Advertisement

Jim Warner is not what we think of when we hear the word "poet." He's not brooding. He doesn't chain smoke or watch French new wave cinema. In fact, he's shockingly normal. He's a self-proclaimed dork who reads comic books and gets along with his parents. He has a steady job as the assistant director of Wilkes University's MA in Creative Writing program. He's involved in the local community and he doesn't have any crippling addictions beyond a record collection.



And as Warner prepares for his first book, Too Bad It's Poetry, to be released on Sept. 21, his record collection seems to be his major inspiration.



"As I give talks at schools or work with my students, I notice that lyrics are what they identify with. And I can remember being 14 or 15 and not fitting in. For me, the very first poets weren't Blake and Shelley and Keats, or even Kerouac, Ginsberg, Burroughs, or Ferlingetti. They were Henry Rollins, Tom Waits, Hold Steady, and Otis Redding. When I was growing up, rock 'n' roll was poetry."



In fact, Warner's book is even set up like a 45 to reflect his influences. Instead of chapters, Too Bad It's Poetry has a Side A and a Side B. Side A is more eclectic in content, immersed with musical references, like in I say "Jim Gordon." You say "Batman?" a poem about Jim Gordon, a session drummer, who co-wrote "Layla." Gordon had a severe drug problem, which resulted in murdering his mother. Warner writes, "Hammers strike a chord, / Hammers struck his mother dead. / That's the blues." Warner adds, "you don't necessarily need to know Gordon's background, but that extra layer of the session drummer fused with Commissioner Gordon and Batman is what hooks you."



While Side A is read from cover to cover, the reader must flip the book over, like a record, to view Side B. Side B discloses Warner's family life and Filipino-American ethnicity, which includes the 15-page poem east/west:



"Together / we / buried / her / culture / in my / teenage years. Stood / by Old / Glory and / towel-dried / her an / American / citizen. She bathed / in / red / white / and blue lights."



Warner says, "east/west is probably the most personal thing I've written and that's what happens when you start peeling away the layers to discuss family."



Warner states that the Emerson, Lake, and Palmer-length powerhouse "east/west" came from an intense hour of writing, with a little help from the Butterfield Blues Band. "After looking at the 15-page journal entry, I noticed that on top of the CD stack on my desk was the Butterfield Blues Band ... the east/west album. The irony is that the last song on that album is 15 minutes long. That's where the title of the poem really comes from."



The poem "east/west" strategically leads the reader to the end of Side B and the end of Warner's book. "I don't think there's anywhere else it should go in the book. It's at the end because I'm home."



Readers can take a copy of Warner's book home this Friday. Too Bad It's Poetry will be released on September 21 at 8:30 p.m. at Paper Kite Press & Studio on 443 Main St. in Kingston and will be followed by an open mic. The book can be purchased from Paper Kite Press studio or online at www.wordpainting.com and at the downtown Barnes and Noble in Wilkes-Barre. Warner will also be participating in a book reading/signing session on October 25 at 7 p.m. at the Barnes and Noble College Bookstore, also in Wilkes-Barre.


-the_book_geek@yahoo.com