5/26/2021 0 Comments Poetry by Hilary Otto stanze CC Mandelbrot The more we mustn't be, the more we become. We repeat, forming a perfect pattern retreating in the heart's eye. We create complexity from simplicity. At our centre is a hole and we must plot relentlessly on the frayed edge of things. The more we mustn't be, the more we become. Hilary Otto is an English poet based in Barcelona. Her work has appeared in Popshot, Black Bough, AIOTB, Ink, Sweat and Tears, and The Blue Nib among other publications. Last year she received her first Pushcart Prize Nomination, and she recently read at the Cheltenham Poetry Festival in the UK.
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5/26/2021 1 Comment Poetry by Beth Cheng Jane Rahman CC Witness She makes her own unhappiness he says as you watch her slowly curl into herself like a late October leaf his fingers close round to crush and crumble and burn Under his weird watchful inattention she knows no better than to be reborn from the ashes back into wife and whore and cunt He says he makes his own happiness as you watch him pluck silky strands from his sweater Long black blond brown and even auburn fall from the shadow of his hand Proud puppet preening and half-cocked he knows all the tricks to turn wallflowers into vixens He rises and falls she falls and rises teeter tottering for as long as you can remember as tears pooled and bosoms heaved To Summer Long I was just reminded that summer to others is winter Because the world is off kilter and on a slant you always secretly wanted winter to be long Pity my dear pity that you weren't a vampire siphoning off the blood of powerfully unwilling virgins to save you the trouble of ever learning how to pick up girls at parties Instead you lapped your way south and stayed there out of habit I read my compass right but alas you were fantastically magnetic in your widening gyre Hackneyed intoxicated I could only hide in the light to avoid going gentle into that good night Now urgent to short I sing myself electric Do Unto Me If love synapses, then chemistry cannot be dammed or reduced or reified, and free will only dances to the pulsed beats of our hearts in simile unexacerbated like the infinite jest of fuck all, goodnight moon and how now brown cow. It figures that God doesn't care if physics fingers math in a rough game of hole-in-one as long as the sky is falling. Beth Cheng is a licensed massage therapist and self-taught poet who has lived in Los Angeles since 2004. She has enjoyed the privilege of having had her poetry published in various online & print publications and being invited to feature & perform in the past, but it's been a while. 5/26/2021 0 Comments Poetry by Katie Chicquette stanze CC
Next Year I’m going to seed my lawn with soft, sweet clover-- what’s left of it anyway, because next year I plan to steal my lawn back bit by bit from my lawnmower and British Petroleum and the epitaphs of my great-grandchildren; sorry lawn, you’re about to become hostas and clover and mulch, and no, I am not actually sorry at all. Next year, I’m going to plant so many different kinds of basil right outside my door that my fears will choke on their spicy cloud of airy joy, and I will buy not a few but a whole shelf of the impatiens at Aldi marked down to $2 because the refrigerated truck got caught in a traffic jam outside Chicago, and they wilted in a way that tricks the uninitiated into thinking they are dead when they are just very, very thirsty. Next year I will paint a single wall dark teal and wonder if this is the right gold velvet to keep it company and I will not ask for anyone else’s opinion. I will spray paint old porch lights, and watercolor geometric shapes, and paint my name with a dollar store sparkler, even if I spend the 4th of July alone. Next year, I’ll have to write new mental narratives for the noises in the night, because I’ll only be able to blame them on my children half the time. I’ll write grocery lists for meals I always meant to make that only suited me, I’ll grate fresh ginger and saute portobellos and as I cook I’ll sing at the top of my lungs instead of the bottom. I’ll write journal entries in invisible ink so I won’t be tempted to relive my mourning -- or my indecision. Next year, I’m sure I will still wear my sadness like a thick, heavy blanket, but next year, I will remember that’s all it is, and shrug it off. But because I am not some hardened, slovenly beast, I won’t just leave it there; I’ll pick it up, fold it with care, set it to the side-- I won’t pretend my grief isn’t real, every tear-track a stitch in this long and lonely time. But what a relief it will be to know that I can sometimes set it to the side. To know that I didn’t need it as a shroud because I was dead--I was just very, very thirsty. Imagine What Your Soul Looks Like She says imagine what your soul looks like I find it trite and wondrous at once and not as a floaty orb of mist, she adds, as though this were obvious then waves her hand, the most casual racetrack flag-drop “go!” a person could do, and so, we go, words chasing our pens across the page, but three words in, I panic I try not to think--this is always the advice when asked to imagine and reflect and remember in writing--which both helps and hinders; how can I imagine it without thinking? And there it is: cheetah print velvet dissolving (thank God, how gauche) into a shovel, dented and dirty--it slices down, the dirt explodes and whitens, sudden stars against an indigo sky over my high school years, I am lying on my back at the escarpment, on the soccer field, my head swims and I know my soul is so far away in that ether but still attached to me, a slippery film, always slick even when I numb myself to try to dry it out so I don’t need to worry or wonder or make excuses or have ethics or feel pain-- it leaves damp footprints all over my life; my fingers slide down my arm to feel the thin film and come away powdery and--is that glitter? Jesus--I flick them, dust my palms, it all flakes off in a dense puff (oh shit, is an orb?) but no the puff is solid now, every shade of purple including the smell of purple which is an early May lilac outside my money pit childhood home, I breathe it in and there is nothing but the scent, not what I said or did or meant, so intense I have to close my eyes (aren’t they already closed?) tighter, sealed shut so tight like a beaten-up boxer in a fight, they won’t open but I’m trying, straining against the black like trying to scream in a dream--is seeing your soul like hitting the ground when you fall in the dream? This scares me, I don’t want to see my soul anymore, imaginatively or philosophically or photorealistically and thankfully my eyes, my real eyes snap open, I see the industrial clock on the wall and she claps once and says, Excellent-- you did it Katie is an alternative education teacher and Pushcart nominee in Appleton, Wisconsin. Her work has appeared in a variety of publications, including Poets Reading the News, Riggwelter, Bramble, Portage, and New Verse News. She’s fortunate to be surrounded by so many active poets in Wisconsin, and young adults willing to stay open to poetry. Contact her at [email protected]. 5/26/2021 1 Comment Poetry by Sharon Suzuki-Martinez Dane CC Brief Bio In the beginning, the world was small. It could fit inside of my family’s house. Outside, lived a rabid German Shepard, and the Kaneohe Marine Corps Air Station roared across the glittering bay. The wide world scared me with its yellow teeth, loud sounds, and sea cucumbers. But I had to leave my house to go to school with the other snotty monsters. Later, school became a riptide yanking me and my love back and forth across the country. Those were the days we scuttled from rental to rental, a couple of academic hermit crabs. Meanwhile, my island family was swallowed, one by one, by the insatiable waves. Over and over, I found myself in the heart of the desert, an ancient ocean now immersed in sharp light. In the end, the world was small. Yet, it could fill one hundred houses with the shells I had shed. Snail Haibun There is a humble snail inside my chest. Thrift store white porcelain shell. Eyestalks glancing the clouds like kite strings. It learns slowly, but it never forgets. I used to smoke to force my snail into its shell. So it couldn’t see, so I couldn’t feel. Now I can make my heart hide in its shell without cigarettes. But cynicism is brittle armor. Life will still crush you, and march on. And since nothing in nature is ever wasted, other snails will eat you, and crawl on. But more often than not, life has put me back together, shard by shard. We all can be brutal boots, but also helping hands. It also helps to know about kintsugi, a Japanese artform meaning “to repair with gold.” When a ceramic piece breaks, a craftsperson rejoins its parts using lacquer dusted with gold or silver. These lustrous scars render the pottery even more beautiful than when it was perfectly intact. The greatest treasure could be one’s humility. A fractured heart, healed. Sharon Suzuki-Martinez’s first book, The Way of All Flux (New Rivers Press, 2012) won the New Rivers Press MVP Poetry Prize. She was a finalist for the Best of the Net and a Pushcart nominee, among other honors. Her work recently appeared in Gargoyle, South Dakota Review, and Midway. Originally from Hawaii, she now lives in Arizona. https://sharonsuzukimartinez.tumblr.com/ 5/26/2021 1 Comment Poetry by Neve Doyle Lauren Gardenbelle Fritts CC The Mountain of Healing Healing is not something that comes easy to me, Like a bandaid on the top shelf that I can't quite reach. I spend so much time imagining what my future could be like. My life thus far has been a tornado of trauma, of hurt, Of self destruction. It's hard to remember that I can build my life the way I want to, A brick house where each brick is made of a lesson learned along the way. Right now, All that's on my mind is the pain running through my veins, The urges of self destruction building up in my chest. I am a balloon getting filled with air, And at any point I could explode. But I have made it through this before. I have spent my whole life climbing mountains And then falling my way back down. The task of healing, Of moving past all of this trauma and hurt, Is guarded by metal barbed wire gates. Only I hold the key. If only it was a physical key, One I could dig around my room to find, But it's not. This key is only obtained by letting go. Letting go of the past that haunts me, Letting go of constant need to destroy my body, Letting go of the pain. I need to surrender. I can't fight the feelings anymore, I can't numb myself anymore. I need to surrender and let the tornado come. It may destroy the town inside my mind, But that's when I rebuild. It's time to build that brick house, Piece by piece, Lesson by lesson, And even mistake by mistake. It's okay that my journey isn't all rainbows and butterflies, But mostly thunderstorms of tears and screams. It's okay. It's okay to believe that I deserve to let myself heal. It's okay to let myself heal. I'm going to climb that mountain again. Who knows if I'll make it to the top this time, But what I do know is that I'll keep climbing every time I fall. One Year of Living It's been one year since I last tried to remove myself from this world. One year without hurt so intense that I can't control myself. That's not to say I don't hurt anymore, That the thought of suicide never enters my mind. But lately, The world has seemed a little brighter. The sun shines a little bit stronger. Now that I don't want to die, Living a real life is so much more appealing. Before, I wasn't really living. Not just because of all the appointments, All the hospitalizations, And my life revolving around my illnesses. Because it's impossible to live when all you think about is not living. And as terrible as it was - Terrible doesn't even begin to explain it - I wouldn't take back that time of my life in a second. Sure, Time was wasted, But now I can appreciate the time I have so much more. I can appreciate life so much more. I watched a video of a man seeing colour for the first time. And that's exactly what this is like. I no longer see the world in hues of black and white, But as a place full of colour, Full of light, Full of beauty. I still feel hopeless sometimes, Still want to sleep the day away sometimes, Still want to do things to take the pain away, But not in the same way. Because I know that given how much I've grown in the last year, I can grow even more. A Eulogy for my Eating Disorder What I say: "Eating disorder, We have a lot of memories together. Remember being seven years old and weighing yourself on the Wii fit every day in secret? Remember that time over Christmas break in grade ten where you made me purge For one of the first times, which then spiralled into everyday? Fun, right? Remember when I passed out in my room and when I came to, my family was at my door asking what happened, and I told them I tripped? You wouldn't let me be honest. Or there were the good ol' times where I would run to the bathroom down the hall after day treatment to get rid of dinner. Not to mention the countless nights and days spent crying on the bathroom floor, Or after stepping on the scale, Or after having over 800 calories, Or after my mom makes me have two ensures instead of one, Should I go on? Notice how there were no good memories? I don't know why for the longest time I was convinced that you were a good thing, That you were keeping me sane, When really you were keeping me insane. You made me feel like I couldn't live without you, Like I was nothing without you. Maybe that's true, But you've been getting weaker for a long time, And it's finally time to lower your casket into the ground. I'm going to find out if I can live without you. Thank you for what you've taught me, For the resiliency you gave me, For the friendships and connections, For the passion I have to want to help others, For shaping who I am today. I'm hoping I won't miss you for you too long, That it won't take too long to let go. But I think this time, It's really time to say goodbye." What I'm thinking: I’m ready to let you go, Ready to bury you seven feet under just to be safe, But I’m scared of what life will be like without you. I’m scared of if I’ll be able to survive without you. You have been with me through it all, Helping me avoid all the emotions that scared me. But you weren’t helping me, you were just telling me you were, Twisting your words in my brain to make it seem like you were on my side. All you were doing was making me more miserable each day, Convinced it was my fault, That every god damn thing was my fault, But that’s not true. But I’m still scared to live without you. And I’m so excited to live without you. As I write this, The excitement is winning, Thanking god for the fact that I’m never going to have to take twenty laxatives again, for the fact that this is going to be my last time going to treatment, For the fact that I don’t have to purge anymore, For the fact that I’ll never have to have my day based on what my scales said in the morning I’m scared, But I really want to learn to survive without you. And that’s exactly what I’m going to do. Neve Doyle is a 21-year-old college student in Child and Youth Care who has a passion for spreading awareness around mental health, which often comes out through her writing. Poetry for Neve is not only a hobby, but an outlet as well, and one of her dreams is to share her vulnerability in her poetry in hopes that it will help someone else. On top of writing, she enjoys spending time with her three dogs and cat, doing yoga and spending far too much time on social media avoiding doing school work. 5/26/2021 0 Comments Poetry by Sherre Vernon Daniel Rothamel CC A Streetlight Lullaby a villanelle Outside the bowling alley, 1979, we wait for them to count the pins, my mama, her mama. Her mama and mine promise a star through the Oregon pines before the morning shift begins, outside the bowling alley, 1979. She’s thirteen, I’m two at the time, though they dress us up like twins, my mama, her mama. Her mama and mine have left their children behind, in the pickup. Night descends outside the bowling alley, 1979. It’s the only sitter she can find: the concrete and her sister’s skin, my mama. Her mama, her mama. And mine comes to the window and reaches in – but we sleep as the long hours thin Outside the bowling alley, 1979: my mama, her mama – her mama and mine. The World forty years I’ve wandered two plus one is three—at three: innocent, at seven: broken, by twenty-one: aflame by Saturn, I said, I am the teacher and the teacher I became. I said, I am the dancer, and raised an ankle over my knee-- and my belly swelled around your soul—your pulse saying all is well, all is-- I have never been at ease in Georgia’s flowers, layers of petals, open their pinks and purples to the world but serpents, I understand and in the garland of scales, head eating tale, I can play the horsemen and the saints-- lion, ox, eagle, man: and the light of your name in white laurels and bows of cedar Sherre Vernon (she/her/hers) is the author two award-winning chapbooks: Green Ink Wings (fiction) and The Name is Perilous (poetry). Her work has nominated for Best of the Net and anthologized in several collections, including Bending Genres and Best Small Fictions. In 2019, Sherre was a Parent-Writer Fellow at MVICW. Readers describe her work as heartbreaking, richly layered, lyrical and intelligent. To read more of her work visit www.sherrevernon.com/publications and tag her into conversation @sherrevernon. 5/26/2021 0 Comments Poetry by Kathryne David Gargano Kathryne David Gargano (she/her) hails from the Pacific Northwest, but isn't very good at climbing trees. She received her MFA from the University of Nevada - Las Vegas, and is currently pursuing a PhD in Creative Writing from the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in Gigantic Sequins, The Arkansas International, Pithead Chapel, Salt Hill, the minnesota review, Tahoma Literary Review, and others. She can be found on Twitter @doubtfulljoy 5/26/2021 1 Comment Poetry by Michele Sharpe stanze CC Brother, By a Factor of Ten The signs are available all week: firewood arrayed just so at the hidden campsite the three otters frolicking like your daughters in the river the freight train’s nighttime moan. Just so, moss drapes and veils the hidden campsite. Both warning and heart-wail, the freight train’s nighttime moan fades. Next day, I’m pumping gas when I see, like a warning and heart-wail, the young man with a backpack riding high, clomping past the people pumping gas, boots half-laced, heading out like you did, your pack riding high and your spirit, too, believing in fresh starts. Loose shoelaces heading out -- he’s your type, brother, and you are multiplied by memory, your spirit, your believing, your desire, your leaving. Your presence is available all week, arranged. Elegy for Austin Born magnetized, sensing what lay behind him and which roads led to water, then memorizing streets and buildings at three years old, stopped at a traffic light, crowing “And that’s the way to River Street,” and born for water, diving head first from the limestone outcropping at four years old when the springs welled up freely and flooded the swimming holes, before the great drought that drew the aquifer down, and born contrary, at five years old, despising reading with the conviction of one who had it thrust on him by strangers, and not his mother, who I loved, who was a child I cradled once, who relinquished him, at six years old, to a good family when she couldn’t piss clean enough to keep him, and that was still before the springs dried up, and he was born fearless, our lineage both gift and curse, so was he born stamped with the arc he carved in air when the ATV he’d mastered backflipped and his neck snapped? At thirteen years old. He is not coming back. The springs are coming back. Again, the floods drench everything. Michele Sharpe, a poet and essayist, is also a high school dropout, hepatitis C survivor, adoptee, and former trial attorney. Her essays appear in venues including The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Poets & Writers. Poems are recently published or forthcoming in Sweet, The Mom Egg Review, Rogue Agent, and Salamander. She lives in North Florida. 5/26/2021 0 Comments Poetry by K.T. Slattery Tim J Keegan CC Between the Last Bell of the Summer and the First Bell of the Fall Too hot to do anything but swim Sticky, suffocating, Mississippi heat Marco -Polo Marco -Polo We ALL played Before cliques Before hormones Marco Polo Fish Out of Water! You’re it! Though we did not want to get caught Didn’t we all really want to be Marco? Eyes closed Flailing about All in the safe and secure realm Of the shallow end K.T. Slattery was born in Memphis, Tennessee, and grew up just across the state line in Mississippi. A graduate of Spring Hill College in Mobile, Alabama, she now lives in the West of Ireland with her husband and an ever-increasing amount of rescue pets. Her poetry and prose have been published in Ropes Literary Journal, Nightingale and Sparrow, The Siren’s Call, Three Drops from a Cauldron, Planet in Peril Anthology, The Blue Nib, Impspired, The Wellington Street Review, Analogies and Allegories, and Streetcake. She was shortlisted for the 2019 Nightingale and Sparrow Chapbook Competition and has was longlisted for the 2018 and 2019 Over the Edge New Writer of the Year. Most recently she received a special mention in the 2020 Desmond O’Grady Poetry Competition. 5/26/2021 0 Comments Poetry by Nadine Klassen fluffisch CC Ghazal for Those Called Longing I brushed your mother’s voice, a yellow only fields can be, Camellia, What can I say that she hasn’t, reach & reach, child, rope-tree, Camellia. I detangled your father’s starry chest, a slick click into a long paved road - walk on, Pawned what he could give for branches, but with this poem I can't pay the fee, Camellia. So what if I touch you, mouth of Nile - admit that we’re both lost, Purse your lips, I don’t have the kind of language for a remedy, Camellia. & if you’re a body in a boy, burn the dresses in my words. This is for you, too, Smack your glitter lips, kissing all the hearts & reach & reach, Camé, Camellia. I, too, have had red stars pop in my eyes’ whites, Gin & Wild Berry, call me Camellia, Empty they get heavy, still, when you hold them up for long enough, see Camellia. Windstille My father, the wood and the woods; sometimes I find him standing lost within himself, his hearing- aid turned off. I imagine his eyes a lake, peer- ing, squinting in sunlight. In the kitchen, after peeling the potatoes, he kisses the hinge of my mother’s spine while the fishing lines are in the dishwater, hooked on tupperware and split foam. Nadine Klassen is a German poet, living in her hometown with a small family of her boyfriend and dog. Her work has appeared in Wild Roof Journal, High Shelf Press and others. When not writing, she likes to crochet sweaters with puffy sleeves. Author photo by Sofie Kohaupt ( @1aeugig ) |
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