In the first issue of Together, Denis Shedd wrote a poignant, funny essay about learning to take drugs again after 27 years of sobriety (July/August 2010, pg 10). He was in hospice care for colon cancer and died on June 25, 2010, just as we were going to press.
An avid reader, Denis was raised in a household surrounded by his father's books and where he often heard poetry recited around the dinner table. His own taste in poets ranged from Arthur Rimbaud to Charles Bukowski, from Emily Dickinson to Allen Ginsberg, from Sappho to Chaucer. Throughout his life, Denis never sought to publish his own poetry, even though he was a printer by trade. Prodigiously self-taught, he once said: “I've produced and mostly discarded a great quantity of poetry, fiction and song.” Together is proud to publish a few of his poems for the first time.
July 4
by Denis Shedd
I carve erratic circles
above an earth that has no north
crippled by independence
in the sky in July on the 4th.
I am borne down by freedom
through the pathless air
released from Capistrano
no charts to guide me there.
I’ve slipped the bonds of presence
for chains of vertigo
that loop my feathered fingers
while all the world below
is lost in celebration
of what I used to know.
End of the World
by Denis Shedd
Death doesn’t
worry me.
Thinking of
the end of
the world is
what keeps me
up at night.
I really don’t
want to be
around to see
that sight.
The day I
go I’d like
to know there’s
still a little
time left.
I could use
the rest.
I’m Brave Enough
by Denis Shedd
I’m brave enough, and crazy, too
and you won’t catch me playin’
the fool down at the end of the bar
bein’ the punch-line of some joke.
Rather you’ll find me laughing
at the stars, flat on my back,
battered by gravity from
looking up too far to care.
There, see, you can’t catch
my heart ‘cause it’s everywhere!
Everywhere I cast it wide
to trap this thing I am inside.
That’s bravery and courage, too,
enough for me enough for you.
All poems printed with permission from the estate of Denis Shedd.
