Christopher Fried – Sparks of Calliope

To The Nation’s Credit

Before he sought the presidential spot
three times, (a losing gesture manifest
in all accounts), he railed against the plots
of slavocracy that had driven the test
of the states, if they should remain. His brother,
at one point, pushed to madness, (what newsmen
had said), knew that men made to rise must suffer
the meting out that causes most to give in.

His friend Fred Douglass knew that service must
be handled with responsibility.
Dear God, Not Mr. Blaine! This antitrust
legislation, the public voice agrees.

Kind words received then helped to face the hushed
retirement, where he sat dull dinners and teas.

Longstreet’s Postbellum Letters

“Bob Lee, you should’ve gone round to the right,
outflanking them that fearsome second day
as then I saw depart from those eyes light
that flickered when came back the wounded gray,
withdrawing from the charge that cracked the south’s
last hope. I knew your stolid heart was bound
with honor for the fallen men. Proud mouths
now closed, the rested were interred in grounds
too many miles from southern soil. Good sir,
I’m still “Old Pete,” your warhorse at command.
Why do they speak as if I lost the war
when only in thought did I countermand
those orders given? ’Cause I sprung my plans
for fostering the brotherhood of man?”

Christopher Fried lives in Richmond, VA and works as an ocean shipping logistics analyst. A poetry collection All Aboard the Timesphere was published in 2013 by Alabaster Leaves/Kelsay Books. His novel Whole Lot of Hullabaloo: A Twenty-First Century Campus Phantasmagoria was published in 2020. Recently, he was an advisor on the 1980s science fiction film documentary In Search of Tomorrow (2022). His recent poetry has been published in Society of Classical Poets, Snakeskin, and WestWard Quarterly, and a new collection, Analog Synthesis, is planned for publication by White Violet Press/Kelsay Books in Spring 2025.

Old Devil

Most artists encourage themselves as ones
athwart the powers placed at chance, enthroned
to punch up as they claim to be most grown
in judgement while declaring what is fun
and morally correct, and smile to shun
those whose wrong thoughts have earned them the first stones
propelled at them, but right thoughts are just cloned
from the same powers from whom they take funds.
Though three decades have passed since he has died,
the more that one fat Englishman becomes
again as relevant and poignant when
a modern controversy roils those in
good grace, for he enjoyed a cultural scrum
against the literary mandarins’ pens
and stressed his loves—pop culture and mixed gins.

Sundown at Kenyon College

Bent down, he searches for names lost
among the scattered, weathered stones,
the tablets probing distant thoughts
when crouched above some poet’s bones.

Then there’s some noise at the site’s edge,
and eyes upwards, he notices
three huddled students laugh and tread
the graveyard with betraying bliss.

He thinks some sacrilege should be
declared for this cool nonchalance,
but then reflects, “If Crowe could see,
he’d say, ‘They know the meter’s dance.’”

And heading to the parking lot,
though not as glum, something’s not right
he reckons as he views the plot,
but no more time, there’s little light.

Christopher Fried lives in Richmond, VA and works as an ocean shipping logistics analyst. A poetry collection All Aboard the Timesphere was published in 2013. His novel Whole Lot of Hullabaloo: A Twenty-First Century Campus Phantasmagoria was published in 2020. Recently, he was an advisor on the 1980s science fiction film documentary In Search of Tomorrow (2022).

Tag: Christopher Fried

Two Poems by Christopher Fried