SHAKING THE BONES

is a review by Tony Moffeit on The Riddle of the Wooden Gun, by Todd Moore. 2009. 144 pp; Pa; The Lummox Press, POB 5301, San Pedro, CA 90733. $15.00.

i hold

todd moore’s new book in my hand and it is like holding a weapon. the words on the page are laid out like machine gun fire. in a world that is falling apart, the only thing that makes sense is your own kind of inner war, the inner war of the outlaw. in a recent essay of his, “The Nightmare of Poetry Is War,” todd moore writes:

“There are times when simple human emotions well up so powerfully and darkly inside the blood, you are left with just two choices. Write HOWL or ARIEL or CROW or DILLINGER or load a machine gun. Because nothing else will do. Nothing else will satisfy. Nothing else will oppose the violence in a violent world like a poem as dangerous as a Molotov cocktail with a short rag fuse that is lit and burning. Ultimately, writing poetry is nothing less than an act of total war. Only this is a war waged in and through the human psyche. This is a war fought in the ditches and the trenches of your worst nightmares. This is really what writing poetry is all about. This is what really defines Outlaw Poetry.”

in a revolution that is an anti-revolution, todd moore continually defines the battleground, the warriors, and the weapons. the weapon in this book is the wooden gun, the battleground is the riddle, and the warrior is dillinger. this book is dreamwave and death soup. it is also about a childhood of wooden guns and the kid as hero. it’s about the wooden gun as archetype and the poem as movie, the poem as novel, the poem as dialogue. it’s about the relentlessness of the outlaw spirit, the relentless spirit of todd moore.

holding todd moore’s book in your hand as a weapon, a machine gun, an archetype for firing bullet words, you are caught in the hurricane of the renegade. to read this book is to burn with the author, to blaze with the language. and war is not enough. the warrior must be on fire. that’s what writing poetry is all about. to be a writer, to be a reader of the miraculous realm of poetry and death and love and poetry and death. the warrior must cover the whole spectrum.

this book is a weapon against hard times. not since nietzsche has there been an outlaw statement of the pure will to power. when all external measures are unsatisfactory, the outlaw poet has nowhere to turn. “where do you get your power?” they ask. and the outlaw answers, “from myself.”

he was
holding a
thompson
in one hand
& a wooden
gun in the
other
but for
some strange
reason
nobody
was afraid
of the
thompson
it was the
wooden
gun that
had every
one edging
back toward
the wall
some kind
of black
energy was
twisting
off the
wooden
gun &
just hanging
in the
air like
strands of
very dark
smoke
& because
nobody
wanted to
get close
enough to
give dil
linger the
money
thick stacks
of bills
began to
pour out
of the
bank drawers
all by
themselves
& once
they dis
covered where
dillinger was
standing
they headed
toward him
& his
gunny sacks
in thickets
of ravenous
love

the riddle of the wooden gun is a riddle of a different kind of reality. not surreality, because riddle it is too concrete, too nietzschean. not surreality, because the mysticism of riddle is rooted not in oneness, but in separateness. not surreality, because the language of riddle is rooted in the violence of extreme individuality. it is a new reality. it is the ghost reality of outlaw.

outlaw is about two extremes: blood and ghost. outlaw is about the merging of the two extremes: blood and ghost. outlaw is about the visceral and the energy that surrounds the visceral. it is a mysticism of the body. it is the singing of the body electric of walt whitman. it is the yea-saying of nietzsche and neal cassady. it is the revitalization found in henry miller.

pretty soon
he sez
baby
i am the
wooden gun
& i am
the real
gun when
you got me
you got
everything

blood and ghost. the spirit of the wooden gun leaves you with scars, wounds, and the bullet holes of language. it is a wild outlaw ride made even more intense by the compacted words, the thin line beating syllables into a pulse, a pound. this poem is an endless sentence with no breaks. it takes you to a different level of consciousness.

the riddle of the wooden gun works on many different levels. what is reality? what is illusion? did dillinger use the wooden gun in his jailbreak from crown point? and as compacted and intense the lines, the poem is about space, the wide open space that the outlaw holds necessary. and so the poem works as a landscape, a frontier.

you cd use
almost anything
as a wooden
gun but most
of us
just broke
sticks off
tree limbs
but it had
to be a stick
that had
another one
growing out
of it so that
it looked
as tho is had
a handle
& when
you got
called home
& you
were still
holding onto
the wooden
gun
hell
you broke
it in two
that meant
you won it
all
what was
it you won
dillinger asked
nothing
everything
mostly
the night
belongs to you

Todd Moore books and a double cd are available here… Tony Moffeit books and cd’s can be found here…

some related articles are listed below:

1. tony moffeit | a man on fire
2. tony moffeit | scorching the darkness: the channeling of dillinger
3. tony moffeit | outlaw
4. tony moffeit | a revolution of consciousness: review on dead reckoning by todd moore
5. tony moffeit | the outlaw revolution
6. tony moffeit | outlaw: the roots
7. tony moffeit | american blues outlaw poetry anarchic dream
8. tony moffeit | spirits
9. tony moffeit | it is the first day of 2010
10. tony moffeit | I’ll never get out of this night alive
11. todd moore | that terrible shaking in the blood
12. tony moffeit | outlaw consciousness
13. todd moore | dillinger was
14. todd moore | rd armstrong | reads
15. tony moffeit | renegade
16. tony moffeit | sleepwalking in the void: a review on crudely mistaken for life
17. todd moore | the machine gun blood of the poem
18. todd moore | the coyote trickster and the wooden gun
19. todd moore | leaving a little blood on the floor
20. todd moore | stealing dillinger, becoming an outlaw
21. todd moore | when…
22. todd moore | working on my duende
23. todd moore | dillinger, outlaws, writing, and murder
24. todd moore | love & death & teeth in the blood
25. lost? & found!
26. tony moffeit | a piece of america’s heart
27. todd moore | the dillinger convergence: three ways of dreaming the outlaw
28. todd moore | the blood of america
29. todd moore | billy the kid in the theater of blood
30. todd moore | outlaw bonfires and dillinger’s blood
31. todd moore | reading the dark
32. todd moore | dillinger stood…
33. todd moore | falling asleep in outlaw country
34. lawrence welsh | todd moore’s riddle: obscurity, redemption and fame
35. todd moore | writing poetry, burning the house
36. todd moore | danger beyond danger, where the outlaw lives
37. john dorsey & s.a. griffin | the dead zone trilogy by todd moore
38. todd moore | blood and fate under mad stars
39. todd moore | the long way home and the blood on the floor
40. todd moore | the nightmare of poetry is war
41. todd moore | the exalted scar and the annointed cure
42. todd moore | fucking
43. todd moore | the question
44. todd moore | machine guns, guernica, and the outlaw poem
45. todd moore | i don’t want
46. todd moore | I work the shattered line
47. todd moore | dynamite
48. todd moore | dillinger and the riddle of the wooden gun
49. todd moore | the name is dillinger
50. todd moore | coyote death mask outlaw
51. todd moore | this
52. todd moore | i’ll play dillinger
53. todd moore | mythic blood, psychic movies, outlaw dreams
54. todd moore | dillinger, death, and the high mountain air
55. rd armstrong | todd moore and lummox press
56. todd moore | i want it all and i want it now
57. todd moore | fighting death for the poem
58. todd moore | what are the stakes in american poetry?
59. todd moore | working the outlaw wind
60. todd moore | the murder and the ecstasy of the everlasting dream
61. todd moore | the sentences are burning
62. todd moore | the last good reading from the outlaw dark
63. todd moore | instructions for reading dead reckoning
64. todd moore | damage, genius, courage
65. todd moore | machine guns, movies, culture, dreams
66. todd moore | the dark country
67. todd moore | outlaw poetry, psychic damage, the survival of wounds
68. todd moore | walking around in the blood
69. todd moore | stealing the fire, stealing the shadow
70. todd moore | blood calls to blood
71. todd moore | writing dillinger in the eye of the hurricane
72. todd moore | night blood, red hands
73. todd moore | all the dark talking to the angel of death
74. todd moore | scorched trinity: dillinger, billie, and machine gun love
75. todd moore | blind whiskey and the straight razor blues
76. todd moore | the treehouse reading
77. todd moore | the outlaw poet and those killer eyes
78. todd moore | nightmare frenzy
79. todd moore | what’s
80. todd moore | just
81. todd moore | the shattered hemingway sentence
82. todd moore | dillinger, the coyote, and the wolf
83. todd moore | the second
84. todd moore | washed in the blood of the outlaw moon
85. todd moore | everything changes when dillinger arrives
86. todd moore | the volcanic death song of baby face nelson
87. todd moore | i write in the blood
88. bill nevin | todd moore, cinematic poet on the outlaw’s trail
89. todd moore | dreaming the dream, paying the price
90. todd moore | death rides the blood
91. todd moore | american metaphors, visions, and nightmares
92. todd moore | the great american poem
93. todd moore | the perfect
94. todd moore | lucky
95. todd moore | gimme danger
96. todd moore | cold fire, molten ice
97. todd moore | hemingway
98. todd moore | the last good movie I made was a poem
99. todd moore | what I want to know
100. todd moore | how come
101. todd moore | burning
102. todd moore | reading the movies, watching the poems
103. todd moore | nightmare splender
104. todd moore | falling in love with danger
105. todd moore | hustling for drinks, praying for lines
106. todd moore | the nightmare talking
107. todd moore | road testing the kid
108. todd moore | burning the…
109. todd moore | patrick mckinnon and the drunken shamanic
110. todd moore | dillinger posed
111. wolfgang carstens | blood, energy and darkness: a review of dead reckoning
112. todd moore | going to meet the outlaw
113. todd moore | shadow of the outlaw
114. todd moore | the blood of the poet
115. todd moore | all the way to the fame
116. todd moore | we cut
117. todd moore | dying with dillinger in the corpse is dreaming
118. todd moore | gary goude and that crushed rotting dawg
119. todd moore | play it & judy christopher
120. todd moore | stories, ashes, and fire
121. todd moore | dillinger stepped
122. todd moore | largo slapped
123. todd moore | I don’t
124. gary goude | sad lives
125. todd moore | the mystery
126. kell robertson | the goofy goddess on the wall
127. todd moore | parker shot
128. todd moore | living at the movies with dillinger and depp
129. todd moore | inventing the nightmare
130. todd moore | the fever of writing
131. todd moore | 45 auto
132. todd moore | tyler’s
133. s.a.griffin | the way of the pen
134. todd moore & john macker
135. todd moore | tasting the blood
136. todd moore | shotgun blues
137. jared smith | I learned of…
138. todd moore | the old man’s waiting
139. todd moore | the dark side of america
140. todd moore | and the gunfight at dodge city
141. todd moore | geeshie wiley
142. todd moore | outlaw poetry
143. gary goude | more poems
144. todd moore | dave roskos, the editor’s editor
145. todd moore | black rain
146. todd moore | the sign of the outlaw
147. todd moore | the fevers and sweats of the nightmare poem
148. todd moore | taking on bukowski
149. todd moore | gary goude | blood on blood
150. todd moore | a conversation with raindog
151. todd moore | coleman is
152. todd moore | outlaw
153. todd moore | into the open madness: the poetry of kell robertson
154. todd moore | love, longing, dillinger, disaster
155. todd moore | how to survive the coming night: the poetry of john yamrus
156. todd moore | the kid
157. todd moore | crudely mistaken for life: the books of wounds
158. todd moore | the rat’s blood had glued my hand shut
159. gary goude | jake’s dream
160. todd moore | pure blood primal: the poetry of kell robertson
161. road/house | chapbook verite editions
162. alex gildzen | looking for the blood of elizabeth short
163. wolfgang carstens | todd moore | boom
164. todd moore | scratching it out street level for the poem
165. todd moore | the nightmare of reading
166. todd moore | coming out of…
167. bone | poetry by todd moore & rd armstrong
168. todd moore | jerry’s old
169. todd moore | writing with your wounds: a reading of the broken and the damned by jason hardung
170. todd moore | jack wilson
171. alex gildzen | street of poets tucson
172. todd moore | just before
173. todd moore | dancing in the fire with s.a. griffin
174. mera wolf & todd moore | read
175. s.a. griffin | for todd moore’s 70th
176. todd moore | cindy was
177. lawrence welsh | skull highway
178. robert swearingen | street milk
179. todd moore | glistening with blood | a bellyfull of anarchy by rob plath
180. todd moore
181. todd moore | the house
182. lawrence welsh | outlaw waiting
183. todd moore | chasing jack micheline’s shadow
184. todd moore | devouring the shadow
185. s.a. griffin | walt whitman’s beard
186. todd moore | frito stopped…
187. todd moore | what haunted
188. todd moore | i love
189. todd moore | the central avenue rundown jazz radio show
190. todd moore | the bank…
191. todd moore | las montanas de santa fe: visions of the spirit country
192. mark weber | for todd moore’s birthday party
193. mark weber | march 17, 2010 | 4:30pm Albuquerque New Mexico
194. todd moore | lisa was…
195. todd moore | donny shot…
196. todd moore | right after…
197. todd moore | when dillinger