Poetry by Aaron Belz

       Emma K Alexandra CC




ABSOLUTE BROOKLYN

Tracksuit heartbreaker, my hand goes out to you. 
You take the twenty and depart for a show.

I cradle moments of you now like instant regret,
and I lope among king penguins like a misfit egret. 

How oft will my famous self rehearse this scene?
It’s the beginning, the end, and a bright in-between.

Forsooth—or bespoke—the enormous cocktail
I now contemplate breaks planes of light brown ale 

with its facets angled almost Mexicanly, or sheer,
which you could see through were you still here. 

I’d skied pieces of nineties Brooklyn so hard 
they landed one by one in my neighbor’s yard,

My neighbor replied by inviting me in for lamb.
I said, but wait up. Do you know the Great I Am?

We chatted like this over the fence for a bit 
until thicketed banjos thrummed skrrt skrrt

and night settled down into each dead function--
the sky a priest, I imagined, performing unction.

Dim clouds grew dimmer, them ancient shutters,
windows swung closed, and milk became butter

of buttery love, fireside and gross. When you,
my heartbroken tracksuiter, showed up anew 

wielding glowsticks you’d been gifted by swamp
women. And I, in turn, cranked an old amp

and plugged in my Red Wine Gibson Super 400
and slummed the loveliest tunes of wonder

and war, and querulous nannies, fairy tales
of tracksuited girlfriends and odd cocktails

blistering bright facets, a broken disco globe 
of real light just for you, unpredictable strobe

of a daughter I loved—and love—and will
continue to dream alongside of rainbow bills 

plastered to construction plywood willy-nilly.
You know I still love you, my distracted hillbilly. 

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Aaron Belz holds a Masters in Creative Writing (Poetry) from NYU (1995) and a Ph.D. in American Literature from Saint Louis University (2007) where his research was recognized with a Walter J. Ong Award. He’s also an alumnus of the Vermont Studio Center, where he received an NEA Grant to support his creative work. He’s since published four collections of poems: The Bird Hoverer (BlazeVOX, 2007), Lovely, Raspberry (Persea, 2010), Glitter Bomb (Persea, 2014), and Soft Launch (Persea, 2019). He’s also served as poetry columnist for Paste Magazine and Capital Commentary, book reviewer for Books & Culture, The San Francisco Chronicle, and The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and Poet Laureate of Hillsborough, North Carolina (2014-16). Belz lives in St. Louis, where he is probably best known as founder of Observable Readings, a live poetry series that has been active since 2003 and named “Best of St. Louis” by The Riverfront Times.