SECTION
THIRTEEN
POETRY PAGE TWO
sm
COLUMN
NINETY-EIGHT,
OCTOBER 15, 2003
(Copyright © 2003 The Blacklisted Journalist)
(Photo by Myles Aronowitz)
(Copyright - Myles Aronowitz)
SEARCHING FOR ABRAHAM LINCOLN
(Copyright
"2003 Ron Whitehead)
Tappingmyphone@aol.com
www.tappingmyownphone.com
Presented
at Starving Artist Caf?
Springfield, Kentucky
Oc
visited Springfield
flew to Louisville
drove Bardstown Road to
St. Catharine College
then
on to The Starving Artist Caf?
Welcome to Springfield, Kentucky
wandered
Main street
side streets
lost for
hours
small
suitcase weighed down with
heavy words
The Emancipation Proclamation
The Gettysburg Address
Abraham
Lincoln's words his works his life
biography of his boyhood
he was spiritual intuitive psychic
'that on the 1st day of January, A.D. 1863, all persons held
as slaves?
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free??
and I'm searching for Abraham Lincoln
on Bardstown Road Beech
Fork Lincoln Homestead
"Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth upon this
continent a new nation: conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the
proposition that all men are created equal."
Welcome to Springfield, Kentucky Abraham
Lincoln country
I walked Kentucky
into the wind
dark and bloody ground
jewel in the lotus
omphalos
heart of the world
holy triangle
sacred
Abbey of Gethsemani St.
Catharine's St. Joseph's
Trappist monks
Dominican nuns
coal mined bituminous
gold nearly gone
smokestacks power
plants largest shovel in the world
profane
Native Americans pioneers
farmers coal miners
strong women
poets writers
musicians
in Kentucky music is mountainous
and I'm searching for Abraham Lincoln
the greatest President of them all
he saved us from ourselves
and here I am in Springfield
heart of Kentucky
Lincoln country
who
will save us now
and I'm searching for Abraham Lincoln
maybe Edgar Cayce can help
modern day prophet
one
of the great psychics of all time
and from Hopkinsville, Kentucky
maybe Muhammad Ali 'the
Greatest? from Louisville
maybe
Muhammad Ali can point the way
with his International Peace Center
"float like a butterfly
sting like a bee?
oh Muhammad oh Muhammad
will you please help me cause
I'm searching for Abraham Lincoln
and
the rivers and creeks of Kentucky
Ohio, Kentucky, Mississippi, Barren, Big Sandy, Rough, Elkhorn, Green
spray us with tears
of Mexican immigrants
who for forty days and forty nights have stood
in the fields outside America's door
knocking
denied entry denied
Churchill
Downs The
Derby singing
"My Old Kentucky Home?
knocking
on our doors
pleading "let us come in?
"let
us live in your beautiful Kentucky Home?
and I'm searching for Abraham Lincoln
walking
up hills mountains The
Knobs The Appalachians
Natural Bridge
bowing
to gravity
leaning backward with my long hair sweeping the path
as I descend the wind and the descent flatten me
and now my muscles are green and yellow and red pain
sustaining my search
drink wine and strong coffee
at The Starving Artist Caf?
and I'm searching for Abraham Lincoln
I want love to have its way
I want us to stand united
not divided
One world One people
together in peace and harmony
and
searching for Abraham Lincoln
I crawl through Kentucky
so many diamonds I find
birthed from the deep dark mines
Iroquois Cherokee Shawnee Tribes
Daniel Boone Henry Clay
Abraham Lincoln
Elizabeth
Madox Roberts
James Still
Bill Monroe
Loretta Lynn
Muhammad Ali
Hunter S. Thompson
Johnny Depp
Harry
Dean Stanton
Ned Beatty Adolf Rupp
Rick Pitino
Lionel Hampton
Wendell Berry
John Jacob Niles Pee Wee Reese
The Everly Brothers
Merle
Travis Rosemary
Clooney Edgar
Cayce Robert
Penn Warren
the literary renaissance
Thomas Merton
Judy Morris
Appalshop
Bluegrass
Bourbon Beautiful Women
My Old Kentucky Home Churchill Downs
Louisville Slugger
The Great Outhouse Blowout
Penn's Store
Gravel Switch
Kentucky Fried Chicken Wildcats
Cardinals
and as I search for Abraham Lincoln
I sit in The Starving Artist Caf?
on a rainy October day
drinking wine
why do men still drink wine
and women still water
beautiful paintings cover the walls
and yes when I give readings round the world
I hear 3rd world voices monks and nuns
Ernesto Cardenal
Nicanor Parra
Daniel Berrigan
Thomas Merton
Mother Teresa
Judy Morris
The Dalai Lama
pierce
the world's terrors chanting singing praying
for love
for
peace
and I'm searching for Abraham Lincoln
'the one who'll shake the ones unshaken
the fearless one?
and searching for Abraham Lincoln
in the St. Catharine College Library
I look in Lawrence Ferlinghetti's
yes San Francisco Ferlinghetti who stood
At
Merton's grave with me
I look in Ferlinghetti's A Coney Island of the Mind and
Pictures of the Gone World
and I read
"Christ climbed down
from His bare tree
this year
and softly stole away into
some anonymous Mary's womb again
where in the darkest night
of everybody's anonymous soul
He awaits again
an unimaginable
and impossibly
Immaculate Reconception
the
very craziest
of Second Comings."
and I'm standing in The Starving Artist Caf?
on Main Street in Springfield, Kentucky
the
heart of Kentucky
the heart of the world
on this rainy Tuesday October 15, 2002
and
the wind and the rain whisper
welcome
welcome welcome
to Springfield
and I'm searching searching
searching for Abe Honest
Abe
searching for Abraham Lincoln
in Springield
welcome to
Springfield, Kentucky USA
##
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