Philomene Long’s death in August triggered an outpouring of tributes, sympathy, sorrow and creativity sent to the Beachhead from throughout the country. This month is no exception. This month’s contributions come from S.A. Griffin, contributing editor of The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry and John Dorsey, a poet in Toledo, Ohio. 

My Dear Lady Nite
~ for Philomene Long

within that exalted dance of
time without time
do stars break &
churn inside of you
like Debussy’s sonic sketches
curling into the sand?

cold crashes into shadow

barking gulls dive
for bits of poetry
like bread dotting the once
bohemian beach

bruised thoughts circle the sun

Lady Philomene,
within your book of sleep
does the word vibrate ecstatic 
like a shivering rose
tipped with virgin dewdrop
celebrating the unimaginable lite of
your golden eternity?

is it written that the gift of genius
comes wrapped in madness
or that every good thing has at its
heart the seed of something sinister?

that sadness is a blessing & an art?

we continue living rear view
as we look out 
    grassy eyed

at all that is left of what 
begins & ends
as a dream

– S.A. Griffin

————

poem for philomene long

in a past life
the sun invented dance
was hunted down and
made to suffer the
pleasures of women the
muse drunk on words

while you sister philomene
sang with beauty
drank cheap wine with
pride and invented the
outline of god

tonight the roman dead
stand sentry on the boardwalk
while you blow one last
cotton candy kiss to
your city now being
washed out into a
sea of dreams and ruins

they pray silently
may you join the
ghosts of venice west
for a pint of holy water
and a nugget of dank zen

a
feminine flower set on
fire

the only god
some angels have ever known

– John Dorsey