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Al Basile

Al Basile is a poet, singer/songwriter, and cornetist. He graduated from Phillips Academy in 1966, and in 1970 he was the first to receive a Master’s Degree from the Brown University Writing Program. He began his musical career as a cornet player with Roomful of Blues in 1973, and has worked with the Duke Robillard Band as a songwriter and recording member since 1990. He has nine solo blues and roots CDs out, the last five having reached the top 15 on the Living Blues airplay charts: guest artists have included the Blind Boys of Alabama and jazz great Scott Hamilton. He has been nominated three times, in 2010, 2102, and 2013, for a Blues Music Award as best horn player.

While hundreds of his songs have been published since the Sixties, his poetry and fiction has begun to be published in recent years. He taught full time at the Providence Country Day School from 1980-2005 and since then has concentrated on his writing, performing, and recording.


 Al's Origami micro-chapbook, selected poem & audio recordings are available below.


Origami Micro-chapbook

Selected Poem(s)

Private Realities

 

Audio: In Praise of Weakness

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My vision isn't what it used to be;
my eyes supply a different clarity.
The surfaces, the edges in my room
no longer sharp, move more or less apart;
between, new figures find their way. Before,
forbidden any foothold in the world
beyond me, they remained within, without
a form. Deprived of signs, I stumbled in
the dark against their unseen presences.

 
Projected now around my view, about
private realities, they sound alarms;
my eyes supply a different clarity.
My vision isn't what it used to be.
Al Basile © 2013

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Audio: 
Christmas Morning in Rumford, 2012
 
Audio: 1 + 1 = One
 
Audio: The Graderubbers

{mooblock=The Graderubbers}

I love to see them writhe and squirm,
and plead their puny case.
I love the look of abject fear
that creeps upon their face.
And once I've let their spirits rise,
it almost makes me shout,
to see that little spark of hope
first flicker – then go out.

Al Basile © 2013

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