Blades is a poet and he knows it

By ALEXANDRA DAVIS
davis.alexandra@dailygleaner.com

Don't be surprised if Joe Blades recites a poem to you this week as you pass him on the street . . .

NONYMOUS Three has arrived

BlackTop MotorCycle Gang raids Nonymous

As the rumble faded away in the distance, in the direction of the nearest watering hole, a dazed, small man, with black powder smeared on his face, pulled himself upright out of a mess of crumpled boxes, strewn paper, and overturned furniture than had been his office. He swayed on his feet and with sandbagged eyes surveyed the damage and sighed.

He knew they'd come back for him. They'd make him do horrible things: drink in public; make a fool of himself; make he read aloud words that would curl the petals of flowers and make loved ones howl and scream in the night. There would be another BlackTop MotorCycle Gang night of mayhem on the spring rain-soaked streets of Freddy Beach.

He heaved his desk upright and found a not too broken but decidedly wobbly chair in which to sit. He hears sounds, a whirring and phut phut phut repeating over and over. He smiled. It wasn't from outside the office window with a cardboard panel from a wine box taped over a hold punched there during the last raid. No, the sound came through the wall from an inner room. Micha picked his way across the ruined office, careful to avoid daggers of shattered mirror on the floor outside the kitchenette and now doorless toilet.

The door had been ripped of its hinges and kicked to pieces, panels of wood flying, in front of him. The bald badass reaking of beer and candied cigarillos that had held him tight almost whispered as he'd said, "We'll do to that to you, if you don't cooperate." Micha had nodded his head and gulped out, "Okay. Sure. Whatever you say."

Now Micha took the lid off the toilet tank, reached a hand in and pulled out a key. In the hallway opposite the toilet was a half height steel door with curled decals warning DO NOT ENTER in bold letters above the lightning bolt and HIGH VOLTAGE below. Opening the door, he stooped and squat-walked two steps in then stood up.

It was a small, windowless room with a fan in the outside wall above a bank of grey equipment with flickering green and red LED lights. The right end was busily moving up and down like it was doing something. Micha reached over, pulled out a stack of paper. The top sheet read Nonymous Three. He'd done it. He gotten it on paper while they were destroying his office, his life.

He'd be ready, when they returned. Better than WANTED posters at the police station and post office, he'd captured a likeness of the BlackTop MotorCycle Gang in words and pictures. They were loud and rude, sweet and perverse, poets and not-poets, their fukted-up and alive, singin' and spinnin', peelin' rubber and leaving tread all over the place. Tonight they'll be hoggin' the talking stick, raidin' the microphone. They'll be in your face and between your ears . . .

BE THERE OR WEEP:
7 pm, Saturday, 4 April 2009
Wilser's Room
in the Capitol Complex
off Pipers' Lane & Queen St
opposite The Tannery & King St
Fredericton, New Brunswick

Bring money, watches, wallets, piggybanks, your stash,
if you want to give a Nonymous Three a good home
out of the clutches of the BlackTop MotorCycle Gang.

shirt: boothill saloon
loc: broken desk
temp: 8 C
sound: prong "rude awakening"

Nonymous on APB (CHSR)

Micha of Nonymous mag here in Fredechicken, NB, will be my live guest in the first half of tonight's Ashes, Paper & Beans show, 7–8 pm, on CHSR 97.9 FM (& on the web). Catch us if you can . . .

—Broken Joe

The Night Before Robbie Burns Day

You don't have to be Scottish

Saturday, January 24, 2009 at 7:30pm
(after the BAG and ConneXion exhibition openings @ The Beaverbrook Art Gallery. 703 Queen St)

'Tis the night before Robbie Burns day and all through the world, denizens are partying, rollicking and . . . well, drinking Scotch, eating haggis, reading poetry, dropping down drunk and throwing up.

This is a BlackTop MotorCycle Gang reading raid open to the public. It will start at Biff's place (158 Brunswick Street, Apt 3-C . . . behind the big red brick house with the huge balcony and porch between Smythe and Northumderland . . . Biff's building is around back) with readings from Robbie (for those who want to read . . . find them here,http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=58856568901&h=AzHQG&u=oJuiM), and a good old Scottish chili and other snacks (bringing food is optional). Joe Blades will be bringing haggis (the most delicious haggis in the world and the only haggis I'll ever eat).

We'll meet at 7:30. After drinking (and you can bring whatever you want...for those of you with defective taste buds that won't accept Scotch) we'll head to the Robbie Burns statue on the Green (which is absent at the moment, but Broken Joe is bringing a bust) to read to his ghost.

And then, it's just pure party-your-ass-off.