Weeds Poetry at the Hideout is a long-running Chicago open mic tradition, meeting weekly on Monday nights. Participants share work of all sorts and all are welcome to come up to the mic and read. For this special feature, Weeds poets submitted work and this is a sampling of what the open mic provides to listeners in the Chicago writing community.

---

(These are excerpts—click on the title to view the whole poem)
 

The Man I Am
 
Yes, I want to be
a shimmering monument
to dreams fulfilled
 
Chuck Kramer

 

solo un recuerdo
 
Mi madre y sus consejos
Viven como Robles en el
Bosque de mi cariño
 
Gregorio Gomez

 

Poem for David Bowie
 
Maybe all my loose talk against the moon,
laying all humanity's sorrows at its door,
was too quick and capricious.
 
D. D. Power

 

Poem For Vietnamese Reunification Day 2017
 
He died with his secrets and limp
shrouded in a fog of dementia.
 
Elizabeth Marino

 

Not About Nostalgia
 
Hers says
ROYGBIV, but his says GYGYGY because he likes the Green
Bay Packers
 
Tom Simmermaker

 

Thirteen 3-Line Love Affairs
 
you need to forget who I am
our love has no face
 
D.M. Jerman