Steve Brightman [photo by T.M. Göttl]

Vending Machine Profiteers

Loud are the
vending machine
profiteers.
One quarter
one quarter
one quarter
clank clank clank
into the cracks
in the armor,
into the empty,
into the Lou Reed
skyline above a city
he never saw.
Loud are the boys
and girls yelling in their
nylon ripcord vocals.
Loud are the raw
and childish voices
of the new silence.

“Vending Machine Profiteers” (c) 2013 by Steve Brightman, from his chapbook 13 Ways of Looking at Lou Reed (published by Crisis Chronicles Press).

Steve Brightman lives in Kent, Ohio.  He is also the author of In Brilliant Explosions Alone (2013, NightBallet Press); Like Michelangelo Sorta Said (2013, The Poet’s Haven); Absent The (2013, Writing Knights Press); The Logic of Meteors (2011, Writing Knights);  Sometimes, Illinois (2011, NightBallet); and Forlorn Teeth (2010, Blasted Press).

He will be one of 60 featured poets during Snoetry 4: A Kulchured Winter Wordfest on 16 March 2014 at Guide to Kulchur, 1386 W. 65th Street in Cleveland, Ohio.

13 Ways of Looking at Lou Reed by Steve Brightman