Dear Lost Motel

By Steve Davenport

Night tongues

the low slur

like an oar

turning swamp

peat and vines.

Ceiling’s a mural

of cracks, chipped

paint, and a fan

that, wobbling,

garbles the slamp

of body on body

in a liturgy

past the mind.

Something more

a body wants

in the dead air

of this motel

service than grind

to clutch of muscle

and back

to clock radio.

A product of American Bottom, an Illinois floodplain across the Mississippi from St. Louis, Steve Davenport is the author of two poetry collections: Overpass (2012) and Uncontainable Noise (2006). His poems, stories, and essays have been anthologized, reprinted, and published in scores of literary magazines both on-line and in print. A recent story in The Southern Review received a 2011 Pushcart Prize Special Mention. His Murder on Gasoline Lake, published in Black Warrior Review and later as a chapbook, is listed as Notable in Best American Essays 2007. At AWP Chicago in 2009, he had the honor of organizing and moderating a tribute to William Gass with participants Mary Jo Bang, Kathryn Davis, Gordon Hutner, and Rikki Ducornet. His scholarship includes essays about the Beat Generation here, Jack Kerouac here, and Richard Hugo here. Recently he’s gotten involved in songwriting projects. One example is Art Box Collective. Another is the collaborative work he’s done with Bruce “Bruiser” Rummenie on This Noise in My Blood, a CD of seven songs. Davenport has also co-authored with wife Lynn four daughters, ages 15, 13, 11, and 7 (their names, One, Two, That’s It, and This Isn’t Funny Anymore). He likes his coffee black and his George Dickel (Old No. 8) poured hard over chipped ice in his favorite glass. His mantra? If he had one? Whiskey cleans the whiskey glass. You can find him on Facebook and at his shiny new website Gasoline Lake.