The Last Outlaw

1937-2010

Todd MOORE

The Last Outlaw

dedicated to the memory and the poetry of todd moore

Poems by Todd Moore & Friends

RUSTY TRUCK PRESS http://rustytruck.wordpress.com rustytruckzine@gmail.com Š Original Authors Cover Art by Debby Dunnegan Other art by F.N. Wright

ISSN 2154-2252

FOREWARD

By RD ARMSTRONG Todd Moore is gone. It’s been a rough two weeks for me. It’s hard when you lose someone you have been a fan of…harder still when you’ve also known them well enough to call them friend and mentor.

I first met Todd ten years ago. I had interviewed him for my little mag, the Lummox Journal, in ’97, but it took me another three years to get out to visit him. I wrote about that trip in my second long poem, On/Off the Beaten Path. I stayed with Todd and his wife Barbara for a few days. They were very gracious. Best of all, Todd and I hit it off really well. Almost as if we were old friends, just getting together for a little visit. And we had some of the deepest conversations…Todd had the ability to get really serious no matter where we were, be it his patio or at the local McDonalds. He could always do that. The last time I spent some time with him, in May of ’09, we spent many hours talking about the craft of poetry and its’ presentation to the world. I’ve always had doubts about what my place in that world is and he was always good at helping me see, without being preachy about it like a lot of poets can be. I never felt like Todd was talking down to me or being anything less than straight-up honest. That’s rare. Much of the Small Press is riddled with the “standard line of BS” when it comes to the pecking order.

But not so with Todd. He was a good man and a decent writer. His Dillinger epic is an amazing sequence of very spare poems, some of which are downright spiritual in nature. The Corpse is Dreaming is the last section of the series and I had the pleasure of publishing it in 1999. It details the last moments of Dillinger’s life as he lays in the alley behind the Biograph, bleeding to death. It is amazing!

But Todd was not limited to one long-ass poem. He also wrote a lot of short poems, all in that spare, just a word per line down the outer margin of the page – style. And, on top of all that, Todd also wrote essays…a lot of them. He wrote eleven or so for my mag during the course of its’ eleven year run and I was only one mag out of many that he wrote for. Perhaps someday Todd’s essays will be published in their own volume and receive the recognition that they deserve. Perhaps that will also be the day that Todd finally receives the recognition that HE deserves, too.

Todd Moore told me once that when a poet starts worrying about his legacy, he might as well hang it up because his days are numbered. And yet, if there is anyone who is more deserving of a legacy, I can’t think of them at the moment. Pretty much all the big

guns of the late 20th century left a legacy in their wake and so too does Todd. His shoes will be retired…nobody will be able to fill them.

sonny pulled a handful of change out of his pocket & dropped it on the bar sd what will a buck twenty nine get me the bartender pulled a cut down pool cue out from under the bar sd get you dead

from Poems for $1.29 --todd moore

Catching The Westbound For Todd Moore Look how it's draggin' I hear my mother's words It's a long drag and a double-header Climbing the grade bowing south to Santa Fe Blending past the purple prairie sage Sun lush in skyward's crimson rim Far behind The Sangre de Christo Sparks link and bellow from its stacks It's whistle low in half open moan.

We can beat it to the next crossing, John This V8 can outrun anything on wheels.

--Charles Plymell

instructions for playing russian rou lette first put the bullet in an empty chamber spin the cylinder 3 times quickly cock the hammer back lick it off for luck & the black taste of death then point the pistol at yr head take a very deep breath ex hale slowly & let yr finger fall in love w/ the trigger the way that maya kovsky’s did the shock of the click cd kill you --todd moore

lola poured

half a bottle of tequila over her pubic hair & cunt then worked her legs open & shut to get the full effect before giving ringo that hey baby look sd you think you cd put yr tongue down there to save those extra drops --todd moore

what're you looking at my old man sd using a straight razor to shave himself w/ what's the trick of doing that w/out getting cut i asked he angled the blade down & i heard steel scraping skin in the lather & then riding clean no trick my old man sd wiping the blade off on an old rag slapped along the sink's banged edge blood is the ante sometimes you lose

--todd moore

when the wolf discovered its legs had been shot off it lay on its side in the long night of snow & began to tell stories from way back in the eyes --todd moore

LETTER TO A FRIEND IN ALBUQUERQUE

Todd; I was listening to your poem About Tornado Jones on that CD Mark sent me and when you talked About the music calling to him Especially when the moon was rising And the wind was in the trees I knew exactly what you meant I too have felt it, tasted it, even smelled it Even though the moon I see rising And the sound of the wind in the trees That I hear is only in my imagination Because when I look out my window What I see through the bars…

There’s no moon No trees And no wind Only the dusty brown sky Or if it’s late The shapeless steel blue of An urban California night Silence punctured by The slamming of doors The siren’s wail And the laughter of someone else’s woman.

--RD Armstrong

Smoke Jumper Scrambled my mind all the time skinned alive totally fried acid coke booze sex with girls obsessed with self-destruction went to see the Dead lost my mind but head would have rhymed with false confidence bad memories; I try to forget because I’m a good girl now all sins washed away with self awareness and experience ‌ smoke jumper lift me high above the flames end the pain of learned life lessons introspective migraine truth daily blues I did not die for you I could not dream but still one existed because of your touch your offer redemption I beg for your forgiveness and trust a kiss too loud teach me silence and maybe next time Heaven will not be so very far away.

-- Lucy Hell

THE FAT MAN we sailed into the port of Nagasaki fourteen years after a bomb codenamed Fat Man was dropped on them searing the minds of the survivors forever & not exactly making us popular as if visiting their fair city so soon after the big bang that dropped rudely upon them from the skies that day was like rubbing salt into wounds the city probably licks to this day & when drunken sailors & marines fueled by the rudeness of citizens of a country known for their politeness found their way to a memorial that had been erected at ground zero where Fat Man had brought death & devastation to them, eclipsed only by the bigger bomb, Little Boy, dropped on Hiroshima only three days earlier & at this memorial there was a mock-up of the city as it had existed before Fat Man dropped in to say hello & there was this button you could push that would bring a beam of light down from above the mock-up & strike exactly at where the Fat Man had hit & a bright ring of light would appear at what had been ground zero & it would expand in concentric rings diminishing in brightness as it expanded in size to demonstrate how far the immediate damage extended, unable to truly show the thousands who died that day not to mention the ones who would die as the years passed & these drunks would depress that button & each time they did they would chant, laughing boisterously" You'll wonder where the yellow went when you brush your teeth with pepsodent" the slogan of a popular brand of toothpaste in those days wondering why they were so hated & couldn't get laid.

--F.N. Wright

possibilities daughter’s chatting on facebook wife’s filling in answers poorly on our son’s homework while he divides his attention between cartoons and video games and I’m waiting for a text message from a woman who may or may not love me who may or may not go back to her husband or run away with the next guy with clean teeth and thick hair and a passport of possibilities able to deliver her as I’m waiting to be delivered some place better, different some place where no one answers for their actions or explanations for the prior years of inaction and still there’s no text message and this may mean something or it may mean nothing at all and my daughter’s fingers flit across the keyboard communicating with the sort of day-to-day friends she’ll depend on for compassion when I make good my escape and my son will never miss me though for the rest of his life he’ll gun me down in first person shooter dreams and my wife will hate me no more and no less than she’s hated me this last decade I’ve been here without really ever being here --Karl Koweski

Waiting Tables In Reno

40 years ago she left him while he was getting his leg blown off in Nam Now, here she was waiting tables in Reno - not even recognizing him after she almost fell over his prosthetic leg “Keep your leg under the table, sir, I could fallen and broken something.�

--Doug Draime

Pair of Suits with bibles under their arms going door to door selling jesus w/ two year fixed rates salvation on the budget plan like cable TV 100% guaranteed not to rise inflation be damned In case of flood toll free numbers in each book Hot mail for all you sinners --Alan Catlin

THE EDITOR I rewrite the poem For the third time Print it out again Ball it up and toss it At the feet of my cat Who shakes it Like a mouse Spits it out Like a bitter pill There will be no fourth time The editor has spoken

FAME Today a poet, editor invited me To submit a poem on fame I thought of asking him for money But long ago gave away my soul for free Being a poet I’m already a millionaire

6 AM POEM Lying here alone in bed A gnawing hunger in my belly Soon I’ll take my aching bones To the kitchen table Take my morning dose of pills Sad there is no woman to put them Next to my morning cereal --A.D. Winans

TIFFANY IN MY BACKPACK This precious, sterling heart Requests it be returned to its dealer Should it wind up lost I deem this request laughable Should it escape in this neighborhood No return from here Unless said dealer has a covert deal With this district’s seedier retailers We’d all like to know about The trick is to conceal the bourgeoisie logo So the golems don’t hone in like airplanes On beacon signals This is, after all, the known Tenderknob The amorphous in-between area Where the rich and poor Rub their shoulders and genitalia Together in a shared depravity Which no one questions Not even the plainly out of place Out-of-placers who aren’t really quite sure How to react When cannabis clouds form around their heads Where hot girls openly share studded tongues Right in front of them.

Everyone plying his or her shtick in these parts Still believes they’re a beautiful player Not like down the hill Where, but for the grace of their goddess They are one bad lover away from landing The gambling gone bad Whether the dreams move uphill or downhill, they never return.

--Paul Corman Roberts

Punking Up Hank III had a bomb tech rebuild his guitar and amp only way to harness all this riffage-n-rage, all these folks treated like skin cancer buttocks scabs exploding, explaining, rat a tat tat freedom agony, economics, ecstacy sonic with thick blistering picks-nthermal dreams

--David S. Pointer

Barry had the campus drug czar in a hardship headlock when a cop came around the bookstore corner and thought Barry was bad and side kicked him into a crumpled silence and the drug czar got up and shot them both w/ a Glock 10mm taken off another corpse.

--David S. Pointer

INTO THE NIGHT I have been walking alongside an unknown country road thumb out all day long now. it is summer & the heat beats down on me without mercy reminding me of another country years ago cars slow down & come to a stop only to peel out & spray me with gravel & taunting laughter as I run to them for a lift most of them young kids, some not so young but behaving like bullies a convertible, four young girls (perhaps cheerleaders) all but the driver flash their young breasts & the two in the back moon me watching their young bare asses disappear is like watching my youth leaving me in their rear view mirror as I walk into the night alone.

--F.N. Wright

Guanajuato Honeymoon On the disco plaza by the light of the chupacabra moon we did the tequila tango until the local chicos y chicas threw Virgin Mary tortillas at us and begged us in Spanish to get a fucking room.

In the middle of the witching hour the ghost of Selena got in bed with us and asked us to rub her feet.

I was pretty turned on but I was shy so I filled the tub with Epsom salt and hot water and soaked with my eyes closed, dreaming of the Gulf of Mexico back when it was electricity free.

--Misti Rainwater-Lites

as dillinger waits an outlaw shot the last colt forty five ricocheting through the universe like tequila shot glasses slammed on a sawdust floor and tonight lola will dance for no one --Scot Young