DENNIS FORMENTO: SO WHAT IF YOU'RE EINSTEIN

so what if you’re Einstein 

so what if you’re Einstein 

& you’ve got all the time in the world 

to play the violin with one hand 

and rock the baby with the opposite foot 

and the country you live in is about 

to declare you and all of your people illegal 

and burn your life’s work 

and you’re a socialist pacifist 

you’ve got to run 

and you give the physics 

that lead to the atomic bomb 

to the Americans 

because if you don’t 

the Germans will come up with it first 

and ten years later you wake up thinking 

“what else could go wrong?”

 Poet and sometime free-jazz/free-verse performer (Ed Barrett Trio, Frank Zappatistas) Dennis Formento lives in Slidell, LA with his wife, artist teacher and yogini Patricia Hart. Also he is the publisher of Surregional Press  (Ungulations: Ten Waves Under the Hoof, by Amy Trussell and A. di Michele, and Fattening Frogs for Snakes by John Sinclair.) His latest book is Looking for An Out Place on FootHills Publishing (2010.)  Latest crazy idea is to bring traditional Italian cantautore and tarantella traditions to New Orleans, collaborating with dancer Nanette Ledet.  He organizes the New Orleans 100,000 Poets for Change readings.