Favorite song
some days
this song
is an
ace up
my sleeve
when the
war is
a loaded
gun in
my boot
and my
children’s
love is
the nail
I use
to hang
myself
up on
the cross
of another
day.
Compassion fatigue #4
see
enough
Marines
die
and
eventually
all
you
remember
is
how
hard
it
was
to
get
those
bodies
into
those
plastic
bags.
Winter in Helmand
The first
night I
saw a
group of
village elders
asleep on
the ground
no blankets
or pillows
just paper
thin robes
on a night
the wind
cut so
cold it
hurt I
think I
knew
we were
never going
to win
this war
Matthew Borczon is a poet from Erie, Pa he has written seven books of poetry so far. His new book Code 3 the prison blues is now available from Alien Buddha press. When he is not writing he is a nurse for developmentally disabled adults.
heart
Saturday, April 21, 2018
Saturday, April 14, 2018
Mark Young Returns With Egregious Windmills, Circumsized USB Ports, Cosmic Emanations, And The Hubs Of A So-Called Civilization
geographies: Ciudad Bolivar
Now that the instruments
of the national orchestra
have been turned into
mulch for the cacoa
plantations, it's easy to
see why US president
Donald Trump's decision
to send a task force of
egregious windmills into
Venezuala to resolve the
country's political crisis
was anathema to the
local musical community.
geographies: Antalya
One of the hubs in this so-
called cradle of civilization is a
treasure house of circum-
cized single USB ports. It also
includes a kitchen that uses an
obscure cosmic emanation known
as "fast radio bursts" to facilitate the
production of their artisanal craft
beers which are now available
in cans & bottles or on tap.
geographies: Qaraghandy
CCTV allows the large
Coyote Canyon framed print
currently occupying wall
space in a small Melbourne
based design studio
to also be on display in a
place considered by many
in the former USSR as
the middle of nowhere without
having to be anywhere near there.
Mark Young's geographies have, over the years, been collected as e-books, chapbooks, & full-on collections from Argotist Ebooks, Dysphasia Press, Beard of Bees, & One Sentence Chapbooks, as well as being included as separate sections in The Codicils from Otoliths Books, & the eclectic world from gradient books.
Now that the instruments
of the national orchestra
have been turned into
mulch for the cacoa
plantations, it's easy to
see why US president
Donald Trump's decision
to send a task force of
egregious windmills into
Venezuala to resolve the
country's political crisis
was anathema to the
local musical community.
geographies: Antalya
One of the hubs in this so-
called cradle of civilization is a
treasure house of circum-
cized single USB ports. It also
includes a kitchen that uses an
obscure cosmic emanation known
as "fast radio bursts" to facilitate the
production of their artisanal craft
beers which are now available
in cans & bottles or on tap.
geographies: Qaraghandy
CCTV allows the large
Coyote Canyon framed print
currently occupying wall
space in a small Melbourne
based design studio
to also be on display in a
place considered by many
in the former USSR as
the middle of nowhere without
having to be anywhere near there.
Mark Young's geographies have, over the years, been collected as e-books, chapbooks, & full-on collections from Argotist Ebooks, Dysphasia Press, Beard of Bees, & One Sentence Chapbooks, as well as being included as separate sections in The Codicils from Otoliths Books, & the eclectic world from gradient books.
Monday, April 9, 2018
Beau Blue With A Jade Dragon, A Cherry Nightstand, A Slender Syringe, And A Finale In The Mourning
nightfall
dried wine roses
surrounding a jade dragon.
the mantel's vase empty
save a layer of dust.
an urn, centered
over the fireplace waits
for its mate upstairs
sleeping with tubes.
a watch nurse prays
into her black notebook,
'the patient asks
for more heat'.
the cherry nightstand,
inlay of rosewood,
the brass handled drawer,
a slender syringe.
finale
the moon reviews
our tufted landscape
dry spikes needle the air
silence tills your desert
bright night sands fill
my retreating footsteps
witness we were never there
Beau Blue has been around a while. Currently, he is the force behind
animatedpoets.com, virtual stage manager at the Cruzio Cafe.
dried wine roses
surrounding a jade dragon.
the mantel's vase empty
save a layer of dust.
an urn, centered
over the fireplace waits
for its mate upstairs
sleeping with tubes.
a watch nurse prays
into her black notebook,
'the patient asks
for more heat'.
the cherry nightstand,
inlay of rosewood,
the brass handled drawer,
a slender syringe.
finale
the moon reviews
our tufted landscape
dry spikes needle the air
silence tills your desert
bright night sands fill
my retreating footsteps
witness we were never there
Beau Blue has been around a while. Currently, he is the force behind
animatedpoets.com, virtual stage manager at the Cruzio Cafe.
Saturday, April 7, 2018
Leonard Gontarek Withstands Her Labyrinth, A Yard-Sale Military Lapel Medal, The Philosophy of Muggings, And A Lost Scarf
To Withstand Evil
A Mistranslation
Live with Katerina. And marry her. And sleep with her.
And sleep with her again. She knows many more
things to do in bed than you. You are after all very
shy and inexperienced and reluctant to admit it.
In the climate of change it is as though
there is a second summer in the middle of fall.
Hydrangea re-bloom beside the peaked trees.
Hope that Katerina is still living with you in spirit
and not pretending to love you.
The light weakens. Keep in mind, Katerina has
nightmares too. Can we only replace a villainous
leader with another villainous leader?
This is not a good dream for her to be having.
The mice are sucked up like shadows
by light and the holes in the wall close.
And this is only the first part of the night.
Katerina goes out into the world.
She is committed to learning everything
about the world and falling in love with it again.
But there has been war. And she
must become a nurse in the land
of the dead where the chickens are frozen.
She celebrates healing, starts a garden,
grows cool tulips and swims
in underground rivers at night.
Far from her home and the man
she loved who is lost in a labyrinth.
Fuck him. I’m tired of getting
him out. It’s Sunday there
or Monday. She never understands
the time change. Katerina draws
a cross between a mandala
and black and white reproduction
of a Pollock abstract. She says
this is what the breath of
many years looks like. What she
knows the trees know and there is
not an ounce of God in it.
This is difficult to accept and
she must keep it to herself.
The stinging wind and morning of loneliness
she must bear too and bear alone.
Battle For The Soul Of The Country
Panel a
He would go back when
the first gun was guided into his hands.
He has filled in a heart
with black and cut it
and pinned it inside his coat.
A yard-sale military medal on his lapel.
A memory of his mother saying,
Look, it is a carpet of flowers.
Panel b
I sit between two men in a diner booth.
On my left, the man is on
a talking jag, wooing me
with anecdotes, arm around me,
spitting and narrating, salting my food,
while the one on the right lifts my wallet.
Panel c
The storm approached.
They removed the stained glass
windows from the church
and placed them safely
in their basements.
After the bombings and the rain,
after the mist cleared,
they emerged from their homes
as though into a new world.
They replaced the windows,
but they were never the same.
At times, the wind whistled through.
Panel d
I say to the mugger:
What of the one town,
the god’s or devil’s pocket
in all of the madness,
does this not suggest
that the country is good
and there are riches beyond
our beliefs, homes with
true works of art?
What about the child
who has drawn a peanut
shape with a worm in it
to indicate the earth?
Federal Land Grab
Dream 1
I left a beautiful scarf
in a restaurant
that closed within a year
which I saw trailing
from the antler of a deer
in a field.
I didn’t make much of it.
Dream 2
He had hoped it would
rain and it did when
he was on the plane
returning to the desert.
Dream 3
I wept about something I read
in a newspaper.
I say wept but I mean
I froze and was able
to step out of my body
and walk a long distance
till I came to a stream
and sat down and wept.
Leonard Gontarek is the author of six books of poems, including, Take Your Hand Out of My Pocket, Shiva and He Looked Beyond My Faults and Saw My Needs. He coordinates Poetry In Common, Peace/Works, Philly Poetry Day, The
Philadelphia Poetry Festival, and hosts The Green Line Reading & Interview Series. He has received Poetry fellowships from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, the Mudfish Poetry Prize, the Philadelphia Writers Conference Community Service Award, and was a Literary Death Match Champion. His poem, 37 Photos From The Bridge, a Poetry winner for the Big Bridges MotionPoems project in 2015, was the basis for the award-winning film by Lori Ersolmaz.
A Mistranslation
Live with Katerina. And marry her. And sleep with her.
And sleep with her again. She knows many more
things to do in bed than you. You are after all very
shy and inexperienced and reluctant to admit it.
In the climate of change it is as though
there is a second summer in the middle of fall.
Hydrangea re-bloom beside the peaked trees.
Hope that Katerina is still living with you in spirit
and not pretending to love you.
The light weakens. Keep in mind, Katerina has
nightmares too. Can we only replace a villainous
leader with another villainous leader?
This is not a good dream for her to be having.
The mice are sucked up like shadows
by light and the holes in the wall close.
And this is only the first part of the night.
Katerina goes out into the world.
She is committed to learning everything
about the world and falling in love with it again.
But there has been war. And she
must become a nurse in the land
of the dead where the chickens are frozen.
She celebrates healing, starts a garden,
grows cool tulips and swims
in underground rivers at night.
Far from her home and the man
she loved who is lost in a labyrinth.
Fuck him. I’m tired of getting
him out. It’s Sunday there
or Monday. She never understands
the time change. Katerina draws
a cross between a mandala
and black and white reproduction
of a Pollock abstract. She says
this is what the breath of
many years looks like. What she
knows the trees know and there is
not an ounce of God in it.
This is difficult to accept and
she must keep it to herself.
The stinging wind and morning of loneliness
she must bear too and bear alone.
Battle For The Soul Of The Country
Panel a
He would go back when
the first gun was guided into his hands.
He has filled in a heart
with black and cut it
and pinned it inside his coat.
A yard-sale military medal on his lapel.
A memory of his mother saying,
Look, it is a carpet of flowers.
Panel b
I sit between two men in a diner booth.
On my left, the man is on
a talking jag, wooing me
with anecdotes, arm around me,
spitting and narrating, salting my food,
while the one on the right lifts my wallet.
Panel c
The storm approached.
They removed the stained glass
windows from the church
and placed them safely
in their basements.
After the bombings and the rain,
after the mist cleared,
they emerged from their homes
as though into a new world.
They replaced the windows,
but they were never the same.
At times, the wind whistled through.
Panel d
I say to the mugger:
What of the one town,
the god’s or devil’s pocket
in all of the madness,
does this not suggest
that the country is good
and there are riches beyond
our beliefs, homes with
true works of art?
What about the child
who has drawn a peanut
shape with a worm in it
to indicate the earth?
Federal Land Grab
Dream 1
I left a beautiful scarf
in a restaurant
that closed within a year
which I saw trailing
from the antler of a deer
in a field.
I didn’t make much of it.
Dream 2
He had hoped it would
rain and it did when
he was on the plane
returning to the desert.
Dream 3
I wept about something I read
in a newspaper.
I say wept but I mean
I froze and was able
to step out of my body
and walk a long distance
till I came to a stream
and sat down and wept.
Leonard Gontarek is the author of six books of poems, including, Take Your Hand Out of My Pocket, Shiva and He Looked Beyond My Faults and Saw My Needs. He coordinates Poetry In Common, Peace/Works, Philly Poetry Day, The
Philadelphia Poetry Festival, and hosts The Green Line Reading & Interview Series. He has received Poetry fellowships from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, the Mudfish Poetry Prize, the Philadelphia Writers Conference Community Service Award, and was a Literary Death Match Champion. His poem, 37 Photos From The Bridge, a Poetry winner for the Big Bridges MotionPoems project in 2015, was the basis for the award-winning film by Lori Ersolmaz.
Thursday, April 5, 2018
Adrian Slonaker Chronicles Epistolary Embraces, Undulating Longhand, Hotel Mattresses, and Psychobiddy Melodramas
“Shirley”
For as long as she'd filled out her census forms,
Shirley had been a one-person household,
and she wasn't a hugger, concluding that,
unless a kid is clutching you to
prevent plummeting to a painful death,
a hug is superfluous.
Yet she posted epistolary embraces to
a penfriend named Ahmet,
the fiftyish Turkish typing teacher who wrote in
dreamy undulating longhand
and sent selfies of a mustachioed face with smiling eyes
and a solemn mouth.
His warmhearted words, eagerly gulped down-
like cloudy lemonade with clinking shards of ice in a heat wave,
sustained her in stoic solitude as her humdrum haze
of postmenopausal puttering progressed
from tolerable to acceptable.
Their correspondence continued until year six, when
Ahmet vouchsafed that he'd be visiting her,
snaking a romantic route from Izmir to Yonkers
by ship and by train.
On April 12th she put on her chartreuse shift dress
and Chanel No. 5
and waited at the railway station
for a passenger who never stepped onto the platform.
Shirley shuffled back every morning
for nine Ahmetless days
before she shrugged her sloping shoulders
at the ninth shrinking caboose
and silently slaughtered hope.
“The Hotel Mattress”
The mattress is long in the tooth,
if mattresses could masticate,
having dazzled in its debut in the city's haughtiest hotel,
bolstering the sweat-blotched backs of visiting VIPs
and their lovers.
But mattresses, like Hollywood honeys,
have a best-before date,
so as Joan Crawford and Bette Davis were found featured
in psychobiddy melodramas in the sixties,
the mattress was next cast in a mid-range motel,
braving ravioli smudges, incontinent seniors, sick anklebiters,
and cursing couples cross at the requirement to rise
at three fucking a.m. for cheap Continental flights.
The mattress continued its descent
down to a roadside flophouse,
suddenly smeared with hookers' rouge and vodka-scented vomit
and grossly groped during demoralizing drug busts.
The mattress is beyond knackered,
yet pleased with its red-letter rips, stains and sags
as a valiant vet is proud of the Victoria Cross or Légion d'Honneur.
Adrian Slonaker works as a copywriter and copy editor, dividing time between Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA and St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada. Adrian's work has appeared in Squawk Back, The Bohemyth, Queen Mob's Tea House, Pangolin Review, The Honest Ulsterman, and others.
For as long as she'd filled out her census forms,
Shirley had been a one-person household,
and she wasn't a hugger, concluding that,
unless a kid is clutching you to
prevent plummeting to a painful death,
a hug is superfluous.
Yet she posted epistolary embraces to
a penfriend named Ahmet,
the fiftyish Turkish typing teacher who wrote in
dreamy undulating longhand
and sent selfies of a mustachioed face with smiling eyes
and a solemn mouth.
His warmhearted words, eagerly gulped down-
like cloudy lemonade with clinking shards of ice in a heat wave,
sustained her in stoic solitude as her humdrum haze
of postmenopausal puttering progressed
from tolerable to acceptable.
Their correspondence continued until year six, when
Ahmet vouchsafed that he'd be visiting her,
snaking a romantic route from Izmir to Yonkers
by ship and by train.
On April 12th she put on her chartreuse shift dress
and Chanel No. 5
and waited at the railway station
for a passenger who never stepped onto the platform.
Shirley shuffled back every morning
for nine Ahmetless days
before she shrugged her sloping shoulders
at the ninth shrinking caboose
and silently slaughtered hope.
“The Hotel Mattress”
The mattress is long in the tooth,
if mattresses could masticate,
having dazzled in its debut in the city's haughtiest hotel,
bolstering the sweat-blotched backs of visiting VIPs
and their lovers.
But mattresses, like Hollywood honeys,
have a best-before date,
so as Joan Crawford and Bette Davis were found featured
in psychobiddy melodramas in the sixties,
the mattress was next cast in a mid-range motel,
braving ravioli smudges, incontinent seniors, sick anklebiters,
and cursing couples cross at the requirement to rise
at three fucking a.m. for cheap Continental flights.
The mattress continued its descent
down to a roadside flophouse,
suddenly smeared with hookers' rouge and vodka-scented vomit
and grossly groped during demoralizing drug busts.
The mattress is beyond knackered,
yet pleased with its red-letter rips, stains and sags
as a valiant vet is proud of the Victoria Cross or Légion d'Honneur.
Adrian Slonaker works as a copywriter and copy editor, dividing time between Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA and St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada. Adrian's work has appeared in Squawk Back, The Bohemyth, Queen Mob's Tea House, Pangolin Review, The Honest Ulsterman, and others.
Sunday, April 1, 2018
Rus Khomutoff Chronicles Realm Navigators, Love Pavers, and Spellbound Speculators
Prisoner of infinity
To Felino A. Soriano
Oh Prisoner of infinity
countercurrent between transgression and transaction
insinuation of eternity’s unrepeatable coalescence
poise deposited in an effervescent aye
on this iron chain of birth and annihilation
you espouse your catastrophe of charm
surefire voices that furnish the kiss of death
an unwearying impulse
to decrypt and decipher longing
like an idea infested with platitudes
realm navigator on the edge of consciousness
Sonic threshold of the sacred
To William Carlos Williams
What waxes wanes
the enforced reincarnation hour
and green quartz veins
over the mind of pride
nonentities
Nowhere you!
Everywhere the electric!
the golden one
living in a poetic world, devouring words
these are the thoughts that run rampant
love paves the way tour existence
Paradise & Method
To Lovebug Starski
An exasperated sigh of grammar and spice
rendered in haphazard lew
vintage wise vanity
lactose intolerant daunt
a dilatation of the dead body of reality
where spirit is no longer
anything but adventitious memory
spellbound speculations
phraseology in completeness
beyond our understanding
the finiteness of type
My name is Rus Khomutoff and I am a neo surrealist language poet in Brooklyn,NY. My poetry has appeared in Erbacce, Occulum, Rasputin, Poethead, and Hypnopomp. I just published my first book entitled Immaculate Days (Alien Buddha Press).
To Felino A. Soriano
Oh Prisoner of infinity
countercurrent between transgression and transaction
insinuation of eternity’s unrepeatable coalescence
poise deposited in an effervescent aye
on this iron chain of birth and annihilation
you espouse your catastrophe of charm
surefire voices that furnish the kiss of death
an unwearying impulse
to decrypt and decipher longing
like an idea infested with platitudes
realm navigator on the edge of consciousness
Sonic threshold of the sacred
To William Carlos Williams
What waxes wanes
the enforced reincarnation hour
and green quartz veins
over the mind of pride
nonentities
Nowhere you!
Everywhere the electric!
the golden one
living in a poetic world, devouring words
these are the thoughts that run rampant
love paves the way tour existence
Paradise & Method
To Lovebug Starski
An exasperated sigh of grammar and spice
rendered in haphazard lew
vintage wise vanity
lactose intolerant daunt
a dilatation of the dead body of reality
where spirit is no longer
anything but adventitious memory
spellbound speculations
phraseology in completeness
beyond our understanding
the finiteness of type
My name is Rus Khomutoff and I am a neo surrealist language poet in Brooklyn,NY. My poetry has appeared in Erbacce, Occulum, Rasputin, Poethead, and Hypnopomp. I just published my first book entitled Immaculate Days (Alien Buddha Press).
Saturday, March 31, 2018
Joe Balaz Returns To Bare Knuckles, Grunge, The Bovine Consciousness, The High Heavenly Rafters, And Why Not To Sell The Farm Just Yet
DA
HEAD LIBRARIAN IS WUN POET
Da
head librarian is wun poet.
Metaphorically
speaking
in
da suburban pastures
and
da fenced in meadows of da city
I
stay looking foa Bohemians
dat
should be sprouting like mushrooms—
I
tink I found one.
It’s
not easy to do
cause
in dis metropolis
all I see are institutional ivory
towers
and
other likewise establishments
catering
to artistic big wigs.
I
need some grunge
and
bare knuckles
scraped
raw wit experience.
Da
head librarian
self
published wun book
dat
wuz on wun display table
by
da back door at da library—
I
wen read ‘um.
Den
I wen find
his
impromptu videos on Facebook.
Da
buggah is animated
and
he stay in wun way out orbit
so
dere’s some kine of affinity dere.
I
wrote him wun email
cause
I got his address
from
da information desk
wen
I wen make wun phone call latah.
I
wuz investigating
his
existence on da local scene.
Funny
ting
he
wen do da same ting
and
he did wun online check on me.
As
foa now
dats
as far as it goes
cause
me and him
are
like two independent mosquitoes
buzzing
da same ears
of
wun big Cleveland cash cow.
Metaphorically
speaking again
I
can see it standing
out
dere in da fields
wun
humungous golden calf
dat
all da academics
are
dancing circles around.
Beneath
da wise sacred mountain
of
muse and plenty
in
northeast Ohio and beyond
got
all kine different voices
doing
various and interesting tings.
Still
yet all da academics dance
wit
dere shiny grants and credentials
as
dey scratch dere own backs
and
toss flowers at da hooves
of
da big gleaming bovine.
It’s
wun good ting
dat
grass is free
cause
anybody can munch on it
and
nourish anyting dey like.
LIMITATION
SCALE
Keep
looking up to da rafters
cause
you going see
wun
slam dunk extravaganza.
Somebody
should have warned you
cause
it’s no fun
being
da tallest midget on da basketball court
wen
da seven-footer walks in.
No
contest.
No
trophy.
No
certificate of participation.
Only
wun idiot will stay and fight
wen
warriors run foa da hills.
Bravado
and self-confidence is admirable
but
dere’s wun limitation scale
dat
you got to pay attention to
adahwise
you going get squashed
like
wun bug.
No
try be
wat
you tink you see
while
you take off
on
dose flights of fancy.
Dere’s
wun reason
dat
reality is filled wit cuts and bruises
cause
it’s hard and unforgiving
wen
you end up falling on your face.
EASY
MONEY
Before
you sell da farm
to
get in on da ground level
make
sure you know wat you buying.
Wat
you may tink is wun great bargain
offered
in heartfelt sincerity
could
actually be wun beautifully designed rug
placed
ovah wen deep dark hole.
Watch
your step
cause
da shifty dealer certainly is.
All
of da tricky methods
are
incorporated
into
wun greater shell game.
Some
choice too—
It’s
like picking between
flesh
eating bacteria, Ebola,
or
wun non-existent pea
dat
will make your arms and legs disappear
along
wit your purse or wallet.
Potentiality
always
glitters like shiny gold
but
dats wheah
you
really have to pay attention
cause
hard earned cash to most people
can
be easy money to somebody else.
Joe
Balaz writes in Hawaiian Islands Pidgin (Hawai'i Creole English) and in
American English.
He
edited Ho'omanoa: An Anthology of Contemporary Hawaiian Literature. Some of his recent Pidgin
writing has appeared in Unlikely Stories Mark V, Otoliths, Tuck Magazine, and
Heavy
Feather Review, among others. Balaz is
an avid supporter of Hawaiian Islands Pidgin writing in the expanding context
of World Literature. He presently lives
in Cleveland, Ohio.
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