Bad Newz
(Alec Soth: "Kenny and Bill—Bad Newz,
Grand Rapids, Minnesota")
They tilt their guitars and stare.
Each boy puts one foot toward
Us, one where a trailing wire
Would run to an amplifier
If amplifiers were there.
Bill's Gibson glitters like ore.
Kenny's Ibañez hoards
White noise in its black fretboard.
Bill's double chin shows. Is it fair
To mention his pudge? Kenny's hair
Gets stuck behind one ear.
Each of the brothers wears
A T-shirt, loose jeans, and a pair
Of bruised high-tops. A pear-
Shaped garbage bag hugs a steel bar.
The big rectangular blur
Behind them looks like the door
To a walk-in refrigerator.
Maybe dad is a restaurateur,
A diner owner who requires
Kenny to spend six hours
A week moving cases of beer,
While Bill chops potatoes, or scours
Grease from the checkerboard floor.
Bill imagines a national tour:
CBGB's. The Black Cat. Hardcore.
Or metal: the glow and allure
Of arenas and open-air
Pyrotechnics at dusk, a chauffeur.
Or do they hope modestly for
Sideman jobs, L.A. 'burbs, the secure
Work of studio engineers?
Two boys hold two guitars
In a basement kitchen, and care
What you think of them. Next year
They promise to practice more.
Right now their repertoire
Is six songs, seven chords,
Five originals, and a spare
Reworking of REM's four-
Minute anthem about a lost car:
"Can't Get There from Here."
Copyright Credit: Stephen Burt, "Bad Newz" from Belmont. Copyright © 2013 by Stephen Burt. Reprinted by permission of Graywolf Press. www.grawolfpress.org
Source: Belmont (Graywolf Press, 2013)