Open Mic Night, September 1, 2025, Labor Day

A last-minute issue moved us to Ada’s Wintersmith Park, but it was a beautiful evening, and it felt like we all read well.

Richard R. Barron - richardbarron.net — Richard R. Barron – richardbarron.net

Richard R. Barron - richardbarron.net. The phenomenon of contrasty details in an image turning colors in front of and behind the point of focus, in this case magenta in the closer text and green in the farther-away text, is called spherochromatism, and is common in telephoto lenses with large maximum apertures. The lens I used is the AFS Nikkor 85mm f/1.8G shot at f/2.5. — Richard R. Barron – richardbarron.net. The phenomenon of contrasty details in an image turning colors in front of and behind the point of focus, in this case magenta in the closer text and green in the farther-away text, is called spherochromatism, and is common in telephoto lenses with large maximum apertures. The lens I used is the AFS Nikkor 85mm f/1.8G shot at f/2.5.

You host reads something, hopefully interesting, in this photo by Cody Baggerly.

Chapter 11: Moral Bankruptcy
by Richard R. Barron

Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.

I need to be more chaotic, so I think, “You can dance on my grave all you want. It won’t make me any deader.” I also think, “Love is a four-letter word, but IF is the word in the middle of lIFe.”

And my life, my poetic peeps, is not an apology.

So give me thought, freedom, struggle, real life, real love, instead of romance. Romance can kiss my ass. Romance is a bunch of smarmy, limp-dicked, narcissistic mental mental masturbation.

But, as my friend Thea once so adroitly pointed out, like all masturbation, it feels pretty good.

Richard, why are you listening to her. She’s obviously completely insane. Obviously.

~~There is no desire in this moment, because there is nothing here to desire.~~

And of course, we can truly say that a smooth sea never made a strong sailor. But we all want that smooth sea, don’t we?

So, Dick, you seem to have it all figured it out. What should we do?

Ignore our insecurities. Insecurities are your heart’s own bad advice.

Stop hating. Hating never fixed anything. Cruelty never solved the problem.

And remember that the ground will always hold you up when nothing else will, and that closing our eyes makes us blind.

Richard R. Barron - richardbarron.net. This is my longtime friend Margaret, who drove down from Oklahoma City to read with the group. — Richard R. Barron – richardbarron.net. This is my longtime friend Margaret, who drove down from Oklahoma City to read with the group.

For the last few sessions of Open Mic, I have been generating “trash poetry,” bits of paper with short verse that might inspire, amuse, or infuriate anyone who wants to take a bite.

Trash poetry = trash taken to the highest level of meaning.

Trash Poetry
from that idiot you warned your daughter about, Richard R. Barron

Feel like crying but can’t decide? Use this handy cry-teria!
~Boo hoo
~Drink shampoo
~Same to you
~I’d cry too if I were you
~I you are a cow, moo

I’m a trash poet and don’t know it!

Relax. It’ll all be over soon.

Secret atomic bomb formula = X.
No, you have to solve for X yourself or you can’t have an atomic bomb.

On the flap of an envelope: “Unfunny jokes and puns. DO NOT LICK!”

In the letter, she said, “I love you,” but based on what happened next, she meant, “f*ck you!” Also, at the bottom of the letter, she wrote, “In the mean time, bend over.”

No, I am not kidding.

I know! I’ll be really unhappy! That’ll show her.

Boohooing in my journal when I was 15, I said I felt “empty,” but I was actually full. Of sh!t.

No, you must be thinking of that other poem, you know, the one that ends every other stanza with, “because Melissa is a b!tch.”