Nov 13, 2019
John Davis Jr. is a Floridian
poet residing in the Tampa Bay area. He has been writing and
publishing for about 20 years. Listen to us discuss how the
Florida landscape and his love for travel influences his work and
about his future projects.
http://yourartsygirlpodcast.com
http://poetjohndavisjr.com
You can
purchase "Hard Inheritance" here:
https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Inheritance-John-Davis-Jr/dp/1944355197/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1508088573&sr=8-2&keywords=Hard+Inheritance
You can order "Middle Class American Proverb here:
https://www.amazon.com/Middle-Class-American-Proverb-Davis/dp/0942544129/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1414094131&sr=8-1&keywords=Middle+Class+American+Proverb
Bio: John Davis
Jr. is a Florida poet. His books include Hard
Inheritance (Five Oaks Press, 2016), Middle
Class American Proverb (Negative Capability Press, 2014),
and two other collections. His poems have been published
internationally, with appearances in magazines
like Nashville Review, Barren magazine, The American
Journal of Poetry, The Common online, and Steel
Toe Review, among many others. He holds an MFA from
University of Tampa in addition to a master's in education. He
presently serves as associate dean of academic affairs for Keiser
University in Clearwater.
Typewriter Thief
Silver keys drew me in – neatly
lettered and numbered circles
the size of my fingers. If only I
could hear those hammers,
smell ink pressed free. Taken by its
store display, I sought
a rhythm of permanence: the striking
discharge of my name.
Once cops found the Remington in my
neighbor’s shed, they said
That boy, as if nobody else would
want black applause
from a curious carriage’s well-oiled
melody
played on paper and ended with a
single bell – done.
Police returned it to Mister Howard,
who let it sit
because his name was already on too
many buildings.
They booked me in, had me hold a
sign with Courier numbers –
white holes of zeroes captured by
print’s hard impact.
Creek Wading with a Young
Son
Arriving by bike, we know to whisper
like the woods:
This stream’s soft trill and the
wind’s slow travel
through pines drown the drone of
highway lanes
beyond the palmetto-frond hands
opening toward water.
Predator, provider: This anonymous
tributary
takes and gives alike as our four
bare feet
bring clouds from its white sand
bottom – swirling rising
residue stirs south, settles back
beneath water.
Your passage here disproves ancient
philosophy:
I am the nameless man who stepped in
the same time
twice thanks to your smaller,
faster-filling tracks.
My deeper plunges do not slow this
aging water.
In sunlit pockets along the
dark-patched course,
shadow fish dart like memories –
there, gone.
But we have neither hooks nor bread
today,
so black scales brush our foreign
ankles underwater.
Your sunken toes discover some
animal’s rib
and like a tribesman, you lift it,
fling it forward.
It skips, ripples holes in two
distant points
before rocking and sinking in new
familiar water.