Saturday, June 7th, 2008...11:43 am
todd moore | damage, genius, courage
no one
knows
how dark
the wolf
is until
the night
begins
to move
Outlaw pushes buttons. Outlaw starts fires. Outlaw gets some people really excited. And, Outlaw also makes other people angry. Three or four years ago I had lunch with a poet who I just naturally assumed was an Outlaw Poet. However he let me know in no uncertain terms how offended he was with the label. As a label the term Outlaw can be offensive, maybe even deeply offensive. And, in some cases the more offensive, the better. I love the label Outlaw. I love it right down to the bones of its letters, I love the sound of it, the implications of it, the sheer aggression of the word. I love Outlaw in the brightest of New Mexico noons when the sunlight shimmers like hammered gold in the air and I love it in the New Mexico midnight when the skinwalkers are out and they want to fuck with your mind. I love Outlaw and I don’t give a damn who it troubles, offends, or just plain pisses off.
The Beats pissed people off. The Dadaists pissed people off. The Futurists pissed people off. The Surrealists pissed people off. However, they also changed the way that we look at poetry and art. Each movement changed the way that whole cultures hear language, see images, write poems, dream. This is where Outlaw is headed. This is where the Outlaw Poem is going, this is both the direction and the destination for the Outlaw Revolution. Outlaw is all about changing the kind of stale academic poetry appearing in the mainstream journals and the academic publishing houses. Outlaw is all about opposing the special interests, the huge foundations which award the lucrative prizes to all the writing degree darlings, mainstream press poets who have lost the juice, the mojo, the magic. Or, maybe never had it.
If pressed to admit it, I’d have to say that we’ve always had prizes reserved for certain poets. We’ve always had mainstream publishers more predisposed to publish a safe poet over a dangerous one. That held true for when Rimbaud and Whitman were alive and it holds true today. Maybe more so, for the twenty first century. It’s a risk free effort to publish the work of a Seamus Heaney and to neglect the work of a Kell Robertson. Heaney is a Nobel Prize winner with all the correct university teaching credits behind his name. Kell Robertson was on the road by the age of thirteen. He never graduated from high school let alone college. Yet, if given the choice, I’d rather read Kell Robertson’s poetry any time. He possesses one of maybe half a dozen truly authentic voices in american poetry during the last part of the twentieth century and the first part of the twenty first century. You don’t have to go to Harvard or Yale to acquire that. But, what you do need is damage, genius, and courage to write the great american poem.
Which also, currently, translates into the great outlaw poem. The great american outlaw poem. The great american outlaw damage courage genius poem. You want a poem like that, I’ll give you a whole book full of them by Misti Rainwater-Lites called DANGEROUS HAIR. I’d like to see what the Nobel Prize or Pulitzer people would do with that. You want damage, genius, courage, then read Joe Pacinko’s THE URINALS OF HELL. Damage, genius, courage? Read POET HEAD by Ron Androla or NUMBSKULL SUTRA by S. A. Griffin.
Damage, genius, courage is the bio for every Outlaw Poet I know of. Damage, genius, courage is what propels Raindog Armstrong’s FIRE AND RAIN, what gives the short circuit wham to Christopher Robin’s FREAKY MUMBLER’S MANIFESTO. Damage, genius, courage is what most Outlaw Poetry runs on. It’s like a form of black electricity and white hot duende zipped to the max. Damage, genius, courage was David Lerner’s alias. Damage, genius, courage should have been the subtitle for Albert Huffstickler’s WORKING ON MY DEATH CHANT. Damage, genius, courage is what fuels Tony Moffeit’s BLUES FOR BILLY THE KID.
I can’t think of any academic poets who deserve the words damage, genius, courage. Not one. But I know Mark Weber deserves them. Damage, genius, courage. I know that John Macker deserves them. Damage, genius, courage. I know that Dennis Gulling deserves them. I know that Theron Moore deserves them.
Poetry somehow damages you in subtle ways if you write it for very long. Little pieces of you crack off and get sucked into the poem. And, Outlaw Poetry damages you in the rawest and most savage of ways. Partly because there are no rewards, monetary, or otherwise. And, partly because the Outlaw Poem demands the rawest of scrapings from the skin, the blood, the dream and the soul of the person who writes it. However, in spite of all this, the Outlaw Poem offers, more than any other kind of poetry currently being written in this country, an opportunity to somehow alter or change the way we listen to the american voice, the way we get that voice down in words, and the way that we fundamentally talk to each other in the dark apocalyptic rooms of the republic. Outlaw is the way we tell our stories to the void and to ourselves. Outlaw because these are the dark stories, the ones we all long for.
A couple of years ago I had a dream about Dillinger. I was writing poetry in this old hotel room. It might have been the Clifton. It was the middle of the night and I was bent over an old typewriter at a rickety night table. The machine I was using was hard to work and wobbled every time I struck a key. I couldn’t go fast the way I like because the keys would stick together every so often. It was an old black steel Royal like the one in my office and now that I recall it seemed as though the story was coming right out of the core of the typewriter. The dark center of it where all the keys were all crouched and waiting for that ultimate swing up and back. The voice was pouring out quickly and the action of the typewriter was grindingly slow. But, somehow I was able to finish the poem.
I sat quietly on the edge of the bed a few moments just staring at the pages of the poem I’d spread out on the bed. After a little while there was a knock at the door. When I opened it Dillinger was standing there. When I invited him in he said he could only stay for a moment. Once inside the room, he said, “I brought you something.” He pulled a Thompson sub machine gun out from under his coat and said, “I think you deserve this.” I tried giving it back but by then he was already gone. Outside, the wind sang of the hotel’s twisted iron and nearly wrecked bricks.

Books from Todd Moore, Raindog, Mark Weber and Tony Moffeit are available for purchase in our shop here…
some related articles are listed below:
- todd moore | outlaw poetry, psychic damage, the survival of wounds
- todd moore | what are the stakes in american poetry?
- todd moore | coyote death mask outlaw
- todd moore | i’ll play dillinger
- todd moore | all the way to the fame
- todd moore | into the open madness: the poetry of kell robertson
- todd moore | gimme danger
- todd moore | outlaw bonfires and dillinger’s blood
- todd moore | I work the shattered line
- todd moore | the great american poem
- todd moore | i don’t want
- todd moore | stealing the fire, stealing the shadow
- todd moore | the nightmare of poetry is war
- todd moore | blood and fate under mad stars
- todd moore | everything changes when dillinger arrives
- todd moore | reading the dark
- todd moore | working the outlaw wind
- todd moore | hustling for drinks, praying for lines
- todd moore | falling in love with danger
- todd moore | what I want to know
- todd moore | the last good reading from the outlaw dark
- todd moore | pure blood primal: the poetry of kell robertson
- todd moore | danger beyond danger, where the outlaw lives
- todd moore | going to meet the outlaw
- todd moore | the dark country
- todd moore | chasing jack micheline’s shadow
- todd moore | falling asleep in outlaw country
- todd moore | nightmare splender
- todd moore | love & death & teeth in the blood
- todd moore | taking on bukowski
- todd moore | i want it all and i want it now
- todd moore | the blood of america
- todd moore | the murder and the ecstasy of the everlasting dream
- todd moore | rd armstrong | reads
- todd moore | the sentences are burning
- todd moore | dreaming the dream, paying the price
- todd moore | patrick mckinnon and the drunken shamanic
- tony moffeit | a revolution of consciousness: review on dead reckoning by todd moore
- todd moore | dave roskos, the editor’s editor
- todd moore | all the dark talking to the angel of death
- todd moore | machine guns, guernica, and the outlaw poem
- todd moore | nightmare frenzy
- todd moore | the long way home and the blood on the floor
- todd moore | stealing dillinger, becoming an outlaw
- todd moore | blood calls to blood
- todd moore | shadow of the outlaw
- todd moore | walking around in the blood
- todd moore | instructions for reading dead reckoning
- todd moore | the fevers and sweats of the nightmare poem
- todd moore | dillinger, outlaws, writing, and murder
- todd moore | the blood of the poet
- todd moore | the mystery
- todd moore | billy the kid in the theater of blood
- todd moore | the volcanic death song of baby face nelson
- todd moore | the old man’s waiting
- todd moore | washed in the blood of the outlaw moon
- todd moore | the exalted scar and the annointed cure
- todd moore | the outlaw poet and those killer eyes
- todd moore | a conversation with raindog
- todd moore | that terrible shaking in the blood
- todd moore | writing dillinger in the eye of the hurricane
- todd moore | how to survive the coming night: the poetry of john yamrus
- todd moore | leaving a little blood on the floor
- todd moore | gary goude and that crushed rotting dawg
- todd moore | american metaphors, visions, and nightmares
- todd moore | dillinger, death, and the high mountain air
- todd moore | love, longing, dillinger, disaster
- todd moore | scratching it out street level for the poem
- todd moore | mythic blood, psychic movies, outlaw dreams
- todd moore | road testing the kid
- todd moore | the sea, the poem, and the house of all possible myths: the poetry of milner place
- todd moore | the machine gun blood of the poem
- tony moffeit | american blues outlaw poetry anarchic dream
- todd moore | writing poetry, burning the house
- todd moore | working on my duende
- todd moore | dillinger, the coyote, and the wolf
- todd moore | i write in the blood
- todd moore | the last good movie I made was a poem
- todd moore | the fever of writing
- todd moore | the nightmare of reading
- todd moore | the coyote trickster and the wooden gun
- todd moore | reading the movies, watching the poems
- todd moore | the shattered hemingway sentence
- todd moore | outlaw poetry
- todd moore | inventing the nightmare
- john dorsey & s.a. griffin | the dead zone trilogy by todd moore
- todd moore | blind whiskey and the straight razor blues
- todd moore | devouring the shadow
- todd moore | cold fire, molten ice
- todd moore | fighting death for the poem
- todd moore | glistening with blood | a bellyfull of anarchy by rob plath
- todd moore | how come
- todd moore | living at the movies with dillinger and depp
- todd moore | doing shots with ben smith in air à boire
- todd moore | writing with your wounds: a reading of the broken and the damned by jason hardung
- todd moore | scorched trinity: dillinger, billie, and machine gun love
- todd moore | the treehouse reading
- todd moore | I don’t
- kell robertson | the goofy goddess on the wall
- todd moore | the sign of the outlaw
- todd moore | the dillinger convergence: three ways of dreaming the outlaw
- todd moore | crudely mistaken for life: the books of wounds
- todd moore | the kid
- todd moore | dancing in the fire with s.a. griffin
- todd moore | the dark side of america
- todd moore | night blood, red hands
- todd moore | 45 auto
- tony moffeit | a man on fire
- bill nevin | todd moore, cinematic poet on the outlaw’s trail
- todd moore | the second
- todd moore | the nightmare talking
- s.a. griffin | for todd moore’s 70th
- todd moore | burning the…
- tony moffeit | I’ll never get out of this night alive
- todd moore | dillinger and the riddle of the wooden gun
- todd moore | machine guns, movies, culture, dreams
- todd moore | the question
- todd moore | i love
- todd moore | this
- todd moore | burning
- tony moffeit | shaking the bones
- todd moore | dillinger posed
- todd moore | peckinpah took…
- todd moore | when…
- todd moore | fucking
- todd moore | dillinger stood…
- todd moore | the gold cane, van gogh’s ear, and the gun in the casket: wandering down this crooked road
- todd moore | las montanas de santa fe: visions of the spirit country
- todd moore | the perfect
- todd moore | lucky
- todd moore | we cut
- todd moore | dillinger was
- todd moore | dynamite
- todd moore | hemingway
- todd moore | stories, ashes, and fire
- todd moore | jack wilson
- todd moore | parker shot
- todd moore | and the gunfight at dodge city
- tony moffeit | the outlaw revolution
- todd moore | dying with dillinger in the corpse is dreaming
- mark weber | for todd moore’s birthday party
- todd moore | right after…
- todd moore | i was
- todd moore | just before
- todd moore | just
- todd moore | red
- todd moore | saturday night desperate, don winter, and the black mitten of poetry
- todd moore | cindy was
- todd moore | the name is dillinger
- todd moore | when dillinger
- todd moore | what haunted
- todd moore | the bank…
- todd moore | outlaw
- todd moore | lisa was…
- todd moore | coleman is
- todd moore | the bottle
- todd moore | they’re coming
- todd moore | tyler’s
- todd moore | the house
- todd moore | reading
- todd moore | frito stopped…
- todd moore | largo slapped
- todd moore | donny shot…
- todd moore | dillinger stepped
- todd moore | shotgun blues
- todd moore | gimme a shotgun
- todd moore | geeshie wiley
- todd moore | billie licked…
- todd moore | tasting the blood
- todd moore | black rain
- mera wolf & todd moore | read
- todd moore | death rides the blood
- tony moffeit | outlaw: the roots
- todd moore & Lawrence welsh | poetry reading
- todd moore | play it & judy christopher
- todd moore | the rat’s blood had glued my hand shut
- todd moore | gary goude | blood on blood
- bone | poetry by todd moore & rd armstrong
- todd moore | what’s
- tony moffeit | outlaw
- lost? & found!
- lawrence welsh | skull highway
- todd moore | burning
- todd moore | jerry’s old
- todd moore | coming out of…
- tony moffeit | scorching the darkness: the channeling of dillinger
- john yamrus | reads
- todd moore & dennis gulling | shotgun weather
- alex gildzen| and the dream factory myth
- wolfgang carstens | blood, energy and darkness: a review of dead reckoning
- s.a. griffin | of mad affairs, tall blondes & drunken poets
- gary goude | more poems
- todd moore | the central avenue rundown jazz radio show
- gary goude | sad lives
- zach king-smith | burning to nirvana
- don winter | lonesome town
- lawrence welsh | todd moore’s riddle: obscurity, redemption and fame
- wolfgang carstens | lost in america: a review of the broken and the damned
- tony moffeit | spirits
- tony moffeit | outlaw consciousness
- dante ocariz | 3 (more) poems












Leave a Reply