Poetry to be a man by

http://www.redflagpress.com/oklahomarevelator/laborfest/2010info. meant to have one blog post to review Mongrel Empire Press books. Got carried away, but will try to shorten it. These two books reek Oklahoma living and people, from a man's perspective.

Nathan Brown's new poetry book, "My Sideways Heart," 93 pages including his black and white photography, digs deep. If you've loved and won and lost, you can identify with the images, the humor, the hurt.

From "Sideways Love":

And life is full of sideways love...
and there are so many kinds...
so many options that don't require
flowers and a phone call every hour.

From "Ribs and Stones":
We walked an older, less traveled
path to the castle of love his time.


Another Okie, Ken Hada, now in Ada (rhyme not intended but there) at ECU, will be reading his poetry at the Oklahoma Labor Fest, along with others and his publisher Jeanetta Cahloun Mish on Thursday, Aug. 28, in  the  Plaza District in OKC. She'll also be "personing" (her words) a table of books, and I'll be you can get a signed copy of Ken's book, "Spare Parts, " 84 pages.

From "Hospice":

the sadness that I knew you
swings
on the empty porch
summer's breeze
half-filled glasses of dark beer ...

From "Dad's Shed":

He built it with used two by fours
scrap metal for runners.
He always saved spare parts... .

You'll want to read "Symphony in Cordell." One of my favorites: "Cottonwoods on the Rio Grande."