The Poetry of Robert Michael Oliver

Prison Brickyard

I follow my brother to the brickyard
through pastures of Holsteins
grazing beneath the tulip poplars
as turkey buzzards circle.

I quake in my dung-smeared
sneakers; We shouldn’t be here,
and we know it. Guards shoot
to kill when a Lifer breaks

for the wire—in overalls,
he grunts in muck, a shank
in his waistband. Through rows
of brick like a cafeteria line,

we step to the ledge. The pit’s
wall smooth as blood, a brown
dab of fur squeezed in the crease.
A rat, my brother breathes.

I plummet into nightmares
of clay, churning red worlds
that punish men for their fury,
and I forget that I'm free.

___

Hunting Convicts

Gone all night, Daddy said
He escaped, his shackles
busted by a pickaxe.

I lay in bed, multiplying
8 times 7 as voices crackled;
cars rutted; hounds erupted.

We’ve got to catch the man
who murdered two babies
and then their momma.

I finished my oatmeal,
then strode to the road
as a yellow bus squealed.

___

Sledding Down State Farm Road

That year, peering out
my second-story window,
I awaited the first snowfall,

waiting to be old enough
to lie down, back up, hands
clenching my Flexible Flyer

rushing down State Farm Road
through a white oblivion,
crystals in my open mouth.

The branches of dogwoods
folded in prayer, Virginia Pines
stout as a cafeteria cook—

such is the privilege of reaching
eight-years-old—danger
has its reward of ice.

Unable to make the turn
I collided face-first with
the fat red oak guarding

the prison gate, its trunk
marked with one more bruise
in a history of sentinels.

___

7/1/2024

Robert Michael Oliver considers himself a Creativist: poet, theatre artist, writer, playwright, filmmaker, and educator. He created and performed one-man pieces: Embodying Poe, Whitman’s Song of Myself, and Ginsberg’s Howl. In 2023, Finishing Line Press published The Dark Diary in 27 refracted moments. A podcast, Creativists in Dialogue, which he does with Elizabeth Bruce, plays at Creativists.substack.com.