Kerouac Blues
Exercise
Jack Kerouac may be loved
by young readers & poets around the world (of all ages) for his
semi-autobiographical novels like On The Road, but according to one of his Beat friends, it’s
his Blues poetry, specifically Mexico
City Blues, that is his masterpiece.
In
the only book written by a member of the Beat Movement on the actual writing movement
itself, Scratching
the Beat Surface, Michael
McClure says the book-length Buddhist poem is about:
“karma and liberation. Thus he begins
simply – almost effortlessly – an easy chorus, but one which shows a master ear
and master skill carrying over from earlier complex works in prose and verse.”
The poem includes “overhearings, and spontaneous
expressions, and perceptions, and word games, and insights into Buddhism…” as
well as a re-telling of his long-dead brother Gerard’s mystical visions
preceding his early death. “ As Kerouac’s cool mind, hand and ear extend the
poem, it becomes the channel for great energy” a force McClure calls both
mammalian and beatific.”
From
Kerouac himself on his blues form:
“
In my system, the form of blues
choruses is limited by the small page of the breastpocket
notebook in which they are written, like the form of a set number of bars in a
jazz blues chorus, and so sometimes the word-meaning can carry from one chorus
into another, or not, just like the phrase-meaning can carry harmonically from
one chorus to another, or not, in jazz, so that in these blues as in jazz, the
form is determined by time, and by the musician’s spontaneous phrasing &
harmonizing with the beat of the time as it waves & waves on by measured
choruses.
It’s all gotta
be non-stop ad libbing within each chorus, or the gig
is shot.”
- Jack Kerouac
1st Chorus
Mexico City Blues
Butte
Magic of Ignorance
Butte Magic
Is the same as no-Butte
All one light
Old Rough Roads
One High Iron
Mainway
Denver is the same
"The guy I was with his uncle was
the governor of Wyoming"
"Course he paid me
back"
Ten Days
Two Weeks
Stock and Joint
"Was an old crook anyway"
The same voice on the same ship
The Supreme Vehicle
S.S. Excalibur
Maynard
Mainline
Mountain
Merudvhaga
Mersion
of Missy
2nd Chorus
Man is not worried in the middle
Man in the Middle
Is not Worried
He knows his Karma
Is not buried
But his Karma,
Unknown to him,
May end --
Which is Nirvana
Wild Men
Who Kill
Have Karmas
Of ill
Good Men
Who Love
Have Karmas
Of dove
Snakes are Poor Denizens of Hell
Have come surreptitioning
Through the tall grass
To face the pool of clear frogs
Method:
Each
participant is given a partner, preferably NOT one they’ve been sitting next to
and a pocket notebook. They are sent outside (in decent weather) and asked to
use one of the most intriguing lines from the work they’ve done that workshop
session, a previous session, or take a compelling line from someone else’s
poem. Each partner starts a poem with that line, working with the associations
that spontaneously arise. Some might be compelled by sound, others by the
content or thematic thread, of the poem. There can be a compulsion to be silly
in such situations. Try to go for something deeper, but don’t be afraid to have
a sense of play. Once each participant finishes a chorus, to use Kerouac’s
parlance, the other person gets to read it and, from the other’s poem, take the last line, or an
image near the end of that other person’s chorus, write it down and begin a new
chorus of your own starting with the image/line from the other. Continue
writing choruses until you get at least nine, or more
if you feel you’re getting somewhere.
peN
1:14P
– 7.21.09
Works Cited:
Kerouac,
Jack.
Kerouac,
Jack. San Francisco Blues.
McClure,
Michael. Scratching the
Beat Surface.