SLAB OF DREAMS: STROUD, OKLAHOMA

Listen to the recording here (podcast)

This vast grey white slab was once an outlet mall before the May 3rd, 1999 tornado outbreak sucked it into its vortex of change and dismay.

It was your birthday and we were dining at On the Border, watching the monitors as electric lines and transformers flashed abeyance to the tornado’s raucous sojourn.

Now, the slab is there, a perfect congregating point for 10 or so flashy cars seeking new owners; an impromptu car lot replete with hopes and dreams and the ghost’s footsteps over the vestigial trace of walls now long gone more than 20 years.

My mind's eye reconstructs that once-proud outlet mall, an important employer for a small town halfway between Tulsa and Oklahoma City.

It purveyed its quirky treasures and extraordinary values for Turnpike travelers on an Oklahoma New Silk Road.

It was my lovely prairie caravanserai; I loved to sip on a cappuccino and watch the ebb and flow of human interaction shaped around the buying and selling and selecting of those consumables we now consider our life.


March 7, 2020
Norman, Oklahoma

IN THE SHADOW OF CONEY ISLAND

Listen to the recording here: Podcast.

Footsteps clatter
fairy tales crossing
a wooden bridge
or the slow ascent
metal wheels, the rackety thrill

Flags fly high
over the original immersive idea
a theme park
a triggered memory
what a Boardwalk ought to be
sands slipping away with the offshore currents

You know what friendship is
tides, currents, water sliding by
and suddenly you have a point bar or a barrier island

a towering rollercoaster on shore
a soft smile in your mirror


March 6, 2020

A Strategy for Analyzing Joseph Wright of Derby's "Experiment on a Bird in an Air Pump" (1768).

Joseph Wright of Derby is one of my favorite artists, and his explorations of science / natural philosophy tell us a great deal about life in the 18th century, and underlying beliefs.

Please watch my guide for analyzing Joseph Wright's "Experiment on a Bird in an Air Pump" (1768).

THE CRUMBLING OF THE VANILLA WAFER

Listen to the podcast. 

The sharp snap
of the sacred
the sugar, the will

bent, persuaded
by slow syrup drizzling
down from on high
your words whispered
sweet

A delicate demitasse
in a tiny tangle
napkins, ribbons
dreams

The crackle of the wrapper
a sense of a new beginning
words lying on their sides
on my outstretched palm

the structure of belief


March 6, 2020