Adeola Davies- Aiyloja http://www.adeolastudio.org/ TODAY I SEE SUNRISE TODAY I SEE CLOUDS TODAY I SEE SUN TODAY I SEE WATER TODAY I SEE SUNSET TODAY I CALL ON MY FOREFATHERS TODAY I SAY THANK YOU TO MY ANCESTORS TODAY IS CELEBRATION OF EMANCIPATION ABOVE ALL STAY WOKE!
Eve Wood http://evewood.net/ Poem for My Arms Without you I could not Embrace the lithe shape of my lover; Nor could I walk arm in arm through the broken city, Defying death. It is only with you That I point to each shivering constellation In the sky, knowing That without you the stars Would cease to exist. Without you, I am reachless, Broken and alone, Bereft of my bookends, my two stalwart Friends, unable to grasp even an apple. Therefore, I will hold you up Like a mutinous flag for all to see and admire. I will extend you beyond the moon’s purview And the sun’s admonitions To show my appreciation, My love. I will erect monuments To your veracity, the unbridled Strength with which you lift The old table, only to succumb To the soft pink sheets of the bed. I will wear garments To accentuate your beauty, Commission tattoos of roaring lions And raging seas to amplify My gratitude, to proclaim once and for all That you are mine And I, inextricably Your own.
guido nosari de danieli @GuidoNosari MORIAME if you danced the robe would be large. If I danced the robe would be large. I bought some ice cream and shells to make things seem easier.
Halim Madi http://www.halimmadi.com/ Hey you * || * A language collage based on found language in my scam mail
Mandy Palasik http://www.mpal.studio The Balcony A teetering appendage of metal and steel Adorned with plastic chairs and wet laundry Flirting between realms Intimate yet public A stage for revolutionary proclamations, romantic confessions, lyrical compositions Or the mere act of watering flowers On our balconies, we are performers Through open invitation, we embrace our audience Peering in through framed apertures Tuned in from the streets below We engage in an audio-visual broadcast of urban reality Sharing a universal frequency The show goes live Although exposed, we are immune to stage fright Our vulnerabilities shielded by a perimeter rail Protecting us from the maladies of the outside world Perched above, we seek comfort in our refuge We take our seats in anticipation of the next act The show goes on… Until the final curtains close For the night
Lauren Dana Smith https://www.laurendanasmithart.com/ Íkaros Oh, lost ground, I’ve tread your dirt before And heard your bird call. Watch me fly this last time! Spun feathers and all into wilder days and under pink disco moons. I know how to take the drugs And it is possible to do it all over again, if I wanted something sweeter But I prefer the sharp sting between my teeth And a hollow tone in my throat. Oh lost ground, I came across a newspaper clipped from the doggone golden age that recounted your Last Big Adventure When you walked into the slick forest and came out the other side on the edge of an iceberg. They brought you home on a fishing boat Overflowing with King Crab and crowned you A hero of men. Oh, lost ground, I am pacing my heart back through snow Through banks of violets Through dust and sips of soda. I am both practiced at blocking out the light And practiced at glossing the day. I am practiced along the razor line of midnight and morning. Ever in these margins. I fly. I press my burnt tongue into the night sky and trace the edges of a nebula Long recessed into firmament. In my mind I am erasing ancient patterns and pulling heaven onto her side in protest. In my mouth is a ball of fire, All chewed up and so close to the sun.
Cindy Rinne https://www.fiberverse.com/ Passages of Time Peering Down the tunnel Columns outline my gaze A few graceful steps I find an iridescent leaf Good for potions Rubbed on skin Heron Glides across the ceiling Under purple moon Forgets This is impossible Pockets of light Orbs guide me To an involved Conversation Between a fortune teller And the bird They wonder What forever means Tears Overflow my cupped hands I’ve avoided This place hoping to Decay enough To understand The ephemeral Flight of water Inside the crystal ball
David Klein http://www.davidlouisklein.com We are one race the human one A solitary tree in forest of mirrors wondering why you are just another tree yearning to flow like a river Why am I a tree? Why am I not a river? Your thoughts like sunlight shimmers on a lake beautiful and fierce Wisps of mist that are never real like love and fear On a mountain top your roots grow miles below the surface Intertwined with all the other trees of every shape shade and hue Your leaves are distinct They blow boldly in the wind Proclaiming their beauty just like the other trees that look very much like you Down deep the roots all twisted in a helix of seven billion other trees just laugh at your foolish pride The roots know your source is so much deeper as your beautiful leaves break free to float around the world for all to behold
Arella Tomlinson https://www.arellatomlinsonart.com DAWN OF SUFFERING Way too slick, it slithers up Uninvited though reluctantly expected. I wince. A toxic flush has given birth… To a new Me, On a (hot) new morning. I cannot stop sweating. Chosen To stick out like a sore To carry this banner of leprosy. Branded, having to sport ‘The Look’, To radiate exposure to the dreaded ‘C’, That we we we would rather not think of And I I I would rather not be, and have to cover. Selected To reflect the utter lack Of all softness and fringe, A beacon for the coming Anti- Comfort. But since it is here anyway, I’ll say… Good morning, Lion-without-his-mane Rise, Eel-of-my-nightmares-sans-eye-brows… Go ahead and amplify my barrenness In Sampson’s vein, But at least help me figure out What color of scarf Will match today’s apology. Is it vain to complain of This crown of thorns to My young, thriving soul? So much more than an annoyance, This Easter Morning Was no holiday This day is when It felt Real.
Jody Zellen http://www.jodyzellen.com The spontaneity of innocent lines seen along the way give pause and open the mind to new interpretations of people, places and things.
Kerry Campbell http://www.kerrygallery.com Moon Shadows Shadows Slink across the ocean In moonlight Shimmering In our eyes Between our lives And ripple Through time Reverberating in motion With our hearts
Kevin Opstedal TIJUANA GIFT SHOP Klo-rene If you listen close to those windy palm trees you can hear the soft whisper of what could be a rockslide out at the edge of yr neural system but is more likely just a clever born-again hula doll tenderly scooping out yr brains w/a backhoe The same amped eyeshadow & disregard applies as love at first sight gets bumped from the menu leaving you to calculate the rate of descent silk sunlight a-go-go capsized in a sea of shadows the late afternoon sky vs “The Poems” in a brown paper bag Running Up the Score I could never see the percentage in dealing in the sacraments but then I’m always cutting corners ready to pop the clutch & fishtail up the coast highway behind the wheel of a working hypothesis True redemption may be only a step away but it’s the step after that could get you DQ’d both do whispers w/considerable je ne sais quoi baptized into one body dancing to elevator music in the stairwell but there’s a place we can go bypassing the relays a place just outside yr comfort zone where the last black lagoon under the sea turns blue & the fog echoes in silver I Left My Feet in My Other Shoes Those shades of blue in the ocean haze only exaggerate the emptiness of the washed-out sky a hybrid Day of the Dead tattoo fading into a sunburnt shoulder Bumpy weather minus the disconnect of rambling bird notes rising above the shifting tides to compensate a re-purposed rendition rigged for lifting & hyphenated w/diesel sand driven beneath the foam measured in intervals like beach tar I could still feel the kelp-bed tremors & cold knuckles the deep blue nomenclature & ringtone resurrecting a phantom pain & then I remembered that I always wanted to end a poem with the word “polyurethane”
Deb Diehl http://www.debdiehl.com/ To the Coyotes Who Steal Dog Toys Last night your coven was there again whipping up a right mess yipping shrilling whirling small mammals into its Eye and then you all masticated luxuriated sweetly quiet Today by the kitchen door you deposited yet another one bedraggled beheaded encrusted but still slick I don’t know what it once was (What once was I?) You are a chimera playful pup yet also mangy scourge so there will be no gentling of the screen door for you and your socially inappropriate behavior gruesome antics tricksy ways Tomorrow is my official Old Lady Birthday (old lady, old lady, nice old lady) To celebrate I may don a blowsy sexy gown and when I hear you and yours come over the hill I’ll join up spinning dizzy keening and feeding you forbidden doughnuts.
Jeremie Riggleman http://www.jeremieriggleman.com/ The Pursuit of Happiness Listen, O Bicentennial Baby, to my words of wisdom By them you will find the way of life Hard work is the ticket to make it These colors will protect you You are chosen and blessed In you, my country, I drank deep the waters I heard the music swell the breeze And bring from all the trees Sweet freedom’s song Found the breeze that sighs belies the marginalized Other colors o’er the land of the free Forgive us, we petition for redress To hear the echo of the chants And the new old proverb
Anda Marcu https://www.andamarcu.com/ My Apple Tree My rock was a tree when I was a child. An apple tree. My apple tree. I grew up in a big house in a city far away a house with tall ceilings, cold walls, and luminous windows. There was a castle nearby and a dozen churches, winding streets and lots of flowering trees. My apple tree was watching over me, his strong black branches reaching above the tallest of trees from just outside my room’s beautifully arched window. He was there long before me and grew old and tall and wise. He accompanied me through my growing up, my joys and my cryings. He would gift me his petals every mid-spring the softest of whites and the most delicate of pinks. Childhood trinkets raining over me.
Diana Milia http://www.dianamilia.com Pattern Recognition Scratched by sunset claws Her face dissolves in winter clay Scales drop desiccated lashes Cliffs threadbare, roots exposed to sky Sun withered, kelp drooping on old logs No child cartwheels across that expanse Different gulls lean against the wind On the same trajectory Where my mother’s ashes swept away I slowly fade in her wake
Corisa Moreno http://www.corisamoreno.com Strength most people think that some people think that gravity causes perspective the axis tilts every experience, the same every thing in the same year calendars and clocks no longer conform add an extra day at this point the masses strike precise aphelion sunlight (the lengths of the seasons never equal) this phenomenon around an elliptical path passes through different ideas when? it begins definitions to be continued through summer the nation agrees we have no seasons that the start is close, then arrives much later a revival from unequal lengths dormancy quartered its journey ground, water, air, fire now explain day, now explain time
Jeffrey Louis Levin @jeffreylevin Cross-Country In younger days We skied vast meadows And grand mountains Ascending and descending Powered by muscles Vigorous and in their prime Propelling us upward To reach the vistas That took our breath away More than the climb itself. Even then I think we knew That such days were not An everlasting gift And that time would turn itself upon us As it always does For that is its unflinching nature. Now we move in more intimate spaces The hills more gentle The pines more gathered The trail’s beauty quiet and modest Tempered by the lack of singularity. The afternoon light Rakes across the snowy landscape And we Through silent sentinels of evergreen Go on For as long as we can.
MaryAnn Loo https://maryannloo.com I emerge again from the water Where a new adventure awaits — Pathways in number as the stars Leading once more to my last gate.
Glenn Brooks
@Gleribro
And here I Am
This obsolete machine
Wallowing ecstatically
In the ignorance
Of my own obsolescence
Debbie Korbel http://debbiekorbel.com I think about the pleasure of kissing you And how If I were the moon I’d counsel the stars to scatter themselves like rose petals across our bed
Ashton Phillips
http://www.ashtonsphillips.com
My body contains multiplicities.
I am crushed particles of ancient sedimentary and metamorphic rock.
I am giant kelp that grew in a marine forest beneath offshore oil platforms.
I am the salt taken into veins and released into this flesh with the sun. I am ground limestone. And
rain.
I am dirt that has been hidden under the surface of this Los Angeles asphalt for a hundred. thousand. million years. I am the coarse, dead fibers of ornamental palm trees brought here as props
for a fantasy
that didn’t
include me.
I am algae and ground pig bones and slippery palm oil, processed with bleach to appear clear.
I am arsenic. And lead. I am aluminum at one hundred times the expected concentration.
I am 3240 mg of iron per kg.
I am evidence. I am history.
I am waste.
I am the seeds of repair. I am millions of microscopic spores with the power to metabolize my poisons. I am the promise of sorghum and sunflower. I am mycelium feasting on exudates from my nascent roots and enveloping my fragile tips with resiliency.
I am designed to fall apart, and I am yours.
My name is Joule.
Christopher O’Mahony http://www.omahonyart.com LUCIDITY I knew it was time to go, When the fog rolled in, The sweetness of the salty air, And the crashing surf muffled. My mother was deathly afraid of the fog, Perhaps a bad memory. I found myself, as I often do, Paddling out, past the break, Floating, breathing in, hungry, For the heavy wet air, Lost of what world I was born, The Pacific called for me again.
K.L. Cloonan http://www.kallcloonan.com “Perhaps I Was Looking Through A Window” I was nervous. I believed my victory to be affected by something sinister outside myself. That it wasn’t me, my efforts, talent or hard work that got me there. I could feel the insecurity in my throat. A new face staring me in the mirror as I searched for familiarity. Without realizing it, my hand was touching my cheek cascading down from the edge of my glasses to my frowning lips. I looked into my eyes which seemed to be looking away from me. Vacant and mindless. Blank and still. I tried to concentrate harder now, begging my consciousness for help in identifying even an inch of my dry skin. I scrambled for a sign, my eyes darting across the length of the glass. I played for a moment that this was in fact not my face at all, but someone else’s. That perhaps instead of looking in a mirror I was looking through a window, staring out at another. A hard as a rock stare. A tough exterior of emotionless intensity. Just then I snapped back into full awareness of my body, pretending with false confidence that I was simply testing myself. This was a test. Indeed! A test of perseverance in the face of adversity. A test of unknowing in the sense of self. With the flick of my wrist, I threw my plastic glasses down into the sink, thinking little of their potential damage and only of my thirst for a new perspective. A potential clarity in obscurity. By blocking the precise analysis of my vision, the over-stimulation of my eyes, I was able to lower my defenses pulling my mind fully into the now, the present. The fear of silence shed, the dissatisfaction of self subsided, the observation of every inch of my body subdued. And for a moment, just a moment, my lack of sight explained everything.
Lena Snow https://msha.ke/artistlenasnow/ Woman! What’cha looking so sexy?! Ain’t looking for you. Woman! Skirt suits ya better! Skirt ain’t what I want. Woman! Playin’ dangerous today?! Dangerous ya confuse with somethin’ else. Woman! Playin’ hard to get?! Don’t playin’ anythin’. Woman! Smokin’ ain’t good for ya!! Smokin’s what I do. Woman! Ya now a fancy rocka’?! Rocka’s sure we all too. Man! Mind ya own! Leave us alone!
Cindy Leung http://www.cindyclsy.com I have very fond memories Of going to onsens in Japan The idea of people Sharing a time and space collectively To submerge in warm water To cleanse their bodies and souls Makes me think of the human connection That’s been fostered for centuries And that we aren’t so individualistic after all -Eastern vs Western ideologies
Maureen Haldeman http://www.maureenhaldemanphotography.com silent laguna a state of mindful balance betrayed by the birds
Yossi Govrin http://yossigovrin.com/ “Straight Lines Round & round” Plains flying Straight lines The world ; is Round & round. Sitting on my 4 legged chair Steady, Gravity Takes me Round & Round In a straight Line
Patricia Moss-Vreeland http://www.patriciamossvreeland.com Bough to Bough Bough to bough grassblades safely erect not whispering underneath nor etched underfoot somewhat fragile in idea and vision waiting for position. But from above A bird’s view less is known less crowded ready to cross over Bough to bough.
Edwin Vasquez http://edwinvasquez.net I BELONG In isolation, I am not alone. I belong in a virtual universe Where brothers and sisters from East to West Meet, laugh, share, drink, and Zoom. Stay-at-home orders Are permission to dream and create like there is no tomorrow, To follow our path wherever it wants to lead us, To trust our own instincts and values, To listen and ask questions to those on the other side of the screen. The art world is a place where I belong. I am a fellow who found a home Where art and poetry run in everyone’s veins, And vanity and arrogance are just words without meaning. We are apart, but we are united by color, shapes, ideas, and beauty. How lucky to be an art maker during isolation. How lucky not to feel alone in the new world order, To be surrounded by compassionate and intelligent people Who give me the confidence and virtual shelter in my own home I am not alone.
Lina Kogan http://www.linakogan.com/ “Explore Control Shift” The negative space, the contents of white silence, The Space with stars and suns turned inside out, like Kant’s philosophy. The moral law within us draws from the good old second helping of self-doubt. A selfie of her mind flipped horizontally, A watch that goes back to when we were bored, Collective memory of simple that breaks easily, That lasts like lazy laser cuts in motherboard. A lazy dog that jumps and jumps, the fox too quick To click her teeth, to double click the cursor, It circles back in time to when this space was built The roads laid and layered on to curse her. The space bar shifts as if it’s being scaled In the computer game she built inside her head She’s at the counter, alone, the bar scene fades To sounds of the famous Star Wars fight jazz band. But back to basics as the vinyl spins, The yellow brick road of her map connects the dots she felt. Fills in the blanks, solves puzzles of the intertwined Geometries that come together as the buckle on the belt. Idea islands, plots that scattered Must connect, or not. The focus jumps – code yellow, code red Thought clusters blure and zoom out of focus. The windy road travels thru the game back to Reality she thought she could control; she must control the drift, The shift, the rift, the lift. The shift is halfway over Punch out, play your card, see through, reflect, explore!
Fahmi DNR http://www.fahmidnr.com New hope Swarm of birds humming be the sound of the morning Humming through the sky Choose their own life way Never ever seem to be tired It’s the sparks of them that shines
Hildegarde Duane http://hildegarden.wordpress.com I carry a stick when we walk by here. Once I saw two very old guys put armloads of wine bottles there in the trash. A coyote is said to live in the bushes. Other dog-walkers have warned me Lately I heard it has a second home – an empty old garage nearby. A Country home and a City home. All on the same block
Lisa Segal http://www.lisasegal.com Ostensibly, When We Talk About Crows, We’re Talking About Crows But I say, I can feel the bed on fire. But I say—tired of the game—I shot the tires. Where I stand inside the fence, barbs are wire sharp. I attempt to leave, can’t escape the wiring of irresistible words back, back, back. My subjugation won’t go. This creeping forward so slow. Is it possible to not have to slink back? Walk as light, not imitation passing as right? Obfuscation seen and beat. All intentions undeterred, truly wired. How can I trust our grasp will hold—might always hold—the wire? I trust our grasp will hold—might always hold—the wire. All intentions undeterred, truly wired. How can imitation passing as light obfuscate? Scene and beam, is it possible to not have to slink back? Walk as light, not this creeping forward so slow of irresistible words back, back, back. My subjugation won’t go. I attempt to leave, can’t escape the wiring. Where I stand inside the fence, barbs are wire sharp. But I say—tired of the game—I shot the tires. But I say, I can feel the bed on fire.
Susan Ossman http://susanossman.com/ Ode to If The yew is an If in French. Guardian of churchyards It roots creed in doubt, believing Then not, Most ancient tree It pays no heed to generations or centuries, or the double effects of its taxanes on living beings. Yew poison is nothing like Socrates’ hemlock. Its movements precede judgement, honor and principle are questioned. If infusions bypass the lips, altogether, a catheter planted in the breast leads the doubtful melange directly to the heart, and mind. The cure destroys all cells that grow in haste, ancient recipes are careless of side effects; at times the body vibrates, like lute strings echoed in a slow-grown, yew-hewn chamber. Note by note, I become bittersweet, a question, an if.
Trinity Morris http://www.trinitymorrisartist.com Looking at you, I see me and all those things I’d dreamed to be. The goals, the wins, the shooting stars the friends, the lovers, trips in cars In your eyes, I see my life, the kids, the house, and once a wife. The highest hopes, the dusty roads, the ache of love, the heavy loads. I see in you so much of me, the joy and pain, the running free. The rivers, mountains, tides that go, you’ll need to learn their ebb and flow. When I see you I wonder why, the time I let it pass me by. I miss that you who needed me, but love you unconditionally.
Susan Arena http://susanarena.com “Eyes Like the Sea” On my mother’s kitchen windowsill are glass bottles, filled with sea glass, just as she left them. A lifetime of collecting these jewels, buffed smooth and soft by the power of the waves Green and brown are easiest to find, pink and pale turquoise, less common. Ultramarine blue is the rarest prize and the most coveted of all, the color of my mother’s eyes.
Anita Getzler http://www.anitagetzlerstudio.com radiance languid limbs reach into the quiet pool in the lake beyond the waves. ink blue waters embrace the body that gently floats in time with the setting sun. reborn in her cool caress infused with crimson light afloat in reflections of infinite space. melting coppery reflections transposed salty liquids cloaked with sun swimming in the fire of her radiance.
Csenge Györbiro https://www.behance.net/csengegyorbiro The sunset of course doesn’t care if you look at it. Take me to the river. Still forgiving
john hogan http://johnhoganarts.com A Map for South of Here I may be wrong when I say I have never know the idyllic, but I’m sure I have known the worthwhile. Facing south, from the mud of the pond, the earth will choose an upward slope, and you will choose it too. From there, the stream that guides your eyes near west, will also guide your feet. Then , when tangled willows thicken, and quickly slow you down, you will stop. This is good, as otherwise you would miss what is scattered there, on your left, beneath your lowest gaze. Though tempted, you won’t look down just yet. You will stop and listen. And this will be good too, because you may hear one, you may hear more. Though if you hear none, for now, that will be okay, because with you or without you, from beneath the guardian reeds and clustered grasses, from the riches of mire and muck, the water-eye bubbles will gurgle and blink at whatever and whomever passes by. And on this day you will be the whomever and the forever that passes and pleases the water gods. Through seasons’ change, and the earth that stays, these water gods remain. And when you doubt what changes, stays, and you will, this breathing pulse will remind you, again, and again, and again. Now that you’ve heard, now that you’ve seen, and now that you’ve been seen, this thing of knowing something once, will never, ever change.
Ioana Țurcan http://www.uncertain-ana.space i walk with them/ my grandpa’s violence/ and grandma’s anger/ when we walk they never leave/ me she said your’e like me/ your father’s hands and mom’s eyes/ your upper lip is like hers,/ slim/ your lower one like his/ meaty/ but your mouth – words are mine,/ fiery and fast like/ anger that never leaves me/ i never thought i was like her/ until those two knives/ were crossed at my throat/ and i meet my grandma’s anger/ and my grandpa’s will to kill
jeremy hight http://calartswriting.com/portfolio-item/jeremy-hight/ so much breath is wasted into balloons forlorn and sagging in impotent debates in discussions of the lithe and shallow of the present of the poisons of looking backward into naïve thoughts of future as well as its too well learned dread and mourning conversations could have made clouds and rain language itself is convective as can be words born briefly into the air yet not even a fog forms over festivals or busy outdoor dining born of so many pairs of lungs and lips at tables and chairs yet there is at that rare time that squall the unseen nimbus near lightning veined rising up into a small patch of air
Bill Mohr http://www.koankinship.com IN THE OCEAN OF NOTHINGNESS Wading into clean, wrinkled laundry, my ironing board’s a pier with buttoned-down barnacles. The water will be warmer tomorrow. It sloshes around my ankles as I walk between sticky pilings. Hip-deep, I finish the sleeves of my third shirt, lean back and float on crescents of disbelief until I sink. A little background noise, even in these depths, makes illusions more believable to anyone gazing down. I went for a long swim last night between two tiny continents. The entrails of a transparent fish swayed in mordent harmony. Near dawn, it spoke: “I am this universe.” Its gills rippled like buoyant silk.
Susan Kaufer Carey http://www.susancareyphoto.com Passage The distant song of an evening train Travels through the mist It mingles with the tune of a gentle rain, Softens the edges of leaving you behind And whispers of this place I’ve never been
Mark Crosier @digitalpeyote 120 seconds. late spring… soft rain. fragrant. nigh dissolving… into dawn. alone with your lover, fingertips touching, tasting a small kiss. quiet. unspoken. devotion. connection. a day’s worth of hours traded for those 120 seconds.
Sean-Michael Gettys http://www.seanmichaelgettysart.com Signs of distress Fearful Shadows hover behind Arguments in broken languages fall Like crunchy leaves under foot in autumn Failed communications breakdown As both turn away The words of heartache Sometimes Erode hope slowly Like a trickle of water across stone They carry away memories What once was good Now Split Asunder
M. Mystery Artist https://052020.wixsite.com/mmysteryartist Auction of useless things. Ladies and gentleman, To your attention I bring an artist, three pounds fifty. Sadly she’s a woman and not British, And way too young, And way too dreamy. Talented? Perhaps. Way too ambitious. This world does not belong to artists But to businessmen. Bids anyone? A fiver? Sold!
Doren Robbins https://dorenrobbins.wordpress.com/ Force 1. The mugger’s face the old stud’s fear a trapped man’s handicap the elevator out elevator street sense mental cinema outcome anticipation thermos held open maladaptation the private index the irritant anxiety’s dumbwaiter burning broth there’s your judge the regretted emotion you don’t get you’re not getting or eventually going to get, held over you the incoming and the other one the dominator the determiner the world has its own volition going in there the imprecision my errands. 2. She called out for the handball paddle. She was used to swatting things down. The dog carried the handball paddle in his teeth. “Precious dog boy, bring your starlet mama chef queen stripper the paddle.” That dog left the room his leather grip his scent of humans his mama his tongue bobbing sideways his self-delight fuck you his handball paddle his cock to point up when he hears her then rejects here his ears to swat the air. 3. Blassie The borrowed man had a big body Popeye Bluto Lawrence Taylor forearms linebacker barreled torso wrestler’s bulk. He had the contempt of Blassie. I’m coming to that. Someone said something about the Twentieth Century Wars Index the History Channel his contempt he could’ve been spitting. Documentaries like that didn’t go into the banking records. To what avail would they go there? His natural spit. His nature. The Hero Channel is worse, The Hero Channel stranded in variations of Heroic Inclined toward Disinclined to Decline Syndrome whatever State whatever Institution. Of what? What do people connected to these channels understand in the way of not raising armies? The whole Tyrant Pathology Entitlement Saga came out of his attitude. The man’s feet looked dainty under his bulk like Blassie’s feet size 8 wrestler’s boots. He was the embodiment of Blassie. Let me remember for you the wrestling king of that era, Freddie Blassie. What belligerence he had for every cursed opponent. The Brit Ripper regular opponent with a “neck like a stack of dimes” The rest were “bug-eyed bastards or “pencil-neck geeks.” Of all the reviled cartoon bubbles. When his opponent was half-out on his back he’d fake tripping then step right into his package. The precious one. That wrestler Classy Blassie beating people insulting their body parts hating his way to a kind of fame. The bottom of his wrestler’s shorts dreaming of something more than thread.
Saundra Fleming http://www.saundrafleming.com That jerkiness Felt in things placed wrongly that are true Staged seamlessly, Hitler’s official office furniture Within a food fight imagined by the 3 Stooges Net result- Greatest Postmodern painting In Paris resides the Pompidou I sensed it, though not thinking about humiliation That is the relevant factor In a tale told by an authoritarian government Their first priority, to squash and fire The dignity of the chosen enemy The lost and wounded showered with hatred by The dominant political baboons Things placed wrongly (Surreallism’s strategy continues) together Make complex sense when redeemed by absurdity Morality, values, humans Towering artists play the role of history’s Phantasmagorical surgeons
Olivia Maney http://oliviamaney.com Looking Glass Philosophy Tidal pools – micro mirror magic of the deep. Ceaseless duels, basins of memories fragile keep. Holding life, Salty healing and the cosmos hide Wonders rife, now vanished and remade by tide. Mystic views, children inspect and consider God’s clear cues! Truth; of life and man and critter.
Jonathan Yungkans
Beyond the Weather and the Certainties of Living and Dying
1
Easter morning rolls, overcast squirreling away the L.A. skyline,
“the mournfulness dense and vertical and relatively sudden,” or so
in “the emptiness,” a searching writer claims in “The Paris Review,”
where angels wear grey silk suits, clouds veil glass stares. Rain
to either defy or deify Southern California’s evergreen deception.
Hollywood stars, “between earth and sky,” nighthawking in a diner
,
preserving a late-night Chandler vibe as LAPD patrols horseback
in the Bank District. Beaded lights overhead in Disney Fairy Blue
while a saxophone laments. Its player suffers the stares that chill
as torrid Santa Ana winds curl hair, make nerves jump and skin
go Chandler itchy. Everywhere else circles L.A. as if it’s a drain,
Let L.A. sing in Gershwin, Copland, Sonny Rollins on a bridge—
recycling another town’s sounds—while Eve wears Jimmy Choos
and dances all night in a club lifted from the T.V. show “Lucifer”—
repurposing overblown to cliché, like anything else in California
sunk into ground, including perdition, thrives like mad. Saxophone
passing as autochthonous and eye-deep in mourning—a grievance
sounding as if rooted, pushing green from soil, leaves elongating—
a strain like blood on bougainvillea thorns, lean as a swaying palm.
Notes that spin an expected nostalgia, kindle a craving to drown in
a prepackaged stillness, sharpened to longing, with scarcely a thing
“old” in sight. Rebooting the first apple. Apple is a Red Delicious,
is a fall from grace, is James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause, blond,
never-aging and dead, parked inside a diner with Elvis and Marilyn.
2
But is a saxophone charting sadness camped in tents on Broadway?
Sadness in tents on Temple? Or a temple of sadness on Broadway?
Places “The Paris Review” might label “Whatever lies beyond.” Places in
“the middle of the night, strung out along this fraying thread”—cloth
more Good Friday than Resurrection Sunday. A shade police draped
over Jake Gittes at the end of a film, telling him, “It’s Chinatown”—
a shroud in the plangent horns of trains as they roll from Union Station.
Dawn, we all gather at the L.A. River to watch them cement its banks.
Artists display postcard images pristine as City Hall, Parker Center—
sunlight airbrushed into clouds “for the field with that last saxophone.”
Those tents on Broadway darken at midnight as foot-beat police glare.
They imitate vacant windows of boarded-up homes in Elysian Park—
heaven gone to seed, and with those eyes the “reassertion of that flat
and grassy emptiness”—ground hard as cypress wood, weeds as nails
in Dodger Stadium’s shadow, vacant for the great American pastime,
“where the lines diverge” like trains on schedule in a rolling separation
before the skyline reemerges in a steel-and-glass incomprehensibility,
concealed in rows of empty windowpanes which wink pure
Title taken from the title poem of John Ashbery’s collection “Houseboat Days.” Quotes are from Seary, David, “The Mournfulness of Cities.” The Paris Review, July 19, 2021. Accessed July 25, 2021. https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2021/07/19/the-mournfulness-of-cities/?fbclid=IwAR3ZlfY9FW9aYFlAR4ye8Xds5skZK-g6IKnUIaNWYGgfZ48g5SaTLKuW6a8
Alaia Parhizi http://www.alaiaparhizi.com There is a little halo floating above my head Carrying everything i will ever know Feeding it to me, when i’m starving I open my eyes because shame found me I can do whatever i want But i want is never up to me