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A new collection of humorous European poetry from poetic observationalist Rick Lupert, master of the poetic travelogue. Join Rick as he travels through Amsterdam with Rembrandt and Van Gough and discovers his hesitance with the city’s slogan “I Am Amsterdam.” Taste Belgium’s chocolate and beer in the cities of Brussels and Brugge (that’s how THEY spell it.) Stop in to Magritte’s house. Re-visit Paris, its cheese. its Monet, its wild eyed man with a giant toothbrush in Montmartre. Travel through Europe with Rick Lupert as his wife earnestly tries to get the pen away from him. Rediscover your poetic sense of humor…put these poems in your mouth.
“[Lupert] writes to us as if we were together, in a library say, a room where speech is forbidden. His poems are passed to us with a nod, a smile librarians can’t see.”
Brendan Constantine,
January 2010
Poetry from We Put Things In Our Mouths
From Amsterdam
In the Van Gough Museum
I want to take a photograph
of the woman who keeps saying
“no photography” and then I want to ask
her “oh yeah, what if I have
a photographic memory?”
Oh Amsterdam
City of tolerance and soup
canals and pancakes
Your trams in their grooves
your red lights, your whores,
Oh Amsterdam,
there is a market on your corner
an art in your window
You, who turned in Anne Frank
your homo-monument.
Oh Amsterdam
The beer, the hash, the tulip
the wood shop
Half your people are syrup sweet
the other half mustard annoyed
Oh Amsterdam, I Amsterdam
The other vowels too Amsterdam
We think we like you
your dike, your pea soup
but we’re not sure how you feel
about us.
From Brussels
The Pis Family
Tonight in Brussels
so hungry we have two dinners
at same restaurant.
Confuses waitress who asks
“didn’t you already eat?” we think,
it was French so could have been anything.
Two meals later we
drink Belgian beer next door.
I bump head on giant wheel,
walk away to see family of
pissing statues
and their dog.
French Class Was So Many Years Ago
I confuse the French word for half
and order a pizza with half cheese
and olives at noon
From Brugge
The Swans are Organizing
At night we see two swans
wading away from the main swan area
towards, perhaps, the North Sea.
They meet up with
two more at a canal intersection
and then two more a little further.
The swans have not organized
like this since the revolution.
Things are afoot.
The Assault
Man, could Magritte paint nipples.
A slaughtered ball.
From Paris
Musée des Canards
They have a museum
for almost everything here,
but not ducks.
The ducks probably
wouldn’t stay on the pedestals
which would lead to frustration for everyone.
Art Appreciation
It is hard work looking at art
noticing the details of a complex canvas
the seemingly out of place steam ship
in the upper right hand corner
Remembering these details when looking
at other paintings
Realizing the similarity
between the two pieces and
then trying to remember the dates
so you can imagine who influenced who
Seeing texture and no texture
Coming home to your own city where
you rarely look at art and
feeling guilty about that
The weight of that guilt
Deciding to put a painting on your wall
so maybe you’ll look at it
as you eat your artless breakfast
drive your artless car to your artless desk
If this is you
Maybe it is not
Your omelette
a sculpture
