this actually happened at my venue on night to a very close friend of mine. it deemed a response
Slightly leaning on it for one brief moment to center ourselves
Rock back on our heels and stare forward
Left eye twitching slightly as the stage lights stare down like god flicked the brights on
Trying to breathe deeply
Just slightly shaking hands subtly slid down the stand and hidden in pants pockets
Heart rate spiking
On stage facing the crowd
Like a firing squad staring back with no blindfold to mask the inquiring target sights of the audience's attention
The primed hammer of towering potential that this particular performance might not be able to block the bullet of a room near silent
Save for a few awkward coughs and a polite golf clap from someone new
Shaking hands gone still but clammy
Sweat staining the poet's forehead
Left eye twitching worse now
that final deep breath, but
This poem is not for the performer
It's for the loudmouth asshole in the back of the room speaking over everyone
Mouthing inebriated versions of conversation so astoundingly potent in decibel level the dj's tenacious control over the microphone volume is all for naught
Persisting beyond more than 85% of the nearby spectators staring at them for uncountable, painstakingly long minutes
Despite repeated attempts at cordial appeals to whatever semblance of culture may be left in them
And slightly more abrasive shouts, exclamations and outright threats
And the fact that the poet has cleared their throat four times
called you out by the pleather jacket you bought off the bargain rack at ross
and assured you, to the amusement of everyone else in the room, that no one wants to hear about your sexual escapades, musical preferences or unusually frequent bodily functions
you just keep talking
very loudly, might I add
through the show everyone who came out here to watch has become fully well aware that you choose to ruin
but not necessarily on purpose
because most people don't set out to be the biggest douchebag in a given location
but the award for loudest one with the least to say goes to you this evening
along with the door prize of being oblivious to at least a dozen people screaming at you to shut up because you just can't quite remember what your friends outside wanted to drink
then stumbling across the length of the entire room
Being sure to knock into each chair even marginally in your path at least twice
Letting out a scream to some person you think you know but probably don't
Laughing at something completely innocuous if not entirely nonexistent and interrupting the same sentence spoken by the one on the mic
For the third time in the same verse
You slobbering, gibbering, staggering ass of all asses
I'll explain this to you in the simplest, most easily understandable verbage I can possibly produce
But don't ask me to repeat myself
We're trying to build something here
And your incessant and intolerably loud babbling is throwing off my chi
So allow me to personally deliver a poetically charged shut up and fuck you very much in the form of a final appeal
If it was you
bearing your wounds for audience approval
sweating under the floodlights fixated on one sole performer
And if it was you losing your patience
Re-repeating the same line again, and louder this time
The obviousness of your growing irritation emphasized by your unmoving glare, clenched fists and pulsating veins pushing out of your neck as you re-re-repeat that same line again, and louder this time
So maybe, just maybe you can be heard over the chatter of an addled pigfucker gabbing on about some television show a developmentally disabled methhead epileptic on acid wouldn't find in the slightest bit amusing
Or rattling on about the petty and intolerably pointless bullshit they and their idiot friends get into again and again and again
And then
At the final slight second of silence
you draw that quick breath to fire out the words left unspoken
Teetering on the edge of your lips
The mother fucker cackles
Not laughs
But cackles
so piercingly loud it would make a nun curse
so then it was you
angrily walking away from what could have been something beautiful
unclenching fists as fingers hang in utter disappointment of not even getting so much as a chance to be heard
begrudgingly smirking when everyone talks about how fucked up that was and you know it was
but it doesn't stop you from questioning whether or not you'll ever try that again
so... if that was you
would you still be talking so fucking loud?
Poetry by David W Durney
Read 532 times
Written on 2008-08-07 at 10:29
Save as a bookmark (requires login)
Write a comment (requires login)
Send as email (requires login)
Print text
dedicated to the asshole in the back
We start by adjusting the microphone to the perfect heightSlightly leaning on it for one brief moment to center ourselves
Rock back on our heels and stare forward
Left eye twitching slightly as the stage lights stare down like god flicked the brights on
Trying to breathe deeply
Just slightly shaking hands subtly slid down the stand and hidden in pants pockets
Heart rate spiking
On stage facing the crowd
Like a firing squad staring back with no blindfold to mask the inquiring target sights of the audience's attention
The primed hammer of towering potential that this particular performance might not be able to block the bullet of a room near silent
Save for a few awkward coughs and a polite golf clap from someone new
Shaking hands gone still but clammy
Sweat staining the poet's forehead
Left eye twitching worse now
that final deep breath, but
This poem is not for the performer
It's for the loudmouth asshole in the back of the room speaking over everyone
Mouthing inebriated versions of conversation so astoundingly potent in decibel level the dj's tenacious control over the microphone volume is all for naught
Persisting beyond more than 85% of the nearby spectators staring at them for uncountable, painstakingly long minutes
Despite repeated attempts at cordial appeals to whatever semblance of culture may be left in them
And slightly more abrasive shouts, exclamations and outright threats
And the fact that the poet has cleared their throat four times
called you out by the pleather jacket you bought off the bargain rack at ross
and assured you, to the amusement of everyone else in the room, that no one wants to hear about your sexual escapades, musical preferences or unusually frequent bodily functions
you just keep talking
very loudly, might I add
through the show everyone who came out here to watch has become fully well aware that you choose to ruin
but not necessarily on purpose
because most people don't set out to be the biggest douchebag in a given location
but the award for loudest one with the least to say goes to you this evening
along with the door prize of being oblivious to at least a dozen people screaming at you to shut up because you just can't quite remember what your friends outside wanted to drink
then stumbling across the length of the entire room
Being sure to knock into each chair even marginally in your path at least twice
Letting out a scream to some person you think you know but probably don't
Laughing at something completely innocuous if not entirely nonexistent and interrupting the same sentence spoken by the one on the mic
For the third time in the same verse
You slobbering, gibbering, staggering ass of all asses
I'll explain this to you in the simplest, most easily understandable verbage I can possibly produce
But don't ask me to repeat myself
We're trying to build something here
And your incessant and intolerably loud babbling is throwing off my chi
So allow me to personally deliver a poetically charged shut up and fuck you very much in the form of a final appeal
If it was you
bearing your wounds for audience approval
sweating under the floodlights fixated on one sole performer
And if it was you losing your patience
Re-repeating the same line again, and louder this time
The obviousness of your growing irritation emphasized by your unmoving glare, clenched fists and pulsating veins pushing out of your neck as you re-re-repeat that same line again, and louder this time
So maybe, just maybe you can be heard over the chatter of an addled pigfucker gabbing on about some television show a developmentally disabled methhead epileptic on acid wouldn't find in the slightest bit amusing
Or rattling on about the petty and intolerably pointless bullshit they and their idiot friends get into again and again and again
And then
At the final slight second of silence
you draw that quick breath to fire out the words left unspoken
Teetering on the edge of your lips
The mother fucker cackles
Not laughs
But cackles
so piercingly loud it would make a nun curse
so then it was you
angrily walking away from what could have been something beautiful
unclenching fists as fingers hang in utter disappointment of not even getting so much as a chance to be heard
begrudgingly smirking when everyone talks about how fucked up that was and you know it was
but it doesn't stop you from questioning whether or not you'll ever try that again
so... if that was you
would you still be talking so fucking loud?
Poetry by David W Durney
Read 532 times
Written on 2008-08-07 at 10:29
Save as a bookmark (requires login) Write a comment (requires login) Send as email (requires login) Print text
