Buying Myself Gifts for Xmas
I don’t need them, but what am I supposed to do, turn
myself down?
Maybe I should call them birthday gifts.
A new denim shirt (pre-faded) to replace an old one I
never liked much
That never faded.
A new sail rigger jacket like my favorite jacket I
bought on sale for $30,
Is on sale again, so I bought another one, this one in
bright yellow.
A gray sweatshirt cut into a baseball jacket style
instead of a hoodie.
I could be dead before I wear any of them.
Burial clothes.
I am surrounded by stuff.
Too much stuff.
OK, I’ll make myself a deal,
I’ll accept the gifts from myself if I agree to throw
somethings away.
No problem.
There’s those gifts from last year and seasons’ past, many
I’ve never worn, now have a new purpose.
Alan Ray Simmons
Alan Ray Simmons was born in Chicago on December 21,
1948. He attended Northeastern Illinois
University, in Chicago, and won two Illinois Arts Council Awards as editor of
Stone Wind Magazine, Northeastern Illinois University Press. Poet-In-Residence, City of Chicago Council on
Fine Arts, 1979-80. Founder of the Blue
Store Readings, Home of the Spoken Word Movement, and creator of the Main
Event, the World Heavyweight Poetry Championship Fights, and The World Poetry
Association, (WPA). He was Commissioner
of the WPA and the World Poetry Bout Association, (WPBA), Chicago, Taos, New
Mexico, 1979 - 2002. Once quoted on the
front page of the New York Times. He has
two books, Care Free, poems, Smithereens Press, Bolinas, California, 1982, and
King Blue, a memoir, Stone Wind Press, Chicago, Illinois, 1992. He has been published in The Chicago Reader,
Strong Coffee, Exquisite Corpse, and most recently in Queen City Review, Blue
Collar Review, WORK, Out of Our, Horus-Hi Road Glyphics, Green Panda
Anthologies The Next, Forage, Your Impossible Voice, Creating Chaos, Echo
Literary Review, Peacock Review, Placeholder Magazine, Blue River Review, and
Ariel Chart. He lives in Alameda,
California. Follow him at simmonsink@blogspot.com
Tags:
Poetry