FUnowTUwasRE
Ecstatic electricity freezes into pulse as biologies become magnets / your eyes lip my cheeks / my koi mouth plumbs your pond / our trunks forest together, organs tromboned by desire fingers / perpetual fleshmachines yinyang existences / masses gasseate / consciousness shrinks to cosmos / our my-your selves merge, we share atoms
we downlings deitise
TAKE ME IN
"Take me in," the poet said, "take me in." The prophet hid.
"Take me in," the poet prayed, "take me in."
No banker paid. "Take me in." The soldier fled.
"Sink or swim," the lawyer pled. "Take me in,"
the poet said, "take me in."
A woman did.
"Make me warm," the woman cried, "safe and warm."
The poet sighed. "Words are thin," he did reply, "weak and thin.
But yet I'll try. Weak and thin, but yet I'll try."
In the bin by page by page,
in the bin the books were laid,
inch by inch were set ablaze.
Line by line the match was lit.
Word by word
the poems all went.
"Now I'm warm," the woman said,
"safe from harm. But poet's dead."
Poet dead?
Poet dead?
He lives on inside her head.
Words go on inside her head.
ESOTERIC
as eager initiates
in lovers’ freemasonry
that true and ancient order
we are illuminati
of the night’s old mysteries
through its well-established rites
its scripts, shared grasps, finger codes,
its postures, pledges, passwords
we advance by slow degrees
our prescribed intimacies
CONTRETEMPS
The tense contentment of the nights before
now in contempt
give way to temptation.
YOU SAY I SAY
You say
your bees come alive
when I prod your hive.
I lift your balloon
and hold you to ground.
I say
I pour and pour ghee
and you absorb me.
...
Image c/o Isabel Gomez de Diego. It’s of an older light skinned man in a plaid outfit sitting down with a young boy in a Christmas sweater putting a red nose on his face. He’s got a party hat and is in front of a table with wine and candles and glasses.
***
“Hello,” – the butterfly whispers quietly with the flapping of its wings,
The caterpillar moves its antenna in amazement.
“I was you,” – says the butterfly, – “
And I know what you are waiting for.
Your dream will come true very soon,
And you will fly into the sky, beautiful and pure."
That evening the caterpillar died, but the butterfly was never born.
***
The voracious phone is roaring loudly
Crocodiles of papers held together with a paper clip
Boss instructs to drink ink blots letters
Chitin grows on the back and computers glitch like rabbits
A piece of sandwich has dried up on my table
The head of the laboratory does not know that the work was paid for in blood
Another day when I have to report
Another day when I apply for a grant
Another day when I quarrel with environmental activists over laboratory rabbits
Another day I can't find a cure for cancer cells
***
the wind speaks
because someone knows how to listen
autumn gives birth to sensitivity
***
wife licks the spring wind
puddles of clouds cut in half
first part for death
second part for waiting for death
and the mirror is cracked
and the cracks are mirrorfull
the future is spreading over the sunday pan
the sun ripens like an apple
snakes twist like vines
the past burns out in the corner of the trash bin
cigarettes are the thing of the present
time flows off cheek like spit
birdsong awakens forgotten memories
lips trying to kiss silence
wife stealthily licks the spring wind
***
The noise that doesn't exist
Nobody came this time
As always
We have no choice but to let our shadows out into the street so that they knock on our door
Knocking on the door - sounds full of desperation
It is clear that there is no one there at the door
Obviously no one will come
***
black ridges of autumn
grow in the pupils of a bird
shot with a gun
***
The bread of black heads is getting stale
Someone is knocking on the door
The aluminum bird breaks all the hinges
Worms devour the remains of flesh
***
Let's pretend there's a blue sky overhead
Let's pretend that we live on a blue planet
Let's pretend that blue blood flows in the pipes
Let's watch the blue cats in the blue cemetery
Let's paint the blue people in the colors of the blue rainbow
Let's turn into blue butterflies on blue bushes
No words can convey the heavy blue sweat on the cheeks of the deceased
***
no one is born without a body
everyone is born without sin
weapons scream at the future dead
people don't fuck with strapons but kill each other with guns
man is a red triangle
the throat of the torn night itches with a ballistic rocket
***
night knocks on the back of the head and breaks the skull with a cast-iron finger
no one rises again
only the cemetery cries at the sight of flowers
flowers in turn dream of living without graves and mourning ribbons
and God's assistant presses the wrong button again
***
no one will crucify Jesus once again
because he will die
on the threshold of a silent tree
on the very first morning
of burning poverty
***
kitten in the red night sleeps motionless
abdominal dreams do not
bother the one who is not to be born
feline cat jesus went on vacation in order
to have a story
dead cat jesus went on vacation
to hang himself
***
the sky screams at the ant
because the ant is insanely small
and prays to the grass
grass is home
grass is glass
glass is a scar that will never heal
***
Dad came from the street and said that the air is red
Is it because the tulips are blooming? I asked my dad as I stumbled over my school bag.
That's why, dad replied.
I came to visit my dad with a bunch of flowers
I said to the grave photo: the air is green now
Is it because the tulips are blooming? - asked the father from the grave
For some reason I kept silent
A bird screamed on a lilac branch
It was still dark around
Morning still hasn't been invented
Reprint: The Wise owl
***
The loneliness of antiquity befell the cemetery
Butterflies played a symphony of heritage with their wings:
They were once in a cocoon
They once cocooned themselves
They were once their own parents
Flowers tickle themselves with playful wings
How much is the life of a butterfly if thanks to a butterfly spring comes and the cemetery lives again?
Reprint: The Wise owl
***
The sky is strangled without a noose
The word death is almost the same as the word deal
Who knows how to control death?
How competently does someone use their talent?
Body that belongs to Nobody
In the middle of the road, the body that was allowed to go to waste
Where does the unpronounceable road lead?
The gold of the red walls scratches the throat
Where does the path lead us along the night?
Black mother-of-pearl coffins underground
The wooden vision of a dead man blooms like a rose
Nobody knows what the word dead means
And overhead the black sky
And overhead the dawn of darkness
Reprint: The Wise owl
***
The child is looking for bruises
The child is looking for knees
The child is looking for legs
The child is looking for a torso
The child is looking for himself
A broken ladder rushes upwards
Reprint: Тriggerfish critical review
***
The weather forecast deceived
Tears instead of rain
Nobody is resurrected
Dahlias have blossomed
In every petal a breath of air
In every breath of air
God was called by his patronymic
Couldn’t imagine it as a feminine
They believed in God according to the national
Calling a patch of unfortunate land a state a country
Ripe apples in the garden
And tomato juice floated through the veins
In the spring, lips kiss
Because they can’t stand their ugliness
The weather forecast deceived
In the spring, bones come down on the grass
And nothing happens
Reprint: Тriggerfish critical review
***
belly torn in half by the birth of love
I'm leaving you kissing your leaving shadow
distance is the castle in which I placed myself
my love is your gift to me
you kiss in the dark with others and then fuck and I'm happy for you
you will forever remain unimaginably beautiful on the other side of the castle
I build distances so as not to harm you with my love
we say goodbye to each other like trains that never dare to approach each other
you will love and be able to make anyone happy
you can give anything but not to me
Reprint: Ouch!
***
Three fingers crushed us with emptiness
A knot has wrapped the air around my neck
The alarm siren and explosion fatigue are drawn to the eyes
We fuck like corpses that will never be separated from each other again
Reprint: Ouch!
The Painter
The compact red book I ran around with:
Crowley’s Book of the Law. I was goaded
into knowledge that a reckoning was at hand.
An archetypal Goddess had manifested as
a tactile reality in my life. An image had been
seared into my mind; a painting called The Vessel;
it was hers, & yet I was a married man. The only
path forward that tempestuous autumn of ‘01 was to
cheat. The book laid down a gauntlet of what
it meant to act in the world with a genuine sense
of destiny; to be a man who had the mettle to be
a real force of nature. She knew, my wife, that I
had been possessed, & that winds were blowing
me in a new direction, towards the forbidden.
I had, it seemed to me, no choice. The night I
spent with the painter, in a studio in PAFA, I
discovered what it meant to have a hinge to
true will about matters of the heart. She kept
paintings there, of Dionysus & Apollo, & she
would make me a myth, too. We shared red
wine that had the effect of being blood between
us; our chalice was the air, the sound of water
pipes late at night in an old building, darkened
corridors meant to hold only us, bathrooms
which could be used as portal-ways into starry
worlds. As I gathered steam, I felt the book
hover in the air as well, a piece of text writ in
boiling blood, pummeling towards spring.
Adam Fieled is a writer based in Philadelphia. His books include Equations, Cheltenham, Apparition Poems, Beams, and Opera Bufa. A magna cum laude graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, he edits the journal PFS Post.
My mother
In the bosom of the nine moons,
My honorable mother who gave birth to me.
Nurtured in a warm embrace,
My kind, loving companion.
Her eyes shine with joy,
The kindest, innocent world.
She builds a castle of flowers in your heart,
She prays in every word.
Of course, intentions will be answered.
I will take you to Hajj, my shining jewel.
Thank you, thank you a thousand times,
My pain, my pleasure, my confidante, my mother.
Murodova Muslima Kadyrovna was born on June 29, 2010 in Jondar district of Bukhara region. Currently, she is a 7th grade student at school No. 30 in this district. Her first poem was published in 2024 under the name "Come beautiful spring." She won the 2nd place at the festival held in the district. She won the 1st place in the district stage and the 2nd place in the regional stage of the "Bakhtim Shul: Zulfiyasiman Uzbek" contest. Her first anthology was published by the UK publisher Justfiction Edition.
About this Whole Nature vs. God “Thing”
I recall it now, in a time of plague.
I was in love with someone.
Who it was is rather beside the point.
I loved her and she loved me, that much I remember. If it was the person I am with now, then the story makes no sense to me. That love is still good. And I associate the story with a fall. So, I am pretty sure it was a failed love. That we loved each other, but that something went wrong.
What happened, which was not the terribly wrong thing that took away our love, was this:
We went to a ballet. It was almost that simple.
Other people went with us, friends, family members, they all joined us. We had enough tickets, that we all sat in a row, alongside one another.
I had family there, she had family there.
I had friends there, she had friends there.
We both were surrounded by other people.
I hated and hate the ballet.
It felt like something forced upon me, like life itself.
What I mean is, metaphorically, no one chooses to be born.
But once born . . . we choose to live.
I did not want to be there, but, there I was.
And during the entire show, I only remember two corresponding sensations, which, combined, informed me about something . . . taught me something about this experience I never would have chosen to live through.
To my left, I felt, repeatedly, an elbow in my ribs, and, whenever I turned, the person to my left kept saying, repeating, “Look at that DANCE!”
To my right, I felt, repeatedly, an elbow in my ribs, and, whenever I turned, the person to my right kept saying, repeating, “Look at that DANCER!”
So I, listening to both of them, trying to learn from both of them, how I might best enjoy this living experience, looked at what we were all there to witness and experience.
And I kept seeing the same thing.
Whether I looked to the Dancer, or to the Dance.
It all looked the same to me.
Aren’t Judas I just perfect, given the money?
I give my money to the brewers of the world because they are truly great human beings. Still it does me no good for answers when I question almost daily the accident of my life, sitting in my apartment loft, reading Henry Miller, staring at my diplomas, wondering about my father, whose first job was holding live pigs’ hind legs, while the animal doctor cut there, or my father, whose last job was holding stock, or wondering about my mother, whose first job was teaching special children, or whose last job was teaching her children.
My life does me no good for answers, petting two cats, one named for disappearing, one named for being seen, or listening to music – name the genre –or sitting next to a well-lit globe outlining already outdated countries – the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, all other countries all running their mortal course, including our own, or typing on an outdated machine, one worth more than a third world income, or wondering why these thoughts of mine do not inhabit another – a Muslim woman burning alive in more than the sun for being unveiled, a child of a disappeared Pole in a forest near white Russia, a South African miner, ass daily probed, giving the merry widow its glow, a rubber worker from Indonesia, his grandfather killed in 1965, in the uprising, an American nun, who taught sharing – that’s what she called it – in South America, now somewhere in its Incan ground, or a revolutionary living in a world without accidents of fate . . . or wondering . . . hung up, if he loved Mary, because he could, or if he loved her instead because he could not . . .
The money that pays the next bills, it gives no answer, no clue, doesn’t it, as I give it to the brewers of the world . . .
this well-lit, mortal world?
Because
They raised the children to be unkind because the world was unkind
because they raised the children to be unkind because the world was
unkind because they raised the children to be unkind because the
world was unkind because they raised the children to be unkind be-
cause the world was unkind because they raised the children to be un-kind because the world was unkind.
