Archive #17
November, 2014
Paul Sands Offers Up A Rather Macabre "Masterwork" Paul Sands
(ˈmɑːstəˌwɜːk) she was a work of art her hydrogen tanned hide toasted and stretched over a Belsen frame dragon ridged through a vitiligous spinal crook such a masterwork of cubist devotion the puked architecture of a thousand regurgitated meals could have engendered revulsion and yet she was beautiful and begged my bone cracking embrace Read the poetry of Paul Sands Read a profile of Paul Sands Wally Swist: The Pleasure and Pain Of Youth Wally Swist
Marquee My mother had just died, and as I recollect I had somehow circumnavigated my strict father for an afternoon to buddy up with Dennis from parochial school. My father didn't approve of much, and as he would say before he took off his belt, after I returned home, Sonny, this is going to hurt me more than it hurts you, and would lay strokes of leather across my skin that left purple welts that would last for days. The cinema marquee with the red capital letters announced not only the title of the film but also the news: Hemingway dies at 60. I remember being stopped cold having read those words, with my inner boy-voice prescient of my wanting to become a writer, and nothing to base it on. Then I was transmuted by the Technicolor I saw on the silver screen amid the crisp wash of the waves and the fluid beauty of Hayley Mills, whom I was absolutely convinced all girls should choose to look like when they began to be old enough. Read the poetry of Wally Swist Read a profile of Wally Swist VerseWrights Welcomes Haiku Poet Angelee Deodhar Angelee Deodhar
A Selection of Haiku... the golden koi nudge blossom rafts further downstream ❧ nail art- the guitarist's fingers flash autumnal colors ❧ New Year’s Eve fireworks lighten the sky- fireflies, the ground ❧ bonfire sparks... fill the camp with shadows black against the night Read the poetry of Angelee Deodhar's poetry Read a profile of Angelee Deodhar New Haiku and Tanka From Caroline Skanne Caroline Skanne
from "A Selection of Tanka and Haiku" inner peace the silence of wings at sundown ❧ daughter lifts her small arms wishing … to be one with the butterflies ❧ in the rain amplified birdsong ❧ i count my blessings on the night sky every star named after you Read the poetry of Caroline Skanne Read a profile of Caroline Skanne We Welcome Poet Polly Robinson To VerseWrights Polly Robinson
First Love ☊ The piano is in need of tuning so it can be played in key music is my first love rock opera symphony I love music sheets tucked inside the seat of piano stool beneath music soft music loud music beautiful uplifting and complete Dissonance: off key jangles discord—clang clang the music chaotic bitter sharp air disturbed—bang bang Black keys and white keys wait proud and still for the piano tuner’s lever (here he comes up the hill) He plays sotto voce presto forte staccato allegro adagio tosto tutti vivace tenerezza eco o o o o oh A tonic in tune once more affettuoso read the score pianissimo dolcissimo come play me piano implores Read the poetry of Polly Robinson
Read a profile of Polly Robinson Enjoy this reading in the PoetryAloud area Charles Bane, Jr. Brings Us His "Bronx Song" Charles Bane, Jr.
Bronx Song I wanna be wich you. By the chain link fence on the corner we walked past (where I kissed u when u stopped and looked at me and went, Dude) There was a street lamp shining through the fence onto a skip of oil and something turned around. Then I came home, now thinking about u. U stepping into day. On Sunday, when even the Korean people are a little nice. When the cooking smells are horns. Hey, you know that red like the truck outside Schwartz’s on flower day? That’s the red I wanna see u in and you know and hey, that smell when we were close, you buy that at the store? I saw your Mom there and I go, Miz Hernandez , lemme carry those and we walked to your place and I look up and your Mom goes, love, it’s like guava Read the poetry of Charles Bane, Jr. Read a profile of Charles Bane, Jr. A Poem By J Matthew Waters With A Reading By Reka Jellema J Matthew Waters
New Moon Rising ☊ we walked between the lake and the rail yards smoking cigarettes and spitting on century old ties wondering if the midnight train would arrive on time it was a year ago tonight marshall died on these very tracks attempting to escape his own restlessness his dream of starting a new life in st louis or kansas city or santa fe seemingly interrupted we made a fire like we always do and sat in a circle our voices as quiet as stones skipping on water our karma just a little off kilter one of us asking rhetorically why there is no moon Read the poetry of J Matthew Waters
Read a profile of J Matthew Waters Read the poetry of Reka Jellema Read a profile of Reka Jellema "Sound," A New Poem From Poet Robert Nied Robert Nied
Sound In a car park in Bermondsey near the dirty river Thames, her patent leather court shoes flashed in the lights like gems. I listened to her footsteps as they echoed from the walls, and drank in each one like whiskey, trying not to stumble or fall. She stepped from behind a buttress and stood with her legs apart. I imagined all the indiscretions, And wondered where we would start. She strode the stairs to the sidewalk, and the street drowned out her sound I turned instead to Southwick alone on the quiet London ground. Read the poetry of Robert Nied Read a profile of Robert Nied Eusebeia Philos Finds A New Home In Shorter Verse Eusebeia Philos
A Selection of Tanka and Shorter Poems... gravestones line up in endless rows so much time on my hands to order my life neither day nor night between two worlds the descent the rise deciding in the pause in waking moment of a guilty dream I form a defense to walk away a free man Read the poetry of Eusebeia Philos Read a profile of Eusebeia Philo Two Poems From The Pen Of Poet L.L. Barkat L.L. Barkat
Moleskine, 3-D In my book we can be red. I, a bus, with double layers. You, a booth, perpendicular to the sky. As I drive by, we will peer into each other’s small revealing windows. Untitled At the end of the Sound, where the pines have been pushed back by an unrelenting salt wind, you will find that jingle-shell beach-- where little cups of pearly lemon peach stretch out endlessly. Put your hands to them and you will not know where to stop. So much beauty, so much unrelenting jingle-chiming beauty. Read the poetry of L.L. Barkat Read a profile of L.L. Barkat Addiction Drives This Poem By Dennis McHale Dennis McHale
Chemical Indifference Those were the lost years when my days were bathed in the hazy, soft glow of fentanyl and tomorrow never came. Those were the stacked hours of feeling nothing and floating lazily down the opium river. I neither belonged there, or here, for more than one lucid moment between applied patches – on with the new, (hungrily chewing the old!) I was then a woken mummy, wrapped in the tattered and dirty layers of chemical indifference, stepping haltingly from light into shadow. In those years my world spun on a shaky spindle, my North, my South, my East and West tossed into a dark, bottomless hole. Saturdays were spent in sweat stained sheets; clothed in smoke and asphalt as the withdrawals descended; counting the seconds and praying for Death to gather me into her dark bosom. Every four weeks, the pharmacist would call my name and I would lather, rinse, and repeat Read the poetry of Dennis McHale Read a profile of Dennis McHale |
Roseville Nidea Urges Us To Sea, Not Seaside Roseville Nidea
Starvation I looked closely at the waves Moving forward to the shore -- ....continuous Replacing one after the other. I listened. Beneath My microscopic senses Were surges, solid sounds Not distinct from the previous. All the seven seas have one and the same. I meditated. If I push Kamote to the soil That is on the surface of the earth, To a significant extent, Tomorrow, in the coming days--certain-- I Would have enough to rub My hungry hallow stomach, yet, Yet I must feed the starvation Of my mind, of my heart Of my soul, fathom The depth of the sea, grasp Every truth of its billows Even if they mean dying every day. To die--better die striving Strive to elevate transfigure the repeated pattern Of the sounds of the surges, Of the movements of the waves Before they reach the shore, than Walk on the seaboard like a monk. Read the poetry of Roseville Nidea Read a profile of Roseville Nidea All New Tanka And Haiku From Chen-ou Liu Chen-ou liu
A Selection... winter twilight an old man and his dog share the shadow ❧ I raise my husky voice, I'm a poet ... the word useless like a moth flying around my heart ❧ winter mist fat phobia weighing on her mind ❧ in the depth of a winter night I peer into the mirror: Death with half-closed eyes Read the poetry of Chen-ou Liu Read a profile of Chen-ou Liu Two New Poems From Poet Liam Porter Liam Porter
November
November came with its usual temper tantrum that screamed and swirled until its wrecking digits swiped leaves from the trees, flung them to the ground in a rage then stamped its feet so hard it cracked the evenings open. Seizing its sudden opportunity, darkness stole through, poured in like ink in water, twisting tightly its furious fingers around the day until it gasped and fiercely fought for just a few hours of light. Learning to Dance Behind those inner walls of sheer self-doubt and inhibitions, lies the rhythm that sneaks sometimes from head to tapping fingers, drumming out time as they dance on a table top, beating out words on a keyboard. Beyond that though, everything is measured. The trick is to try to free the tempo that for so long had been beaten down, then rolled into nothing more than taps of a toe. The journey from head to feet is one that is fraught, with mistimed movements and always counted steps. Even when walked first, hand-held slowly, through every single motion, they manage to bemuse. Trying the patience, it is time to shift the weight of expectation, to repeat and rehearse, until there is something; like freedom of movement. Until it looks at last like a dance. Read the poetry of Liam Porter Read a profile of Liam Porter Luke Prater's "Melanie Brown," With His Reading Luke Prater
Melanie Brown ☊
Where did you go to Melanie Brown? Did you ever return? Did your hands get burned? Nice to know you, Melanie Brown nice to show you round. Took your wanting wan nightgown pills, and rock CDs Ridgie, Ruth and me friends you made that term in town friends, they let you down? Left on sullied mid-heeled ground your looks, and college books. Travestied; too many cooks. That stinging, scuppered blue-eyed frown shakysmileme down. Do they still try it on, come round lank-haired, rock n' roll boys surreptitious ploys lifting that sorry blue-eyed frown, like they did that term in town? Not a place of great renown - fast-dance saloon - cried, like Syd, for the moon we tried not to let you drown in pools of Melanie Brown. Were you flipped like half-a-crown hung up on highs and whys fed up being fed mud-pies? Was there any joy that term in town before you went on down? Where did you go to Melanie Brown? Did you ever return? Did your tongue get burned? Nice to know you, Melanie Brown nice to show you round. Read the poetry of Luke Prater
Read a profile of Luke Prater Enjoy this reading in the PoetryAloud area Simon Kindt Celebrates Simplicity, Seaside. Simon Kindt
We, such stuff as dreams are made it’s true sometimes, a day will end like this: the river swelling as the tide comes in, the sun slouching down below the ridgeline, light unstitching the horizon. the shadow of a hunting hawk spiralling a thread of air above the headland, waves singing quiet through the water, golden light washing your hands. your daughter carrying a bucket full of shells she plucked from the low tide line, she’ll spill like jewels across your palm, and you, for once with no desire to weight these things with any meaning but their own, for once with nothing in your head but thank you. Read the poetry of Simon Kindt Read a profile of Simon Kindt Samantha Reynolds' Newest Poem, With A Hint For Poets... Samantha Reynolds
My four-year-old poetry teacher My brain is jammed with the noise of errands and the poem knows it half-done hiding away in the quiet of my ribcage waiting for a way back in which is how I came to see how the noticing pours out of you blunt and new like the colour of the girl’s hair in your drawing that is neither brown nor blonde and you tell me it is like a paper bag which of course it is and how you describe grandpa’s face as mushy and that a frog would feel like a bird if you held it tight in your hand and how nuns look like Red Riding Hood in black and white and how library books smell like closets so I kept asking and the answers dropped out of you obvious as stones each one a lesson in what it takes to be a poet. Read the poetry of Samantha Reynolds Read a profile of Samantha Reynolds Ellen Conserva's Newest Poem Is On The Verge Ellen Conserva
Cupped Hands The verge is where I lived today. That precipice where the salty liquid Begs to be allowed release Down my cheeks Off my chin Onto my chest. Looking through watery glasses Crawling along my familiar road Becoming vapor in my own heat Melting away the me I am In my soul Off my feet Onto the brittle grass. The verge is where I will stay Until I find a safety place In my every day space I hold my tears back As I am unsure Where they will fall. Will you hold your hands out to me? Will you catch my tears in your cup? Will you take them to your lips and kiss them? Will you taste them with your tongue And let my sorrow into your own body? Or will they drop to the dry ground One after the other And be stepped on, and twisted Into the earth By the ball of your foot, as you pivot and turn away Making a small circle of mud there between us? Read the poetry of Ellen Conserva Read a profile of Ellen Conserva The "Extraction Poetry" of Shloka Shankar Shloka Shankar
Note: To create extraction poems, poets select certain words from previously published poems or passages, keeping the original format of that printed page. The idea is to have the form reflect the message. It is harder than it looks. Life
Extracted from e e cummings' poem, "if"
We Welcome Poet Stefanie Bennett To VerseWrights Stefanie Bennett
Shine, The Gulf ~for Tim Because happenstance Likes To play truant, The colour Of the smoke-house Is indigo ... Twirling much As a prayer-wheel Does before The river wild Sucks it on Back up A full throated February Gullet Quieting the Sandpiper. Seen From Above I take it, the crust Of the moment, One word At a time: ... Move it Cross country Past the livery Stable, the train's Box-cars —, all 'A-hoot' On the half hour Siding Where —, just like Great-Grandma, I put it in A pipe And smoke it. Read the poetry of Stefanie Bennett Read a profile of Stefanie Bennett Paul Mortimer: A Poem About Habit (And Irony) Paul Mortimer
Habit Every morning, regular as ....clockwork. He marches past my sash window. Determination in every step. Full head of grey hair, eyes fixed four paces in front. Every morning, whatever the weather. Today it just sits there, waiting for the conductor to wave her baton, drumming up wind, sun, rain or whatever else is written on the meteorological score. For now the iron black branches just beyond St Andrews house are still. And here he is. Marching back again. The Guardian tucked hard under his right arm. The same paper each day. The same navy blue jumper. Eyes front. Four paces. Regular as clockwork. I watch him. Read the poetry of Paul Mortimer Read a profile of Paul Mortimer |
Leslie Philibert: Two Poems, Two Women, Two Settings Leslie Philibert
The Moor Girl Feral as leather Sculptured as a scarab Curved as a burnt twig. Asleep beyond the punishment, Each tress solid with peat; Flaxen as old corn. Perhaps you softly breathe water Under the door of the moon Still as the night is rain. Table Dance softporn saxophone; botox for the soul, strained faces only held together by skin, gluteal muscles for nylonhearts and sweaty collars, porcine, popeyed each mouth fallen open like a gallow`s trapdoor the delight at a big dame battleship, built in stereo that makes aftershave boil under matching ties; littlemen reduced to red. Read the poetry of Leslie Philibert Read a profile of Leslie Philibert Kim Talon Celebrates Nature, But Not The Unnatural Kim Talon
November Lights October’s radiant colors weep into November’s grey oblivion November is unguarded-- secrets held dear on summer nights debris furtively swept under starry rugs November reveals through gossipy winds A mist of memory remains caught in the boughs of the crooked pine The Crafting These creatures we gentle tame so they might abide by rules created by us, their captors, and leave their wanderlust at the gate have shaped us as much as we shaped their destiny as we manipulate genetic codes unraveling all that someone else created their version of perfection tainted as we celebrate our own cunning Read the poetry of Kim Talon Read a profile of Kim Talon Two New Poems From A Series By Janet AalfsWhat the Dead Want Me to Know
 Janet Aalfs
and light finds us with the other loves dawn sunders to define. —Eavan Boland 1. John's Poem Cards Happier than I had ever seen, my father showed me his poem cards. Not to regret the black and white rabbit or the open door. Not to make up for sunshine mocking long-eared shadows that fled. And not that he wished he could stay more hopeful, less afraid. Then he laughed because each drawing, and the words that went with it, meant everything. How we only had this table, our heads bent over the cards, a certain darkness surrounding, and nothing felt distant. 16. Ascension I whispered. Eyes closed. I waited. Neck still limp. Beak darkly gaping, the songbird's body grew light as a shadow in my hands. I had no face but the wind. And though my prayer enveloped me I never thought it would fly huge and sudden into the trees. Between us such daring. Read the poetry of Janet Aalfs Read a profile of Janet Aalfs Eleanor Swanson's Latest, A Sensual "Tracing The Light" Eleanor Swanson
Tracing the Light At dawn, the bare trees are glazed with ghostly copper light, light that changes with the click of the second ....hand. If I could be an inanimate object, I would be a clock, and finally understand my essential nature. A shadow ascends and descends. Your sleep sounds are light as mere breath, mere murmuring in dreams. Passion Passion is Who’s asking? Love What love is… Even while running I close my eyes to the strong midday sun and forget to look for my totem—the kestrel. I dream of you in my arms again. I am tracing the light as bird shadow ascends and descends outside my window, blinds closed. I think of holding you in my arms again. In late afternoon, I see matter sweeping across the sky, through the light. I trace the paths of this cosmic dust, through the light. Sound moves through the light. Soon, I will hold you in my arms again. Corporeal. Our dying neighbor sings inside her house, but we can hear that clear, pure voice from the street as it moves through the light, into space where it will never dissipate. Passion is… Love is. As night falls, trace the light with me. Don’t stop, love. Read the poetry of Eleanor Swanson Read a profile of Eleanor Swanson The Latest Poem From Poet Michelle Sho Michelle Sho
from the land there was a cave full of glowworms shaping the darkness with their beauty. this is where i want to be, in visible coast to cloud. drinking silence from notes of wind a touch of hairy spine, silky moss crumbling in gaps i am calm to dying the way a chrysalis divides itself-then metamorphisis. it is the body of science and soul the sun in your hands cupping the moon of my earth i can hear native stories unbroken streams lovers lost for each other in a field of bones and twilight weeds where your scars feel like stones on the landscape, as immoveable mountains and gods i tie your arms around me press my heart to poetry in single moments and hope they shine with my belief in you Read the poetry of Michelle Sho Read a profile of Michelle Sho Two New Lyrical Poems From Poet Marianne Paul Marianne Paul
wisdom sprouted communities with ironic names that mimic nature misplaced sentimentality harkening of woods, meadows, wetlands the deep, the dark, the moist poetic street signs epitaphs to past place, past earth ghost flora, ghost fauna forests that shimmer like shadow just beyond touch replaced in the here and now with park-ettes splash pads instead of ponds mulch and day-lilies and saplings perfectly placed un-sown by root and wind nor carried as seed by fur or feather to set down home in unexpected places propagate with wild, untamed efficiency and inexplicable wisdom desert winds poetry women tell women in those places of trust and gatherings where the moon moves through cycles full as a mother's breast and then as empty where wild poppies sway white as virgin, pink as pout crimson-bruised as first sex where mountains rise and fall like breath catch with the sharp clear edges of pain and childbirth the rugged beauty too where words and sorrows are communal without tags of authorship, ownership, copyright for who owns the desert winds and the sandstorms escapes the fighting season hasn't held a broken body in her arms and wailed Read the poetry of Marianne Paul Read a profile of Marianne Paul Poet Rowan Taw Contemplates The Foldings Rowan Taw
Existential Origami Every morning I make these folds. Gentle creases encourage initial shaping, blank paper expanse transforming, as valley folds take hold. Every morning I make these folds. Manipulating fingers push and merge swallow wings along imaginary …………………………dotted lines. Every morning I make these folds. Through fragile, temporary structures my mountain folds summon up existence. Every morning I make these folds. Finally flight path ready, my plane of existence soars. But how many flights? And how many planes and paths? For every day I make these folds. Read the poetry of Rowan Taw Read a profile of Rowan Taw Kathleen Rogers Brings Us A Dark Poem, With Color. Kathleen Rogers
color The wind is changing. Cloth awnings flutter their skirts like an Indian raindance Maybe she'll make it home before the clouds are overcome by moodiness Can she avoid the grey eyes? She was cruel before she left Steel grey. Still grey And she's so foggy anyway A life held together by duct tape Sometimes a sticky thread gets caught He is pulled, lightly Turns his head, slightly A few feel her gray cashmere heart with the kind of heat that starts out fuzzywarm and ends up draining like a hot tub Read the poetry of Kathleen Rogers Read a profile of Kathleen Rogers A New Lyrical Poem From Dunstan Carter Dunstan Carter
The Lemon Tree The sun whispered In the garden As nature throbbed, A single hummingbird Fluttered Frenetic, Flies buzzed all fussy And the wind Tickled leaves, As we wandered All dazed. A warm blooded sky, Hot light flickering, The weird Clicking crickets And their hypnotic Racket Flowing and growing Like an orchestra Thrumming, A dizzying oddness Pausing our thoughts. We held hands And stared straight at A single fruit sitting At the heart Of a lemon tree Singing, Simple and high pitched, An odd waspish whistle Of witch giggles And wonder, A strange treasure plundered, A sour delight; It was wondrous, Peaceful, A beautiful sight, God knows how we got there But this drink Now tastes right. Read the poetry of Dunstan Carter Read a profile of Dunstan Carter |