Antelope Field

There are antelope
in the field down
the road. Okay, 
well maybe not
antelope, but nyala
or oryx. & maybe
it’s not a field
but a patch of
garden which in
reality is too small
for the eland &
in reality is not
even a garden but
a window box in
which the cat sits
soaking up the sun. 
& since I don’t have
a window or a cat
it’s quite possible 
that this scene
from the wilds is
nothing more than a
screensaver that
comes on after
I’ve been away from
the PC for at least
three minutes. Which
I haven’t been, I’ve
been sitting here
all the time. So maybe,
just maybe, it all
comes down to
a plasma rectangle
that is framed by
tool- & scroll-bars
but is otherwise
entirely white except
for the two words 
floating at the top.
Field. Antelope.



Putsch

He picked
up whatever 
thoughts
were upper- 
most in 
his mind at 
the time 

ran with them
for a while

& then 
discarded them
as if they were the 
children of 
a past regime.


Nijinski reminisces

Exuberance
is in an eye
much more

beholden
to the magic
of the mo-

ment than to 
the pattern
of the dance.




Inside knowledge

Or:
knowing where
the bodies are
buried. 

Or:
knowing when
the berries are
bodied.


On Journeys

The shape of the journey
has something to do
with color. A small part
but important. The color
has to do with the shape
of those things you are
looking for. Also important,
not so small. The taste lies

on your tongue. Sound is
restricted by allowing one
album to come along with
you. Either earphone music 
or that playlist in your mind
cycling through an endless loop.

Call Me Well Again

I’ve survived another you

saliva infectious 

dreary and shopworn

I tear through the streets wildly 

search for 

someone’s discarded shred of home 

soft sheets 

a fireplace perhaps

light operatic music 

it’s just a fantasy

non-existent

any minute your truck will come barreling through

my thoughts of salvation

I’ll get by on a lower dosage 

of you

We’ll cut it down to three days a week 

I’ll end up stalking you

grip the light post 

to climb the rim of the dumpster 

try to peer in 

your window 

You’re agitated now 

I’m so low I’m a slinking

belly scraping beggar 

no real reason I’m lingering outside 

in thirty-five degrees 

wearing a denim jacket 

you shuffle me to the truck

I’m edging away 

from two failed marriages 

put it all on them 

but it was me me me 

When I’m well again

I’ll come calling

fresh as babies’ skin

holding a tray of Starbucks

While I Wait for my Lover 

The buzz and hum of New York City

fills the air 

I tuck into a restaurant for cover 

small

Italian 

quiet 

The couple at the table next to me

sort through sonogram prints

I feel a pang of jealousy at 

the little fetus forming in this woman’s 

belly

My lover 

late – and certainly not mine alone 

has no interest in children 

For his sake 

I forego this 

I cannot help but stare 

longingly into the abyss of those 

black and whites 

that little heart 

tiny head

this embryo I turn my body 

away from 

for martyrdom 

yet it’s the thing that calls to me

from some primal part of

my makeup 

I’m on the edge now

sacrificing the eggs 

I feel bouncing around 

in my uterus 

for some blind pact 

that later seals the deal

of which we will be much 

happier 

together 

without kids 

While I Wait for my Lover (Cont.)

The woman feels my eyes 

says it’s a boy

smiles uncontrollably 

I worm around in my seat

the couple finally gone

I am left alone

and this is how it will be

as I decided I’ve passed that exit 

many many highways before 

I’ll just wait for my lover to show up 

and order us scotch on the rocks 

for the long pull of loneliness 

has begun to root 

What Will Your Mother Say

When she finds your corpse

with foam bubbling

down your chin

eyes sunk deep 

in your sockets

black spreading around

your lids and mouth

the needle still stuck

frozen

You

in your aloneness

You 

in your dying

As your mother cracks open

lays across you

the spoon now cold

your spirit beats against the window 

pleads

with God

to let you

back in

To see her in a pile 

of grief and longing 

so deep

your soul evaporates

into the pain

What will she tell

your siblings

the school

the bus driver

the crossing guard

it was an accident

always is

Wait for the autopsy

to understand

what went wrong

deep in the gully of absent parenting 

divorce

boyfriend fondlers

What Will Your Mother Say (Cont.)

booze

cigs

marijuana

heroine

here……..

As you lay hardened

frothing

a slow last milky tear oozing

She still wants you

she begs 

to glue you 

for a day – just one day

even if it’s your druggy lean against the wall

eyes open to a slit

turtle movements 

slurred speech

if just that…than the hell of this 

to speak of you

now

in your deadness

warning

a storm warning

the butterflies in my stomach

announced the summer plan to intercept


continuous distance
hair fell on hair
the sky turns red as if it knows
everything in advance
my hair fell for
the first time on your comb
which you will never use again

Basement

Human is the basement of the toilet room

Tenement maze of history and stories


No animal in the world has ever died for its cage before

No animal has invented aerial bombs


To first Octobers number 


Suck my death

an unborn kitten is knocking at the church of a torn belly

the future flows like sperm from the wall of the gateway

my dead lover gets stuck in my throat where his cock used to hide during blowjob

I dream of having my throat fucked by a nuclear bomb

I dream in my dreams that instead of a strap-on a hydrogen bomb will stick out of my ass

I know that god will not pour anything into my balls during a handjob

mosquitoes and military pilots meanwhile fly towards the scent of blood

not a single military man gave me flowers

only somewhere in the dark a muscular sergeant said: hey fag suck my dick like before death

what if the ammunition depot where I'm already being fucked by a group of soldiers will explode from the fact that I'm so hot and sexy

suddenly I will destroy the army and piss all the military factories with my blood

suddenly I really will be fucked in a minute by the last soldier in the history of mankind

in the meantime they fuck me in all the cracks and call me a fag

I wonder if the soldiers have wives

I wonder how many lovers smeared the mouths of soldiers' wives with sperm

I wonder how many soldiers kissed their wives on the lips after that

I wonder how many nuclear bombs are produced in secrecy

I would like to grow longer hair and dye it blonde

the truth is hidden in the details of my anus

god fuck us all with your voice

we are tired of the silence of the red buttons

after which a nuclear explosion will follow


after fucking a new nuclear bomb will be born in me [?]


Brown town

In the heart of earthy hues,

Brown town,

A needle threads life's tapestry,

Brown town,

A need, a yearning palpable.

People encircle, form clay figures,

Silent echoes of existence,

Seated, molded by time's unseen hands.

Within, dwell stories untold,

Brown town,

Clay figures poised in quiet contemplation,

Sculpted reflections of shared moments.



my lover asked

my lover asked me when i first saw porn

it would be better if he asked something simpler, like how many times we quarrel with my husband

(sometimes it seems to me that love is too abstract a word for our painfully non-abstract world)

my lover finally pissed me off when he started talking about the non-binary nature of human nature

- I call you bitch to suck and not destroy our homosexual intimacy with the philosophy, fag, - I said to my lover while he turned into a statue

my lover is a beautiful antique statue but alas the statues don't have blood

my professional skills as a bloodsucker are now in question

my lover its: not reacted to my bites and slaps for a day

it seems to me that he sailed away into the cast-iron tunnel of the night

it seems to me that my lover dreams of flowers in ball gowns and without graves

death knocked on the back of the room and asked: whose house is this?

and this ruined house is now a ruin

the anti-missile installation of the heart has failed

the night in the eyes of my dead dead man will no longer dissolve

even explosions won't wake my lover

red sky like a bud revealed death

god's assistant pressed the wrong button again

аll in vain


We

Free

Freends

Friends

French fries

With self burger


We distance

We running

Running away from each other



vegetable garden

my body is a vegetable garden in which nothing grows

we're all hungry without the smell of fresh meat and cum

generals fuck tomorrow's dead for free saving on prostitutes

sun umbrellas and winter sleighs are in vain


sho(r)t (hi)story
I want the last nuclear bomb to explode inside my ass
the sun warms the cold body of my lover shot by dawn
the trenches are screaming but no historian
will tell about our buried feelings in the future
the stones are screaming but only the wind drowning in the river
will tell about our buried lovers

No title
the station of tears breaks out and thirst falls from the inside of the heart
let's go to my house, drink my blood, burst my capillaries, tear my ass, tear out my tonsils
meanwhile god's deputy keeps pushing the wrong buttons

onlyfa
the steak burned inside my stomach
the gun kills me but nothing will come out of my vagina
we drink only sperm
my eggs and balls strive for your grape nipple
still life of the world during the continuous noise of a siren
we drink only tears

one cocku
you drink the silence of my moan
and I feel uneasy about spring
which hasn’t come either

part-time
part-time job
being naked in the pristine ruins of houses

Haiku by Maurizio Brancaleoni


bagno all'alba:
la scia del sole tra alluce e illice

bathing at dawn —
the sun glitter between hallux and index toe

*

mattino calmo:
un mosaico d'impronte di piccioni

quiet morning —
a mosaic of pigeon footprints

*

luna calante:
vespe e formiche su carcassa di pane

waning moon —
wasps and ants on bread carcass

*

mattina presto:
cammino nei solchi del SUV sulla sabbia

early morning —
I walk in the ruts of the SUV on the sand

*

rough sea —
the cat's lapping
in the plant saucer

mare agitato:
il lappare del gatto
nel sottovaso

*

luna di tre dì:
il pomfo della puntura interrotta

three-day moon —
wheal of the interrupted puncture

*

mare calmo di mattina:
le zampe rosse dei piccioni

calm morning sea —
red feet of the pigeons

*

malato al sole:
le zampe fredde della mosca

ill in the sun —
cold feet of the fly

*

cirrocumuli:
la chiave dell'auto
fa da cotton fioc

cirrocumuli —
the car key
serves as a cotton swab

*

ascelle al vento:
l'insetto non riesce
a rigirarsi

armpits to the wind —
the bug can't
flip back over

*

dopo il mare
anche sporche le mani
sembran pulite

after the seaside
even if dirty
hands feel clean

*

restless wasps —
the lonely old man
from person to person

vespe irrequiete:
il vecchio solo
di persona in persona

*

ora di pranzo:
condizionatore di
sopravvivenza

lunch time —
survival
conditioner

*

notte d'estate:
centro zanzare
mentre il sonno mi elude

summer night —
I hit mosquitoes squarely
while sleep eludes me

*

mese d'agosto:
anche le case rosse
si spelleranno?

August —
will even the red houses
start to peel?

*

niente acqua per
le labbra secche:
lamiere lucenti

no water for
dry lips —
shining floor plates

*

vento in spiaggia:
una mano sul cell
l’altra sull’ombrellone

wind at the seaside —
one hand on the phone
the other on the beach umbrella

*

Pronto soccorso:
la zanzara bruna
non trova l'orecchio

Emergency Room —
the brown mosquito
can't find the ear

*

bocca sdentata:
alcune case senza
tenda da sole

gap-toothed mouth  —
some houses have
no awning

*

vespa vasaia:
una solitudine tranquilla

potter wasp —
a tranquil solitude

*

nascondendosi
nell'orto il gatto
svicola indisturbato

hiding
in the garden the cat
sneaks away undisturbed

*

primi rovesci:
sotto la giacca a vento
la canottiera

first downpours —
under the windbreaker
a tank top


Maurizio Brancaleoni lives near Rome, Italy.

He holds a master's degree in Language and Translation Studies from Sapienza University. His haiku and senryu have appeared in Dadakuku, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Under The Bashō, Horror Senryu Journal, Cold Moon Journal, Scarlet Dragonfly, Memorie di una geisha, Rakuen, Haiku Corner, Pure Haiku, Five Fleas, Shadow Pond Journal, Haikuniverse, Asahi Haikuist, Plum Tree Tavern and Wales Haiku Journal. In 2023 one of his micropoems was nominated for a Touchstone Award, while a horror ku originally featured in the Halloween-themed issue of Scarlet Dragonfly was re-published in this year's Dwarf Stars anthology. 

Maurizio manages “Leisure Spot", a bilingual blog where he posts interviews, reviews and translations: https://leisurespotblog.blogspot.com/p/interviste-e-recensioni-interviews-and.html

Gastric Juice

What is a woman if not fluid 

cursed and born bubbling up the esophagus 

meeting fingers at the uvula and spewing

heated siren songs of stomach acid and

torn-up lemon slices and cucumber bile. 


if not trapping and festering life

with eyes of gold and silver-plated teeth,

they cover tobacco stains under lips stapled tight

shrouding their deadbeat heart 

with red right-hand knuckles.


What is a woman if not a frame imagined 

too plump, if not a figure

malnourished from longing, yet so full

from desire, of indentured servitude 

to their own stomach rumbling

with craze and clouded appetite. 


A woman, if not

A sickly yellow vomited like 

a scream amplified 

From the depths of the womb.

Five Untitled Monostichs

independence prickly pears at long last

—

millions of it this bottomless denver

—

instead of concrete bright yellow bird hank

—

late eclipse pepper sandwich later

—

grass lather unless tree & tree

—

bio/graf

J. D. Nelson is the author of eleven print chapbooks and e-books of poetry, including *purgatorio* (wlovolw, 2024). His first full-length collection is *in ghostly onehead* (Post-Asemic Press, 2022). Visit his website, MadVerse.com, for more information and links to his published work. Nelson lives in Boulder, Colorado, USA.

FEARMONGERING IN SPRINGFIELD

		“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs!”
		yelled Trump at his TV debate.
		What’s behind these demon tales?
		What fuels such baseless hate?

		It starts with an influx of workers
		back in 2017.
		Springfield factories no longer hummed.
		The town was in decline.

		Then came the Haitian immigrants
		to package food, work shifts
		in automotive machining plants.
		But new faces caused rifts.

		15,000 new faces
		riled up a Nazi group—
		this “Blood Tribe” marched with swastika flags
		and paramilitary troops
		
		to crash a jazz and blues event.
		Pointed guns at cars.
		Shouted, “Go back to Africa!”
		The Blood Tribe was at war.

		A spokesman told the City Council:
		stop hiring workers’ kin.
		“Crime and savagery will increase
		with every Haitian you bring in.”  *

		The speaker got kicked out. Next day,
		Springfield City Hall
		was closed because of bomb threats,
		and a school got threatening calls.

		Then, when a cat went missing,
		the scapegoating began.
		“They say those Haitians eat our pets.”
		Rumors wildly ran.

		Now schools are closed to keep kids safe.
		Bomb threats, fear, and hate
		menace Springfield’s peaceful town.
		Does this make America great?

		* Quote by Drake Berentz, aka, Nathaniel Higgins,
		reported by Stephen Starr in the Guardian, 9/14/2024