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Air
Tim Van Schmidt: 6 Performance Poems
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| Air and Words
If I jumped from the plane
I would want words to
Be the parachute. First,
I would glide in freefall
Straight through the freeze,
Speed measured by
How tiny parcels below
Get bigger, lines reaching
Definition, clouds sifting
Through my beard. But then
I would yank the cord,
Let letters stream above,
Making friction, scooping me
From the faithless plunge.
They save me, stop
The nameless dive by
Making meaning, joining
The world of shapes with
Electricity of mind,
Offering choice. So thin
This cloth of ideas,
So much like the vapor
That looks full above,
But like wet smoke within.
The earth rises
To accept my feet,
The atmosphere resounds
With a lifeline spoken:
This jump, I will survive.
-Tim Van Schmidt
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Emmaline
Tim Van Schmidt: 6 Performance Poems
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| Emmaline
The water pure foamed
Over rocks slanted just
For such a cold, clear run.
Emmaline lay at the top,
A stunning, windswept source, quiet,
A haunt for marmot,
A bowl for the raptor’s swift dive,
Squirming fish for lunch. Up there
You could feel the snowfields melt
Under your feet, greet
The tiny tundra flowers, behold
The one magnificent columbine
Standing by itself in the blow.
Crisp, air thin, knobs
Picketed by a million trees below,
Huge white cornices hanging
Above the chill, gnarly treeline.
Emmaline splits into a gush
That pools, but must
Push down against the stone.
All you have to do is look up
And have Emmaline’s cold grace,
Her wild, loud hair,
Wash it all away.
-Tim Van Schmidt
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More Poetry by Tim Van Schmidt!!
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Hear music by Tim Van Schmidt!!
"O Obama" and "Sunshine Songs"!!
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Fusion
Tim Van Schmidt: 6 Performance Poems
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| Desert Fusion
No, I am not lonely
I say, the wind whistling
Through the teeth
Of my adobe ruin.
I sit on the tiles
Embracing a trickling fountain
And hear the coyotes
Chasing down
Wide-eyed housecats.
They tell me, their eyes
Flashing from arroyos:
You must speak up,
Rail into widespread nights,
Paint the dusty world
With your own spit
And make it light,
Make it shine
For your one most precious moment.
And I salute them
Like a tattered flag,
Until finally, closing my eyes,
Ten prickly fingers
Pull me into
The crystal cold desert
And I become the whole day,
The night, saying, No,
I am not lonely.
I say I have never been lonely.
-Tim Van Schmidt
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