Hey folks! Though the path to healing after hard experiences is still something I want to explore through art I don’t feel as called to update here right now. When I started this blog I was touring and performing poetry full time and bartending/managing a night club part time.
I’ve since left the world of the night and being as that I’m not as immersed in the culture of the dark hours I don’t know if I’m still an authority on the subject of how to deal with what happens after consuming the spirits. I’m not condemning (unless your under 21) or condoning enjoying the drink, I’m just sayin’ …it doesn’t play a very big role in my life. anymore.
I still enjoy making orange and blue martinis for the ladies during Bears games, but even they are in the off season right now (the Bears, not the ladies). Yes, I still partake here and there, though like my writing, my energy is placed elsewhere right now. If you are interested in keeping up with my writing check out my new blog atwww.WhoisDanSully.com! You can also find some great downloads, mp3′s, show info, and more there. Drop on by and say hello.
With that said I’d like to say an emphatic THANK YOU! The Cure For Your Ales may not be updated again…who knows? I sure don’t. If it isn’t, y’all have been great. If you’re trying to get over the loss of having new content from me come hang out at the new site and make sure to send me links to your blogs because I like to read stuff! It’s been fun here. Creatively, I’m just moving on to something new and exploring some of these subjects we’ve breached here in new ways. I hope you join me on the journey.
“Early voting has already started here in Illinois. In fact, I’ll be voting (Thursday) morning myself. And we need you to get folks to the polls so they can start casting their ballots this week.
We also need you to find those folks who are planning to sit this one out, and we need you to tell them that they can’t vote just once and then just hope for change to happen.
They’ve got to vote all the time, every time. They’ve got to vote for their council members and their mayors and governors and members of Congress.
Because in the end, our campaign was never just about putting one man in the White House. It was about building a movement for change millions of voices strong as a movement that lasts beyond one year and one campaign.”
My mom recently forwarded me an article on on coconut water as a natural hangover remedy. I did a case study on my own body after a tough Blackhawks playoff game and several unfortunate icings and let me tell you, coconut water in the AM: the real deal.
Coconut Water: The Natural Hangover Elixir by Lizzi Loraine
Coconut Water is a natural fat free drink and has the ability to rehydrate your body, besides providing you some necessary minerals, such as potassium and sodium. Coconut water has no artificial additives and contains significant amounts of electrolytes, while being low in food energy. Coconut water is therefore not only a very refereshing drink, it has proved to be the best natural hangover cure.
My poem “Hips For The Hops” was recently published in “Learn Then Burn: a Modern Poetry Anthology for the Classroom.” The book includes some of my favorite performance poets and is edited by my homies Tim Stafford & Derrick Brown. You can find it on amazon or straight from the publisher at www.WriteBloody.com.
It was around midnight on Sunday when it hit. The pain rolled in like a permanent thunderstorm. It was the second to last tooth on the bottom right of my mouth. I’ve had stitches in both of my eyebrows, the center of my palm after an accident with a trip-wire garden hose and a Coca-Cola Classic bottle, my leg, my finger, and 3 broken ankles. The combined pain of all of those things does not compare to the throbbing that took over my mouth that night.
I tried every homemade remedy I could find online in the middle of the night. Salt water. Apple cider vinegar. Vodka. Vanilla extract. Whole cloves. Dried peppermint. Peppermint tea. Fresh sliced lemon. Onion. A pound and a half of Ibuprofen. Pinching ice between my thumb and forefinger to confuse the nervous system. Anything. Nothing.
The next day I attempted to schedule a dentist appointment. The earliest they could fit me in was 10AM Wednesday. One more night like last. Sleepless. In constant pain. I figured out that even though my tooth was sensitive to cold, ice would freeze the nerve and give me 30 to 45 seconds of peace. It also meant by night two I had to sip ice-cold water at least once a minute to keep the relentless stab and sting within my mouth at bay.
There is no way to sleep if one has to sip water every 30 seconds. I knew I wouldn’t sleep much but I had to figure out something because I had been awake for around 40 hours at this point. My mouth needed to be constantly cold to fall asleep. One can’t just put an ice cube on a gum and call it a night…it’ll melt in 30 seconds. So I rummaged through the freezer.
I found a package of frozen pierogi. If you don’t know what pierogi are you’re missing out. They’re Polish dumplings stuffed with cheese, or potato, plum, meat, sour krout, you name it. They’re fried in butter and are really good for you. I opened the package, individually wrapped the pierogi in plastic sandwich bags, lined them up on my bedstand, and popped one in my mouth. The frozen pierogi would keep my tooth cold for about 15 to 20 minutes at a time. I would sleep until they defrosted on my tongue. The pain would return, I’d wake up, and pop the next one in, getting sleep for 20 minute intervals.
They held the pain at bay long enough for me to get at least minimal sleep until I got to the dentist. They performed an emergency root canal and now I’m good to go. I slept 12 Wednesday night with a 2 hour nap in the middle of the day. My tooth thanks my mom for making us Polish. Moral of the story…pierogi are God’s gift to the mouth. In good times and bad.
“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.”
- Leslie Poles Hartley
There is a woman with a laugh like a viking.
She is on the phone. Outside her office,
the one with the windows, the others in their cubicles
can hear because after all, walls are only walls
when they are walls. They listen because she
is a bulldozer in the shape of a smile.
Between a signature and a satellite conference
she leaves the building,
walks ten steps, lights a cigarette,
each one her last. She’d quit if there were time.
Back in her office there is a blinking light,
three new voice mails, two calls on hold, thirteen e-mails.
She answers a question, writes a memo.
One floor down a crisis averted. She bangs her fist
on her desk. They fall silent.
At home she will open a window,
kiss her fiancé, feed the cat, play spider solitaire
and remember the days when it didn’t work.
Hey folks,
I’m participating in the National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) challenge. 30 poems in 30 days. I’m not going to post all the poems here as many of them will probably be, well, shitty. If you’d like to check out the poems I’m doing this month go here: http://thecureforyourales.blogspot.com.
I’m sure I’ll post a few here too. Probably second or third drafts. You guys here at TCFYA get the good stuff. If you’d like to learn more about NaPoWriMo go to http://readwritepoem.org. If you are taking the challenge please send me a link to your work!
A short movie about Slam Poetry, Street Poetry, and Protest Poetry. There’s footage of poets on the streets of Chicago, at war protests in Washington D.C., and at the Green Mill where Slam Poetry started. Poets are some of the most passionate, corny, funny, serious, smart, philosophical, sad, and above all dedicated people you will ever meet. — Wes Heine (director)
I make a quick cameo at 1:15 right after Nina Corwin and Tim Cook. Enjoy!
The Bartender Dreams of White Moths by Karen Weyant
Of flutters pounding in her ears, tissue wings
snagging on loose wires of screen doors, burnt
crisp on streetlights, bent backwards around
the antennae of a car. She wakes up sweating,
thinking of bar napkins tearing on cans of beer,
bar stools, the heels of work boots heavy
with dust. One regular always sports jeans
stained with white paint, another wears
the wings of sweat stains under his arms.
Smoke rests in her mouth, coats her throat,
splits her skin. The jukebox echoes, Garth Brooks
scraping her hips, pinching her thighs.
She remembers all the last calls slipping
through the back door, hoping the night
insects grasping the screen will fly away.
They only cling tighter.
Hey folks! Though the path to healing after hard experiences is still something I want to explore through art I don’t feel as called to update here right now. When I started this blog I was touring and performing poetry full time and bartending/managing a night club part time.
“Early voting has already started here in Illinois. In fact, I’ll be voting (Thursday) morning myself. And we need you to get folks to the polls so they can start casting their ballots this week.
My poem “Hips For The Hops” was recently published in “Learn Then Burn: a Modern Poetry Anthology for the Classroom.” The book includes some of my favorite performance poets and is edited by my homies Tim Stafford & Derrick Brown. You can find it on amazon or straight from the publisher at 
It was around midnight on Sunday when it hit. The pain rolled in like a permanent thunderstorm. It was the second to last tooth on the bottom right of my mouth. I’ve had stitches in both of my eyebrows, the center of my palm after an accident with a trip-wire garden hose and a Coca-Cola Classic bottle, my leg, my finger, and 3 broken ankles. The combined pain of all of those things does not compare to the throbbing that took over my mouth that night.
