Stephen Sutherlin - Poet | Designer

Prison of judgment

Oh my God are you okay?
You’re writing poetry everyday?
“Geez, oh Pete’s are you alright?”
Write rhymes of reason every night?
What prostrations come from you?
This urgent burst for what is true?
Self-indulgent acts of pride?
Surely you think of suicide?
How can you waste your time, my dear?
With flights of fancy, sex and fear!
Think of yourself as a poet, son?
Give me example of just one?
Who’s as loud as your TV?
My god, boy—they don’t even read!
People you now “represent”?
Locked in a prison of judgement…
Who are you to decide what is present?

2019 American Place Poems

SuperCar

Post author By Makar
Post date September 28, 2019

Oil over metal
Fuel into fire
Inertia soon released
Smoke off tires
Green lights blink
Foot off clutch
Pedal to metal
Checkered flag rush
Open up throttle
Chaos in control
Chasing white line
Racing’s in your soul!

“Start your engines!”

2019 Albuquerque American Place Poems

@Macs

Post author By Makar
Post date September 28, 2019

We sit and eat
And stare at
The paintings
On the wall
Across the
Street.
They don’t
Really represent
What they
Look like.
Proportions
Off, eyes
Too small
For large
Black heads
Dog and cat,
Couch of
Snake and fish,
Blue iguana.
Staring contest
w/ the cartoon
Crew across
The wall
From them.
GoodShepard
Animal clinic.
“The Doctor Is in.”

2019 American Place Breaking Muse Poems

Beautiful Day

Post author By Makar
Post date September 28, 2019

Beautiful day
Ruined
By schedules
Subjective
Of course
The day
Perfectly happy
To be perfect
Not bothered by my
Objective

“Off course, re-routing”

Ars Poetica Footnotes Why

Prologue

…and that’s why poetry appeals to me so much–
because it’s so eternal. As long as there are people, they can
remember words and combinations of words. Nothing else
can survive a holocaust but poetry and songs. No one can
remember an entire novel. No one can describe a film, a piece
of sculpture, a painting, but so long as there are human beings,
songs and poetry can continue.

— Jim Morrison, Prologue Wilderness Volume I
© 1988 by Columbus and Pearl Courson

2019 Breaking Muse Poems

No Ideas but in Things

Post author By Makar
Post date September 27, 2019

Poetry is a prison

Capturing
Things
Onto
Pages

Leaving
Every thing
On the
Shelf

||| || ||||

Poetry is a privilege

Turning
Things
Into
Words

||| /||| |

Poetry is a gift

Giving
Things
To
The People

Saving
Things
By
The People

Remembering
Things
Of
The People

2019 Breaking Muse Poems

Town Crier

Post author By Makar
Post date September 27, 2019

Record 𝙔𝙤𝙪𝙧
surroundings
Report on the
mundane;
Everyone write a poem
Even if it’s
Insane!
Tell me
All about it
Paint the picture
True
Shout out
For your
City.
Just
Let it flow from you.

2019 Albuquerque American Place Garden Psalms Poems

Chicken Feed

Post author By Makar
Post date September 27, 2019

The Birds are

on the move

Snatching up the

Last mating

Bugs of Summer

Slow

Oblivious

Fattening up for

Winter’s rest

Or supper.

2019 Albuquerque American Place Poems

Head for the Exits

Anytime I Go
Anywhere, I know
Exits and barricades.
I have to know
Where we are to go
If you’re on a rampage.
Your second privilege becoming our existential threat.
What do I tell my children?
“There there little one, don’t you cry.
There’s ‘thoughts and prayers’ for us when we die.”
“Now, now, there there, don’t you despair.
Run for the exit, it’s over there.”

2019 American Place Garden Psalms Poems

Piedra Lumbre

Post author By Makar
Post date September 26, 2019
Sticky post

It’s easy to see
Why Georgia O’Keefe
Landed in Abiquiu.
All these cowboy clouds
and sunshine smiles
So much painting to do.

Rosie red arches
And sulfur burning
With Yellowing tongues
Rising, Lashing out
Lapping up lapis
Skies, with brushes swung

Heavy oil to evoke
American dream.
A land growing lost
To the lush beauty
She acquired on
blank sheets of canvas.

”Stone of lumination.”