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. 

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

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.

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

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.

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:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
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:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


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.blog or on Twitter @NJApoetry. Nathan is a member of the C22 collective, you can find more about it at c22press.wordpress.com.

The Ushuaia Rabbit
El conejo de Ushuai 
by Fernando Sorrentino
Translated from the Spanish by Michele Aynesworth
	
I just read this in a newspaper: “After long months of futile attempts and several expeditions, a group of Argentine scientists has succeeded in capturing an Ushuaia rabbit, thought to be extinct for over a century. The scientists, headed by Dr. Adrián Bertoni, caught the rabbit in one of the many forests that surround the Patagonian city. . . .”
	
As I prefer specifics to generalities, and precision to transience, I would have said “in such and such a forest located in such a spot in relation to the capital of Tierra del Fuego.” But we can’t expect blood from a turnip or any intelligence whatsoever from journalists. Dr. “Adrián Bertoni” is yours truly, and of course they had to misspell my name. My exact name is Andrés Bertoldi, and I am, in fact, a doctor of natural sciences, specializing in Zoology and Extinct, or Endangered, Species.
	
The Ushuaia rabbit is not actually a lagomorph, much less a leporid. It’s not even certain that its habitat is the forests of Tierra del Fuego. Moreover, not one has ever lived on the Isla de los Estados. The rabbit I caught – I alone, with no special equipment or help from anyone – showed up in the city of Buenos Aires near the embankment of the San Martín railroad, which runs parallel to Avenue Juan B. Justo where it crosses Soler Street in the district of Palermo.
	Far from looking for the Ushuaia rabbit, I had other worries and was headed down the sidewalk of Juan B. Justo, a bit downcast. It was hot, and I had some unpleasant, not to say worrisome, business to do at the bank on Santa Fe Avenue. Between the embankment and the sidewalk there is a wire mesh fence supported by a low wall; on the other side of the fence, I spotted the Ushuaia rabbit.
	
I recognized it instantly, how could I not? But I was struck by the fact that it remained so still, for this animal is normally jumpy and restless. I thought it might be wounded.
	
Be that as it may, I backed up a few meters, climbed the fence, and lowered myself catlike to the ground. I advanced stealthily, fearing at each moment that the Ushuaia rabbit would take fright, and in that case, who could catch it? It is one of the fastest animals in creation; though the cheetah is swifter in absolute terms, it is not in relative terms.
	
The Ushuaia rabbit turned and looked at me. Contrary to my expectations, however, it did not flee, but kept still, with the sole exception of the silver tuft of feathers that shook as if to challenge me.
	I took off my shirt and waited, stock still and bare-skinned.
	“Easy, easy, easy . . .” I kept saying.
	
When I got close I slowly deployed the shirt as if it were a net, and suddenly, in one quick swoop, I had it over the rabbit, wrapping it up in a neat package. Using the sleeves and the shirttail, I tied a strong knot, allowing me to hold the bundle in my right hand and use my left to negotiate the fence once more and return to the sidewalk.
	I could not, of course, show up at the bank shirtless, much less with the Ushuaia rabbit. Thus I headed home. I have an eighth-floor apartment on Nicaragua Street, between Carranza and Bonpland. At a hardware store I picked up a birdcage of considerable size.
	
The doorkeeper was washing the sidewalk in front of our building. Seeing me bare-chested, with a cage in my left hand and a restless white bundle in my right, he looked at me with more astonishment than disapproval.
	As bad luck would have it, a neighbor followed me in from the street and into the elevator. With her was her little dog, an ugly, disgusting animal. Upon picking up the smell –unnoticed by human beings – of the Ushuaia rabbit, it erupted in earsplitting barks. On the eighth floor I was able to rid myself of that woman and her stentorious nightmare. 
	
I locked the door with my key, prepared the cage, and with infinite care began unwrapping the shirt, trying not to upset, or worse, to hurt the Ushuaia rabbit. However, being shut in had angered it, and when I opened the cage door I couldn’t stop the rabbit from hitting my arm with a stinger. I had sufficient presence of mind not to let the pain induce me to let go, and I finally managed to maneuver it safely back into the cage.
	In the bathroom I washed the wound with soap and water, and, right away, with medicinal alcohol. It then occurred to me that I ought to head to the pharmacy for a tetanus shot, which I did without wasting any time.	
From the pharmacy I went straight to the bank to conclude the cursed business that had been postponed because of the Ushuaia rabbit. On the way back I picked up supplies.
	Since it lacks a masticatory apparatus during the day, the most practical thing was to cut up the food into little pieces and mix in some milk and chickpeas; I then stirred it all together with a wooden spoon. After sniffing the concoction, the Ushuaia rabbit absorbed it with no problem, just very slowly.	Its process of expansion begins at sunset. I therefore transferred the few pieces of living room furniture – two modest armchairs, a loveseat, and an end table – to the dining room, pushing them up against the dining table and chairs. 	Before it was too big to get past the door, I made sure it left the cage. Now free and comfortable, it was able to grow as needed. In this new state, it completely lost its aggressivity, and now became apathetic and lazy. When I saw its violet scales pop out – a sign of sleepiness – I headed for the bedroom, went to bed, and called it a day.	The next morning the Ushuaia rabbit had returned to the cage. In view of this docility, I felt it was unnecessary to shut the door. Let it decide when to be inside or out of its prison.	The instincts of the Ushuaia rabbit are infallible. Every evening it would leave the cage and expand like a fairly thick pudding on the living room floor.	As is well known, its feces are produced at midnight on odd days. If one collects (in the spirit of play, naturally) these little green metallic polyhedrons in a sack and shakes them, they make a lovely sound, with a rather Caribbean rhythm.	To tell the truth, I have little in common with Vanesa Gonçalves, my girlfriend. She is considerably different from me. Instead of admiring the many positive qualities of the Ushuaia rabbit, she thought best to skin it in order to have a fur coat made for herself. This can be done at night when the animal is elongated and the surface of its skin is broad enough that the cartilaginous ridges are displaced to the edges and don’t get in the way of the incision and cutting. I did not want to help her do this operation. Armed with only dressmaking scissors, Vanesa relieved the Ushuaia rabbit of all the skin on its back. In the bathtub, with detergent and running water, a brush and bleach, she washed off any amber or bile that remained on the skin. Then she dried it with a towel, folded it, put it in a plastic bag, and very happily took it off to her house.	It only takes eight to ten hours for the skin to completely regenerate. Vanesa had visions of a great scheme: each night she could skin the Ushuaia rabbit and sell its fur. I would not allow it. I did not want to convert a scientific discovery of such importance into a vulgar commercial enterprise.	However, an ecological society reported the deed, and a paid announcement came out in the papers accusing “Valeria González” – and, by association, me – of cruelty to animals.	As I knew would happen, the onset of autumn restored the rabbit’s telepathic language, and although its cultural milieu is limited, we were able to have agreeable conversations and even to establish a kind of, how shall I say, code of coexistence. 	The rabbit let me know that it was not partial to Vanesa, and I had no trouble understanding why. I asked my girlfriend not to come to the house any more.	Perhaps in gratitude, the Ushuaia rabbit perfected a way of expanding less at night, so that I was able to bring all the furniture back to the living room. It sleeps on the loveseat and deposits its metallic polyhedrons on the rug. It never eats to excess, and in this as in everything else, its conduct is measured and worthy of praise and respect.	The rabbit’s delicacy and efficiency reached the extreme of asking me what would be, for me, its ideal daytime size. I said I would have preferred the size of a cockroach, but I realized that such a small size put the Ushuaia rabbit in danger of being stepped on (though not of being killed). 	After several attempts, we decided that at night the Ushuaia rabbit would continue to expand to the size of a very large dog or even a leopard. During the day, the ideal would be that of a medium-sized cat.	This allows me, when I am watching television, for example, to have the Ushuaia rabbit on my lap where I can stroke it absentmindedly. We have formed a solid friendship, and sometimes we need only look at each other for mutual understanding. Nevertheless, these telepathic faculties that function during the winter months disappear with the first warm spells.	We are now in the last month of winter. The Ushuaia rabbit is aware that for the next six months it will not be able to ask me questions or make suggestions or receive advice or congratulations from me.	Lately it’s fallen into a kind of repetitive mania. It tells me, as if I didn’t know, that it is the only surviving Ushuaia rabbit in the world. It knows it has no way of reproducing, but – though I have asked many times – the rabbit has never said whether it is bothered by this or not.	Moreover, the rabbit continuously asks me – every day and several times a day – whether there is any use for it to go on living like this, alone in the world, with me yes, but without other creatures of its own kind. There is no way it can kill itself, and there is no way I could – and even if there were, I would never do it – kill such a sweet, affectionate animal.	And so, as long as we experience the last cold spells of the year, I continue to converse with the Ushuaia rabbit, stroking it absentmindedly. When warm weather returns, I shall only be able to stroke it.[Original title: “El conejo de Ushuaia.” First published in the magazine Proa, No. 70, Buenos Aires, September 2007, pp. 33-38. Included in El crimen de san Alberto, Buenos Aires, Editorial Losada, 2008.]