Dancing on Main Street Lorenzo Thomas Coffee House Press 144 pp. ISBN: 1-56689-156-6 Available from Powell's Books.

Put the damn tin cup away
- Lorenzo Thomas, "Quiet Riot"

Lorenzo Thomas not only puts away the tin cup in Dancing on Main Street, he breaks out the Wedgwood china. He has something to say about everything. Sadly, as some of his material is afro-centric, and the book jacket art seems to go after that sort of urban post-beat thing, I fear that Mr. Thomas may be stereotyped -- quite literally. Yes, his subject matter does address race, but he transcends that topic -- his poetry is certainly not a one trick pony. He mixes the sensibilities of Allen Ginsberg and LeRoi Jones -- no, not the later, crazy Amiri Baraka nee LeRoi Jones of 9/11 conspiracy theory ramblings, but Jones's earlier incarnation as a workmanlike poet who brought a 1950s black man's experience of the beat into cold war American consciousness. Mr. Thomas shares these fine poets' ability, in that he approaches life as a photographer: he provides quick, biting, single-frame images of various experiences and lifestyles.

Unlike many of Coffee House Press's other writers, Mr. Thomas actually has a fairly noteworthy record -- this is no first stab at a book. He has published chapbooks and has written extensively for magazines, even appearing in the king of all magazines for the poetry set, the late George Plimpton's Paris Review.

Dancing on Main Street covers a staggering amount of ground in its modest 144 pages; Ginsberg's chapbooks largely addressed a particular period or theme in just as many pages. Thomas tackles everything from images of growing up young and poor, to the suffering of the Vietnam War, to the nostalgic catches in which we find ourselves in middle age. "When If the Big Bands Come Back" addresses the co-opting of be-bop and jazz music by the mainstream -- a distinctly black art form and an icon of black culture that is toyed with by whites without regard for its deep history. "Last Call" discusses war, from The Odyssey to Vietnam. "Excitation" covers the epic struggle of nature and old cultures against technology and "progress". "Pornography = Exploitation of Men" frankly shows Mr. Thomas's take on why men act like they do...ahem...allegedly. "Back in the Day" is an amusing nod toward how older folks shake their heads, looking at all the tough, dumb stuff that kids do, only to try to justify the tough, dumb stuff that they did themselves at that same age.

Despite the preponderance of poems that address big themes, there are also several enjoyable shorter pieces -- snapshots of everyday life. "Suburban Saturdays" is just such a poem; it documents what happens on a suburban Saturday, only hinting at bigger issues. This grasp of both the high and mighty (e.g. what war does to a man's soul) and the commonplace (e.g. the two poems that discuss TV game show classic The Price is Right) shows Thomas to be quite a craftsman as well as a journalist.

Music is one of the topics that Thomas returns to again and again. "Spirits You All", a poem dedicated to the Charles Gaye Trio, catches the beat, be-bop-y connection between music, culture and the cultural record in the form of poetry in a way that I have never seen outside of Kerouac's speed/booze-fueled ramblings. It's beat not merely in style, but in the nature of the subject matter - real, hard jazz. You will never find a poet writing such words about pop crap like Jessica Simpson. And if you do, please tell him to cut it out.

Dancing on Main Street is a remarkable book, chronicling a wide variety of Thomas's poems. Poetry dilettantes and hardcore poetry-slam fans alike will enjoy it immensely.

-- Tyler M. Carey

Coffee House Press is an award-winning nonprofit literary publisher dedicated to innovation in the craft of writing and preservation of the tradition of book arts. Coffee House produces books that present the dreams and ambitions of people who have been underrepresented in published literature, books that shape our national consciousness while strengthening a larger sense of community.