Stomp and Sing : Poems

by Anderson, Jon

• ISBN13: 9781931896153
• ISBN10: 1931896151
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-04-01
• Publisher: Curbstone Pr

Summary

Jon Andersen's debut book of poems, Stomp and Sing, illuminates the concerns and aspirations of the new working-class generation. Andersen's image-studded lyrics about work, love, family and class struggle create a vivid narrative that traces the concerns and aspirations of young people facing the challenges of daily life in a turbulent century. These are clear, direct poems that take us from mountaintops to local cafes, from lumberyards to town sidewalks, and range in theme from the impact of racism to the consolation of nature. Postcard from Chimney Pond Climbed the talus around the pond last night-so many pebbles around a puddle from the views of Baxter Peak, but down here chunks of granite as big as the small house I grew up in, all jumbled, jutting out of cold, clear water and piled up towards the stars. Silent lightning split the sky far north. Scrambled as far up the rock throat as I safely could and then some. Slept beneath the cliffs. Had a dream of you so real that for a long time after waking up, it felt good to have seen you again. Jon Andersen won the 2003 Working People's Poetry Award (Partisan Press). He has recent work in the Blue Collar Review, The Progressive and O Taste and See: Food Poems (Bottom Dog Press). He teaches English at E. O. Smith High School in Storrs, Connecticut, and lives with his wife and sons in Willimantic, Connecticut.

Table of Contents

I. Fierce to Go
The Mulberry Tree	3	(1)
The Street Named After Spencer	4	(2)
Spencer's Scrapbook	6	(1)
Civilian Life: 1976	7	(2)
Hi-Fi	9	(1)
Green World	10	(2)
The Lumberyard Needs a Real Nigger	12	(1)
Planting	13	(2)
The Foreman Calls in Sick	15	(2)
Looking at a Photo of Our Grandfather, Seeing You	17	(2)
From Spencer to Lisa	19	(1)
Lisa's Reply	20	(1)
The Rustic Café	21	(8)
II. The Trails
Postcard from Chimney Pond	29	(1)
Cathedral Trail	30	(2)
Trail Crew, Baxter Park	32	(2)
A Brief Note from Spencer	34	(1)
Dream	35	(1)
Saddle Trail to Tableland	36	(2)
To An Old Friend, from Good Earth Farm	38	(1)
July, Good Earth Farm	39	(1)
"Children Set Homeless Man on Fire"	40	(1)
October, Good Earth Farm	41	(1)
Postcard from New York City: May 1994	42	(1)
As I Went Walking	43	(2)
White Mountain Poem	45	(4)
III. The Real World
You Must	49	(1)
Encounter	50	(1)
True Story	51	(2)
F.Y.I.	53	(2)
Hey, Baby	55	(1)
Love in Willimantic	56	(2)
Learn, My Boy	58	(1)
My Mother Paints Again	59	(2)
The Daughter I Never Had	61	(1)
The Real World	62	(3)
Two Mottos	65	(1)
Soldier	66	(2)
Spencer Goes to School	68	(2)
Spring, Catskill Mountains	70	(1)
Pit Bull	71	(2)
The Deal	73	(1)
Soon	74