The Lineup

Just got the first two issues of The Lineup Poems on Crime. In the mid 90s, while I was working on a Masters @ SUNY Buffalo, I had a small chapbook magazine called Word Outa Buffalo. WOB did a special issue, for which I even advertised in Poets & Writers. I still have copies. Anyway, aside from one really crazy guy (something about protecting their white wimmen, I dunno) and one teenage girl with a story that made me reach out to her, even if it wasn't about her. (I protect her still. She came to Word Outa Blfo's reading at... Solid Grounds (no help from google, I guess it's closed.))



Anyway, I did a hard boiled issue Trouble is my Business. It was a very good issue, for what it was. So should I submit some of the old poems I wrote? I also wrote a great little chap called Friday is Payday.

This was one from Trouble is My Business

Been said

Been done, like most made beds
someone always along, even invisible
working the threads to order.
These weavers walk among us-
I picture them singing, that half note
you hear, then turn quick
but it's gone. Trick is, forget it
or finish it yourself. The other way's
crazy-making, purse lipped poised
to join the next sing along. You look
the fool, it's you.

It's like the shimmer in neon
that refracted bit of light you read
from as far away as your deep self
and you walk toward, try to get in it,
because that shard of light
opens a door you locked on yourself,
a wall bricked from within
and you can't get in or out
and the voice you use to call out
gets thinner and weaker each step.

ⓒ1996 Virginia Conn