers family originated in Germany and has lived in Kentucky for many years. "My greatt aunt worked in a factory at the age of 12 for 25 cents a week.
BLIND SIGHT by Amanda Freeman
Why must I die...Only to live again...Pain, the breadth of innocence...Vengeful lust...Christened loss...Parodies, all dead and gone.
I'm still here...a million lives, a million deaths...Inebriated madness...Crystal wreath...Clawing...Screaming
Fighting into my mind...Myriad lives...Myriad losses...Complete stillness...Darkness only the absence of light.
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Thom Kirtzer is a 21 year old that dropped out of college to learn "the collected wisdom of a thousand mad wanderers". He attended 12 years of suburban catholic school and three years of a liberal "hippie"college. He does not consider himself industrial but has "been there before". He hated the " impotence that comes with being inside the city, inside a "scene" just another clique, another meaningless subdivision, an artificial us and a plastic them." "I've run for the woods..peace"
THE DOG IS NAMED SPOT by Thom Kirtzer
She called it cliche.
I guess she just can't dig post-post-modern-new-surrealism which nocks traditional form by mimicking cliche to find new thoughts..hidden deep within the old-school of wisdom.
She said that was bullshit.
But she doesn't see that the only way we can be free is to embrace society and its traditions and reality in every facet, to know what it is and place a bold flag over our collective consciousness.
To proclaim everything in what we are not.
Spot
is the only thing my dog does not believe in.
Spot
Is the embodiment of everything my dog denies
Spot.
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Jack Bowman is a 50,000 year old with degrees from Eastern Kentucky U and U of Dayton. Born to industrial parents that worked their life away only to get minimum social security so the capitalist leaders can live "high on the hog". Jack has worked in factories, on farms, for the state and is a Vietnam war veteran. A teacher that seeks to possess and distribute all the knowledge of the universe.
THEY AND I, AT THE PIQUA HOMECOMING FOOTBALL GAME (14 OCTOBER 1994) by Jack Bowman
When they see the stars and stripes...I see a swastika
When they see the color guard dressed in green with yellow stripes...I see them dressed in black with two lightning bolts.
When they hear the crowd Indian warhoop...I hear Jim Jones encouraging his followers to drink.
When they see the man in tight pants - with long serpentine penis guarding the eggs...I see sterile glass balls and a hollow ceramic tube.
When they smell the popcorn...I smell the mustard gas of the Argonne Forest.
When they see the players rolling on the field...I see babies that never drank milk from their mothers breast.
When they hear the clash of two helmets...I hear bullets penetrating soft pliable babies skulls.
When they see the Quality Piqua school signs...I see Sparta carrying away the children at seven to condition them to die for their country.
When they hear the mother cheer her son on...I hear the Spartan mother-without tears - as she hands the shield to her son - say - "Return with it, or upon it"
When they see the word Piqua and the yardage marked on the field...I see Leuctra and 371 B.C.
When they hear the national anthem...I hear taps.
When they see a cheerleader do a cartwheel...I see a naked camp follower - with legs spread wide - inviting the sperm of tomorrows last battle.- Then douching with acid - terminating the genetic funneling of a million years.
Who are they?...They are the community leaders that sent the soldiers off to Sparta's last battle.
Who am I? ... I am the one the community leaders executed just before Sparta's last battle. - I am the one executed before every last battle. - I am the the one pleading - begging- and crying before every last battle.
What are their names?...Their names are mister, sir, doctor, officer and your honor.
What is my name? ... My name is known by the old women that have cried each night since the last war.- Old women that gave their son's milk from their breast - that cry for the football player son that played his last game. - Ask these old women that douched with alum. These old women with bitter shriveled vaginas. They will tell you my name.
Other works by Jack Bowman:
Destroy this Paper at The British Mountaineer Society http://www.infinet.com/~aeonflux click on Hit the Road Jack
The Blizzard http://www.linda.com/poetry/jackbowmanjr.htm and comments on The Blizzard http://www.linda.com/comments/jackbowmanjr.htm
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Anna Kiss Mauser-Martinez is 18 years old. She was home schooled and will be a student at Antioch College in Yellow Springs Ohio this fall. She has previously published the Zine Slur. She has been involved in performance art and coffee house poetry readings for the past four years. She is a film-maker.
ON READING POETRY by Anna Kiss
Enthralling bits of your art, through walls of cigarette smoke and sugar complaints, prove with words softly gliding off your tongue that somehow you've found peace in silence, shot me down onto your imagined bed and leave you reigning from your S&M throne, make you the flagitious monster, lurking beneath my window. drawn with your ink pen tongue across my sky.
You drop the phrases off like tattered clothing and I, sitting homeless at your feet, gather them up for warmth.
Sinking quickly through my pores, they've fired comfort for my soul; feeding me; repulsing me; demanding I obey your every thought...
I convulse on the floor, licking my palms disgracefully, the words overtly chimerical. .every second there's more you've left said and I am the unsaid one.
Apart from your image, I'm raging with jealously. Am I not the one to lie sleeping, balanced on your poetry, cooing in your brilliance? Am I not the one to make tentative, silent steps with hot tea to soothe your aching mind? Was I misplaced beyond this obsession?
Or have you merely lost your passion for me within the resplendent human outcries you've created?
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Jonathan Levant is a 38 year old that has survived without working in the Industrial World by sheer will power. He has had more than 1000 poems published throughout the world. Jonathan is Dayton Ohio's most published poet. His father is a retired literature professor and a Steinbeck scholar.
READINGS by Jonathan Levant
each reading changes the writing
text is a turd of a word deconned is disillusioned
reading the play before production is completely different than after & during as the stage manager does
is the most different of all rereading the rejected manuscript is more radical than reading your mind the first time the idea rooted there
or rutted in the fruit & flour of strawberry rhubarb pie a prayer is something god is rereading a curse is something the angels give a cold reading & keep to themselves.
RESTLESS DISPIRITED STRANGE by Jonathan Levant
the god in the god; machine in machine i do not know who i am that you should pull my string and hang me up like washing to be your ghost and never your shield
we will rewait the wait for your first kiss recapture existing as far from wrong as our longest walk in the lightest mist i noticed last night that you wore no ring
recouping loses; bouncing back from blows taking the busiest trips of all be- cause the fear of footing it always shows you in the tub with your knees so knobby
powers stay and guard the little we've seen i return at length; but i must leave soon
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Chris Ritter is in his 20's. He has been active in the Dayton Ohio Poetry scene since it's beginnings. He is founder and editor of Bohemian Ink. He is married with one child.
NO NEED TO SHOUT for Jack by Chris Ritter
Live the love nicely and spicily spanking mankind there upon the rumpus of lost dialect, maybe
it is time for a revolution, maybe cause is immediately reactionary, maybe
mansions sitting edge where the city lets loose, maybe something solemn apolitical birth renounce active vision vacating the premise of childhood destiny, maybe
Stalin couldn't take the time for anarchistic tendencies temptetuously tickling the terra cotta of universal theorem thick thanksgiving since the Indians couldn't pronounce a hot dog, maybe
there on the terrace happenstance the penis holy politically posturize the species into bad language linguini salted sparatically on the backs of the Jews left to rot in a side order cafe where 40 years intersected with the main thorough-fare fifty times greater than any expanding Roman fare, maybe
greatness breaking into school time habits of thought and explosion and recognition revolvers blaring the night a thousand time since your presence is so severe as the primary poet the primary poet in the city of non-primal fragmented poetry found in great primary poetry of second hand smoke of great breaking into the title of the city' greatest poet, maybe
Maybe than man there man there within that man over there maybe he's not the brightest cloud in the sky maybe he is man teaching young mind apolitical radical everything A L maybe that's Al or maybe that's Jean Luke Picard or maybe that's the next generation of poets aligning with the stars to make it maybe into the make- shift pattern of greatness and maybe we have star not as bright as Buk and maybe never so bright as Kak but that the man can stand and announce his greatness is greatness developing as a challenge to us all so that we can take that statement and prove him wrong, maybe
in the radical act against him, maybe we ourselves can burn the clouds to sulfur.
Other works by Chris Ritter
Bohemian Inkhttp://www.levity.com/corduroy
additional bios: http://www.rahul.net/jag/ritter.html and http://www.rahul.net/jag/ritter_bio.html
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Michael Downing is a 17 year old student in the Dayton Ohio area. He specializes in computers and is currently working on a Spoken Word web page for Dayton Ohio Industrial Culture Poets.
A SEMI-SOBER STATE by Michael Downing
I am a monster. I am a demon in disguise----I am the whispered secrets, the vicious lies----I am the stranger, which made your heart feel no danger----I am the one who will hide, and kill from the inside.
I am the devil that true hell will send to bring you to a painful end.----I am the sickness with no cure, I feed disease to all that's pure----I am the death - sweet final breath.
I am the tragedy you won't see until it is too late.----The enemy of all who live.----Twist of fate.
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Richard Balint is 21, from Madison Ohio and is a Madison High School Graduate. He is a student at University of Dayton studying computers and anything else that attracts his interest. His web site is http://voyager.udayton.edu/~balintrc/poems/poetry.html
IMMORTAL SOUL by Richard Balint
A number of years ago, I took on the pseudonym "Immortal Soul." It was a statement of my faith, of who I was. Well, that is indeed what it was: Who I was. Since I took on that name, my life has changed. I used to feel alive; I put my soul to paper, and inspired others. However, I decided to change. And change I did. I spurned my Immortality, granted to me by God. I have become the Mortal Soul.
It is a scary thing to realize that I have divorvced myself from all that I once held dear. I lowered my standards, again and again. I am but a shadow of my former self. I am no longer Inspired. I no longer Feel like I did. My pen is dry.
Until recently, I thought that I needed to change myself, to force changes. That cannot be. I must evolve. There is no way back to the way I was; that part of me is dead. I must move forward. Whereas I had thought I had slipped backwards, I did not. Deep within, my Faith remained. I have merely stagnated.
When I moved to Dayton, my old life wrapped itself up nice and neatly; I was free to move onto a new life for myself. A chance to find new friends, new lovers, a new community, and a new experience of God. Instead, I grew sloth. I did nothing. That is probably the worst thing I could have done.
I am at least thankful to God that I did not "kill" myself, spiritually and emotionally. The time has come for change, the change I needed to invoke three years ago. I am not lost, I just lost my focus.
Lord, Grant me the strength to do your will, and to find my place in this world...
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Scott Stalnaker is 31 and was born in Kettering Ohio. He has a an AAS in Mental Health Tech at Sinclair and a BS in Rehabilitation from Wright State U. He has had short stories published on the Circuit Traces and Dream Forge webzines. His poetry has been published on the Project Equinox and Gruene Street webzines. Email for Scott neuroscott@dnaco.net
GEN X: BITCHIN' TO A BUSTER by Scott Stalnaker
Don't babble to me.....About the VW busses.....They aren't spray paintin' flowers......On the BMW's and Benz's.
Don't ramble to me........About how he was.........Rebellin' 'gainst the Establishment..................He was going to join the Peace Corps.....And heal the poor.....After he finished med school.........Insurance won't pay for mom's nursing home.
Don't mumble to me 'bout.........Fightin' the Man..............She wasn't marching........On the Washington Memorial .......... When the shit was gettin' beat out of....Reginald Denny and Rodney King.
Don't whisper to me about Woodstock........The naked stage baby.........was molested by a foster brother....While her mother and father...Shot morphine in their motel room.
Other works by Scott:
Circuit Traces http://www.ctraces.com/Circuit_Traces/CTI_4/index.html
Dream Forge http://www.pcisys.net/~drmforge/index.html
Project Equinox http://ww.el.net/poem/
Gruen Street http://ebbs.english.vt.edu/olp/gs/2.1/stalnaker.html
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Lori A. Keith is 22 years old is from Silver Springs Maryland where she attended Spring Valley Academy for 12 years and Northland College for 1 year majoring in beer drinking and ice hockey. She is currently attending Wright State with a major in Biology and Chemistry. She says she is, "in the process of beginning a revolution. Ha Ha! Fighting the government is my greatest pleasure in life. Well sort of." She is a staunch supporter of the second amendment, and a fighter for freedom against tyranny.
REVOLUTION DAY by Lori A. Keith
Tyranny started in the usual way......Slowly more rights were taken away....to protect the people, to save the day...The government promised they would hold sway.
No longer would we be responsible...Complete safety would be possible...They banned our guns, our cigarettes,.. They would even ban Twinkies if it were plausible.
Warning labels soon appeared ...on cartons of milk & cans of beer..."You no longer have a thing to fear!....For president Hillary is here!"
One day the people could take no more...The cry went up "There will be war!"...The government wasn't sure what was in store....If the people ever caught that blonde bitch whore.
The Revolution started on Independence Day...The people knew the way...To overthrow the woman who tried to hold sway...Once more the people had saved the day.
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Paul Wright is 21 years old. He was born in Dayton and grew up in Kettering. Secrets of life realized in '94, finished high school, 3 F at Sinclair due to laziness, coffee houses as a second home, pretending to be a vampire every Thursday, poetry brought me to my friends, currently painting cars.
COYOTES by Paul Wright
Have you seen the coyotes?... I have...... They sit in their holes in the corn fields and dream of insects and blood.
and they scream... and they scream... and they scream my name.
and I hear them....and I see them....In my nose...and my tongue....and my fingertips.
and I scream...and I scream...and I scream their names.
EARTH.......WIND.....FIRE.....WATER
and they come to me from their holes.
whirling....twirling...through my soul.
and I breath...and I breath ....and I breath their names.
earth....wind.....fire....water.
Have you seen the coyotes?
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Drew Perfilio is an Environmental-pre law major at Ohio State University. He is 20 and was born under the roar of Fighter jets at Hill AFB, Utah. He went to seven schools in eleven years. He has been happy, sad and a slew of other emotions. He enjoys many things, all legal and all mocked by his friends. He is the music director of a college radio station, ACRN Radio, Athens Ohio http://oak.cats.ohio-edu/~acrn. He is co-founder of War Against Silence Poetry readings at the Daily Grind.
Che - Milt - Me (I didn't now any better) by Drew Perfilio
Last week.......Midnight car ride.......Down expressway buyousie.....with Che Guevara and Milton Friedman....Arguing and wrestling ....homelike , in the backseat......I didn't know any better.
When I was born.....they had to rip the silver spoon ....out of my mouth....When I was born.....I didn't know any better.
I was born in a car.....with Milton Friedman and Che Guevara arguing and fighting for the wheel....up front.....I was young....I didn't know any better.
Now Milt and Che and I ....Intellectuals fuck each other ....in an orgy in the backseat....and I don't know who's driving....I guess I don't know any better.
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Amanda Keith is a 16 year old student and Industrial Culture Chick of the month for July 1997. You will find her bio in the Archives .
POEM OF INTELLECTUAL BLUNDERS by Amanda Keith
Forced rape by your vibrator we call life...While the world is spun....By a giant's hands...
Pieces of a jigsaw puzzle....Politics...Never fit together unless you use super glue.
Children's limbs, torn off, scatter a lawn...but when the police come they find they're just doll parts.
Kids having sex and bragging...but when you dig deep down you find them a lie.
Cars crusing faster and faster not getting caught...because the radar guns are causing cancer...in the lives of the fuzz.
Slurpies without straws...Pizza without sauce or cheese...it's all redundant.
Ripping up political documents...to find out later that they were your paychecks.
Hacking into top secret areas...only to be caught with copied on your hard drive.
Loving only to lose it...and have your name and number written on bathroom stalls.
Scaling smoke stacks...and having to many close calls for comfort.
Styles of the 70's...coming back, when styles of the 90's...get to boring.
These are the things we call life.
and whether we want to or not...someday we'll all realize...it's bullshit...that's been scraped off a hundred shoes...
Only to be stepped in all over again.
We're all on antidepressants...except the political leaders...a fake happiness...to mask the pain there're causing.
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Andrew Blenner is 32. He was born in Dayton and attended Sinclair Community College. He is an artist with a son and daughter named Aaron and Lauren. His art is Abstract /Surreal.
Monday, by Andrew Blenner
Part 1 of 6 parts.
Though prone I may be when arriving before such favorable glances; know that I'm not hanging by wits end, nor floundering as does all those other hybrids who are accustomed to the exchange. For soon I too would I go rather mad and confirm sound judgment as basis for all fallacies that gather like clouds, clouds who delivers deliberate rain, rain that trickles, tinkles and finds favorite spender in frigid running rivers. To this we woke and walked those tall ones, alone along the cliffs and vales; it is a gray still sky; another day born in the morning we all call Monday.
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Doug Jerome is 34 was born in Ft. Wainwright Alaska. He is a three time college dropout. He has been playing in bands (mostly Punk) since 1979.
Sorry About the Dickens Sentence, by Doug Jerome
What the fuck am I doing?.......Week after week I make.....vain attempts at poetry,.....Little slices of dysfunction....scribbled on notebooks pages...to be read to indifferent....soulless bastards and bitches....or the occasional antsy ....so-called poet.....waiting for their chance ....to get up and orally masturbate....before an unconscious collection.....of over-caffeinated....over-sexed....automatons who only....respond to harsh words....and screaming profanities.....I have nothing profound to say to these people. .....My roommate worked at ....NCR....Some other fuck who worked there....had tuberculosis....Now we all have to get tested....for T.B......I can't seem to get a date......No one gets hot for a purple haired,.....unemployed freak.....The washing machine is broken....so now we have to.....drag ass to the Laundromat....Who cares?.....I envy the women.....that get up and read....Anna Kiss ranting about the .....penis betrayer....that left ahole in her soul....and a .....gash in her uterus....It doesn't matter what anyone ....thinks about what she says, ....at least she feels something......Kate Downs gets up.....and reads her strange, ture-life....accounts of her decline....and fall,....elegant news flashes....from Dayton and Gamora.....Every word another brush stroke.....in her painting of despair.....And I am impressed with .....their feeling....for I am worn out,.....scorched over,....numb.
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JeanAnn Bolliger is 40. She was born in Peoria Il. She has a Bachelors degree in Nursing from Miani U. and has raised four children.
ARMCO Now AK Steel by JeanAnn Bolliger
Across the street an orange flame dances....It wavers, brightens, and dims, upon the clouds,...casting obscure refelections against traffic.
It is 12:30 a.m. at the coke plant which....is the burning city that trembles unaltered.....Unlike other towns, its blaze is deliberate.
Behind the city another flame burns blue...bounding sky-ward from its subterranean space....Steam and smoke issue around the city....from chimneys and cracks--drifting....across low pressure sodium lamps.
It is a scene from Dante's inferno....the place, in urban legend,....where scientists drilled a hole seventeen miles deep....then lowered a sensitive mike...to hear screams and moans below.
The tellers of this story would have us believe.... these cries are cries of the dammed....Perhaps this is so--just not exactly in this place...but down the road.
In Busters bar or at Bill's Cafe in Mayfield....They cash pay checks from this city every Thursday.....You will find many of its denizens there....answering to different names, their voices rising in the smoke.
and like the dammed, ....their expressions remain unrecorded.
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