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Praise for STRAW WRITES “Straw Writes is nothing short of astonishing. The ghosts of Walt Whitman and Allen Ginsberg weave through the text, and Christopher Shugrue ably shows himself to be one of their literary heirs.”
LINDA TATE , au tho r o f POWER IN THE BLOOD “In this sensitive and brave first book, Shugrue works hard to make sense of the materials of war, and of the time that follows it. He considers the memory that a person might build—and loop —in civilian life. The life where you get to love someone and follow them a little bit of the way. He is not afraid to write into the madness. What it means to go and not, always, return.”
STRAW WRITES
BHANU KAPIL , author of SCHIZOPHRENE “World on fire, ghost winds, naked children in the American night, as a Whitmanic and Ginsbergian ethos permeates the battleground of a Fallujah nightmare. This is the scape of Straw Writes, a hybrid text of conviction and urgency.”
ANNE WALDMAN , autho r o f GOSSAMURMUR ISBN-10 0-9915429-2-4 ISBN-13 978-0-9915429-2-5 51000
C h rist o p h er S h u g r u e 9
780991 542925
m o n k e y p u z z l e p r e s s . c o m
STRAW WRITES
STRAW WRITES C h rist o p h er S h u g r u e M o n k ey Pu zzl e Pr ess Ha r r i so n , A r k a n sa s
COPYRIGHT Š 2014 CHRISTOPHER SHUGRUE All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief excerpts. Printed in the United States of America.
COVER ART Nevin Brownell
Author Photo Elyse Brownell
COVER & INTERIOR DESIGN Nate Jordon
ISBN-10: 0-9915429-2-4 ISBN-13: 978-0-9915429-2-5
Monkey Puzzle Press 424 N. Spring St. Harrison, Arkansas 72601 monkeypuzzlepress.com
This book is dedicated to my family. You know who you are. But to name a few: To Elyse Brownell: my flatland wildflower, complete love of my life, my muse. To my ma, Patricia Ann Schueneman: always there for me. To my father, Steven Michael Shugrue: raised me right and always kicking rocks. To my daughter, Delia Ayn Shugrue: my buddy, my little blackbird, always my little girl. To my muses whose writings appear here: Robert Hunter, Bob Dylan, Jack Kerouac, W.B. Yeats, Tim O’Brien, Ernest Hemingway, Walt Whitman, and Allen Ginsberg. And finally to Straw: whose ending I wrote before I even knew who he was.
Table of Contents Straw Writes Ghosts Make Love
1
Straw Writes Ghosts Make War
7
Straw Writes Ghosts
14
Straw Writes
23
Straw
31
STRAW WRITES
Straw Writes Ghosts Make Love “It was my view then, and still is, that you don’t make war without knowing why. Knowledge, of course, is always imperfect, but it seemed that when a nation goes to war it must have reasonable confidence in the justice and imperative of its cause. You can’t fix your mistakes. Once people are dead, you can’t make them undead.”
— Tim O’Brien, “On the Rainy River”
Dearest Margaret: Eloquence is not my strong point so I’ll get straight to it: thanks for taking Rosalie and running. Awesome! Exactly what I needed upon return; just what I deserve after eating sand and drinking the blood of rats. Don’t worry about me. One thing I learned in the desert: all I need is my knife and the ghosts of the men I’ve murdered. Peace, Your Loving Husband
1
C H R I S T OPH E R S HUG R U E
Outside Salisbury Hotel . . . 3 AM . . . St. Patrick’s Day . . . ghost drums and pipes . . . no cars racing up and down . . . no stars above scrapers: is it overcast? Have the everburning lights of the infernal city finally extinguished the soul, killed the life-force of celestial bodies? 57th Street: barren. No tortured souls; none in enraptured limbo. Where to now? The party on the seventh floor faded; left a couple sitting up there, contemplating an exquisite corpse, passing the whiskey round. And Emma’s eyes; the rush when her hand had lightly brushed his; he in her arms for a moment; how the blood surged when she’d kissed his neck. She was a flower, brilliant in all regards; he a man chasing ghosts; he ran, left her considering what used to be.
2
STRAW WRITES
Arabian wind; The Needle’s Eye is thin; The Ships of State sail on mirage but drown in sand in No-Man’s Land where ALLAH does command.1
Where to now? East: Central Park? No, won’t revisit that scene: sitting on rock just within boundaries, sun rise over city splendid, man with the mustache kept saying “Please can’t find my knees” and “Have you found Jesus?” Knew the blade was there before the reveal. The freak was strong. Felt the knife plunge: no bone; all soft tissue; no pain. Not Central Park; the fishing there this night would be tragic. 6th Avenue walking downtown; Ghosts. Knew he’d see them again, like yesterday as he strolled through Harlem: They sat hand-in-hand on the steps of Langston Hughes’ house; he could see them; knew no one else could. They grinned with cold eyes. On the right: “Your roots dig deeply searching for the water.” On the left: “All voices are lost.” Just words; him—slack jawed—and cars, people in the street, the sunny Harlem afternoon.
3
C H R I S T OPH E R S HUG R U E
They lie where they fall; there’s nothing more to say; the desert stars are bright tonight let’s meet as friends; the flower of Islam; the fruit of Abraham.2
They run before him skipping and laughing, naked children in the American night. Quicken the pace, try to catch them; they’re too slick; they vaporize through the doors of Radio City Music Hall. The marquee reads: An Evening with Elvis Costello. The ghosts will make love in the aisles of the great hall. He knew when Allen died he’d search for Walt, find him here. Where to now? He won’t wait. “Let them make love in the aisles.” The city sings; he can’t cover his ears. Stone drops from scraper sky; BLAM! Slams into plate glass. At his feet a bird brained, maybe dead. Poor soul! American Woodcock. Staring through plate glass turned wall of destruction, a watchman flicks his flashlight; beam of light on bird then up to face; he squints and stares at the sentry. Beam of light back to bird. The watchman shrugs, returns to his rounds. Now, just he and bird, the quiet night. “Leave it there?” Maybe crush its skull, head back to the Salisbury, a knock on the door; she’d let him in; he could smell her, yearned to be let inside, to feel her warmth.
4
STRAW WRITES
Under eternity . . . Under eternity . . . Under eternity . . . Blue Bird of Paradise Fly In white sky . . . Under eternity . . . Blues for ALLAH In’sh’ALLAH . . .3
Scoops up bird, feels around her feathered throat. A faint pulse, the blood, the blood, the sweet blood still flows, neck not broken after perilous flight. Tucks bird close to center, continues on his way down 6th Avenue. Something draws him, the bird wrapped in his fate. The ghosts he’d been chasing led him here, so he walks, bird held close, and begins to coo. “Beware the western wind; beware the stormy weather.” He tells bird a story of ghosts, tattered fabric of time and space, of coordinates and vectors, directions through the scraper canyons that lead out of the city to safety.
5
C H R I S T OPH E R S HUG R U E
Where to now? He walks, holding his little bird.
6
End Notes 1. Robert Hunter, “Blues for Allah,” A Box of Rain (New York: Penguin Books, 1993), 20. 2. Ibid. 3. Ibid. 4. Ibid. 5. Ibid. 6. Ibid. 7. Ibid. 8. Ibid. 9. Robert Hunter, “Wharf Rat,” A Box of Rain (New York: Penguin Books, 1993), 240. 10. Ibid. 11. Bob Dylan, “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall,” Lyrics, 1962-1985 (New York: Knopf, Inc., 1985), 59. 12. Ibid. 13. Bob Dylan, “Someone’s Got a Hold of My Heart,” The Bootleg Series, Vol1-3: Rare & Unreleased 1961-1991, Copyright 1983 by Special Rider Music, www.bobdylan. com/us/songs/someones-got-hold-my-heart 14. Robert Hunter, “Althea,” A Box of Rain (New York: Penguin Books, 1993), 8. 15. Walt Whitman, “A Sight in Camp in the Daybreak Grey and Dim,” Leaves of Grass (New York: Modern Library, Random House), 246. 16. Bob Dylan, “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall,” Lyrics, 1962-1985 (New York: Knopf, Inc., 1985), 59. 17. Allen Ginsberg, “Howl,” Collected Poems 1947-1980 (New York: Harper & Row, 1984), 126.
Acknowledgments The poem “Upon Seeing the Ghost of Walt Whitman” was originally published in Sans Merci, Shepherd University, 2004.
About the Author
Christopher Shugrue Š Elyse Brownell
Christopher Shugrue was born on the run. He is a writer, performer, and photographer whose work appears in several journals, including Semicolon, Sans Merci, The Front Porch News, and Bombay Gin. Straw Writes was named a finalist in the Monkey Puzzle Press 2013 Prose Chapbook Contest. Chris holds an MFA in Writing and Poetics from Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado, and also assists with promoting and archiving the monthly performance series, Bouldering Poets. Chris’ current work explores the ghost and what it means to be haunted. He lives, works, writes, and teaches in Boulder with his bride, the writer Elyse Brownell, and their 106 pound malamute, Yoda, Son of Chewie. For more info, visit his blog: twocrowsonawire. blogspot.com
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Praise for
STRAW WRITES
“Straw Writes is nothing short of astonishing. The ghosts of Walt Whitman and Allen Ginsberg weave through the text, and Christopher Shugrue ably shows himself to be one of their literary heirs.”
LINDA TATE,
autho r o f P O W E R I N T H E B L OO D
“In this sensitive and brave first book, Shugrue works hard to make sense of the materials of war, and of the time that follows it. He considers the memory that a person might build—and loop —in civilian life. The life where you get to love someone and follow them a little bit of the way. He is not afraid to write into the madness. What it means to go and not, always, return.”
STRAW WRITES
B H A N U K A P I L , author of S C H I Z O P H R E N E “World on fire, ghost winds, naked children in the American night, as a Whitmanic and Ginsbergian ethos permeates the battleground of a Fallujah nightmare. This is the scape of Straw Writes, a hybrid text of conviction and urgency.”
A NNE W A L D M A N ,
autho r o f G OSS A MURMUR
ISBN-10 0-9915429-2-4 ISBN-13 978-0-9915429-2-5 51000
C h rist o p h er S h u g r u e 9
780991 542925
m o n k e y p u z z l e p r e s s . c o m