No Compromise
Digital collage, 4" x 6"
Sandy Beach (Maple Grove MN) is mostly a poet who also works in photography and mixed media, and recently moved into the world of digital collage. Her literary work is primarily in conversation with or in opposition to visual art. Often specific poetic lines become the genesis for a collage. Sometimes an image sparks a poem. Text and Image duke it out. Everybody wins.
Being My Own Man
John Grey
In high school, I stood apart from the jocks and the nerds and even the hip kids. I had no interest in folk music and I was bored by peace. In fact, anyone who insisted on telling me what was wrong with the world while strumming a guitar at the same time was, in my estimation, no better than a giant blood-sucking fluke worm. And then there was poetry - pseudo significance or puerile posturing or lovesick scarifying. Take your pick. I didn't. I listened to jazz when nobody else did, stuff like Ornette Coleman that no friend of mine could possibly like, which made having friends redundant. Coleman played free jazz and when he blew into that saxophone it sounded as if the very molecules of my body were crying the blues. Those with a different ear were likely to equate it to tabby cats wailing. My avoidance of such people got me through the 12th grade. I managed to sneak my way into an Ornette Coleman concert when I was sixteen. 1 must have looked old for my age or maybe the crew at the club figured no kid would pay good money to hear such whacked out brass blowing. Keening angular melodies, blissful free funk – try telling that to your chemistry teacher or the girl who still hasn't woken up to the fact that pigtails are so passe. There weren't many in the audience. but empty chairs and tables have always been my kind of people.
