I received a wonderful response when I posted "Train Tracks: A Work in Progress", a poem that my Bebe Girl Autumn wrote as she began to read "The Book Thief". She is part of a group of promising young spoken word artists called "The Starving Artists Project". These artists also participate in Slam U, a group of artists that compete in spoken word. If you've never been to a poetry slam, you should get to one ASAP! You don't know what you're missing!
Because of the positive response to that poem, I feel that it would be great to offer up a biweekly "Poetry Corner" with a work by one of these talented artists. This week your artist is "Verb" Odum. Enjoy!
Sensitive reader: Some sexual language and reference to violence
Spin The Chamber
by Eric Odum
Hammer pulled back
Click
No stronger sound in the world than a strap pulled from a space in your spine,
Like backbones could be make of metal, slipped out from under flesh--you invertebrate,
Follow me around the bend since you’ll fall forward forever bent, spineless
Slip metal into slots, always reloading, pulling brain cells in bullet form,
You’ve been burnt out longer than the last shell you shed,
Click, click, click
How a wasted casing sounds when it’s hit the ground
For a gun to be so loud the bullet is assassin silent when it digs through flesh reaching aquifers of blue blood,
Fossil Fuel
It would take years to replenish the amount spilled,
Dark Knight in the dark night, no masks,
Villains rarely hide identities,
Essence, refused to be erased, permanent marker on sidewalks, less likely to wash away then chalk outlines,
Release reality like some pent up orgasm, it spills over the Earth like God’s first flood, no rainbow, blood doesn’t reflect light like water does,
It doesn’t stink the same, stain the same as slain runoff,
Sticky honey nectar, changes color,
Pump, fills holes like wine cups molded by metal craftsman
Smith…Wesson…reload, revolve back,
Holding a glock between ya legs don't make you a man, power between ya thumb and index nah bruh you're measuring your manhood, your life span. Neither is impressive.
I bet it made you hard holding it in front of a 15 year old
Made you drip when you cocked it and saw his eyes widen
Bet your knees buckled when you thought about pulling the trigger
What rorschach photos would his brains make on the side of his grandfathers car,
That’s what you wanted
On the west side of Cleveland
A piece of steel with rubber wheels that you would joy ride before ditching, cause you were just looking for a good time,
Go home and play Russian Roulette, load the chamber, spin, click, pull the trigger
Pull the trigger; feel what being dead is like, only for a little while, no stage of life can be permanent right?
Sounds scare you like alley cats, side street pussy
run away…
To leave a kid I consider my son standing in the dark, sweat trickling from pores like internal tears drops being released,
Cause he used to this…
At 15, accustomed to gun play like its monopoly
Residency is far past Go, he’s trying to lap around
The $200 is small reward for making it to his next breath
SORRY, The WHEEL OF FORTUNE never lands where it should, but if it could…it would have spun the bullet, into the chamber,
Ejected like jet pilots in burning planes, into empty space
But think of it like this
Every bullet has a name on it
It just didn’t have a Cleveland West Sider’s name on it…
I wonder whose final song is written in a spiral on silver sheets of paper
Etched in gun powder.
