In 1998 I won a Northern Arts writers award. In July 200 I read at Waterstones bookshop to promote the anthology 'Titles Are Bitches'. Christmas 2001 I debuted at Newcastle's famous Morden Tower doing a reading of my poems. Each year I read for Proudwords lesbian and gay writing festival and I partake in workshops. 2005 saw the publication of my collection LOVEBITES published by Chanticleer Press, 6/1 Jamaica Mews, Edinburgh.
On Saturday 16Th August 2003 I read at the Edinburgh Festival as a Per Verse poet at LGBT Centre, Broughton St.
I also have a BBC web-page: http://www.bbc.co.uk/tyne/videonation/stories/gay_history.shtml
It starts the way it ends-
someone yells Hallelujah
and the hooligans put away their
brass knuckles and firearms then
sing lullabies to coax the wings out.
Pin the tail on the donkey is replaced
with games of ball and jacks.
The bungo juice is passed around one
final time and then the soberest one
in the bunch stumbles up to read out
aloud the note scotch-taped to the pearly
gates, you know, the one that says;
Picking-up some Chinese takeaway,
Be Back In A Jiffy!
Biography
After almost a decade of working as a freelance photographer in Europe,
Maurice Oliver returned to America in 1990. Then, in 1995, he made a
life-long dream reality by traveling around the world for eight months. But
instead of taking pictures, he recorded the experience in a journal which
eventually became poems. And so began his desire to be a poet. His
poetry has appeared in numerous national and international publications
and literary websites including Potomac Journal, Pebble Lake Review,
Frigg Magazine, Dandelion Magazine, (Canada), Stride Magazine (UK),
Cha Asian Literary Journal, (Hong Kong), Kritya (India), Blueprint Review,
(Germany) and Arabesques Review (Algeria). His forth chapbook was One
Remedy Is Travel (Origami Condom, 2007). He edits the literary ezine
Eye Socket Journal at: http://eyesocketjournal.blogspot.com . He lives
in Portland, OR, where he works as a private tutor.
Beat Until Smooth
I am in the middle of discussing my recipe
for caramel nut brownies with Janet,
the woman seated next to me on the flight home
when there is a loud popping noise
and the plane starts losing altitude fast.
I can hardly breathe.
I can hardly believe this is happening.
This plane is really going down;
we’re really going to die.
It occurs to me that
when I hugged my wife
goodbye at the airport,
I only kissed her on the cheek,
and not on the lips like I should have.
It also occurs to me
that an airliner’s rapid descent from the sky
goes by way too fast for anyone
to be able to get their prayers organized
in any sort of way that would make sense to God.
So listen, I say to Janet,
we really don’t have a lot of time,
but, as I was saying, you only want to use
the black walnuts from Diamond for this recipe
because the other kinds of walnuts
always seem to come out tasting weird
when you take them out of the oven!
Bio:
A past member of five national poetry slam teams (Worcester, Mass. (x2), Washington, D.C., Wilmington, Del. and Albuquerque, N.M.), Rich has published four chapbooks of poetry and for seven years hosted an open reading and slam in Newark, Delaware. Since moving to Albuquerque in March of 2008, Rich has been performing and writing steadily in the Duke City, and is a regular contributor/editor at localpoetsguild.wordpress.com. He is also an educator, adventurer and desert compound prophet. Rich’s poems have appeared in Adobe Walls: An Anthology of New Mexico Poetry, Fickle Muses, The Rag, Menagerie, Clutching at Straws, Shot Glass Journal, Mutant Root, The Mas Tequila Review, and The Legendary.
Congratulations to Kenneth and his poem Summer Home. The first poetry post. I enjoyed reading all work submitted for April, here's hoping May will bring me equal pleasure.
Summer Home
We all suddenly disappear from time to time.
It is not intentional, even when the thought
is as plain as the hands on a clock face.
It is the path that leads into the woods
or the rails that the hobos ride
or the long American ribbon of highway.
And even though all paths and roads and rails
eventually lead to the banks of the Acheron
that is farther than anyone I know
will travel today—a Saturday in April
with blooms bursting forth from trees
and all the colorful tulips tall in the garden.
I own a house upon the Acheron’s near shore
and rent the spare room upstairs
to the dark angel who glows white light
that illuminates the river and far bank—
that tunnel feeling, that warm grip of wood
as oars stoke the river’s water.
But my house is not where you disappeared
when you vanished last Wednesday
somewhere between George R. R. Martin
and J. R. R. Tolkien at the local library.
Your fantastical search continues
in its attempt to locate the thirteenth century
in the Allegheny Mountains
long before the white men arrived
with their cutting tools
that harvest both trees and rock.
-Kenneth P. Gurney -
bio: Kenneth P. Gurney lives in Albuquerque, NM, USA. He edits the New Mexico Poetry anthology Adobe Walls. His poems appear regularly in print and on the web. For complete publishing credits and available books visit http://www.kpgurney.me/Poet/Welcome.html.
