by James Brush
Coyote Mercury Posts
the moon
cradled in elm
branches
plastic ghosts
sway on the wind
long autumn
shadows
full trees still
cling
to summer
a sulphur butterfly
rides prairie wind
late sunflowers
lean heavy
against a barbwire fence
everyone’s asleep
my footsteps in the dark house
the box fan rattles
autumn grass
sunglare scattered
in dry fields
This is a video I made for a Tim Suermondt poem at The Poetry Storehouse. The readers are NS and Amy Miller. The music is “Simple Delayed Guitar + Violin Loop” by Candle Nine from Soundcloud. All of the pieces that comprised the video had been released under a Creative Commons: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license (the same one used here at Coyote Mercury). That license makes projects like this possible.
The video came about quite by accident. I was playing with Hyperlapse on my phone while at ACL Fest, just experimenting during Gaslight Anthem’s set. Later I came across the Suermondt poem and thought that some of the images might work with the poem.
I also liked the fact that the poem had multiple readings because I wanted to see what would happen with two different and distinct voices. I tried them both, and opted for NS’s as the front in part because it was shorter, and I didn’t have much footage.
I edited to the rhythm of the words and the video. Then went searching for music. I wanted something with guitars, and the Candle Nine piece at Soundcloud worked well, and was the correct length. This was a fun one to put together, and I’m pleased with the result.
starlings
swirl from highway signs
southbound traffic
A few years ago, I took a photo of the live oak tree in our front yard every day in October. Today, I’m playing with the gallery feature in WordPress and so, here they all are in one batch. One of these wound up in the logo art for Gnarled Oak—my new project, an online literary journal, and the other serves as the header image for Gnarled Oak on Twitter and Facebook.
