Slinging the Word
Janet Kuypers poetry selected from reading at the Chicago radio show WordSlingers on WLUW Radio
1058-5154
chicago, west sideshe knew who they were coming for she crouched in front of the window straddling her chair she moved from the corner her coffee sat in the window sill the condensation rising, beading on the window right about at her eye level. she took the side of her index finger periodically and smeared some of the water away to look into the streets. the snow was no longer falling on the west side of Chicago; it just packed itself darker and deeper into the ground with every car that drove over it. she gunshot was ringing in her ear still. it was so loud. the earth cried when she pulled that trigger. let out a loud, violent scream. she could still hear it. for these few moments, she had to just stare out the window and wait. she didn’t know if she should bother running, if it mattered or not. she couldn’t think. all she knew was that this time, when she heard the sirens coming from the streets, she’d know why they were coming. she’d know who they were coming for. |
gift of motherhoodpart one We need only think of how the gift of motherhood is often penalized rather than rewarded even though humanity owes its very survival to this gift Certainly, much remains to be done to prevent discrimination against those who have chosen to be wives and mothers Letter to Women, Message of His Holiness POPE JOHN PAUL II, July 10 “he started in on me again last night, he had too much to drink, and came home, drunk, and started yelling at me. he got home at ten-thirty but wanted to know why his dinner wasn’t warm. and he wanted to wake up the kids and play with them, but i told him it was a school night and they needed a full night’s rest. i swear, i can’t tell anyone else this, i have to keep telling everyone i fell down the stairs and i burned myself when i was cooking dinner and i tripped over one of the kids’ toys or a vase from the book- shelf i was cleaning fell and hit me in the face. i’ve come up with a lot of excuses, i know. but what would the kids do if i lost him? how could i work and take care of them? how would they be able to go to college? i know i keep making up excuses, but i have to. for the kids.” |
Thank you, women who work IThank you, women who work In this way you make an indispensable contribution to the growth of a culture which unites reason and feeling, to a model of life ever open to the sense of “mystery” Letter to Women, Message of His Holiness POPE JOHN PAUL II, July 10 Thank you, women who work because you take on the responsibilities of men while still having to be mothers, wives good little daughters and feminine creatures Thank you, women who work because you are the ones we can blame when the family falls apart Thank you, women who work because you make a point to do more than your fair share without being paif fairly even though no man would do the same for you Thank you, women who work for you know you have to prove yourselves over and over and over again and that it still isn’t enough, so keep up the good work, ladies |
Coslow’sI am backat my old college hang-out years later sharing some beers with an old friend then i remember being there with a friend who used to work there she told me about the women’s bathroom in all my years I had never been there she said women write on the wall at the left of the stall women write that they’ve been raped they name names there were arrows pointing to other women’s messages saying “i’ve heard this before” first names last names when she told me of this years ago i walked in read the names and wrote down one of my own i forgot about that wall until now and i am back just yards away from the bathroom door i get up walk open the door years later all the names are still there jake jay josh larry matt scott i can even still see my own writing it didn’t take long to find it |
All These RemindersLook, over here, in my living room. You left an empty bottle of beer on the end table. The cap, too. And come here, follow me, over here, in the kitchen, look in here, see, you left some of your food in the pantry. A box of spaghetti, some canned tomatoes. And come here, in the bathroom, I know you probably won’t notice this, but here, this towel, it smells like you, is smells like your shaving cream. Why did you have to go. Why does this have to seem so hard. Okay, look here, the remote for the television is on the arm of the chair, where you always leave it. And the cocktail table, it’s pushed forward on one side because you’d always rest your feet on it. Everywhere I look around me, I see something that you affected. I look in the kitchen. I look in the dining room. I look in the mirror. Why did you do this to me. Why couldn’t you have made a clean break. There’s still some of your messages scribbled on scraps of paper next to the phone in the kitchen. And look, the pillow on the couch is bunched up because you could never get comfortable with it. And over here, the phone books are out on the kitchen counter, you never put them away, and here they are, still sitting out, I’ll have to put them back in the cabinet. and look here, why do I still have all of your love letters stuffed into a drawer in my desk. When you left me, why did you have to leave me all these reminders. |
she told me her dreams 1we were at some sort of showing some sort of exhibit where they were displaying the glass sculpture, it was eighty-three billion years old, and it was more smooth than anything and it went on and on, one smooth curve after another it was so old they displayed it on the water was it a lake, or the ocean it rested on the water, religiously and I was in the water with someone a man, I don’t know who and we were swimming around it, touching it he was on the other side, told me to swim under it I didn’t think I could make it across but I went under, across I went I kept feeling the sides, the smoothness somehow, transcribed along the sides of the sculpture, was a time line, a record of history there’s wasn’t much at eighty-three billion years ago, but there was more and more the closer we got to present I remember reading Lyndon Johnson’s name, and then I saw information about the future it was all on the glass, I was looking at it, but I can’t remember what it says |
Childhood Memories oneI was in the basement, the playroomthat’s where all my toys were, you see and I had just run in there after yelling at my family sitting in the living room “I hate you” now, I’ve never said that before to my family, nor would I ever say it again  I knew betterand I had just run into the playroom slammed the door shut I couldn’t have been more than five and I ran in, and I looked for things to put in front of the door so they couldn’t open it and find me I took one of my chairs from my little play set and dragged it over to the door then I took the little schoolhouse for Fischer-Price toys, the side opened up, it had a blackboard and everything I took that little schoolhouse, put it on the chair guarding the door patiently obeying my orders I was running around looking for something else I could carry to the door when I heard the door knob turn and my sister, with one arm pushed all of my toys away and opened the door I knew I had been defeated |
Christmas Evewe made dinnerfettuccini alfredo with chicken and duck vegetables bread we ate couldn’t finish everything we were putting on our coats getting ready to go to midnight mass i decided to pack up our leftovers give them to some homeless people on the main street we got in the car and drove to broadway and berwyn i got out of the car walked over to a man there asked him if he was hungry i got the bowl of noodles and the gallon of milk out of the car another man walked over to me i told them to promise that they would share i got in the car we were just driving and all i could think of was these two men in the cold eating pasta with their fingers on Christmas Eve |
flooded war memoriesit was st. patrick’s day,went to another country to see you met up with you at a hotel it was like we were never apart we talked like old friends, old war-time veterans who fought in a war together who shared our life stories while sitting in a trench together waiting for a bomb to strike it was st. patrick’s day, and everything seemed normal and right even though you lived far away and even though we had different life plans it was st. patrick’s day, i remember you laying down in the bath tub, like a little boy, splashing and playing in the water, not even flinching that i was there talking to you, naked in the tub it was st. patrick’s day, i wanted to get out, see the town and you didn’t want to move content in a dingy hotel room all i could think was that it was st. patrick’s day, and i was in another country, i wanted to get up and go and i don’t know what snapped in you on st. patick’s day, but i was in a dress, ready to go, and you knocked me down i remember being knocked on to one of those hotel beds in my panty hose and dress, and you strangled me it was like you were in the war again and you were fighting to the death but i thought we were on the same side why are you trying to hurt me and like a bull dog that finally listened to the commands of their master, you finally stopped, and there i was, your ally, the one that sat in the trenches with you all those years ago torn panty hose, bloody knees i never thought you’d fight one of your buddies, i swear * i got out and called for back up in the hotel lobby at the pay phone an older woman came up to me, asking if i was all right her question stopped me from hyperventilating i looked down at my torn hose, bloody knees and I said, i’m fine * i just knew i had to get out of there before more shells fell |
There I Sitthere I sit I sit alone separated isolated away from my only love my obsession I pull out a fountain pen I look at the lines the contours of his face defining the piercing eyes the pointed nose the tender lips I feverishly draw I sketch I capture his image I stare I gaze I memorize his every detail but he never looks back so I will draw until my fountain pen runs dry |
other horizonsI live in the basementit’s all I can afford nothing grows there but I would have a little plant at my office desk every morning water it watch it grow I’d take on all those tasks I’d even have my own partition I live in a room with no view but I don’t need one no oceans, no skylines when I make it I’ll look out the window at the whole damn city |
signs of the timesThe president says it’s okayto be gay, as long as you don’t tell anyone. Suburban husbands are murdering doctors who work at abortion clinics, because they saved the world from a mass murderer. Nineteen children are found in a freezing apartment alone, sharing one bowl of food on the floor with a dog. People walk to the churches, see Mary’s statue crying. One lone man in New York hears the voice of God through his dog and kills. Were the children saved from the murderer, were they sharing their food with God were they crying |
Conversations,
i am a teacher |
About the AuthorJanet Kuypers has a Communications degree in News/Editorial Journalism (starting in computer science engineering studies) from the UIUC. She had the equivalent of a minor in photography and specialized in creative writing. A portrait photographer for years in the early 1990s, she was also an acquaintance rape workshop facilitator, and she started her publishing career as an editor of two literary magazines. Later she was an art director, webmaster and photographer for a few magazines for a publishing company in Chicago, and this Journalism major was even the final featured poetry performer of 15 poets with a 10 minute feature at the 2006 Society of Professional Journalism Expo’s Chicago Poetry Showcase She sang with acoustic bands Mom’s Favorite Vase, Weeds and Flowers and the Second Axing, and does music sampling. Kuypers is published in books, magazines and on the internet around 9,300 times for writing, and over 17,800 times for art work in her professional career, and has been profiled in such magazines as Nation and Discover U, and was nominated as Poet of the Year for 2006 by the International Society of Poets. She has also been highlighted on radio stations, including WEFT (90.1FM), WZRD (88.3FM), WLUW (88.9FM), WSUM (91.7FM), WLS (8900AM), Q101 (101.9FM), the internet radio stations ArtistFirst.com, chicagopoetry.com’s Poetry World Radio and Scars Internet Radio (SIR). She has also appeared on television for poetry in Nashville and Chicago, and was interviewed on her art work on Urbana’s WCIA channel 3 10 o’clock news. Inducted as a Poetry Ambassador during Poetry Month in 2006 & 2007, and nominated to be Poet of the Year in 2007, Kuypers turned her writing into performance art on her own and with musical groups like Pointless Orchestra, 5D/5D, Order From Chaos and The Bastard Trio, and starting in 2005 Kuypers ran a monthly iPodCast of her work, as has morphed her Internet radio station (JK Radio) to become a part of Scars Internet Radio (SIR) — and the radio show she even runs the Chaotic Radio show (an hour long Internet radio show) through BZoO.org and chaoticarts.org is on temporary haitus in 2008. She has performed spoken word and music across the country — in the spring of 1998 she embarked on her first national poetry tour, with featured performances, among other venues, at the Albuquerque Spoken Word Festival during the National Poetry Slam; her bands have had concerts in Chicago and in Alaska; in 2003 she hosted and performed at a weekly poetry and music open mike (called “Sing Your Life”), and from 2002 through 2005 was a featured performance artist, doing quarterly performance art shows with readings, music and images. In addition to being published with Bernadette Miller in the short story collection book Domestic Blisters, as well as in a book of poetry turned to prose with Eric Bonholtzer in the book Duality, Kuypers has had many books of her own published: Hope Chest in the Attic, The Window, Close Cover Before Striking, (woman.), Autumn Reason, the Average Guy’s Guide (to Feminism), Contents Under Pressure, etc., and eventually The Key To Believing, Changing Gears, The Other Side, The Boss Lady’s Editorials, The Boss Lady’s Editorials (2005 Expanded Edition), Seeing Things Differently, Change/Rearrange, Death Comes in Threes, Masterful Performances, Six Eleven, Live at Cafe Aloha, Dreams, Rough Mixes, The Entropy Project, The Other Side (2006 Edition), Stop., Sing Your Life, cc&d v165.25 (an art book), The Beauty and the Destruction Writing to Honour & Cherish: the Kuypers Edition, Blister and Burn: the Kuypers Edition, S&M, Distinguished Writings: the Kuypers Edition, Living in Chaos, Tick Tock, Silent Screams, Taking It All In, It All Comes Down, Rising to the Surface, and Galapagos. Three collection books were also published of her work in 2004, Oeuvre (poetry), Exaro Versus (prose) and L’arte (art). |