THE RISING PHOENIX POETRY COLLECTION

Accompanying the Rising Phoenix sculpture in the lobby at each performance, is an audio recording of each of these poems, inspired by our heroes. Thank you to the poets who volunteered their time to write these poignant words.

The Chain Saw Fairies
By Aurora Wynnly
For Hurricane Hero: BETTINA FREESE

A snap, a crashing crushing blow
Baffled the windows
The forest has fallen to man’s overconsumption
But for once, not by the saw
But by the sharpness of wind
By the storm of the anthropocene
Fern gully fell to its knees
The fairies and the fox fire held council
Crying into the oversaturated moss
Such terrible loss
Punctured lung of the life giver
Where does deliverance come from
From the saws
Man monstrous tools reinvented
Sharp steel and bar oil, gasoline
Performed the autopsy
Cut our ancient brothers away
From the homes and roads where laid their graves
Saws, for once, saved us
Cleared the way for change
Left our wings reeking, but our arms much stronger
The fairies saved the monsters
In spite of what they hated
And we all participated in their grief
Finally saw how much we needed those trees
Let us repay them in seeds
In potential and time
May not one more tree fall
Save the woods, save us all

River Arts
By Aurora Wynnly
For Hurricane Heroes: JEFFREY BURROUGHS And JUDI JETSON  And PHILIP DEANGELO

Art in the river
Oil and water mixing in white turbulence
How many hours of love were spent
Making beauty from mud
Brushing life and bitterness into something
The painters and creators bled their color out
For us
Now the watercolors run like rain on the windows
The banks bulging with broken hearts
The artists, perpetually poor,
Scored by the score and how it stacked against them
Like bricks and sticks wasted
Community the payment they always appreciated
But couldn’t feed their families on
Became all that they could draw upon
Studios turned into packed studio apartments
Bodies sleeping next to each other like pencils in a case
This place will never be the same
And like always, the greedy dare to profit from their loss
Pulling pieces from the river and selling it at a markup
Promising exposure, and pocketing the wealth
Masking extortion as help
‘We encourage you to donate, but we didn’t pay”
We won’t let the story end this way.
Write it on the walls in spray paint
Flood back love, put food on our plates
And in return, the creators will re-create.  

Blunt Pretzels
By Aurora Wynnly
For Hurricane Hero: EDDY SCHOEFFMANN & THE TEAM AT BLUNT PRETZELS

We all bring something to the table
from the market
or from the other side of the world
Water and flavor connects us all
So does the lack of it
My pantry was empty
My wash basin unclean, but still
We drank and shared of the life we had stored there
No one had much to spare
But spare we did
Back to cooking over an open flame
To eating with our hands
Kids making mud pies
Was never dangerous before
Trees twisted like pretzels
I didn’t know what to do
Then you gave me a knife
And asked me to make a fruit salad
Or maybe stuffed bell peppers
something good, from whatever I had
We saw that a little salt goes a long way
towards preservation
That the blunt force of creativity is sustenance enough
And that a little spice
can turn the worst life has to offer
into something … survivable

EMMA
By Aurora Wynnly
For Hurricane Hero: Andrea Golden  

When I was a little girl
I wanted to live on a houseboat.
To float down the currents of life, unmoored
I thought my town was so boring
Little did I know
how precious that boredom would become
The happiness of the humdrum
Or how a mobile home might become
A house boat
If it rained enough
I’ve always been a good swimmer
But the tides of change are fast
Like a flash, our humdrum life was in tatters
And my home,
wish I had complained about, called trash
Became, actual trash
I miss the plants
that used to hang on the metal post
The sounds of the street lamp’s buzz
But most of all I miss my cousins
My friends, the Spanish speaking woman
Who would bring tamales round every year
Things aren’t the same here
Folks had to move away, they couldn’t stay
Someone with a bulldozer came to take
what’s left of our community away
To make way for the new wake of privilege
They’ll forget about us
The mobile poor
Those of us who endure
Without a concrete slab
But with a strong foundation nonetheless
They will forget
But not us
We remember how to swim
How to wave our arms and kick
How to lift all ships
Ownership, starts with caring for our own
Community is what makes a place a home.

Rising Tide
By Jordan Durham
For Hurricane Heroes: Jen Hampton and Marcia Mount Shoop

We are all crew here on the Pequod.
Every neighbor has a seat on the ship, in storm or calm seas.
So when Ahab nailed his demands to our mast:
"Remember, rent is due on the first," he risked mutiny.
We asked the quartermasters what we had left, besides MREs and gasoline,
"Not much, except each other, lean in and put your backs into it" they said.
So when those landlubbing landlords loved property more than people,
we stepped on the deck and did it for them.
With a will to take Ahab's good leg out from under him,
we chose against the cutlass in favor of pens—a mightier tool by far.
We put the mad captain to shame; the rent came due and the crew refused to pay.
By our combined fight, we reserved the right to not be dragged from our homes.
We have a new navigator these days; Ahab has lost his sea legs and Jen has the wheel now—he rants from the brig, but we all press on to seek out a nobler game.

Buckets
By Jordan Durham
For Hurricane Hero: Lark Frazier

When the lights went out and all the river rose at once,
like the myriad quail sent by God in his ire to the Israelites,
we had gotten all the water we wanted; just far too much
—an excess to the point of having none at all—and we saw what the need was.
The most basic of problems arose with the flood.
Issues of thirst and blood and desperate needs.
In shock we counted bodies in trees,
trucks torn asunder, landslides, fires, houses floating downriver
playing at levee, bricks breaking in the brackish French Broad.

We have not been this way for long, but it is carved into the foundation stones of every universe that you and I are friends.
We only met last year, but you and I remember when we held horsehair rushes and made them into straws,
blowing their cotton pith into the air when we were just small.
Then when the world shrank down to the few square miles we could see,
only you could I reach, and so we each began to move.

Ever practical, ever wise, in the ancient way of roots, you saw the cycles we all inhabit:
People need fucking to poop.
So you bought buckets.
No, not like that—trash bags, too—no, you need it to compost; dry leaves and sawdust,
cut up that foam noodle from your pool.
Keep it dry, much as you can, we don't know how long this will last.

It lasted so long, but too many days and much night soil later, we had cleanup to do.
The hours were frustrating and tiring and far too long;
the power had returned, the pipes stayed dry, but one thing still held true:
When push came to shove, thanks mostly to you, we at least knew how to poop.

Anonymous
By Aaron Parks
For an undisclosed Hurricane Hero

No one knew the nurses name
Ironic considering neither did the woman that she saved
A woman who was lost in wreckage of the devastation in the wake of disaster
Couldn't even remember her own
A minute detail lost in the rubble of the neurodegenerative disorder
devastating the pathways
cast away in the rising rivers tow
She didn't even know that god was not willing & the river was rising
Until after the crest had fallen and the water marks changed
All she knew was a kind face when she saw it
The nurse smiled and amongst the piles of castaways on her docket
she found a way to help a woman without a name
Find her way home
No longer alone
Unknown & unforgettable

A Storm Arises
By Ashlee Huber
For Hurricane Heroes: Michael and Mitch Hampton

As mountain folk
we usually get
the tails of hurricanes
not the horns
Especially without warning
into our mountain side
but that night
the water raging
and walls breaking  
streets became streams
and sidewalks the shores
A boat and two brothers
searching structures
determined to find
anyone and everyone
that was still alive
Saving families
from balconies
or clinging to trees
they worked for days
at a fierceful pace
storms don’t always
come from the sky
they are formed
in the heroes that arise

When the Storm Passes
By Ashlee Huber
For Hurricane Hero: Tiffany De’Bellot

The storm has passed
wind has stopped howling
rain has moved on.
What’s left is silence,
except the sound of boots
Water first. Count the jugs.
Mark who needs medication
Stack the canned goods in neat rows
Fold the blankets and tarps
No heroes here, just helping hands.
Hands hauling debris,
Hands giving out food,
Hands steadying the shaking of other hands .
We check the radios for news.
We send runners
We provide shoulders
We take count of needs
Because organizing is hope,
Order rising from chaos.
We can’t stop the storm,
But we can sort through the aftermath.
Piece by piece, need by need,
We build something that can’t be washed away
A promise to look after one another
If the floods return

Good Deeds
By Ashlee Huber
For Hurricane Hero: Drew Reisinger

They say that our deeds determine
who a person is
but the deeds the person chooses
molds them too
to step up and help out
when many wouldn’t know
what to do
when the darkness
seems endless
there are those who start
with a step or two
or an archivist who knows what to do
The Registrar once known
For papers signed and titles shown.
But when the storm had torn the land
He rose up with help in hand.
He knew the lines where land was drawn
The names that made a house a home.
He gathered who he could and hit the ground
They searched for what needed to be found
to keep track of life and death on paper
and now became a lifesaver
and stepped forward that day
For heroes rise to help those in need
Even the keeper and his deeds.

Who You Choose to Be
By Jason Huber
For Hurricane Hero: Michelangelo “Mikey” Palomo Ramos

He loves disasters,
won’t stop talking about earthquakes, hurricanes, and volcanoes,
but we didn’t know what he’d take away from Helene.

What does it mean when friends and family are hurt by fascinating things?
What does it mean when the world is covered in mud?
What does it mean when your shovel is the smallest one?

It means you dig twice as hard.

You see, our hero learned his lessons from Batman and the Man of Steel.
He learned that a person’s actions make a real difference in this world.

So, he stood tall next to chainsaws that moved trees and machines that moved mud.

With Batman’s yellow gloves and Superman’s red cape,
he set to work, and, though his piles of dirt took longer,
his arms grew stronger and stronger with every scoop.

Even when his eyes drooped with exhaustion,
he kept digging until his friends were freed,
kept working until the world was cleared of mud and fallen trees.

When he released the cape from around his neck and took off his gloves at the end of the day,
he stood a little bit taller,
a little bit mightier,
and a lot more heroic. 

Six-Hundred Hours
By Jason Huber
For Hurricane Hero: Jeremy Fine (AKA: The Dancing Man

One can’t help but look for signs in the face of a natural disaster.

We, the masters of our space, need to make sense out of trees falling from the sky
and roads sliding down mountains.

It was no heavenly fountain,
no manna from above.

No, it was a stress test on our capacity for loving each other in desperate times.

And so, we look for signs.

A ray of sunlight dances through the remaining trees and finds purchase in the mud below.
That ray is toe to toe with a man who has light feet and an open heart.

Signs on signs remind us that we are not truly lost.
We are not undiscovered.

What’s uncovered when the rain stops is a community dancing before the eyes of the lord.
They’ve turned mourning into a steady, hopeful beat.

The man in the lead jumps joyously from spot to spot
with a sign that points to a bountiful supply of food
and a split rock where potable water springs forth.

The dancing man brings joy with every new step,
every breath passes through a smile with unwavering hope.
He knows that there’s still beauty to share in the wake of devastating things,
so he dances and sings about love and the continued strength of our community.