We Rushed
to the sound of broken
water and crashing streams.
A thundering knock
at the door, early morning. These
are the pools we stepped in.
For too long I’ve spent too much
time puttering on things that just don’t
matter, trying to peddle my goods.
Time to stop applying a metric
to my faith – good, better, best –
Just be.
It’s enough.
Really.
Gaming the System
Forget the trees
Outside my door a moment.
I was seeing the bright colors
Of future worlds by the time
I was ten. In the films I watched, I met
Cities and skyscrapers.
Batman saved my reading life.
In the video games I played, I found
The ability to hop into new worlds, and leap
Over unfamiliar obstacles.
In those days, we had to level up,
You started back at the home screen if you
Stopped the game. No re-spawning.
So, my days were spent trying to beat
A boss – then starting back at square one,
Over and over.
How many days, wrapped in blizzards,
Did I spend navigating a digital character
Through a video snow.
There is Space
where space should be.
This poem is not about
rockets, I assure you.
There is a wondering
absence where there really
is not absence. Am I
an arm, a mind, an interconnected set
of thoughts and instruments
moving ensemble
what is my motion
my e motion
what is my work
life, work life
the continuation, the
meaning.
I Have Tried
too long to brace verdant reality,
bunching up worries into an
easy-to-follow guide,
warnings whispered on websites,
and more time, time
to linger longer in the quiet,
stillness of the waters that pass,
decorated with litter.
Now, I linger again in the
stillness of this time, unsure
of where the world goes from
here. Hopeful. Realistic.
Almost a year ago, I lay
on my back as I do today,
different purposes, new reasons,
lack of reason.
I thought of what would
be ahead, framing moments
of trust
in unseen figures. A constant
hope.
Weeks earlier, I accepted
a new path that would
come to reality.
I try to know myself,
thinking, reading, believing
in bright promises ahead.
I sought connecting
as I wait for warmer
weather.
Others See Me As
warrior
mentor
soul friend
collaborative writer
Appalachian scholar
supportive
attentive leader
one with kind eyes
dependable
covenant partner
educator
sincere
one who invited
healing.
I am only one person
making a way
in the world,
mindful of footprints,
seeking
true words and actions.
New Pathway
beginning of a forest,
dogs trotting ahead in the path,
fresh air adjusting leaves
like ornaments around me,
warmth of summer
years ago, remembered again
point of a branch, and I know
I’ll return here soon
again and again, and never leave
as I once did.
Preserving the silent world.
There is
a space where
space should be,
there is a wondering
absence where they really
is no absence. A hollow
that is filled but still echoes.
Am I an arm,
a mind, an interconnected set
of thoughts and instruments
for making syllables and other
sounds.
What is my motion
my emotion
what is my work
life, work-life,
where are those boundaries
now?
the continuation, the meaning,
as days stack up.
I want to be a better
teacher, a voice that’s honest
a clear teacher of teachers.
Poetry from Vyarka Kozareva
INTERPRETATION Of course, We all could condone any vitriol Spilt on the rifts of the long hibernation. The flesh seems fresh than conjoined For those who want to believe it. You see it banal from the space Between your index and thumb. The night is blank sentence, Projected perfectly onto the medulla oblongata Where The vector of light pokes the horizon To trace the core of the cross. HAPPY BIRTHDAY The top layer swanks creamy Decorated with an arty-farty cut lemon body Ornated and candied, More aesthetic than functional. Nobody knows and wouldn’t ask If some hours ago The acid juice splashed its hangman’s pink skin, Innocent, Seeking dormant wounds To nip. ADVENT I try to imagine my curbed ego, The marking commas, the restrictive brackets. I knew the coin’s been already thrown For a voice which grammar has many cogent rules. The new beginning would be inky, Far from all those pastel-painted frames With empty rooms fostering pastorali In stuffed poultry hearts. The real blood never puts artless colors on its pride. From the chandelier fell too much of words Keeping silence about the profit of being mortal. I tried to discern the salt in the wound, bugs on the face Worn promises, Holly knowledge. I regret losing my taboos in remission of sins But the new me still has time to slip into my old Long haired coat Because the snappish winter is coming close. REVIVAL Morning is tiptoeing over to the window Like a cat Descending the tree of wishes Head first To see all ghosts off Too modest in their self-knitted hats And backs heavy with the weight of the tenderness. Interjections wait woven into the soggy day. Lungs implore more oxygen. Movements set a Morse code rhythm Flirt with coffee steam Dance under the wind’s baton On the garnished with fine mica flakes pavement. From the crowd’s sleepy orbits Protrude huge, perplexed, yesterday‘s question- marks. CORROSION IS IN FASHION We are charming in ochre, scarf-styled, Radiating that exceptional dress sense While fall is parading its paradigms. The warmth of gold is already proven Out of time arguments When the taste for art mimics the lack of logic In the global language. Sometimes we wonder If the closed societies undergo attitudinal changes. In fact, silk on wool presents fond delusion in rainy days. That world’s hurly-burly, A storage of nonsense we use to feed scraggy wars Pretending that they’re somewhere far In order to satiate our nonchalance And quell any inner disturbances. Happy hypocrites we are If believe in the grace of the swan neck Garlanded with luxurious plumage. Beneath the camouflage— the wormy throat.
Poetry from Chris Daly
The Comeback The big trucks roll in and out all day and the gulls on the dump don’t know them any more from St. Francis. There are hundreds of them fluttery and imperturbable orgying on the donations of 400,000 citizens. Ugly on the ground they look like overfed pigeons with skinnier legs if that’ possible & with heads like Edward Everett Norton but when they spread those long wings there is a grace the eye does not resist. There are so many that it’s scary at first but they don’t give a shit (hopefully) about visitors, another truck comes in they swirl about in their somewhat flipped out fashion this set up being too easy and maybe you start feeling a little flippy too. The garbage men get two holidays a year which they make up the following saturdays. The birds have been there for years. Archimedes at the Wedge two sumo size guys sitting with the great stillness of the huge another somewhat noisy somewhat sizable guy with ugly hair & no definition big lower lip many years at the beach one other large mostly muscled guy with the best hung-over drawl about the tangle of the last few days’ parties and these gentlemen misshapen to various degrees are deferred to by the trim and the less seriously physical. off at a distance families demolish boxes of donuts. a dreamy woman almost gets sucked to her death, a guy with stitches shows up. one of the sumos has disappeared but one shoots across a short high left face half his body out of the water holding up the world. Terminal Island (a fond look back) The sailors come from off the sea The porno movies for to see I take them there for a small fee Because I am a cabbie, a cabbie. They also go dive-hopping And on suitcase-buying sprees. $4.10 into town, or if you have 5 horny greeks, $4.50, or 3 insane Bostonians, their wives with season tickets to arthur fiedler (whose dead, I think), $4.30. But I like it out there. The driving is fast and reckless, The air feels good. The ships are platonic, The ship’s whores doubly so. The company supplies the tires, The sea provides rumor And inference. Nude beach When you come over the bluff And look down into the cove It looks like sand When you get there It turns out to be millions Of small rocks Which leave red marks on your ass Which look like sunburn From a distance Loudmouths and quiet lookers With salty dried-out hair Girls with stones for eyes & tits that are pointy guys dive off rocks and try to keep from being sucked by the current into the cave flesh everywhere but not a stiff prick in sight people stand on the side and shout to the divers “stay on the surface” beach at trouville 1873 the sand is behaving itself the smoke is beautiful in the clear air dress is formal, boater for the men buss & parasol for the ladies no one is lonely or trying to get picked up marriages have reached the here-we-are stage, the hair is dark, not grey the beach socially is just being discovered and the feeling is somewhat like a movie set la mer is vaguely paid attention to less than say boats on it we are all fairly fucking cool thank you later our teeth will be pulled and freudian psychology revealed with a national twist and a slight yawn but now it’s the morning of light the sand is being so good the heels are clicked together hard to tell shape of ass under those large skirts but the waist is a general guide the weather is perfect and it’s the most perfect day of a fairly perfect year tahiti in tails a cole porter level of charm there is no food and the wine is not in sight the wind is excellent there are no numbers or letters visible (being in the picture they cannot see the artist’s signature but if they could they wouldn’t change a thing) of course everywhere is a seminal dream as we existing prove we’ve only lost the charm the style the clothes the light and control of the sand
Poetry from Andrew Cyril Macdonald
Insides of mausoleums
i
Shapes shifted
blue (turquoise endeavored)
to the favorite bar
our constant devotion what
stumbles across them the
distant voices once heard if
hereafter recollected,
existents of a higher plane
every body talks of—
this no man’s land
a graveyard
sought for if retrogressive.
ii
Type doors
to faded sepulchers
spectraled silhouettes align with,
bundle what light makes
(ancestral, important)
in tombs
windows encase them,
cutting the distance to climb of
their paradise eternal
a squared room
contorts it.
iii
Sky’s throw
the distance that covers
closed sets of harvest
(once and for all)
if consequents of choices
stand tall to accuse of
some Other’s vision
this room stocks it while
perennial graces
alabaster
herein triumphs.
Andrew Cyril Macdonald considers the role of inter-subjectivity in poetic encounter. He celebrates the confrontations between self and Other and the challenges that occur in moments of injustice. He is founding editor of Version (9) Magazine, a poetry journal that implicates all things theoretic. You can find his words in such places as A Long Story Short, Blaze VOX, Cavity Magazine, Don’t Submit, Experiential-Experimental Literature, Fevers of the Mind, Green Ink Poetry, Lothlorien, Nauseated Drive, Otoliths, Synchronized Chaos, Unlikely Stories and more. When not writing he is busy caring for seven rescued cats and teaching a next generation of poets.
Poetry from Alan Catlin
Gladys always said, “Beware of what you dream. Ignore those visions if you must, but remember, these things have a habit of coming back to haunt you.” I don’t know what she based this kind of assessment on but, more often than not, she was right. Not long after this warning I had a dream that Gladys and I were in grave danger in some dark and threatening place. She died but I did not. Unfortunately, I ignored the dream.
After she left, I began seeing all kinds of people I knew who were dead. She said this might happen. Most of them were illusions or cases of mistaken identity. I wondered about the others.
Once the rain began, it was impossible to see the path forward or back. After a while, even up and down were getting confused. I felt as if I was in the up-escalator dream where all the stairs had stopped moving and all the lights in the tunnel had gone out. The air was stifling. It felt thick and smothering like a wool blanket that scratched the skin and burrowed its way into your throat. There was no point in trying to move. There was no place to go. Awake. Or dreaming.
Weathered stone. The way is blocked by weathered stones. Not exactly like a wall. Like what? A path where stones grew instead of grass or weeds. Stones that had sharp, ponied edges. Peaks sharp as knife blades, slippery with moss and mold that glowed in the incipient moonlight. These weathered stones. That moaned as they grew, aching as they cut through the gumline of the earth like teeth with nowhere else to go.
The shy is septic. An open untreated, suppurating wound too long left to fester. The fluids formerly trapped inside are leaking out like rain. I’m sliding on the black ice that covers everything the rain has touched. It’s like walking on sheets of motor oil, something that is both solid and frozen at the same time but impossible to move on. If I don’t relocate, I will adhere to where I am. Become a misshapen ice sculpture in a greasy downpour. Waking up here is unthinkable.
Cento Derived from the Titles of ‘Erasure’ Poems by John Dorsey
Taken from the Work of Everette Maddox
I can see morning
Good things
Autumn trees
A row of lights
Railroad tracks
Oh world
For years you have noise
Frozen morning
A small yard
Dogs barking in some poor home
It’s all puddles
Neon bar
My boxers drink Gin
My sister dubbed the booze
Get drunk
Falling off a bar stool
Stay drunk
I can’t pour piss
Sweating comfort
I ain’t drinking orange juice
Everybody dies topless
I watched dog days
Hot Pearly Gates of the Confederacy
I threw the whole telephone book
Clouds brooding ah yes
My friend kissed my ass
I’m near an old radio
Murderous rock n roll
Heaven, hell, or Birmingham
The last day
Short story from Santiago Burdon
When I was a kid I got invited, to my buddy Marty's Bar Mitzvah, it was for his thirteenth birthday, his parents were throwing him a big party, to celebrate a rite of passage, ya see Marty was a Jew. I told my parents and was so excited, the Bar Mitzvah was at Shedd's Aquarium Downtown Chicago, my Old Man said he didn't care, if it was at fucking Disneyland, I wasn't going, and forget about being friends with Marty, he didn't want him hanging around, ya see Marty was a Jew. I was more than disappointed, I was righteously pissed off, the only reason he had for not letting me go was because of his religion, ya see Marty was a Jew. His family didn't seem to mind that I was a Christian, you're telling me that's why I can't go, what's so bad about being a Jew, my mother put in her two cents worth, did you know Jews don't believe in Jesus, what does that have to do with anything, why does it matter, maybe Jews don't believe in Bigfoot, it's not a logical reason, I knew somehow in some way Jesus would get involved, why in the hell would Jesus care if Marty was a Jew, and there's more pressing world issues Jesus should be attending to, hold on here just one minute, you both have your facts mixed up, you don't want me to be friends with Marty or go to his Bar Mitzvah, just because of who he doesn't worship, Marty is a Jew Yet we go to church every Sunday, except the Old Man, and pray to Jesus, who died on the cross for our sins, and both of you should be grateful he did, because what I'm about to say, you may find it hard to believe, I guess you forgot this Messiah named Jesus, or maybe you just never knew, I read it in the Bible, so I'm sure it must be true, ya see Jesus just like Marty, was a Jew.
Poetry from Nathan Anderson
Sugar Window
it [comes]
[tripping]
[tripping]
[tripping]
DOWN THE...
#####################
along again along with machine
a marching band
and a
H*O*R*S*E
quaalude to take the cake
the wheel has come off the
[FIT]
[FIT]
[FIT]
[FIT]
######################
###############
#########
.
.
.
Nebulous Time[stamp]
////////////////////////////////////
////////////
////////
////////////////////
this is the sound of THUNDER (something)
only on the better
spring
clouded
semaphore
semaphore
semaphore
semaphore
[[[barked down in
nightdress as the soldier
grovels with
lids in the basket]]]
WHAT A case:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Insubstantial Lamplight Callisthenics
hoof and
hhhhhooooooooopppppppppp
waging on the shore
B
L
A
N
K
MISS-ALIGNED
[soup][swing]
!
the coast is cold
&
volume is apprehension
&
&
&
.
.
.
Glass [half] cut [half]
brother can you spare a...aluminium aluminium aluminium...
a constant swab of...falalalala...how much is the cash back...
long long long long long long long...sheepskin rug...I
bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb
uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu
bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb
uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu
!!!
and the same to you
/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
////////////////////////////////////////
////////////////////////////////////////////
--lift--[to say it[[
--left--[leg[[to say it[[
--lift--[to say it[[
--right--[leg[[to say it[[
ARRANGE IT ALL AGAIN
Anxiety Measure (wa wa)
consignment
ever
t
h
i
s
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
a l
i
n
e
in the
u
p
p
e
r
c
a
s
e
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
crustacean
i want my elbows back
i want to stand in summer
i want a nightdress and a telephone
i want
i want
i want
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
w
a
n
t
what
you've
..................
..................
..................
Bio: Nathan Anderson is a poet from Mongarlowe Australia. He is the author of Mexico Honey, The Mountain + The Cave and Deconstruction of a Symptom. His work has appeared in Otoliths, BlazeVox, Beir Bua and elsewhere. You can find him at nathanandersonwriting.home.