BREATH I go through from inside to the outside deck via the automatic doors of an impossibly large ship. Just beyond handsome wooden slats beige that meet white painted wrought iron dividers topped with a teak rail, are nothing but waves, the waves of the salt sea. I sit down and watch the horizon line. Some birds appear birds that are tropical and that follow the ship. I wonder then where and when they rest, and it puzzles me. I sit in a chair with faded orange cushions. A woman comes out and her dress is long and is a print decorative and unapologetic. The wind makes it to dance. I wish I had a camera, she says, because I would get you take a picture of me. My dress is part of the wind and I look like a bird. Can I sit next to you? I don’t want to bother you. Sure. The woman says she is from the Carolinas now, but lived most of her life in New York City. I am no Southern Belle. Her intonation denotes that she is not below such, but rather more expansive, even cosmopolitan. She remains on my left. A man approaches from the right but I don’t see him. She does. She says to him, You are one fine man. I have had my eye on you. And what a head of hair. Every time I lay my eyes on you I can’t take them off. Other men just don’t compare. I look over, turning my head right to a forty five degree angle. He is a bit shy. He has flyers in his hand and is smoking a cigarette. I handed out these flyers advertising a party and I put the wrong information and now I have to go around and hand out the new ones. A pain. But I’ll get it done. He takes a long drag of smoke into his lungs and exhales. The woman and I look at him and then glance out to the sea. By the way, he says to me, pointing to a table messy with wine glasses and beer bottles, an industrial strength ashtray with half its metal lid missing, I don’t know you but wanted to mention that you handled yourself really well in the midst of that fiasco last night. My husband and I were watching the whole thing. Bravo. Admirable. I have no idea what he is talking about because he has mistaken me for someone else, which is a pattern, which is something that happens often. Thanks but it wasn’t me. I wasn’t even near here. He is surprised. I breathe in smoke. The woman breathes in smoke. He breathes in smoke again. We are all thinking. Say, I say, What was it all about anyway? Sounds intense. Abortion. Abortion? Ya. There is a group of women here that think the new anti abortion laws are great. I could hardly believe it from anyone, but from women makes it worse in my mind. I was so angry. He is political. The non-Southern Belle with the beautiful dress nevertheless says something but I can’t make it out for a gust of wind, wind somehow like a breath exhaled by the sea skies. I am generally apolitical, though I have a few ideas here and there that lean left. I let them talk. He listens to her and is upset about something and then voices his disagreement... They continue on though and are friendly but there is still some problem. Yet, they seem to find common ground on other things, more than not. Their voices fade out. I am thinking. I wonder what will happen if someone mistakes me for a person other than one that had a gift of oratory in debate, or attended an information technology training weekend, or someone who worked construction in the north of towns for a company that I, in reality, had never even heard name of. I wonder some more, about other things similar that have also happened, like the man who identified me as the person who Did not deserve one bit what Lisa and them did to you…no way, not you, who is a good guy and they are wicked evil and I am sorry you had to go through that.. I don’t know any Lisa or group like that. But so far the reviews of the persons that are not me but look like me are good reviews. I wonder what would happen if some authorities approach and say simply, Can you come with us please, and though it is a question on paper, is not a question in real life but a statement, and I have been mistaken for someone who did something, well, bad, untoward. Two men come out and sit beside me on the right. One is of German descent. He told me this before. He chews on his cigar. I am a fisherman, from California, he says, as if simply continuing a days old conversation. There are many rules where I come from, about fishing, I offer. If you get caught out of season they can impound your car, your boat, basically anything. That’s right. Where I go also it is the same. Your Canada country population can fit into my California by the way. And, he puts his hand in front of him to help his point, and makes a gesture of some sort, There are rules for a reason, and they should be obeyed. It’s to protect the poor fishies. I laugh inwardly at hearing this big and otherwise tough guy, chewing on the thickest cigar I have ever seen, say, ‘fishies,’ instead of ‘fish’. Beside him I see another man. His face and affect, clothing and something about his general aura remind me of an old friend who committed suicide. Joseph Campbell said that once you reach over thirty everyone you meet will remind you of someone else you already met. True enough. And then what about fifty? What happens then? Maybe unless you are an extrovert, you don’t want to meet anyone else. This man looks like the suicide had he lived another decade or two. The man wears a collar shirt, a golf shirt or something close to one. Non-descript haircut, average height and weight if there are such things. I sense he is not an asshole though, but rather an okay guy. The suicide was also kind, especially as the world goes. Golf shirt is thoughtful but thinks about worldly things. He is talking to someone on his right about points, aero plan, miles, and he keeps glancing at his phone. This mediocrity consumes many people, perhaps the majority. I breathe deeply, drawing the tropical air as if right to my stomach. Then I take a drag of nicotine and chemicals in smoke and bring them just as deeply in. I don’t really want to talk to any of these people, one way or the other, but there is nowhere else to go to smoke. Its hard maintaining, to coin a phrase, ‘lonership,’ upon a ship. Someone apparently caused a fire on a balcony and there is no smoking any longer on such personal outdoor spaces. Everyone pays for the sins of one. Plus it’s gotten late, and alcohol is a strange thing, - it loosens the mind otherwise inhibited and lubricates the lips. People say things they otherwise would not. I don’t know that I want to see or hear or know what waits dormant in most peoples’ minds and behind their lips. The ship continues at eighteen to twenty knots, but it feels much faster than that in my guts and blood and bones. Maybe I am too sensitive, empathic towards the immediate and not so immediate environment. Luckily, a song sounds, and it’s Fleetwood Mac. It’s somehow soothing, a calm against the cacophony. Almost everywhere I go, they play Fleetwood Mac, because there is something universal about it all. I listen. I listen then to Stevie Nicks as she sings Dreams, Oh, thunder only happens when it’s raining Players only love you when they’re playing The wind picks up. A storm is beginning but they don’t close the area. The man with the exemplary hair excuses himself and goes inside. I am back with the bird-dress lady, who is kind and articulate, animated and eccentric and quite beautiful, statuesque. She speaks of many things seemingly at once. America. The Black experience. Diasporas. Education. Employment. Travel. Relationships. Even diet and nutrition. And hens, ‘Hens,’ which I sought clarification on, and was her designation for women that, as she put it,… talk gossip, talk cheap talk, talk nothing but shit and lies about others, people that spread darkness and not light, not realizing that their darkness is going to come back and visit them double-fold in time… It begins raining hard. That warm tropical rain. The wind pushes it into the deck area. We stand up together. She is tall by any metric. But I am taller. She asks me if she can hold my arm to go inside, and it is windy, for the breath of nature has become much more pronounced. I guide her inside at her request. Where is the woman’s washroom, she asks. I don’t know. I know the men’s is here. But I have never gone to the woman’s washroom. She walks with me to the stairs and I ask her if she will be okay to find one. Yes. I ascend the steps and she disappears down a hallway. I would normally offer to help her a bit more, to get there, but I have then begun worrying about many things, half formed fears, mistaken identities and the faulty perception of people, even of good people. I was thinking of storms, of politics and division, of life and no life, of health problems and health care, of alcohol, tobacco, and vessels that travel in the night through tropical storms strong. At the top of the steps I was not out of breath, yet I paused and took a deep breath anyhow. Then I began to make my way to my room, walking alone under one green electrical sign after another that illumined the way. I could feel the ship rocking back and forth more than usual, a ship perhaps five or seven stories high and housing more than three thousand people. The night storm had gathered so much strength by then that I could hear the winds whistling even from the inner corridors of the boat. They sounded like spirits calling out diatribes, rhetoric, pleas, strange joys plus metaphysical pains and warnings, all songs and long wild unabridged strange poems in the middle of a living dream. It all mixed together in my brain and spirit, and I thought of the sea and its vast expanse, of the Atlantic, the Caribbean, of how it rains, the sometimes pregnant sky birthing endlessly through time and cycle its own waters, and how the wind often takes these and places them everywhere, blows them with a breath, and they land sometimes in drips and drops like tears across and down windows, mostly never seen or noted, but having existed nevertheless. There are spirits simply everywhere, and I think to myself then that many of the dead so-called are more alive than the living.
Poetry by Duane Vorhees
To deflesh, the shaman, the seer, the mystic lacerates, purges, starves, punishes, isolates the body of the self. The poet, inventor, entrepreneur concentrates the body of the self on the solution of a problem like a laser microscope, to deflesh. An ordinary, to deflesh, removes from the flesh of the body by reading, by dreaming, by jogging, by gaming, by giving, by loving. SACRIFICES, ALL That pilot brags about the size of his payload and he forgets about chasing a horizon. He imagines himself to be a volcano. Will you permit yourself, then, to be the virgin? Oh, those gladiolas that brightened Pilate’s halls, like those gladiators, distractions from trials. RICHARD FIRST Across geographies maintaining emperors by cults and soldiery has been a commonplace matter of procedure against the populace. Richard had good PR since he was popular among the troubadours. And today, presidents who can stay in power are liked by journalists. SIGNS The philosophers, poets, and scholars, workers of the mind, invented Mankind. They made Being firm by creating terms and categories, the mythic stories, right words and patterns: They shaped God Saturn and then mere planet: Elements: Senates: Beauty: Gram: Language: Society: Beige: History; Prisms: Patriotism: Sin: Geography: Self: Heredity: Time: The unconscious..... The list is endless. These concepts define our world by their signs. THE CONJUGATION OF AGING Years are no series of jumps across gulfs. We pass through life on a conveyor belt, paying little notice to the timelets that pace our course on the running machine. We only slowly accept we're the guests of Is, Are, Was, Were, Be, Being, and Been. Our exercise machine slows then ends before we realize we've reached the When.
Poetry from J.J. Campbell
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ the neon nights of my youth listening to an old elton john song thinking of the neon nights of my youth where the drugs lifted me to endless heights where the drinks made me invincible where women seemed to still be interested where the yellow brick road seemed like it was still possible it always existed ------------------------------------------------------------------- drink for courage some people drink for courage and others are trying to cope with the pain of life some like to unwind and others think of the magical powers they suddenly posses i find it more likely these days that i'm drinking to hopefully end all of this way sooner than the powers that be intended plus, arthritis has made it rather difficult to hold a gun or tie a fucking noose so, it's either the bottle or a good hose and some duct tape when the bottle stops helping to write these poems be kind enough to check my garage if you don't hear from me for a few days ------------------------------------------------------------------- the retired life two cups of coffee fall asleep in the sun like a cat i tell my mother to enjoy the retired life she doesn't can't come to terms with getting older and not being able to do certain things alone i'm always there to help even though most of the time she doesn't bother to ask i tell her pride will kill her faster than any disease --------------------------------------------------------- wars have been fought over less soft brown skin years of regret a lover's lament it was us against the world now we can't see past each other to accomplish anything wars have been fought over less and no matter how much either side wants to give in and let the calm set in pride and the ego always get in the way a lack of communication will be the end of us all ------------------------------------------------------- the smallest nugget of joy you ever noticed the death poems come easy but how you languish over the page for love for happiness for even the smallest nugget of joy but death that cold reality the cruel mistress that always laughs at your pain it's the old routine or perhaps you always understood that death was always a part of life just a part that most are unwilling to talk about or even consider
J.J. Campbell (1976 – ?) is old enough to know better. He’s been widely published over the last quarter century, most recently at The Rye Whiskey Review, Disturb the Universe Magazine, Carcinogenic Poetry, Lothlorien Poetry Journal and Horror Sleaze Trash. You can find him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (https://evildelights.blogspot.com)
Poetry from Judge Santiago Burdon
Bad Habits and Old Addictions Just when I think I've finally lost them Convinced they'd never find me again. There's a knock at my door Heavy fists pound harder and louder Yelling for me to let them in Bad Habits and Old Addictions Constantly ringing the doorbell. The Ding-dongs wakes up my weakness The flaws in my willpower now exposed To the uninvited influence wearing down my resistance Bad Habits and Old Addictions I buried them away years ago Must've dug the grave too shallow They've escaped and returned My resolve losing faith to temptation Bad Habits and Old Addictions Our association never matured into a friendship More of an acquaintance of inconvenience at best Stained with bad blood Not one breath of trust Exhaling air of incessant suspicion Bad Habits and Old Addictions Where do I find the courage to tell them I'm more than the sum of my mistakes I'm not the man I once was No longer devoid of self-respect Or a festering scab on God's face Bad Habits and Old Addictions Now my subconscious is questioning my decision Sending them away may be a mistake What's the harm in extending some hospitality After all they've come such a long way I'll tell you why they've gotta get Because one is too many and a thousand is never enough Now head on down the road get your ass out of town Don't ever think of coming back I've fought a long fight to save my soul Surrender no longer an option Confidence in the faith to stay true to my convictions Vete Lárgate Bad Habits and Old Addictions
Denis Emorine’s new poetry collection A Step Inside, translated by Phillip John Usher and reviewed by Cristina Deptula
Denis Emorine’s new collection A Step Inside attacks, blasts, compels, disturbs, and ultimately enchants us with the (quite literal) power of language.
The first section’s poems evoke the psychological and emotional toll the creative process can take, along with its wonderment. We begin with an anecdote where the speaker stabs the disembodied voice of his creative muse when it asks him to write about the woman he loves, then finds blood on his pillow as he has destroyed part of himself (Metaphor). In another memorable piece, the letters of the alphabet literally assault a protagonist (A trap). Other pieces speak to acknowledging inspirations and aspirations one cannot fully reach (Nocturnal), to the havoc creative obsessions can wreak on one’s personal life (Disobedience), to the rejection an artist can face at the hands of the public (Fever) to the struggle to be able to create at all (Face to Face) to the solidarity creative writers can feel for each other (In Solidarity).
Yet, even with these tough-minded renditions of mental turmoil, the beauty, wonder, and ecstasy of the creative process still come through in A Step Inside. Emorine draws upon many of the traditional positive literary metaphors for inspiration: muses, stars, dreams, gardens at night, even in some of his most violent poems. Also, writer protagonists encounter magical moments others miss, including a lively visit with Kafka, climbing up to one’s flat.
The second section, From My Window, consists of longer narratives blurring the lines between artistic performance and seduction. In one, a former live theater tech invites his female neighbor to dress for him in the robes of Greek goddesses. At first reluctant, she embraces the role at the end and chooses to dress as Venus before they consummate their relationship (The Mural). Another story shifts the gender roles, with a male artist undressing in tune with the rise and fall of music and another man watching and discovering his passion for him (The Virgin and the Shadow). In another piece, an old and sick man who comes close to cheating on his wife at a literary conference finds himself instead taking comfort in the memory of her healing touch (Irina) and the final piece, Twenty-One Hundred Hours, involves a chaste intellectual friendship that develops between an older professor and a sex worker who turns out to be a literary student.
This new collection from Denis Emorine explores the different forms creative inspiration can take and the various ways it can shape and revamp our lives. Whether we are alone staring at a blank page in our bedrooms or encountering others at a symposium or theater, we can find ourselves wrestling with the angels of our art.
Poetry from Mesfakus Salahin
Poetry in the Clouds The secret poetry of rain makes melody in the folds of clouds The continuous flow of fountains painted on the mountains Veiled nature's drunken invitation At this time, who will tie the mind floating in the air? The reflection of the heart running in the raindrops Flowers' fragrance walks on a loose path Like a bird that has lost its bond, it does not return to its nest Can't you find love in the crowd of people? A manuscript of a poem swirling in the breeze The notes of love float in the voice of the sky I extended both hands to the water of the horizon line The mind just runs on the pull of who knows who.
Poetry from Mykyta Ryzhykh
*** people don't want to die either in spring or summer prisons are open all year round (Reprint by Dreginald) *** sad clowns die with a smile every time performed on stage (Reprint by Dreginald) *** nightingale staged a night gala every night he flies to my yard even after my death (Reprint by Dreginald) *** torn faces litter torn tracks (Reprint by Dreginald) *** statues also die and time is not easy to consider among all that one in memory of which one today the bells are ringing in the church (Reprint by Dreginald) *** Roar of war Garcia Lorca don't go back to Granada (Reprint by Monterey poetry review) *** summer is a mystery the winter of nuclear war still lives in the heart (Reprint by Monterey poetry review) *** Old-fashioned tragicomedy armor protects the soul with the body and the bombs are flying (Reprint by Monterey poetry review) *** The cemetery under the bed opens at the first request Once upon a time in childhood we were taught to make little men from matches Today we are taught to burn My mother says that life was better under the Soviet Union Someday the future will come, but not now Today we are taught the word "later" (Reprint by Star 82 review, 11.3) *** doctor said that i died and i agreed *** Cardboard Bird Indignant In a raspy voice Doesn’t eat anything Doesn’t drink anything Protests Doesn’t touch anyone Рretending to be the wind Handing out money right and left Imagines himself Image A picture of the postmodern half-life And something else very important I do not remember Maybe wings Could be a beak Maybe a soul Exactly I do not remember (Reprint by Wise Owl) *** I promise that I will take away my painful darkness But not right now I will be able to understand the meaning of this darkness in the future Well for now Give me a chance to die again Cause freedom is loneliness Love is a crime against loneliness (Reprint by Wise Owl) *** I play war games and watch scat on TV My freckles are gone And yes, I will have to pay back the loan for this (Reprint by Corvus review) *** Houston, you're in trouble The gypsy's prediction did not come true And a lot has happened Ever since someone jumped off a bridge The dew from under the eyes has not dried Where did it all go Where does it all go Republic of the Dusk Star Your cold palms sparkling in the sun Whisper that it's very cold The sun has completely faded The universe is tensed up And lives in constant tension around you ever since How someone jumped off a bridge At the same time, they started selling Watermelons have risen in price this year Note: Strengthening the internationalization of economic relations between states and the deformation of the economy are possible causes of inflation, causing food prices to rise (Reprint by Corvus review)