A Million Revolutions: Poems 2022–2024

By Greg Masters

A Million Revolutions – A Fearless Poetry Collection by Greg Masters

In his eleventh book from his imprint Crony Books, Greg Masters delivers a fearless and deeply resonant exploration of the world around us, and within us. These poems are sharp, unflinching, and tender, moving effortlessly between the political and the personal, the universal and the intimate.

With a voice that is both bold and vulnerable, Masters calls out miscreants in seats of power, exposing corruption and hubris with wit, fire, and precision. He then turns inward, revisiting moments from his youth, unearthing the experiences of sixth grade and beyond that shaped his view of the world.

Along the way, Masters celebrates the transformative power of art, showing why creativity matters most in times of turmoil. These pages also carry poignant farewells to dear friends, written with raw honesty and a refusal to let their memories fade. Yet, amid grief and chaos, A Million Revolutions finds redemption in the everyday, a fleeting spark of beauty in ordinary details, small truths that bind us together, and the hidden poetry of life itself.

By turns provocative, nostalgic, and luminous, this collection invites readers to pause, reflect, and feel deeply. If you're drawn to poetry that challenges, heals, and inspires, A Million Revolutions will stay with you long after the last page is turned.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Nov 1, 2024
• ISBN: 9798350980738

Greg Masters

When he arrived in Manhattan's East Village in the mid-1970s, Greg Masters attended readings and workshops at The Poetry Project atbSt. Mark's Church and the Nuyorican Poets Cafe. Along with Michael Scholnick and Gary Lenhart, he edited the poetry magazine Mag City from 1977–1985. In 1977–78, along with a crew of poet comrades, he produced a cable TV show, Public Access Poetry. From 1980–83, he edited the Poetry Project Newsletter. This is the 11th book of his writing from Crony Books.

Book preview

A Million Revolutions

the infrastructure will collapse—Thom Yorke

It was a time of a million

revolutions and we were right,

still are, to resist, rise, oppose

the unevolved agendas and

those personalities guided

by complete lack of empathy

extolling nothing more than their

advancement and rise to power.

Enemies of critical thought,

these mustard-brained, so-called leaders

and their followers enflamed by

fantasies of retribution

against their perceived enemies,

clashing with intelligence at

odds with their determination

to demolish opposition,

and harken to nothing less than

biblical retaliation.

A continual reckoning,

isn’t it, the interference

from those rationalizing their

awful legacy privilege.

On the local level, it’s the

guy a table over in a

café speaking with colleagues on

a Zoom call as if fixed in a

legitimate environment.

In the capitols, boardrooms and

seats of influence, the money

persuades, entangles and holds sway.

The day is bright, I am inside

with some aspect of pirate blues—

impotent to thwart this outrage

other than to shout out in verse,

announce the facts to those who are

amenable, who give ears to

this proclamation intended

to expose the flagrant disguise

and bare the wretched intention

of those butchering decency

and sabotaging agreement,

pretending destiny favors

detouring the proclivities

of everyone whose lifestyle

is anathema to their own.

A Secret I Tell Her

Some young men are fools

not able to commit the

way perhaps women can

determine a plan to set a

foundation for what might

come to be.

Guys like him, I say,

are young, have

a lot of advantages that

free him up from having

to make decisions.

He’s one of the

privileged few who

can easily bystep the

preordained agenda to

not fulfill the expected.

"We’re moving in different

directions," he texts her—as if a

legitimate part of this dialog

the day after they spend a

day together.

The point is she’s upset.

Distraught even. Not her usual,

cheery self when I walk into the

café where she takes my order.

I’m smart enough to not proffer

the prescriptive