Bellowing into the firmament:
destruction, love & mercy in the poetry of Corbin Louis
Poetry by Corbin Louis & Art by Said Atabekov, Saule Dyussenbina, and Abylai Murashbekov
The Battle of Qazygurt, Shymkent, 2021: N-8 Photograph (Series) by Said Atabekov
Corbin Louis’s poems are… a kind of groundswell of compassion and love, for those living and not, for those known as loved ones and those considered to be strangers. —Poetry Editorial by Theadora Siranian
STAR TOOTH BANNER
—a call to my friends, living or not
May we unite under the face of one star-tooth sky
for doomed posterity must rewind the script
And we are such doomed birds, I, like you—Kev
was born in the Oxy jaws, was born in the Big Gulp
and raised by the stalk of glucose fields
Behold, the dead friend glossary, Behold the
nebula crash site, drunk drivers in the ER church
I am with you, flock of crash dummies, I am with you
depressed monk, who does not pray, in Fairfax
I am with you, surviving on nacho cheese, chewing
on gas stations, we have all been chained to the cave
in one way or another, whether gunshot or Depakote
snowstorms or 9 to 5, such hands shake like cigarettes
like wind chimes, trust me, I too have suffered your
overdose, I too have cried and worked and spread-sheeted
the future into flat circles, boring, pneumonia, whatever
ailment seeks throats, like razed hearts crackling from the
molotov kiss, bomb me, seppuku, riot mouth, my splayed
guts diagram the McDonalds, and Coke, and outliving
4 friends in a haze of benzo shockwave, this American
flag, how it weeps of disability, how it stands for
grind, landlord and defcon 5, bury me then, with
the ones who said no, I respect suicide like most
can’t imagine, because I know that living with
disease is a gasoline question mark: Why you
chose the needle, why I sold the half, ate glass
and cut off my head as a gift to the ever-present
The answers are obvious: rotting brains and
white marble: the firebird drives us into
the ground and up again—so may we unite
there—somehow—everything different
SUGAR, SEX AND ZIG-ZAGS
I’m back on the stucco roof
Feet dangling out from clouds of blunt smoke
And I’m back to Katherine’s ‘no’
The kind of hardline you don’t cross
but she did give head in a triangle of light
that cut through the basement window
21 never felt so deadly—that year
so good—Chris’s motorcycle
which he let six or seven of us share
all summer, until Jon crashed it
broke his leg and got high forever
like a red kite that goes up and up
then out of sight into the horizon
Rest easy Jon
Rest easy Chris’s motorbike
The important thing is
we all got laid
Hit 110 mph
and went so fast into our wishes
that we ended up on the backend
of a medical tent
on the backend
of a dishpit
in a failing restaurant
where the paycheck meant
blood on wrinkled hands
What I’m saying
is that when pills
go too far oh well
May the brain damage
be a reminder of ninety
sunsets we shared over
a drinking song
Picture a chant
lasting three months
Picture Jon shooting
arrows in the backyard
Proud of himself
I mean really proud of himself
for the bullseye and jokes
and all the pussy he was getting
The last summer
but a good one
In a parking lot for six hours
on top of the van roof
stargazing through light pollution
and blood pollution
My brain is borderline
crossed over
into suicide attempts
But still I’m here
telling you that
a recklessly good time
is a shining blue marble
Earth and Andromeda
I have been beyond
Way past the surface
with these friends
Beyond and through
So far into powder and tears
So far into hugs and funerals
With the stolen Camry of 2008
rolling downhill as Sam yells
fucking run
and I flail
into the ravine
This is how I learned to love
Overdose
Mania
Small talk over a burning zigzag
Sit with me then
Tell me
how have you been
And pass the lighter
let’s smoke another one
The Battle of Qazygurt, Shymkent, 2021: N-8 Photograph (Series) by Said Atabekov
The Battle of Qazygurt, Shymkent, 2021: N-8 Photograph (Series) by Said Atabekov
The astronauts seem to be staged in a face-off against the intense physicality of the horses and people on the ground.— Visual Art Editorial by Patricia Coleman
BRAND NEW [EMPIRE] TEASER
Fade in white hot temperature sky drops down
speaker turns on dog barks kid shoots
gun becomes religious symbol T-shaped
music builds up violinists shatter the glass
[but cannot make rent] more machine guns
on screen everyone is putting on lotion
sun too hot beach is abandoned plastic
another gunshot followed by car crash
then three more car crashes virus headline
pan to an image of the american flag pan to
an image of a hardboiled egg teeth sink into
the white flesh of a jesus figure who is home
less jump cut music builds violinists
shiver in the hospital a president figure
jump cut back to a homeless jesus licks
his lips and walks with a pastor who
refills his coke in a 7/11 and then is gunned
down as all the shelves are raided for toilet
paper that night is played on loop wind
nudges a bullet off course which narrowly misses
the cowboy as insects swarm the temple the
narrator speaks: ‘and in the final days everything
will fall and few will rise in a nation on the brink
of’ cut to white male (thirties): ‘let’s get out of here
….’ kicks open a door and lets his flame thrower rip
INSTRUCTIONS FOR LIVING
Stay with me for this—ten days in a row:
Lifted on earthquake magic
Playing the broken speaker for necessity—sound of epic legions
Sick poet legions and bad protocols that drive artists insane
More than once I was taken to the edge and almost jumped
Since then it’s been very clear
Nothing is made to last and I love you for that
Our skull of skulls
split open as the mind soup pours into the sky
I screamed for the cancer patients
I screamed for the painters who don’t have the space to paint
I screamed eloquently
at the banquet of crushed titans
Trust me
It pays to deny 9 to 5
It pays to avoid your ‘responsibilities’
for bigger responsibilities like reading poems
Picking flowers and painting three thousand black circles in a row
Ink alone does not save lives
So I electrify the ink until it autobahns my blood towards the future
Welcome me home vampire bats
Come crown me with nothing special
I will remove my teeth to prove all coronations are fake
I will speak the Final Word which is the First Word—as follows
Rotate the cemetery
See it as garden
Recognize the mountain tunnel dynamite song
Drive-drive-drive 30 hours to San Diego
Racing through the pitch black with extreme caution
Ignore the spelling errors
Hardly legible in the city those stars are
Rewind the tape and never play it again
These are instructions for living in 8 places at once
Find yourself touching sand beneath waterfalls
Irrigation
Propeller symphonies
I promise
No one can disregard you
Not in any meaningful way
And this is because I will not disregard you
And the daisies will not disregard you
And because I have screamed for you already
Praying that everyone who wants piano lessons gets them
Praying minimum wage is raised and then abolished
Praying with vinegar swash howling two months beneath porch light
I insist
that you film the sidewalk
Eat the pumpkin seeds in June
And if you can, find gold rope—wear it—climb forever
I, just like you, want to escape more than anything
And I, like you, don’t have that choice
So I suggest
Eat the shoreline
And the daikon radish of the shoreline
And the $15 kite used once
left in the garage for dust sunsets to prove time
Only for time to be disproven by the clockless casino
and the infinite chance to take chance for a ride
Hello again
Welcome in
I am here for you
Inasmuch as I bleed the selfsame star
Dripping those questions I cannot answer
But I have written down the wifi code to hive mind
tucked away in the card deck
Ace
River
Joker obviously
2,652 combinations
Count the branches
just to see how quickly you lose count
And that is how fast your life is
A lost count of endless growth
Sideways and up
Down jagged
I pray
I pray so hard
To find the magic again
And the magnifying glass
And the roads that lead to something I’ve never seen
which is every road I’ve never taken
Easy enough
to find
to go that way
when good and ready
Subjects in Space, 2021: plastics, paper, and wire by Abylai Murashbekov
