_____________________
HURRICANE KATRINA _____________________
Ancestor Talk
“And ancestor talk
creeps gingerly—like a
gravedigger in a flood—
into confused souls on the
brink of two uneven worlds.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Crossroads at New Orleans,”
Hoodoo Headrag
After Katrina—
After the hurricane &
Big Easy flooding.
Down in Baton Rouge—
Helping out some of my friends
After Sodom & Miss G.
After God punished—
All the homosexuals
And Mardi Gras queers.
I had this strange dream—
Oozing up from Delta slime
Mississippi mud.
New Orleans Mon Amour
“But new gods are found
buried above ground
when old ones lose shape.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Crossroads at New Orleans,”
Hoodoo Headrag
View Carré flooded—
Abandoned & flooded deep
People in attics.
Old folks drowning dead—
Trapped underwater in their
Flooded retirement homes.
All the cats & dogs—
All the pets & loved ones left
Behind dead alone.
Voodoo Hoodoo
“Crossed spirits create
imbalance in believers;
then, skeptics start praying.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Crossroads at New Orleans,”
Hoodoo Headrag
I prayed for them all—
But it didn’t do no good
I had this nightmare.
Dinge hoodoo-voodoo—
Came back to haunt me real bad
Dinge mumbo-jumbo.
I was after all—
A mixed-blood mulatto man
With Mandingo roots.
The ledgers said so—
My Go Down Moses mother
Adopted back then.
Mississippi Gods
“Jesus and Ogoun find
ample place in the crescent
of the Mississippi’s waters.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Crossroads at New Orleans,”
Hoodoo Headrag
So when Jesus freaks—
And born-again Zombie creeps
Waved the Bible high.
Praising Katrina—
For punishing all the gays
Their uppity ways.
Blaming all the queers—
The French Quarter faggots
For the city’s woes.
Pitting the two—
Jesus & Ogoun against
Each other back then.
Katrina Karma Kum
“Secrets and prayers are rare
when gods are made to fight.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Crossroads at New Orleans,”
Hoodoo Headrag
I could feel it deep—
Katrina Karma Kum back
Then cuming thru me.
A karmic wet dream—
A nocturnal emission
Teenage kid again.
Adolescent angst—
Hormonal hurricane dream
Flowing outside me.
Down by the levee—
Old Man River in the nude
I got the kid off.
Hurricane Betsy
(September 1965)
“But hunger is a fierce wind
knows no friend, peace, peer.
It eats the very force
That engendered it.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Hungry Loas at Cancun,”
Hoodoo Headrag
Hurricane Betsy—
Slammed into New Orleans
One September night.
Smashing all the way—
Over Florida & then
Gulf of Mexico.
All along the coast—
Shattering plate glass windows
Knocking down old trees.
Littering the streets—
Of the famous French Quarter
With death & debris.
250,000 people fled—
As the mammoth storm roared in
Hitting with full force.
Ripping off the roofs—
Darkening Crescent City
Flying glass & blood.
Out of the Carib—
Battering Nassau there in
The calm Bahamas.
Blowing the roof off—
The Tulane Room popular
Big Easy nightspot.
Drowning the south shore—
All along lake Pontchartrain
Flooding small Venice.
Plaquemines Parish—
Flooded with people trapped in
River pilot shacks.
Freighters & barges—
Tossed around like little toys
Seawalls splashed over.
Biloxi nightclubs—
Their neon lights still flashing
Until last moments.
Pascagoula smashed—
Oil rig workers flown back home
As Betsy roared in.
Bayou La Batre—
Mississippi fishing fleets
Fleeing more inland.
Planet of the Apes
“Damballah—cosmic snake—
hatched an egg creating our world”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Hatched Love at the West Side,”
Hoodoo Headrag
Hurricane Betsy—
Just as bad as Katrina
Cosmic snake hatching.
Working in the Gulf—
As roustabout that summer
For Union Oil.
Paying tuition—
Getting thru LSU then
It was good money.
They flew us back in—
I drove back to Baton Rouge
As the storm came in.
Spent a stormy night—
With South Stadium boyfriend
Howling winds outside.
We saw a movie—
“Planet of the Apes” that night
Apocalyptic.
The world had ended—
Apes had taken over and
Heston had it bad.
Standing there alone—
The Statue of Liberty
Buried in the sand.
Hurricane Betsy—
Would it end up doing the
Same End-game to me?
Naked Currents
“There were whisperings
from dying and filtered
spirits in need of souls.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Naked Currents, (New Orleans),”
Hoodoo Headrag
After Katrina—
I flew down from Seattle
Strange déjà vu trip.
Forty years later—
After Hurricane Betsy
Back then in 1965.
All the way forward—
To Hurricane Katrina
Tragic in 2005.
But I didn’t know—
Anybody on campus
All those years later.
Didn’t know about—
Andrei Codrescu back then
Teaching on campus.
Dada poetics—
NPR, Exquisite Corpse
Commitment to friends.
I was a loner—
An Allen Hall basket-case
All my gay friends dead.
Wiped out by the Plague—
The Post-Stonewall hurricane
Killer Katrina.
What could I do there—
It was lucky I didn’t
Volunteers got sick.
Poisoned, polluted—
The flooded waters were death
To the lungs & flesh.
I chickened-out fast—
Cleaning up the Big Easy
Just wasn’t for me.
Story of my life—
Just an exiled Sixties gone
Hippie who gave up.
So I ended up—
Spending a long Lost Weekend
Drunk in the bayous.
Drinking, smoking dope—
Listening to Zydeco
With a Cajun kid.
Young Andre Boudreaux—
Son of a former lover
Sorrell Bayou boy.
In fact, Andre was—
The son of the guy that night
When Betsy blew in.
“Planet of the Apes”—
Was the movie we saw
That hurricane night.
There I was again—
After another big storm
Consoled by a youth.
A young naked ape—
Those well-endowed Boudreaux boyz
Making me forget.
Ancestor Talk
“And ancestor talk
creeps gingerly—like a
gravedigger in a flood—
into confused souls on the
brink of two uneven worlds.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Crossroads at New Orleans,”
Hoodoo Headrag
After Katrina—
After the hurricane &
Big Easy flooding.
Down in Baton Rouge—
Helping out some of my friends
After Sodom & Miss G.
After God punished—
All the homosexuals
And Mardi Gras queers.
I had this strange dream—
Oozing up from Delta slime
Mississippi mud.
New Orleans Mon Amour
“But new gods are found
buried above ground
when old ones lose shape.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Crossroads at New Orleans,”
Hoodoo Headrag
View Carré flooded—
Abandoned & flooded deep
People in attics.
Old folks drowning dead—
Trapped underwater in their
Flooded retirement homes.
All the cats & dogs—
All the pets & loved ones left
Behind dead alone.
Voodoo Hoodoo
“Crossed spirits create
imbalance in believers;
then, skeptics start praying.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Crossroads at New Orleans,”
Hoodoo Headrag
I prayed for them all—
But it didn’t do no good
I had this nightmare.
Dinge hoodoo-voodoo—
Came back to haunt me real bad
Dinge mumbo-jumbo.
I was after all—
A mixed-blood mulatto man
With Mandingo roots.
The ledgers said so—
My Go Down Moses mother
Adopted back then.
Mississippi Gods
“Jesus and Ogoun find
ample place in the crescent
of the Mississippi’s waters.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Crossroads at New Orleans,”
Hoodoo Headrag
So when Jesus freaks—
And born-again Zombie creeps
Waved the Bible high.
Praising Katrina—
For punishing all the gays
Their uppity ways.
Blaming all the queers—
The French Quarter faggots
For the city’s woes.
Pitting the two—
Jesus & Ogoun against
Each other back then.
Katrina Karma Kum
“Secrets and prayers are rare
when gods are made to fight.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Crossroads at New Orleans,”
Hoodoo Headrag
I could feel it deep—
Katrina Karma Kum back
Then cuming thru me.
A karmic wet dream—
A nocturnal emission
Teenage kid again.
Adolescent angst—
Hormonal hurricane dream
Flowing outside me.
Down by the levee—
Old Man River in the nude
I got the kid off.
Hurricane Betsy
(September 1965)
“But hunger is a fierce wind
knows no friend, peace, peer.
It eats the very force
That engendered it.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Hungry Loas at Cancun,”
Hoodoo Headrag
Hurricane Betsy—
Slammed into New Orleans
One September night.
Smashing all the way—
Over Florida & then
Gulf of Mexico.
All along the coast—
Shattering plate glass windows
Knocking down old trees.
Littering the streets—
Of the famous French Quarter
With death & debris.
250,000 people fled—
As the mammoth storm roared in
Hitting with full force.
Ripping off the roofs—
Darkening Crescent City
Flying glass & blood.
Out of the Carib—
Battering Nassau there in
The calm Bahamas.
Blowing the roof off—
The Tulane Room popular
Big Easy nightspot.
Drowning the south shore—
All along lake Pontchartrain
Flooding small Venice.
Plaquemines Parish—
Flooded with people trapped in
River pilot shacks.
Freighters & barges—
Tossed around like little toys
Seawalls splashed over.
Biloxi nightclubs—
Their neon lights still flashing
Until last moments.
Pascagoula smashed—
Oil rig workers flown back home
As Betsy roared in.
Bayou La Batre—
Mississippi fishing fleets
Fleeing more inland.
Planet of the Apes
“Damballah—cosmic snake—
hatched an egg creating our world”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Hatched Love at the West Side,”
Hoodoo Headrag
Hurricane Betsy—
Just as bad as Katrina
Cosmic snake hatching.
Working in the Gulf—
As roustabout that summer
For Union Oil.
Paying tuition—
Getting thru LSU then
It was good money.
They flew us back in—
I drove back to Baton Rouge
As the storm came in.
Spent a stormy night—
With South Stadium boyfriend
Howling winds outside.
We saw a movie—
“Planet of the Apes” that night
Apocalyptic.
The world had ended—
Apes had taken over and
Heston had it bad.
Standing there alone—
The Statue of Liberty
Buried in the sand.
Hurricane Betsy—
Would it end up doing the
Same End-game to me?
Naked Currents
“There were whisperings
from dying and filtered
spirits in need of souls.”
—Alden Reimonenq, “Palmnut
Naked Currents, (New Orleans),”
Hoodoo Headrag
After Katrina—
I flew down from Seattle
Strange déjà vu trip.
Forty years later—
After Hurricane Betsy
Back then in 1965.
All the way forward—
To Hurricane Katrina
Tragic in 2005.
But I didn’t know—
Anybody on campus
All those years later.
Didn’t know about—
Andrei Codrescu back then
Teaching on campus.
Dada poetics—
NPR, Exquisite Corpse
Commitment to friends.
I was a loner—
An Allen Hall basket-case
All my gay friends dead.
Wiped out by the Plague—
The Post-Stonewall hurricane
Killer Katrina.
What could I do there—
It was lucky I didn’t
Volunteers got sick.
Poisoned, polluted—
The flooded waters were death
To the lungs & flesh.
I chickened-out fast—
Cleaning up the Big Easy
Just wasn’t for me.
Story of my life—
Just an exiled Sixties gone
Hippie who gave up.
So I ended up—
Spending a long Lost Weekend
Drunk in the bayous.
Drinking, smoking dope—
Listening to Zydeco
With a Cajun kid.
Young Andre Boudreaux—
Son of a former lover
Sorrell Bayou boy.
In fact, Andre was—
The son of the guy that night
When Betsy blew in.
“Planet of the Apes”—
Was the movie we saw
That hurricane night.
There I was again—
After another big storm
Consoled by a youth.
A young naked ape—
Those well-endowed Boudreaux boyz
Making me forget.
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