cleo creech

How fitting that Mark Sanford’s career would now be so tied to a country that gave us one of most famous political divas of all time – Eva Peron.
Below is a found poem, combining the lyrics from “Don’t Cry for Me Argentina” and the Governor’s now famous steamy emails to his latin lover.
The poem starts [...]

 
Last night there was a candle light vigil held in Atlanta’s Piedmont Park for those who have fallen in the recent violence in Iran. It’s interesting as an outsider (non-Iranian) to bear witness to the pain and suffering felt by this community. I feel though that as an activist it is important to uphold basic [...]

Okay a light and fluffy post – a cleaning the palette post – before developments in Iran on Saturday unfold. Between being in job search mode for weeks now, sending out book manuscripts and now the world facing what may be a revolution in Iran – time for a little diversion.
First I have a confession [...]

I’m a chronic organizer, evaluator, and list maker. Which is sort of an odd thing for a poet, but it also comes from the always competing sides of my brain, and from my work in training and management. Writing a training guide for or quantifying anything poetic or artistic into a spreadsheet is beyond me, [...]

I’m a big fan of the beat poets, not just for their work but for the sense of experimentation and openness in which they lived their lives. There is in the beat movement a direct link to the gay liberation and even to modern queer culture. This is explored in one of my favorite books [...]

The ongoing protests in Iran have demonstrated just how powerful a force new media and social networking have become. Historically, when a dictator staged a coup or there was a government overthrow or revolution you sent a couple of soldiers over to take over the main state-run radio station and TV station. Then you also [...]

It used to be my mall, back when it
used to be my old neighborhood.
It used to be a lot of people’s mall.
Back when the now barren empty
asphalt ocean was once full of cars.
One of the first real malls
long made small and obsolete
by ever leapfrogging, ever mega
megamalls in ever growing
circling nooses of suburbia.
I only visit now [...]

 
Adam Lambert and newly visible boyfriend Drake Lebry were seen out on the town, dancing, holding hands, and people still, still, coyly seem to be wondering about his sexuality – huh? I just don’t get the mystery over Adam Lambert being gay. Has the whole country’s gaydar just gone wacky? What does a boy have [...]

It’s the big Hollywood dream, someone with a great voice or they’ve just written the great American novel, or the next big broadway show; they just need to be discovered. I think we all sometimes see ourselves in that scenario, that we have something unique to offer, something of greatness inside of us. Not many [...]

Not that I’m making light of that situation. If anything it’s become a deepening mire that’s becoming a heavy burden on our American psyche. Almost daily now, what’s torture, do we torture, what did we learn, when? Now these new pictures that were to be released, then were not released, hinting at something darker going [...]