E. J. McAdams
E.J. McAdams is a poet and artist, exploring language and mark-making in the urban environment using procedures and improvisation with found and natural materials. He has published four chapbooks: '4x4' from unarmed journal press, 'TRANSECTs' from Sona Books, ‘Out of Paradise,’ an e-chapbook from Delete Press, ‘Close-range Divinities’ from Shirt Pocket Press, and most recently, 'Middle Voice’ from Dusie Kollectiv. UDP published his 4x4 – “BOOM/BOOM/BOOM/BOOM” – in its Poste series. He had a solo exhibition, an installation called Trees Are Alphabets, at The Bronx Museum of the Arts, and a mail-art piece in a group show at Phoenix Art Museum. His poems have been published in The Paris Review, EOAGH, eccolinguistics, About Place Journal, unarmed journal, and others. Recently, a selection of poems were collected in the anthology Poetics for the More-than-Human World at Dispatches from the Poetry Wars. He was chosen by Laura Mullen and Angela Hume for 'Heir Apparent' in The Volta's Trash Issue which featured a visual TRANSECT. Another visual poetry project, ‘Wayfaring,’ was covered by author Robert Sullivan on A Public Space's blog. He curated the Social-Environmental-Aesthetics reading at EXIT ART from 2009-2012 and was a founding board member of the interdisciplinary Laboratory of Art Nature and Dance (iLAND).
An Action to End Gun Violence
lips on loaded
AR muzzle
blow as if
kudu shofar:
peace
registers
its blow-
less blow!
THE REMAINDER
1.
garbled through bathroom vents
2.
if she wants to bounce she can bounce
3.
engine sounds remind me I’m not one
4.
somehow don’t let that fact get in the way
5.
downed telephone pole as good a roost as any/great blue heron
6. DARWIN:
the birds idly singing mostly live on insects & seeds & thus are constantly destroying life
7.
little material crosses self-contained diffuse Gaia border except (alleluia!!!) space dust
8. MINETTA LANE
cement meanders where stream once was
9.
son’s rainbow starship arcing toward a sun
10.
almost but not quite yet open
11.
sundog
12.
whatever we do/don’t do neutral sky there (always) out window
13.
yellow daffodils in ice
14.
with cold sleeping sparrows in the only
15.
sun//beams/gleam
16.
say what you want bad about pigeons but they can fly
17.
love has no nor never respects bounds
18.
faux corporate waterfalls
19.
sparrows so familiar in their crummy hunger, alien in all else
20.
potted evergreens as security bollards
21.
chasing each other’s other
22. HERO TIME
beginning middle end (repeat)
23.
keep us animal enough to survive
24. RIDDLE:
what’s this that is always thus and now no more than the least among all leastmost things
25.
bills pile up like snow
26.
crow missing one primary one tail feather limping into low cloud cover
27.
black lonely mountain or black misty island
28.
snow’s general Ireland over everything
29.
waiting for the poem to come I find it finally here
30. FIRST GET RID OF THE WORLD OF CERTAINTY
31.
desire lines
32. TAISHIN, THE MONK DAITEN:
In the spring of 1767, Jakuchu and I journeyed to Osaka in a boat. We did not care…
33.
infinite possibilities within the finite
34.
some days it is mystery alone gets me through
35. VALENTINE’S DAY
what have I done for love lately except use it in a sentence
36.
other days it’s mystery too
37. COLDEST DAY OF THE YEAR SAYS THE RADIO
feral cat crosses path lugs rabbit sack home
38.
empty/shell/echo
39. INTIMACY
can’t kiss my own mouth
40.
how many life points you got?
41.
deep inside my own heart I find the facts of daily life co-equal
42.
that last thought in the kingfisher’s bill
43. EJECT NO NAME
44.
ocean sand sky sand sky ocean sky ocean sand
45.
no word yet for this snow – but watch your step
46.
there’s one fuckingthing I want to know
47. BLACK CLOUD OR SILVER LINING
None smart enough to be pessimistic nor stupid enough to be optimistic..cloud..cloud..
48.
I can’t not look up
49.
raining rain rained
50.
endangered by estrangement
51.
crow wings crow bones crow cry with/against that’s how it was
52.
was day all day until it was night
53. PEOPLE
earthbound with a sweep toward the vertical
54.
wishing for the end of suffering is a kind of suffering…and yet
55.
Albany rain feels a whole lot colder
56.
always forgetting surprise
57.
buildings sundialing streetscape
58.
home/homeless/homelessness
59.
driving north through hardiness zones/spring in reverse/blossom furls to bud
60.
on the flowering dogwood a tag says “flowering dogwood”
61.
this & that this & that this & that I can’t wait for this & that this & that can wait
62.
yellow yellow yellow yellow yellow yellow yellow yellow yellow yellow yellow yellow
63. MIYAZAWA KENJI:
Unless the entire world/becomes/happy, there can be no happiness/for individuals.
64.
wind dies never ends
65.
no one seen. windows closed. out of nowhere kestrel dives out of sight.
66.
sparrows come to the old on benches
67.
never seen this yellow-blossomed tree before
68.
a longing gone awry long gone
69.
the dead don’t write poems/the undead do
70.
on Mt. Morris crevice in schist green with relentless weeds
71. PLEASE DO NOT THROW GARBAGE IN THE GARDEN THankYou!
72.
daughter draws red petals purple disks around family/rays sparking off
73.
who – why – would I ask for forgiveness – for what
74.
vanishing moon and ok with that
75.
earth knows me – you too
76.
saggy green grass stubble growing out sewer grate
77.
through fog/ferry over/words/still unextinct
78.
death is not the end/only the empirical fact/of the end
79.
eyes not enough anymore to see what’s real
80.
each birthday double birthday
81.
afterglow of bird song
82.
trees and stars and grass and sky and ah and ah and ah
From COVID is an atmosphere
Monday, June 1, 2020 NYC: 208,550; 21,607
hummingbird moth
in rhododendron
on and on and on
Tuesday, June 2, 2020 NYC: 209,195; 21,649 deaths
it’s a graveyard
luminously so
wasp in web silk
offer to with
Wednesday, June 3, 2020 NYC: 209,688; 21,688 deaths
history haunts
no real free for
until free from
police brutality
Thursday, June 4, 2020 NYC: 210,227; 21,779 deaths
at outer rings of
circle of violence
nessus sphinx
in pink blossom
Friday, June 5, 2020 NYC: 210,728; 21,782 deaths
urn of burn it
ever lit unknown
on line arm in arm
aflame in rage
Saturday, June 6, 2020 NYC: 211,274; 21,815
8 minutes
46 seconds
of silence
remembrance
Sunday, June 7, 2020 NYC: 211,728; 21,844 deaths
dung beetle pushing
upside down Sisyphus
ball of shit uphill
wobbling determination
Tuesday, June 9, 2020 NYC: 212,469; 21,918 deaths
when will it end
stupid dumb virus
systematic violence
not over yet
Thursday, June 11, 2020 NYC: 213,271; 21,993
bird evensong
dipthongs of wood
echoes across
won’t bring him back
Friday, June 12, 2020 NYC: 213,707; 22,043 deaths
moth of nothing
red thread in web
what’s nightmare