JANUARY 11, 2016 — FOR ZIGGY

by Bill Hurley

David Bowie turned 69 recently.

I turned 69 recently.

18 months ago, David Bowie found cancer in his body.

18 months ago, I found cancer in my body.

Two days ago, David Bowie still had cancer.

Two days ago, I still had cancer.

Yesterday, David Bowie died.

Yesterday, I did not.

Instead, I woke up, ate some oatmeal, played the piano,

Went to a garden, photographed statues and banyan trees,

Sipped a latte while browsing through Dorothea Lange pictures,

Had lunch in a museum café, went to a jazz concert,

Then helped the sun set in a drumming circle on the beach.

Today, I woke up again and learned that David Bowie did not.

So what am I to do with this one more day?

And how many more will I be given 

Before it’s my turn 

To return 

To Stardust?

Bill Hurley is a retired video/multimedia producer and former broadcaster.  He is a frequent contributor to open mikes around Columbus, Ohio. His work has appeared in Common Threads, The Institute for Poetic Medicine, and he won the 2005 Thurber Treat award given by Thurber House for humor/parody writing. This year he is the humor juror for The Ohio Poetry Association’s Competition for high school poets. He recently was the featured reader at The Poetry Forum. He also is the MC for the annual Poetry at Perkins event at Ohio Wesleyan University. His collection, No Weeds in Wahkeena is available on Amazon.

THE BLANK BOWIE

by John Paul Davis




Don't say glam. Everyone always says that.
Neither say alien nor say stardust.
Invent a brand new vocabulary.
Say moonage. Say sula vie milejo.
Before heavy metal, before eyeliner
for rock gods, before electronica,
there was Bowie, self-named after the knife,
himself the blade, separating spirit
& the body, feminine from female,
mask from masculine. Androgyny and.
All of us & simultaneously
none of us. He went to hard rock's bombast
& distortion to find soul. To Berlin
to find the blues in a synthesizer
orchestra. Called himself the Thin White Duke,
thus freeing himself to write R&B.
He knew what everyone craves most of all
is a mystery. It's why our gods ask
us to carry what we can never hold
up some sacred, burning mountain, why love
comes laced with heartache, why such queer lyrics
keep us awake in the night, wondering.
He understood that to write a hymnal
for the spiritually dispossessed
he must himself become a borderland.
What is the sound a soul makes as it leaks
from its seams? Bowie. How keens the heartcry
of a person born out of place in time?
Bowie. How echoes joy on your second
wedding day, after you'd all but given
up on love? Bowie. Say the hot demon
of the drink or drugs still bucks in your veins,
say you think you can't leave the one who hurts
you, say you're harrowed by an old music
you heard once on an aging stereo
as a child. Say Bowie & he'll appear,
screwed up eyes & screwed down hairdo, well hung
& snow white tan. Saint Satellite, my dim
dreams need your code-switching & baritone,
my hetero tongue, needs your gender
bending & the high holy spark & howl
of your guitar, my weekday commute needs
your compact rebellion & scattershot
crimes of fashion. Let me borrow your mouth
& be beautiful, if not for a life
time then for just today, just one more day.


John Paul Davis's poetry has appeared in Muzzle, Rattle, Four Way Review, The Journal and many others. He lives in New York.