Ham Kicker

Featured here is a collaboration between Cynthia Spencer and Joe Robinson. Cynthia lives in Milwaukee and writes poetry. She has a chapbook available from Plumberries Press titled “In What Sequence Will My Parts Exit.” You can look forward to reading more of her work here. Joe is a Chicagoan. He’s a teacher by day. Ham Kicker is his other passion. For this piece, Joe wrote and recorded a song for Cynthia’s poem.

In the End
By Cynthia Spencer

To chase
emphatic exhaustions,
breaking bed-bones with satisfying
smacks, to find
pillow clouded agoraphobic, crawling
low and sweetly
out of blanket loam.

Someday, I will go around
with clasps undone. I will speak
myself an opening. A photograph

will find its way into the hands
of someone who wondered, long ago,
what it was made of. Someone

will be answered, not stop asking.

Download In The End or click below to listen.

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Featured here is a poem by Suzy Erin, which has been put to music by Barber Green.

The Progress Project
by Suzy Erin

Once we were told
when you cross the street
be sure to have a hand to hold
It was medicine we just wouldn’t swallow

We laughed in the face of danger-
Put our cold hands into the fire.
We beleived we were going somewhere-
That Rock’n'Roll held some meaning.

Who will ever know about
the dress I never wore?
What will you do
with a jacket that doesn’t fit anymore,
or blue jeans filled with holes?

Dust gethers in an empty room
where yesterday still writhes on the floor.
A proud display on the cofee table:
photographs sick of their smiles.
It’s been a long time since that was that child.

Smell the seasons changing – Fall to Winter
Already the town is changing its face.
Cut off and cauterized,
We can never go back home.

Now we find ourselves alone
standing in the middle of the street.
Stars we once reached for
are headlights running us down-

Download The Progress Project or click below to listen.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.