Strong-water
poems and illustrations on alcohol
The second chapbook of poetry from award-winning poet and author Loren Walker, Strong-Water examines the impact of alcohol on history and culture, from rite of passage to emergency medicine to artistic muse.
Available on Amazon!
Available on Amazon!
Excerpts from strong-water
border town
(first published by the West Texas Review)
"Watch out for the Americans," we were told early on:
the wild-eyed nineteen-year-olds that make their way
from Detroit to Windsor, to Bentley's over the border who grope,
grind, and follow us girls,
then steal back over the Ambassador Bridge
in the morning, snorting, giddy with getting away
from this second-rate automotive capital,
from the hard lemonade that legally stings the tongue,
from our sweet mouths, our girlish arms empty, yet open.
But no worries, girls: I can speak their language;
my father is the alien from Chicago and Salt Lake
who brought me over state lines for the summers.
I have it covered. And we Canadians aren't as nice
as they say. We're glaring, audio-abrasive on this side
of the border; we give a flick of a finger when they stare,
when they grab, when they corner, pull and run,
when we fight through a radius of fingers,
mascara smudging in the heat, our goose bumps writing a story.
On Thursday nights we take our revenge;
in this Windsor bar, here goes our best imitation of Cape Breton soul:
we scream in unison, raise bottles, go hoarse,
hook arms and lock the Americans out.
They look on in bewilderment, waiting to pollinate.
But they don't know these words, this country's bar anthem.
They can only swing their shoulders without knowledge
through tobacco, slosh through clouds of smoke,
clutch the beers they can only order here,
staring at the backs of our jeans as we dance.
achilles
(first published by the West Texas Literary Review)
He was the source for all my scars: forehead, knee, anklebone.
Three years ahead in the game, our world was slaps and fists,
knuckles driven into thighs, wrists seared by Indian burns.
I’d seen his car crashes, taken panicked calls in the dawn.
But he was always fine in the end.
Mother said coolant gnawed away his skin,
ran into his boot when the air bubble blew
in the car factory, pooled and chewed.
Third-degree right down to the bone,
and a trail of speckle-scars, burns arcing across his back.
I imagined the heel as scooped out:
a ball of flesh, neatly rounded,
removed and pulsing, a hollow, bloodless cavity.
But I couldn’t; I wouldn’t creep down the basement stairs
to see those plastic sheets, his body turned by nurses.
I got drunk on disinfectant; studied bandages brought to the kitchen,
oily and orange; eavesdropped
when he shifted his weight
on the pullout couch,
watching cartoons alone.
my little odalisque
(first published by Coffin Bell Journal)
Brambled thoughts, and bloodletting this morning
for long-gone infatuations: one, two, ten.
Uncovered and hungover. my chest smeared pink:
a tribute, for the ones who could flush my throat
and burn my collarbones with a written note.
Curse this violent blood uprising, these capillaries in full bloom.
In the light, a rash; a sunburn, stained with rum
that means nothing to no one,
save this fool, mining at well-tinted memories,
those women that got away, who dangle in my corners:
their skeleton movement; the shadow of their claws;
lilac-veined and ever-waiting for me.
Bring forth the fog that rolls over my scope.
Nestle in crevices, cloud the synapses,
and remember:
I know corpuscles well.
How to scrub them out with the wash.
How to bleach them into oblivion,
How to chew on peppermint,
and call for a new idol.