Seven Poems by John Yamrus

 

he was afraid...

 

afraid

of dark things,

 

strange things,

 

dangerous things,

 

difficult

and deep things,

 

and

most of all

he was afraid of her,

 

and that

was the best thing ever.

if

 

he

or she

 

or

they

or them

 

or it

 

speaks

to your heart,

 

take

it home

and keep it.

 

everything else

is a great big waste of time.

the only thing

 

a

writer

really has

 

is

a usable past

 

and

the time

to put it to use.

my friend Bill James played the blues...kinda.

 

mostly,

he drank beer

and smoked weed,

 

but,

every

now and then

he played the blues.

 

it

was the 60s

and the old blues guys

were having a revival of sorts,

 

and

Bill played

songs by really

obscure guys like Yank Rachell

and Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee.

 

when

i first met Bill

he was fresh in from New York,

 

where

he tried to

make a name

as a musician, but

the only thing he ever got

 

was

beat up,

and a real

love for the blues.

 

i remember the time

Bill got drunk,

 

and passed out in his car.

 

he

spilled a

quart of milk

on the seat, and

he slept all day in the sun

 

and

the milk

turned bad

and stank for a month.

 

and

Bill was

one of those

guys who came to mind

when you heard that old song

 

that

called someone

a walking contradiction,

partly truth and partly fiction...

 

except old Bill

(who was probably all of 26)

was all fiction, but he was a good guy,

 

right

up to the end,

when he locked his car

and took his guitar out into the park

 

and

hung himself

from a big old tree.

 

i wrote a poem

about him

once,

 

a

long

time ago.

i’m writing

another for him now.

 

he liked it

 

when

she said

(several times a week):

 

don’t

interrupt me now,

 

this

sorrow i’m feeling

is too good to ignore.

 

that

was cool,

and he respected that.

 

but then,

there were also

those days when she’d

sit back in her chair and mumble to herself:

 

don’t

let them

shit in your ice cream

and try to serve it to you cold.

 

almost

 

from

the day

they could walk,

the Kelly boys were

never called Walter and James...

 

they

were always

Fat and Fatter...and

 

even

though he was

the heavier of the two,

James was Fat and Walter was Fatter.

 

it

made

no sense,

but nothing

ever does when you’re 12

 

and

you got

no friends.

 

it

took

a lot of work

and a lot of years,

 

but, Fat

eventually

lost the weight,

changed his name to

Montana Todd and moved to Idaho,

 

where

he ran a

health food store,

until he got cancer and

on the day he died he weighed 87 pounds

 

and Fatter

never did leave town,

and just got

fatter

 

and that

was the end of that.

 

 

in a room

 

full of

other people

 

we

receive

from the woman we love

 

the answer

     

John Yamrus - One of the most prolific writers of poetry on the scene today, John Yamrus is widely considered to be a master of minimalism and the neo-noir in modern poetry. The relaxed style of his writing can be seen as a continuation of the oral tradition of literature associated with Allen Ginsberg and The Beats, and his poems are best appreciated when read aloud.

The unlikely pairing of often dark subjects, combined with humor and irreverence has become something of a trademark of his work.

His nearly 50 published books, which include not only poetry, but also novels, memoirs and a children’s book, are beginning to appear in translation, and he is a frequent guest on podcasts and television programs.

His acclaimed memoir, THE STREET, is a look back at his early years, growing up less than wealthy, in a Pennsylvania coal town in the late 1950s.