Death of the Teacher

You make for the lobby’s tattered chair,
your spine’s ladder a leash for collarbones
and windmill limbs blocking out the sun
patched with glare that throbs against your eyes
filled with clouds and the shadow of a thread
endlessly snapping, the blinding light stinging  
until you must drop your eyes to the stripe
glowing magenta on the rug which,
if you follow it, might take you out
of this hospital, however many
possibilities braid the unspoken
with the unexplained and hold themselves out
to you as you sit there, sipping the coffee
he left when his name was called, the last thing
he ever drank, and here you are, still drinking it,
cold, trapped inside your own geometry.

 

Calendar


It’s spring. A punk in a convertible lops off all the mail boxes, his tires blistering the road to the exit. It’s summer. The wrecked Mustang, tires blown, sinks into grass rubbery with snakes. A crystal bottle lolls under the front seat. Maybe it’s worth something. It’s fall. Trees have faded to an ambiguous yellow, and the color confuses those of us who have already given up. It’s winter. The car, rusted through. Grass, shagged with ice. There’s a drop of Scotch in the decanter so we’ll drink that first, before we feed the piano to the flames.



Connection

He reaches into the closet. Pulls out the pink silk dress. Takes her in the crook of his arm. Unfastens her robe. Pushes the fabric from her shoulders. Watches it fall to her feet. Sighs. Tugs her onto his lap. Eases her into the dress. Slides it over her lingerie. Zips it up. Notices his tie has come undone. Asks her to knot it for him. Thanks her. Brings her the leg braces to her. Fastens them. Hands her the forearm crutches. Says “you look beautiful tonight,” holding her hand against his chest. Briefly mistakes her fingers for his own.

Frost 

It was a 100 years ago
when Stopping by Woods
on a Snowy Evening 
first appeared in print.
Staring out at the white
mountains on a snowy
morning, I wonder how
much of that beauty is
killing people or wildlife.
I think I know some of
those roads, though I 
cannot see the houses.
I would not want to live
there. The snow and cold
would be too much. It
looks beautiful in films,
the frozen lake, the farm-
house, and starlit evening.
I shake just feeling that 
cold when by mistake I 
leave a window open only
just a bit. The cold wind
fills my bones. The lovely
mountains filled with snow
I see are miles away. I see
them before I go to sleep.



*


Isn’t It Nice?

Whipped cream clouds,
white out stars and moon,
yes, I know, do you?

Calm waves all day,
the red fish bleeds.

Turn up the volume
Mother Earth sings.

Isn’t it nice
that fresh air is free
when you can get it?

Bread is money
and dove is a pacifist,
chocolate, and soap.


*


Hungry Dogs Eating Flowers 

Never set your eyes on the sun
as you lay in the grass facing
the sky. All around you, can you
see and hear the trees suffering?
It keeps me awake most nights.
How much pain can they take?
I keep my eyes on the draperies
that keep out night’s moonlight.
There are things going on in the
fabric, hungry dogs eating flowers.
It takes the weight off my mind.
There are men, women, and children 
dressed as doves and hawks. I 
worry about the flowers being eaten.

Letter in a drawer

We wanted to be there
for you but being
only kids ourselves,
we got caught up
in the riptide of living
in that technicolor
time of sexual
revolution and
tie-dyed, platform shoe
evolution and so
when it came to raising
you and your brothers
and sisters,
there were no
easy solutions
so we let you
go barefoot
and free as the
Santa Ana winds,
knowing that life
is more fun
when you open
the windows and
doors, put on
Peter, Paul and Mary
and let the breeze
blow in
anyway, forgive us
if we weren't the
picture perfect parents
straight out of Life Magazine
that you wished we were
just have some
compassion for our
passion and know
your mama and your papa's
actions might have been
crazy as our family pet
Capuchin monkey
yet our intentions
were always pure



Brushed Shoulders

I always knew you
had that certain something
that can't be taught
or even guided
and that your temperament
was tailor-made in the shade
and that if given the chance
you would harness the forces
of good with a dash of evil
for good measure
and that you would bring
pleasure to the king
and queen and the court of
public opinion
and that for you
the stars would all align
I also knew that when
you reached the top
you would no longer
remember
you were once
a friend of mine



Me of little faith

You'd think by now
I'd live comfortably
without the need
for a great deal of hope
but I still play Lotto
read fortune cookies
as well as dabble
in unanswered prayers
and I often ask others
if they still believe
in the lord
or a lover
and they say
"yes, implicitly"
yet I wish they'd
elaborated explicitly
but I have a respect
for privacy and don't
push it any further
and accept that
people like me
ultimately
end up
alone in a room
with nothing
but a crucifix
and a rosary



Drunk Text 

I can honestly say
I knew you were lying
to me and next to me
at the same time
I was falling for
the character you
were creating from
scratching my back
while putting up a front
of always taking
the middle ground
most of all
I liked having you
around and around
the time we stopped
getting along
I didn't exactly
stop loving our song
I just no longer
needed to sing along
as I drove myself
sane after going
crazy over you
and your quirks
and all the perks
that go with
being in love with
nothing more
than a what if
and so what if
we will never
know what might
have been
because we could
not get past
the future that
will never
ever be seen
look, I didn't mean
to confuse
or use you
I think you know
deep down in
your broken heart
exactly what I mean



It's on me

So much
has happened
since we fought
over who would
pick up the bill
at that five-star
time of our life
and I still have
my head up
in the iCloud
and would rather
Google old loves
than actually call
because I'm
ashamed of being
mortal after all
that buzz around me
back when I was so close
to the big money
I could almost
spend it
anyway, I'll pay
the tab
if you pay
the tip
with one
of your debits
and we can then
stay past the end
of our story
to watch
the credits


Discounting Sheep

This is my story
though I can't
really claim
to be the author
because it was all
as unpredictable as
the weather or a lover
or someone or other
who said something
that discouraged or
encouraged me to
try or give up on
things that might
have made everything
not necessarily
wrong or right
but at least
better than this
mix of happiness
and loneliness
that keeps me
up at night
wondering what
could have or
might have been
better or worse
I think having this
hypersensitive mind
is a blessing
and a curse


Content Discontent

I've held on
to the promise
of a dream
within a fantasy
of a vision
whispered
as a wish
while meditating
upon a vision
of an ambition
and I have yet
to see it
materialize
into something
in the 3D
dimension
within the
context of
the day in
day out
drudgery
that I am really
trying to do
something about
but what bugs me
the most
is that this
leaves me with
absolutely nothing
to post



Bio:

Ivan Jenson is a fine artist, novelist and popular contemporary poet who lives in Grand Rapids, Michigan. 

His artwork was featured in Art in America, Art News, and Interview Magazine and has sold at auction at Christie’s. Amongst Ivan’s commissions are the final portrait of the late Malcolm Forbes and a painting titled “Absolut Jenson” for Absolut Vodka’s national ad campaign. His Absolut paintings are in the collection of the Spritmuseum, the museum of spirits in Stockholm, Sweden. Jenson’s painting of the “Marlboro Man” was collected by the Philip Morris corporation. 

His novels, Dead Artist and Seeing Soriah, illustrate the creative, often dramatic lives of artists. Jenson’s poetry is widely published (with over 1000 poems published in the US, UK and Europe) in a variety of literary media. He has published a poetry book, Media Child and Other Poems, and two novels, Marketing Mia and Erotic Rights. 

Mundane Miracles, his critically acclaimed poetry collection, hit number 1 on Amazon in American Poetry.

Ivan Jenson’s website: www.ivanjenson.com
Twitter: @IvanJenson

Prickly Pear

 


weighing dark matter…

when black one thing out

begs question, what else?

 

 

alley leaf

circling my feet…

rats!

 

 

possession

is nine tenths of the law

know takers taking

 

 

slow unthawing of May

way boomers

talk about theys

 

 

house of

corrections

and misprints 

 

 

 

Bunny Ears

 

flowers log-jam

in the rock bed  

edge of waterfall

 

 

still can’t drink from tap

thankfully, may purchase

for a song

 

 

s w e e t   n o t h i n g s ~ crockpot simmering

 

 

scorpion analogy

chopper hanger-on

gets sudden urge 

 

 

s p a c e   i n v a d e r   l e n g u a   t a c o s

 

 

 

Golden Barrel



gas station fountain… pits and bits, holes and soles

 

 

no points on scoreboard

no lights on scoreboard

why is it even there

 

 

hang up the phone

and quietness sets in

this is being alone

 

 

last naan standoff —

sits untouched

cools

 

 

those who stay

and learn to live with it

Toxicity

 




terracotta head pot

 

    subtracted brain-pan

    in place of neurocranium

    green electricity

    issuing forth evokes Pallas

    and the dark mother

    their parthenogenesis

    eukaryotic organisms

    foreheads’ fertile wombs

    skull cakes

 


 

 

there is something of the game warden

 

to the sheriff – and doctor – still,

who staunchly preserves in the short term

with every intention of their masters’ future slaughter,

field dress, and apportioning of each

swaggering thrush and caribou

Jerome Berglund has many haiku, senryu and tanka exhibited and forthcoming online and in print, most recently in the Asahi Shimbun, Bear Creek Haiku, Bamboo Hut, Black and White Haiga, Blōō Outlier Journal, Bones, Bottle Rockets, Cold Moon Journal, Contemporary Haibun Online, Daily Haiga, Failed Haiku, Frogpond, Haiku Dialogue, Haiku Seed, Ink Pantry, Japan Society, Modern Haiku, Poetry Pea, Ribbons, Scarlet Dragonfly, Seashores, Synchronized Chaos, Time Haiku, Triya, Tsuri-dōrō, Under the Basho, Wales Haiku Journal, and the Zen Space. 

thoughts on artistic success – letter to a friend
By:  Norman J. Olson

thanks for the chapbook about Steve Richmond…  about whom I knew pretty much nothing except that he was mentioned in Bukowski’s biography and was apparently an admirer, emulator and to some degree sycophant of Bukowski…  reading this got me thinking about fame, celebrity and artistic success, whatever that is…

in my many years of involvement with the small press, I have seen many poets come and go…  when I first started publishing, I found it amazing to just be in print…  to have an editor think my poor words worthy of publication…  later, I tried to get into more “prestigious” journals (i.e. those published by university creative writing departments, or respected independents like the Chiron Review)… when that happened, I thought of having a poetry book published…  it seemed to me kind of an exercise in futility to self publish…  but, I did self publish several very small runs of chapbooks including “15 Image Poems”… etc… anyway…  but, I knew these were worthless reputation wise because they did not undergo the scrutiny of an editor…  so, I simply printed twenty or thirty of them and passed them out to acquaintances in the literary press world who were interested in my work…  I must say, that I never had any thoughts of making a living from art/writing… or indeed, any money at all…  

I decided that I would not do a poetry reading unless someone asked me to do one and I would not publish a book of any kind unless an editor asked me too… needless to say, I did few readings and no books…  until a few years ago when a French poet and publisher who liked my work asked me to put together a book so, I did and he published it on the print on demand site LULU…  where it still is, if anybody wants to buy a copy for $4.50 (of which, I get nothing…  LOL)   it is called “44 Image Poems”… I was also asked to put together a book of prose writing which I did for publisher in India and the result is “Writing about Travel and Art plus a few Memoirs of My Rural Childhood”… which you can find at Amazon or Barnes and Noble…

when I first started publishing, I noticed that some of the poets were older and as they started dying, I had the amazing, to me, realization that these poets dropped from the little recognition they ever had into a complete and total oblivion as if they had never existed…  this is even more true today when so many of the journals are on line…  when the journal folds, it disappears like a drop of tar dropped into a black and bottomless abyss… so, when a poet died there was not even the survival of some coffee stained mimeographed journal with his/her words, unread on the shelf of Brown University Library to note the poet’s brief tenancy in this vale of tears…  as the cliché has it, fame (in the literary press world) is indeed fleeting and will not survive the passing of the poet, or even the electronic dissolution of the on line journal that published his/her work…  

Richmond, like so many artists, seems, in spite of his disclaimers, to have had some notion of the importance of art and more especially his art as being some how a big deal…  well, whatever gets you through the night, but during my years of making art and writing poetry, a great many poets and artists have made a lot of art, nearly all of which is mostly worthless as anything other than a brief bubble of artistic ego expansion…  and pretty much all of which will cease to even exist within a few hours of the expiration of the artist/poet, and/or the literary journal in which it was published…

when I was young and wanted desperately to have the local museum of modern art accept my work and put it in an exhibition, other artists, in my case, mostly conceptual artists and identity artists, were having big shows in the spacious white painted galleries of the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis…  well, those “successful” artists from those years are now mostly forgotten and now about as well known as me…. which is to say they are complete failures… and have disappeared from the public eye as if they had never existed… 

but wait…  maybe is success in the arts, some ineffable quality unrelated to celebrity or notoriety or even survival in the public eye?  is it a something that does not need the validation of an editor, gallery manager or indeed any audience at all…  is the true genius like my great uncle who made up symphonies on his guitar while sitting alone in his room, and never performed them in public??  are we all geniuses waiting to be discovered, whether we are discovered or not??    

well, if so, it seems obvious to me that in that case, artistic success is of about the same value as closet masturbation when considered vis a vis the society at large…  this is the nihilist view, I guess and if I really believed this, I would encourage those who attend my passing to celebrate with a large bonfire of all my works…  okay, and I do sometimes think that is what my art will come to and I guess I am okay with that…  I have lived to a ripe old age, have had the rich experience of making lots of poems and paintings that have found a small audience…  so what if I am not a celebrity and so what if my work does not outlast me….  the apex of fame and success in my lifetime career as an artist is the interview of me that was done by the Wilzig Erotic Art Museum a year or so ago which is still posted and which you can see at:  https://www.facebook.com/WilzigEroticArtMuseum/videos/443428413395766/ 

the Richmond article mentions that he was an acquaintance of Jim Morrison, the famous rock star…  more than one person I have personal knowledge of, in the poetry world, delusionally  thinks that he/she should have rock star fame and fortune…  maybe Richmond wanted that kind of fame for himself…  apparently, he tried to earn money from his art, even though he was wealthy and managed to piss away a pretty substantial inheritance… but, in all honesty, almost nobody in the poetry and art world makes any money at all from their efforts much less achieving fame and fortune…  yes, music/poetry artists do achieve fame and fortune if they are talented and lucky enough to become stars…  but, even in that case, despite their wealth and fame, I have lived long enough to see the big stars of my parent’s generation all but disappear…  who listens to Frank Sinatra today??   I was talking to a young person recently and when I mentioned “The Beatles,” she said, “who”…  a very small number of poets from the last fifty years are still studied in creative writing and/or literature programs at colleges and universities, but how many of them are actually bought and read by ordinary readers???  remember that even Bukowski only started making money when he started writing novels and as novelists go, he was certainly never a best seller or a household name…


so, like Richmond and thousands and thousands of our peers, I am an artistic failure…  I never had an actual paying book contract, never had an art show in a big museum, never was paid for a reading…  my work and myself will be forgotten when I am gone except by my loved ones and when they are gone the work will probably all be long since consigned to a dumpster…  I would like to be more successful, but have to admit that the quality of the art and writing probably warrants about the degree of success that I have and at this age (75) I am on the downhill slide and whatever success I would have in this life, I have already had…  (I have read enough artist biographies and autobiographies to know that artists usually overvalue themselves and their art as well as their talent or ability to create “great” art and I refuse to partake in that fallacy!!) 

perhaps the only consolation I have, if any, is that even the most successful of artists and poets are virtually unknown outside of the literary world in one case or the art world in the other… and that we will all, Bukowski, Morrison, Lennon, or Ginsberg…  Huffstickler, Richmond, Jones or Olson …  etc. etc. etc.  be as forgotten as yesterdays bad news, in the case of the famous, in a generation and in the case of the rest of us, the day that we drop over dead.