I think it’s one of those sociobiological things, this tendency to look back on the year and reflect on what happened or didn’t happen. Of course doing this ignores the previous years that laid the rails for the last year and will of course maintain that course for years to come. Instead, year end reflections are written and spoken of as if the occurrences of that year took place in a vacuum. If nothing else, time is a study in continuity and progression. The seeds of yesterday’s events were laid months, years, perhaps generations in advance. The future is predicated on actions, trials, motives, impulses and proceedings- made all the more unpredictable by any one person’s inability to grasp the scope of the force of history. You see, time has no doors. There’s no pause, no sudden cosmic or earthly cessation that marks December 31^st from January 1^st. The light of exploded stars still reaches us. Immortality remains a mathematic equation, or an extraordinarily intricate riddle game performed between artistic consciousness and logic empiricists. The living speaks for the dead and the dead have yet to tell anyone whether they agree or disagree with the mythology.

It’s all kind of humbling and despite all claims of religious or spiritual piety mortals don’t particularly like being humbled. So we mark the passing of time with clocks and calendars. The next year is heralded by fireworks and descending disco balls. Therefore, because we are mortal, conscious of the moving of time in a way that no other creature is, it becomes our imperative that even infinity- mathematics, music, poetry, riddles and all- bears our signature. Resolutions are made to do some things differently if not better. And why not?

Again, the rails have been laid. What will be done in 2008, beneficial or injurious benevolent or acrimonious is based on quantifiable events known and unknown that lead up to this point. As time cannot truly be compartmentalized, what choices we accomplish will not occur in a vacuum.

This brings me back to time. For all intents and purposes the best earmarks of time lie in the people one interacts with each day whether it’s face to face, email, phone, television and radio Their lives, the utter manifestation of the force of history interweave with each of us, their memories entwine with ours and our in their turn find expression in the acts of others. Author, Stephen L. Carter notes in his book Civility, that we are like passengers sharing space on crowded train and as such we must be mindful that what we do impacts others. Civility calls upon us to sacrifice some things in order to make the ride tolerable for others.

Time is that train. Mortality shares it. We are not alone. Should we resolve to comprehend and affect this then our individual signatures upon infinity will look less like temporary impositions of self and more like a map weaving lines from life to life, from then to when to be viewed on the last train home.

Michael Covenant Watson

On Tues 12/18 a fixture in the Lincoln Square neighborhood was killed by careless driver near his home. Dubbed, The Pigeon Man, he would sit for hours feeding the pigeons that gathered not only around his feet, but his lap, shoulders, even his head. Theirs was a relationship built on trust and mistrust. The pigeons trusted him implicitly while he in turn grew to mistrust and distance himself from people.  Ironically, he was struck down by the very affects he was attempting to distance himself from- the carelessness of man.

The following is a poem written by friend and fellow poet Buddha 309.

The lights are dim in Lincoln Square
the shops all clothed in black
pigeons on the wing
fly at half mast
        flags don't pay attention to this kind of royalty
the King of Birds has passed

he sat motionless
providing comfort to his people
cooing and calling each by name
        and the passerby found him quaint but crazy
we are lessened by his passing and his mockery of fame

Bird man
Pigeon King
tell me a story
        tell me one you've heard on the wing
        the ones on the winds of fate and feathers
        tell you their secrets because
        you like how they sing

The lord of oil slick neck ties
keeper of the promised land
        all the pigeons hang their heads
the wires are barren today
The god of the pigeons is dead

Death Star Date  09 02 07

I’m jus’sayin…

It’s the Labor day weekend. Which means what? Once you get past the smell of barbeque, or manage not get smash mangled during an

alcohol juiced stock car road trip to ratsville  or swallow copious amounts of aspirin and despair because your dream version of labor has little to do with what you actually do for a living, the September future resembles a long road of compromised hygiene and retrofitted reasons for self medication.

Any way this Sunday night on Wordslingers 9/2//07 8pm-9 pm 88.7 fm WLUW and streaming live on www.wluw.org

Chicagoan and Columbia College graduate Lee Kitzis  is described as as a young poet that has done more than most poets have done in a lifetime. He’s been performing his work in Chicago for over ten
years, featuring at many venues in Chicago, including venues
such as The Café, Pontiac Produce, The Oak Park Library, The
Skokie Public Library, The DVA Gallery, and Big Horse. He produced a series of poet-band concerts at The Bop Shop and several suburban locations. His poetry has appeared in numerous publications, including: After Hours, Ink, U-Direct, and The Columbia Chronicle. He’s edited two editions of the "Anti-Mensch Anthology", and the short-lived magazine Big Pen. He has published two books with the Puddin'head Press "The Laundromat Girl" and "Eight Dollars An Hour".

Sandy Goldsmith has been writing poetry since college. In her poetry are experiences of handing down family traditions as granddaughter, daughter, mother, and grandmother. Her poems have appeared in numerous literary journals and
anthologies, including Skylark, Rockford Review, The Lucid Stone, Rambunctious Review, and Rhino. She has performed her work at all the major
poetry venues in the Chicago area. She has won prizes from Poets and Patrons, Triton College, and The Pennsylvania Poetry Society and is a recipient of the Joanne Hirschfield Memorial Prize for Poetry. She is a long time member of The Poets' Club of Chicago. Sandy Goldsmith's new book is called "Imaging Center".

David Gecic is the editor in chief of The Puddin'head Press, one of Chicago's longest running and most active presses. Puddin'head Press has been around since 1985 and has produced many books by Chicago's favorite poets. David Gecic has hosted poetry readings at many locations including The Oak Park Library, The Skokie Library, The Alsip Library, The Bartlett Library, The Worth Library, Estelles, The Gallery Caberet, The Bop Shop, The Waukegan Yacht Club, The Chesterton IN Book Fair, The Printer's Row Book Fair, and the Harold Washington Library,  His work has appeared in several magazines and journals including Afterhours and Hammer Magazine. He’ currently a member of Neutral Turf, a not-for-profit organization that promotes teen poetry. He is one of
the founding members of the Red Path Theater Company.

 Wordslingers airs on the 1st and 3rd Sunday nights from 8pm to 9pm live from the campus of Loyola University on 88.7fm WLUW and streaming live on www.wluw.org  Archives of past shows can be found in the Wordslingers' Vox Cafe.
Now approaching it's 8th year, Wordslingers is all about poetry; no hype, no hustle, just the word, the rhythm, the vibe and the vision of poetic perception in the pulse between the power and the page!

Nuff Said.

Michael Covenant Watson

host of Wordslingers Poetry On the Radio

founder of Wordslingers.org