Marie Lecrivain is the force behind Poeticdiversity, LA’s leading litzine, and she is the host of the famous Sunday afternoons of poetry at Beyond Baroque. Plainspoken, direct, wistful and hip, Marie’s work—whether it takes the form of poetry or prose—is filled with the sights and sounds of early 21st century Southern California existence. There are rock stars making sound checks, there are gangsters reflecting on their pasts, there are the working poor struggling to get by, there are motorcycles roaring past windows at 3 a.m., there are the inevitable sounds of hip hop and talk radio. It’s a circus and even a freak show but the work is always real and honest, and Marie records what she sees in a calm voice, without hysterics or condescension. She is a pupil of Bukowski and the Beats but she can’t really be categorized: rather, to read her writings is to see, instantly, the very tall palm trees that sway on your streets, or to smell, instantly, the newsprint that comes off your LA Weekly while you’re waiting for your Boba drink. This is dirty realism with fine local color, and just edgy enough so that your parents will almost certainly disapprove.
echo
park pieta
She remembers that foggy morning on the bus;
abandoned to sleep in her lap,
his small hands twined 'round her strong forearm,
damp hair plastered to his forehead,
she brushed away with kisses
and inhaled his scent of milk and need.
This evening at a bus stop,
she struggles with his heavy body
in her withered arms.
His breath, once so sweet
labors with each heartbeat,
and his blood stains
her faded housecoat.
She remembers
when his soft skin was just caramel
and not blemished with Old English script,
clown faces, spider webs,
and women with flowing raven hair and crystal teardrops.
When his velvet eyelids
moved to the rhythm of childish dreams,
instead of not moving at all.
His head lolls back,
the weight maligning an ancient shoulder.
She braces for the impact
of the moment;
the spirit leaving his body...
worse than the pain of
his entry into this world.
His head on her shoulder-
her scalding tears,
can't soften his death mask.
Sorrow has no sheen,
no patina to disguise her loss.
There was nothing noble,
in the death of her only child.
He was no savior,
though he was loved-
and will be missed.
within a one-block radius
The tail of a headless rat
twists in the wind
near the steps of the porn palace
where a paraplegic emperor
defecates into a golden bowl
and contemplates the one thing
he cannot own: the immortal
streaks of fire ablaze in
the darkening sky.
I walk slowly,
savor the wind
as it blows through
the double row of megaliths
on Wilshire Blvd.-
a poor man's Champs Elysees
while behind me,
a career receptionist
stoops to retrieve
a scrap of faith
skittering in the dusty gutter.
The traffic lights linger
deliciously orange
(I am thirsty),
and the whisper of
clotted legs in corduroy
is louder than
the belligerent traffic.
The light turns green
as I step off the curb
into another set of circumstances
nowhere near as intriguing as those
I leave behind.
She remembers that foggy morning on the bus;
abandoned to sleep in her lap,
his small hands twined 'round her strong forearm,
damp hair plastered to his forehead,
she brushed away with kisses
and inhaled his scent of milk and need.
This evening at a bus stop,
she struggles with his heavy body
in her withered arms.
His breath, once so sweet
labors with each heartbeat,
and his blood stains
her faded housecoat.
She remembers
when his soft skin was just caramel
and not blemished with Old English script,
clown faces, spider webs,
and women with flowing raven hair and crystal teardrops.
When his velvet eyelids
moved to the rhythm of childish dreams,
instead of not moving at all.
His head lolls back,
the weight maligning an ancient shoulder.
She braces for the impact
of the moment;
the spirit leaving his body...
worse than the pain of
his entry into this world.
His head on her shoulder-
her scalding tears,
can't soften his death mask.
Sorrow has no sheen,
no patina to disguise her loss.
There was nothing noble,
in the death of her only child.
He was no savior,
though he was loved-
and will be missed.
within a one-block radius
The tail of a headless rat
twists in the wind
near the steps of the porn palace
where a paraplegic emperor
defecates into a golden bowl
and contemplates the one thing
he cannot own: the immortal
streaks of fire ablaze in
the darkening sky.
I walk slowly,
savor the wind
as it blows through
the double row of megaliths
on Wilshire Blvd.-
a poor man's Champs Elysees
while behind me,
a career receptionist
stoops to retrieve
a scrap of faith
skittering in the dusty gutter.
The traffic lights linger
deliciously orange
(I am thirsty),
and the whisper of
clotted legs in corduroy
is louder than
the belligerent traffic.
The light turns green
as I step off the curb
into another set of circumstances
nowhere near as intriguing as those
I leave behind.
© 2010
Marie Lecrivain
Marie Lecrivain was a Featured Poet who read her poetry at the September 2010 Second Sunday Poetry Series
Marie Lecrivain was a Featured Poet who read her poetry at the September 2010 Second Sunday Poetry Series