Big Poetry Bonanza

Fishes,

Come on out to the Four-Faced Liar (165 W. 4th St.) tomorrow (May 26th at 2PM) for a big poetry party featuring assorted No Tell poets and assorted New School Alummmmns.

Drink specials will include Screaming Pygmies! AH! I am screaming just thinking about it!

Yours,
Shafer

NaPoWriMo 04.30.07 (Whew! Finished just in time!)

[not by me at all but by Jamison Driskill]

The Middle

Clever as cinder blocks,
Round as a Shafer sonnet,
Back in style once again,
On loan from the islands of paradise,
The much talked about,
The renowned and respected,
Uptown tonight,
For one night only,
Let loose from the dregs and water,
Salvaged from the ocean floors of Texas,
Setting the lake on fire,
Bubbling up once more,
Hanging from the edge
Of your bedroom window,
With room for improvement,
I politely ask that you use my proper name.

Call me the Shoeless Piper,
Or the penguin,
Or Jim.

I’ll not say a word.

Two Days of Peace and Shafer

Hi Fishes,

I am giving two readings this weekend in Brooklyn. The first on Friday at 7:30 at the Fall Café in Carroll Gardens with Zach Barocas. Full information here:

http://www.typomag.com/burningchair/2007/05/two-wild-and-crazy-guys.html

The second reading will be on Saturday at 6 at our beloved Abbey in Williamsburg. The Abbey’s at Driggs Ave. between North 7th and 8th off the Bedford Ave. stop. I will be reading with Amelia Jackie.

Much Love,
Shafer

NaPoWriMo 04.29.07

#3 unused poem for my little brother's senior yearbook ad:

An Acrostic for Dick (An Acrosdick)

Running well, like a new Tahoe or an old Trans Am
In the wide asphalt rivers of mighty Texas: Richard
Can host an afternoon party or a late-night on-the-road
Hootenanny (all it takes is two folks and an iPod,)
And when it’s time to go back to school, he’s
Ready for that too; not just a brother or son or future
Dad; lots of us think of Richard as all we have.

NaPoWriMo 04.28.07

#2 unused poem for my little brother's senior yearbook ad:

A Limerick for Dick (a Limerdick)

There once was a young man named Richard
who go-carted into a ditch, or
something like that.
His mom’s heart attack
is mended by law school with honors.

NaPoWriMo 04.27.07

#1 unused poem for my little brother's senior yearbook ad:

A Haiku for Dick (A Hai-kick)

blond big-wheel rider
your brown hair changed its color
summertime swinger

NaPoWriMo 04.26.07

Something Glorious (for Rachel Vanderweit)

We are very jealous
of the rusted oil drum barbecue pit
on the stoop across the street from us.

Particularly in the summertime,
with the leaves a-quiver
with the loud, loud music,
and every window open
in Brooklyn, my roommate Lucas
and I sit in our second-floor apartment
like two hungry cats in a cartoon,
all sharp teeth and drool.

Maybe if we could hide our incisors
they’d invite us over with a wave,
but we like the way the sun flickers
off all of this big yellow ivory.

NaPoWriMo 04.25.07

Clickable Poem for Alexa Vachon

French Canadienne Cowgirls
take great photographs,
I know because
here in Brooklyn
she has photographed everybody
from Dan and Joe
to Tom and Joanie.

From New York to Ireland
she's our sexiest pair of eyes.

NaPoWriMo 04.24.07

Ann and Lindsay Alone In Their Apartment

Ann and Lindsay alone in their apartment
is such a spectacular separate universe to me,
where whisky slowly props placenta
up into tents, and the Vino crawls on its claws
toward whatever books they're reading.

It's always such a spectacle to see yourself
upside down (through the eyes of each other)
reflected in a shorter mirror.

There are places in Brooklyn
where my mind will always be;
every Saturday afternoon let's go back
there long after the fact.