Courtesy of Geo Kiesow's Facebook
Poet George “Geo” Kiesow has died at age 58. Geo grew up in the Town of Clayton, when it was farm country west of Neenah, where his family operated the Raveno Ballroom. In the era of “beer bars” where 18-year-olds could drink legally, The Raveno was a popular stop for touring bands as Geo wrote recalled in the poem “Saturday Nights at the Raveno.”
Until a fired destroyed The Raveno in 1997, Kiesow hosted the annual Cornstalk Festival presenting live music, fireworks and camping.
An avid outdoorsman, Kiesow was part of a long lineage of writers, from Jeff Poniewaz and Antler to Henry David Thoreau, Edward Abbey and James Hazard, who drew from nature for inspiration. Fittingly, he spent his final years enjoying the great outdoors in Saint Germain, WI.
A three-time letter winner in track and field at Neenah High School, Kiesow attended college at UW-Oshkosh before moving to Milwaukee where he connected with childhood friend musician-producer Kelly Meyer to form the rock and poetry group The Poem Tones. Together the duo, with other musicians, released several collections of work.
Geo’s chap books of poetry included Saturday Nights at the Raveno which described in equal measure the charm, humor and stench of rural life. “The Day All Hell Broke Loose in Winchester, Wisconsin” depicts the mayhem when a truck loaded with watermelons overturned one Summer day. The poems of 12 Stool Saloon, was inspired by the characters he got to know in his years slinging drinks.
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A veteran bartender, over the years he could be found welcoming customers at the Toad Café (where he hosted the weekly Geo’s World salon), Y-Not II, Up and Under (Geo’s memories of The Up and Under here, Jamo’s and Club Garibaldi among others.
Photo Credit: Blaine Schultz
Geo Kiesow (second from right) with music legend Rufus Thomas and friends on Beale St. in Memphis, TN.
Something of a renaissance man, Geo edited the Shepherd Express’ poetry page, appeared in a television ad for the Wisconsin Lottery and rescued a puppy from the Milwaukee river after a race towing an empty ¼ barrel behind a canoe.
Many Milwaukeeans might best recall Geo as host of the weekly Poetry Slam at the Y-Not II. During this time, he held the lease on the revolving-door apartment on Lafayette Place.
Today Jeanne Marie Spicuzza is a producer and actress in Hollywood, making her own films. In 1993 she encountered Geo’s generosity. She gets the last word here.
“I had just run into my soul mate leaving his Riverwest upper flat with another woman. I stumbled in the cold, making my way over to Len (D’Acquisto) and George’s place, crying my eyes out. I began composing a poem, a sort of good-bye letter to the heartbreaker. When I arrived at my intended destination, grief-stricken and wet-faced, I read the piece out loud. Geo uttered, in his signature hearty voice, “You ought to read that at the open mic at the Y-Not II.” I did. And I met the best friends and colleagues I’ve ever known. It changed my writing forever, for now I thought about the audience, and grew in verse and understanding.
“It’s safe to say that I might not have shared my work publicly, much less made a living at it, if it had not been for him. I might have been stuck in myself, instead of entering a world of mutual celebration; but Geo was a liberator in every sense of the word.”
