The first half is a little hard to read; it jumps and starts and sputters, but by the time you get to the second half — where most of the premier poets seem to show up — the motor is mostly thrumming. Colorado T Sky seems the sagest voice in the whole book. Eddie Pliska touches on the origin of bikers — not as a group but as individuals and why they may choose the biker life — and there is some powerful emotional content in his poetry. Mary Susan is very visceral with some good images in her poems.
My favorite by far, though, is Chopper Kate. She has the best grip on language. Her poems live. Her poems move down the highway, revving, pausing, turning, never parking:
Friction is born / as the asphalt bites / and rubber's torn. // Deep and dark / you leave a black mark / that stays forever / here embedded / like ground tattoos.
These guys and gals love their bikes. There's lots of innuendo here: moaning and screaming and kissing and squeezing thighs. Interestingly, as we non-bikers tend to stereotype bikers, these poems give us a glimpse of how bikers stereotype us "cagers" — no freedom, bad drivers, and convinced that the biker life is what we want.
There are a number of photographs included in the anthology as well. The photos are as rough as the words, portraying a rough, dirty life full of leather, bald heads, big bellies, tattoos, and lots and lots of motorcycles. I would really have enjoyed seeing some poets put a thousand words to each of these pictures, though, distilling the history of the events.
Rubber Side Down is really is a fine introduction to the eclectic world of biker poets. It seems to be a genre still trying to find out what it really is and what it can accomplish but it should be a really good ride.
For more information on the world of biker poetry, visit Highway Poets, Roadpoets, and Chopper Kate.
Article comments
1 - MarySusan
Excellent review. Balanced, tells what the reader enjoys and the disappointments as well. Scope of the review is broader than most I have read to date and highlights several writers rather than just promoting one writer, as if the writer, themselves wrote the review. Of course, it was also nice to see my own name mentioned. A surprise for sure. Blaze, ChopperKate, Peddlar, Sorez, Ironhorsewriter are the more than worthy of mention, and certainly, far more talented than I. -- Check them out!
2 - shawn macmillan
ya what she said