Biker poets

New book collects best of “Biker Poetry”

Rubber Side Down. Edited by Joe Gouveia, Peddlar Bridges, and Susan Buck. (Archer Books PO BOX 1254 Santa Monica, CA. 93456) $16.

Did you know there is a Biker Poet movement? Bikers are not only Hell's Angels with leather and nefarious intent, but poets, on the road, burning rubber, and spouting odes to the endless highway. Joe Gouveia, poet, motorcycle enthusiast, and new head of the “Highway Poets Motor Cycle Club” had the good sense to edit an anthology of Biker bards. The poetry club, founded by Colorado T. Sky, boasts many fine poets in their ranks.  Allen Ginsberg commented on the concept of “Biker Poets”(according to a history included in the anthology):

“The Highway Poets could be, for their generation, what the Beat Poets were for ours.” And for this lively subculture of poets this could indeed be the case.

The title “Rubber Side Down,” according to an essay in the book by Martin Jack Rosenblum means to ride safely, and “we shall meet again at the next café for coffee or swap meet for spare parts-if we have kept it down safely.” To the biker, cars are cages, vehicles of conformity.

Rosenblum defines Biker poetry, or at least the Biker poetry presented in this book:
“The poetry in this book is written by folks who are outside the cultural safety zone. Some ignore technique, some deplore it, some explore it beyond where workshop academics would confine it and some take a breather from the understood confines of a literary canon sensibility to gather a better voice because of a crazy, two-wheeled power drift into experiential reverie.”

I was pleased to see a number of poets that I know and have published appear on these pages including: Linda Lerner, K. Peddlar Bridges, and Marc Goldfinger.

Goldfinger has an intriguing prose poem  “The State Trooper & The Biker Get Tested.” It involves his offbeat encounter with an offbeat State Trooper while riding his late wife's bike.

Naturally, many of the poets in this collection write of the vehicle of transcendence, the motorcycle. The beloved bike provides them with freedom from the grind of everyday. In her poem “It's Okay,” Susie Howard portrays the road as a trip that flies in the face of convention:

“But the road is free of that
It is the steady air against the skin
whipping hair and clothes
and flawed thinking from my mind
with the steady hum of opposing carburetors
passing by dinosaur  Buicks
traveling to destinations of work,
lifestyle, maintenance, drone hood
while I follow no map but that of whim
and its steady song of
It's okay.
It's okay.
It's okay.”

And Diane Wakoski in the “The Desert Motorcyclist” explains why it is better to ride a motorcycle than a man:

“Now I run away
to my dry desert,
the place where there is enough space
for my imagination
and nothing to drown it.

Desert motorcyclist:
that is me.
And it is the man,
never the machine
who betrays me.”

If you never have been exposed to this genre, then get a strong grip, plant your rear on a leather hide, hear those cylinders roar, and take a ride.

LYRICAL
Somerville
edited by Doug Holder

Poet Linda Mannke has a poem about a little “sap” or should I say “sapling.”

My Little Sapling

I want for her what I want for it.
That she take hold, branch out and stand tall.
Her roots find a home in the stony brown soil.
That she may embrace each season of change.
And know in her branchings to seek balance.
When to flower and when to bide.
To face the sun and know that what is lost
Will surely grow again and again.
That she may one day find a place of her own
In an orchard for others to see
Standing tall with the rest of the forest . . .
And most of all, that she outlast me!

            - Linda Mannke

To have your work considered for the Lyrical send it to:
Doug Holder, 25 School St.; Somerville, MA 02143.
[email protected]

Comments

[RoadHousePress]

Having published/edited/promoted Biker Poets since early 1980s, and being included in Rubber Side Down myself, I think I am qualified to say this article, while interesting, is not quite accurate historically. The Highway Poets MCc was founded by K. Peddlar Bridges and Colorado T. Sky. Rubber Side Down was Edited by Joe Go, but the title Submissions Editor belongs to K. Peddlar Bridges. The Associate Editor, Susan Buck, came on board after the original galley (which I have a copy of) and the original cover (which I have a copy of) were already made. I have volumes of newspaper articles, news releases, promotional material and published work of K. Peddlar Bridges, as he is, and always has been the generator that pushed the Biker Poets out of their closets into the community. I have records of Colorado T. Sky that date back to the early eighties as well. Both Peddlar and Sky have put Biker Poets on stage, on the web and in print, and with collaboration with Joe Go, Rubber Side Down has brought together Biker Poets from around the world. The Holy Ranger was the first to bring Biker Poetry to National attention when he was appointed Harley-Davidson's Poet Laureate. The IronHorseWriter has been bringing Biker Poetry from the Pacific West to Connecticut Cruise News readers, as has, Peddlar from New England, through the Poets' Corner where Publisher Don Clady gives 5-6 pages of ink to Biker Poets monthly. Sorez the Scribe is now manning the post as Associate Columnist for Poets Corner and will continue to showcase Biker Poets and their work. Chopper Kate is an Associate Columnist who covers the column twice a year from the Mid West. Chopper Kate is the newly appointed Biker Poet Laureate of the Mid-West. J.Barrett Wolf has been appointed the National Biker Poet Laureate. So, while leaving out many, I hope I have brought to the readers attention that Biker Poetry encompasses a wide spectrum of the Biker Community and there without each and everyone, Rubber Side Down would not have happened. There are many non-Biker Poets who have supported Bikers and their art/poetry over the years by providing publications (Leo Castell of The Motorcyclists Post), cyber publishings (such as motorcyclegoodies.com), readings, hard copy and promoted events for Biker Poetry readings, but the entire poetry community at large has always generously hosted and welcomed Biker Poets to contribute and take part in their venues. Rubber Side Down is an important collection, a celebration for many, but it is after all, just a small part of a whole. --MarySusan Williams-Migneault of RoadHousePress.