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“Charisma is a word that erodes stale on the page. When compared with the tangible, flesh experience it tries to label, it falls short. The only way to understand it, is to meet it.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
“Butterflies,
the embodiment of myth,
the articulation of the past,
first for the elite,
then for the rest of us.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
the embodiment of myth,
the articulation of the past,
first for the elite,
then for the rest of us.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
“To those who advocate that America follow the Chinese model of a totalitarian lockdown because of a virus or flu strain, must remember that the Maoist principle of Chinese rule is founded on total control of the populace, with the loss of freedom on every front: of speech, movement, work, information. Americans shouldn't be drinking the green tea so unquestioningly.”
―
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“The heart can be
the reality beneath the contrivance
a sideshow attraction
an ashtray full
voice roughened by decades of Marlboro Reds”
― Sentiment and Sediment: 21 Poems
the reality beneath the contrivance
a sideshow attraction
an ashtray full
voice roughened by decades of Marlboro Reds”
― Sentiment and Sediment: 21 Poems
“The lonely, wistful revisionism of memories is as gratingly repetitive as snow and ice in Canada. I avoid them both at all costs - memories and Canada.”
―
―
“Mornings are cool like a spy,
cool like a rebel,
cool like a rhetorical street fighter,
cool like an unfilled spot where wit and joy once stood,
cool like the man who can make productive use of his demons,
cool like the deciphered eccentricities of good friends,
cool like the later protest-and-psychedelic era.”
―
cool like a rebel,
cool like a rhetorical street fighter,
cool like an unfilled spot where wit and joy once stood,
cool like the man who can make productive use of his demons,
cool like the deciphered eccentricities of good friends,
cool like the later protest-and-psychedelic era.”
―
“Endings are thus formally unappealing to me, more than beginning or ending, in life, I enjoy continuing. Continuing is my only focus or concern.”
―
―
“Heart resides
where crumbling churches give way to blossoming trees
empty storefronts to towering mansions
it doesn’t want just another heist movie
or an illusion of cleavage
it’s not accidental or meaningless
it wants to be known”
― Halcyon Days and Stormy Months: 21 Poems
where crumbling churches give way to blossoming trees
empty storefronts to towering mansions
it doesn’t want just another heist movie
or an illusion of cleavage
it’s not accidental or meaningless
it wants to be known”
― Halcyon Days and Stormy Months: 21 Poems
“Pay phones,
relics of an almost-vanished landscape,
always a touch of seediness and sadness,
and a sense of transience,
sweaty phones used by men outside maternity wards,
feeding them fistfuls of change.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
relics of an almost-vanished landscape,
always a touch of seediness and sadness,
and a sense of transience,
sweaty phones used by men outside maternity wards,
feeding them fistfuls of change.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
“A pickup truck is a fragile ego overcompensated”
― Sentiment and Sediment: 21 Poems
― Sentiment and Sediment: 21 Poems
“I never trust a man who tucks in his shirt by choice or neglects coffee in favor of tea.”
―
―
“American dream,
a spouse,
a brace of children,
cuddly pets,
coffee-table books,
rusted skeleton keys,
plastic cauliflower bags,
business cards of business-card printers,
a mound of used airmail envelopes.
Old house on moving day,
all echoes and loneliness.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
a spouse,
a brace of children,
cuddly pets,
coffee-table books,
rusted skeleton keys,
plastic cauliflower bags,
business cards of business-card printers,
a mound of used airmail envelopes.
Old house on moving day,
all echoes and loneliness.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
“To be a boxer is to be within yourself, inside your thoughts and feelings.”
―
―
“Trying to change someone only makes them cling to their existing behavior with brutish, primal force.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
“Inevitable pickup trucks complete with full gun racks,
chainsaws,
fishing poles,
and big, sneering dogs in the back,
line the streets and parking lots.
Meek murmur of autumn skies,
Ford and Chevy outfits to roll through town,
as people get ready for a long, gray, foggy winter,
big, four-wheel-drive pickups with snow blades attached,
the box loaded down,
with a high stack of cordwood topped by a huge elk carcass,
to go disheartened in the midst of wretched weather,
cold, raw, continually snowing.”
―
chainsaws,
fishing poles,
and big, sneering dogs in the back,
line the streets and parking lots.
Meek murmur of autumn skies,
Ford and Chevy outfits to roll through town,
as people get ready for a long, gray, foggy winter,
big, four-wheel-drive pickups with snow blades attached,
the box loaded down,
with a high stack of cordwood topped by a huge elk carcass,
to go disheartened in the midst of wretched weather,
cold, raw, continually snowing.”
―
“Time
concocted by caffeine
unnervingly familiar
a ferociousness that sucks you in
even as it wears you down”
―
concocted by caffeine
unnervingly familiar
a ferociousness that sucks you in
even as it wears you down”
―
“Boxing is beautiful brutality, and the devil is in the duality. Boxing is a tug of war and you recognize the antithetical feelings that are pulling you from the other end.”
―
―
“Rum is tonic that clarifies the vision,
and sets things in true perspective.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
and sets things in true perspective.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
“The heart can be anguished
arrogant
even silly
milling about comically
rejecting fake decorum
it comes from a repressive family
that disapproves of its child’s chosen profession”
―
arrogant
even silly
milling about comically
rejecting fake decorum
it comes from a repressive family
that disapproves of its child’s chosen profession”
―
“After you have seasoned your gloves with the blood, sweat and tears of your opponents, all else is anticlimactic.”
― Life in the Trenches
― Life in the Trenches
“Life,
perhaps less a document than an impression,
conveyed through partial glances,
stream-of-consciousness juxtapositions,
unpredictable rhythms,
a collage of sound,
a conscientious diarist,
a career of blackmail and scandal culminated in murder,
a blind man with a will of iron and a nervous system of gossamer.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
perhaps less a document than an impression,
conveyed through partial glances,
stream-of-consciousness juxtapositions,
unpredictable rhythms,
a collage of sound,
a conscientious diarist,
a career of blackmail and scandal culminated in murder,
a blind man with a will of iron and a nervous system of gossamer.”
― Fresh Oil and Loose Gravel: Road Poetry by Brian D'Ambrosio 1998-2008
“The heart can be a parade of non-sequiturs
always just tenuously around
one of those seething places
that often reeks of sex and moonshine”
― Sentiment and Sediment: 21 Poems
always just tenuously around
one of those seething places
that often reeks of sex and moonshine”
― Sentiment and Sediment: 21 Poems
“Happiness is a habit,
it’s more than fleeting,
more than a disintegrating lozenge.”
―
it’s more than fleeting,
more than a disintegrating lozenge.”
―
“Force, not persuasion, not discussion, is the legitimate instrument for influencing and policing the hockey mind. Fighting in hockey is one of the most magnificent and eloquent displays of refinement in all of sports.”
― Warriors on the Ice: Hockey's Toughest Talk
― Warriors on the Ice: Hockey's Toughest Talk
“Simplicity matters. Especially when it comes to the muscle memory of boxing. That is perhaps rule number one. Simplicity works. Simplicity is repetition. Repetition is function. Boil function down to one action, maybe two. Left or right. Simplicity. Simplicity is really the hardest thing.”
― Rasta in the Ring: The Life of Rastafarian Boxer Livingstone Bramble
― Rasta in the Ring: The Life of Rastafarian Boxer Livingstone Bramble
“The heart is an invitation to be part of the process.”
― Halcyon Days and Stormy Months: 21 Poems
― Halcyon Days and Stormy Months: 21 Poems
“Boxing is the most extreme metaphor of personal liability – you enter the ring alone and compete the same way.”
― Life in the Trenches
― Life in the Trenches
“The heart
can be tragic
trapped
defending itself with corrosive wit
it can be perfectly mediocre
and a source of shame
hard
rough
homely
flophouse grimy
hair that is blonde
but we see the dark roots”
― Halcyon Days and Stormy Months: 21 Poems
can be tragic
trapped
defending itself with corrosive wit
it can be perfectly mediocre
and a source of shame
hard
rough
homely
flophouse grimy
hair that is blonde
but we see the dark roots”
― Halcyon Days and Stormy Months: 21 Poems
“I've always stressed the value of autonomy for intellectual and moral development. Autonomy provides us with a sphere of discretion which we all require.”
―
―
“Short lives,
bouncing harmlessly as a cloth doll on grandma’s lap.
Small helpless states,
pretentiousness garbed in the unintelligible,
makers of disposable art,
the zeal to make a scoop unstoppable,
pacified by fresh news,
of scrabbling sexy movements.”
―
bouncing harmlessly as a cloth doll on grandma’s lap.
Small helpless states,
pretentiousness garbed in the unintelligible,
makers of disposable art,
the zeal to make a scoop unstoppable,
pacified by fresh news,
of scrabbling sexy movements.”
―
