Poem of the Week: 7.27.23
"After Laughter" by Ricky Novaes de Oliveira
AFTER LAUGHTER
by Ricky Novaes de Oliveira
Read by the poet:
This concrete poem is in the shape of a deflated balloon.
There’e been constant litter of colorful balloons and chrome pods in the alleyway by my place recently. Nitrous oxide gas huffing is on the rise; I see people sucking in air from a balloon in one hand and driving with the other, or double-fisting a Modelo and some pink plastic. A roommate that I once had would lug heavy tanks of NOS into his room and spend his days getting inflated.
What’s most jarring to me—and what I find poetic—is the duality of a deflated balloon: either the party is over, or it is just getting started. Like laughter, there is a good end and a bad end to be on. This poem shows the bad end with the image of balloons that did not make it to the party, like hopes that lose shape. A separation is formed by the ampersand, with the “&” sign meant to visually evoke a knot or twist. As if what was meant to fill a “body” with some “high” is instead left sedated by the “tranqs” (short for ‘tranquilizer’ as well as other other street drugs). At once blown up with promise, now spent and pacified.
Not a very happy poem this week, but I was trying to work on my concrete form. I knew I should have written about aliens being real!
Festively, Ricky