Thursday, February 1, 2007
Editor’s Note:
Who would have thought something that was born on a dark and stormy night could turn out to be as warm as a pair of flannel pajamas. But that’s exactly what’s happen. In fact, CSR has begun to crawl. It’s so heartwarming to watch it pull itself up by the desk leg where my laptop sits and longingly gaze at the chair in front of it as if imaging how comfortable it would be to sit there. The bald-headed bundle of joy has already learned not to eat poetry contests and pushes away any unsolicited manuscripts because of the tremendous response to the “subs by invitation only”, a concept its single parent came up with after just one shock treatment. And because it’s so cute and cuddly both national and international artist bend down on one knee to tickle its cheek. The February issue will showcase a few of them. And guess what, you don’t have to like infants to like CSR. On the other hand, what kind of person doesn’t like a baby! So either sit back and read this second issue or I’ll have you hand wash a whole week’s worth of soiled diapers. And I won’t even offer you hand lotion when you’re done. Now, get to reading…
Who would have thought something that was born on a dark and stormy night could turn out to be as warm as a pair of flannel pajamas. But that’s exactly what’s happen. In fact, CSR has begun to crawl. It’s so heartwarming to watch it pull itself up by the desk leg where my laptop sits and longingly gaze at the chair in front of it as if imaging how comfortable it would be to sit there. The bald-headed bundle of joy has already learned not to eat poetry contests and pushes away any unsolicited manuscripts because of the tremendous response to the “subs by invitation only”, a concept its single parent came up with after just one shock treatment. And because it’s so cute and cuddly both national and international artist bend down on one knee to tickle its cheek. The February issue will showcase a few of them. And guess what, you don’t have to like infants to like CSR. On the other hand, what kind of person doesn’t like a baby! So either sit back and read this second issue or I’ll have you hand wash a whole week’s worth of soiled diapers. And I won’t even offer you hand lotion when you’re done. Now, get to reading…
Amber Nelson
The Emergence Of Armor
Bone does not become thinner
at the invasion of an opening
it is only the cutting
waxen under skinned knees
the drift and rust of a wet blade
we have become less than
the sediment in our blood
the diseased movement of the body
our lips crust over
seal our mouthed calling
broken by the scalpel
out tenderness emerges slowly
Lovers
They adopted names.
Cohorts in formica, tin and twang, compromising
at used and rigid overtures, the red the lidded
aplomb tinged like lipped margins, anchored and
thinned, parched above whispers, a ratcheted
bearing that sucks the ashen order of canopy,
left to lift and dive.
Sometimes a strange, sometimes an accordion
for a kiss, and sometimes the sky rounding out
the mouth.
Heartbreak
Dusty possession of skin
the people count plenty
the season hunger
when streams dry
the wildebeest thunders
grass turns the herd, loping
for wealth in pastoral
the year tumbled
illuminating in yellow
invisible morning into crater
Glass Blinds
making sense of absence
in stained paper windows
how exact, the folded obstruction
the sill that submits
to the pressure of waiting
roaring through glass
the clatter of blinds retrieve
the border, sullen, burnishes
into the silo of wanting
A Wavelength of Visible Light
Mining a glass evolution.
Alight and blue smudged,
the next thing always belongs.
To pull the trigger.
To break like quicksand.
This conchoidal architecture is the fissure
in which to reopen.
As though perception could be picked
from soot and coal.
Sand evolved
lucid, in the heat.
The Emergence Of Armor
Bone does not become thinner
at the invasion of an opening
it is only the cutting
waxen under skinned knees
the drift and rust of a wet blade
we have become less than
the sediment in our blood
the diseased movement of the body
our lips crust over
seal our mouthed calling
broken by the scalpel
out tenderness emerges slowly
Lovers
They adopted names.
Cohorts in formica, tin and twang, compromising
at used and rigid overtures, the red the lidded
aplomb tinged like lipped margins, anchored and
thinned, parched above whispers, a ratcheted
bearing that sucks the ashen order of canopy,
left to lift and dive.
Sometimes a strange, sometimes an accordion
for a kiss, and sometimes the sky rounding out
the mouth.
Heartbreak
Dusty possession of skin
the people count plenty
the season hunger
when streams dry
the wildebeest thunders
grass turns the herd, loping
for wealth in pastoral
the year tumbled
illuminating in yellow
invisible morning into crater
Glass Blinds
making sense of absence
in stained paper windows
how exact, the folded obstruction
the sill that submits
to the pressure of waiting
roaring through glass
the clatter of blinds retrieve
the border, sullen, burnishes
into the silo of wanting
A Wavelength of Visible Light
Mining a glass evolution.
Alight and blue smudged,
the next thing always belongs.
To pull the trigger.
To break like quicksand.
This conchoidal architecture is the fissure
in which to reopen.
As though perception could be picked
from soot and coal.
Sand evolved
lucid, in the heat.
Richard Fein
Thin Spectrum
Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet,
Roy G Biv twists through myriad prisms.
Slow wavering is red, a fast flutter is violet,
and sandwiched between infra and ultra,
between radio waves and cosmic rays
is our wafer of visibility.
Bees see ultra violet and vipers sense infra red
and we stumble in between,
blind as a bat to most of the universe.
Yet it’s neither bee nor viper nor even bat but only we
who discern the segue shades of gray.
Minute Hope, Hourly Desire
Years ago the hours and minutes stopped somewhere between 12 and 12.
The glass was too scratched to see exactly where,
and he was too drunk to care precisely when.
But he has rewound, tightened hi metaphorical main spring.
No longer a panhandler,
he seeks to measure his remaining time
with blinking hours, minutes, and seconds
or the graceful sweep of watch hands.
Then passersby instead of pretending to look away
will approach and ask nothing from them.
A panhandler measures days
by meal to meal, drink to drink, fix to fix,
or bankruptcy to bankruptcy.
Yet he’s been sober long enough,
and earned and saved almost enough
for that digital Casio in the drugstore display case.
A Rolex remains a distant dream.
But he rubs his still naked wrist, and hopes.
Blanket Existence
Cerebral cortex,
Defined by Webster’s unabridged as a superficial overlay.
A layer of neural gray cells, a wispy membrane rousing
a dream-walking being into self-awareness.
For when the frog doesn’t even know it exists,
likewise the frog in the jaws of a snake.
Or the snake in the talons of a hawk.
But we can ask why, judge right form wrong,
dream, know we’re dreaming, and fulfill those dreams.
All the threads that weave an immortal soul
rest in a mortal meshwork blanket-thin.
Cloudy New Year’s Morning
Surely last year she left someone or someone left her,
the way she sits on the bench by the 69th street pier,
Slowly tossing crumpled bread to the gulls.
She even tires feeding the manna form her open palms,
but the feathered Israelites refuse her handheld charity,
preferring to peck on the ground.
Thus with downcast eyes and slumping posture
she anoints herself the center of the gull’s attention
and so I move toward her.
And what am I doing here this cloudy New Year’s morning?
We two alone together on a pier so deserted
that even the daily fisherman are absent.
I walk past her and instead of happy new year,
I blurt, “It will be better this year”.
And she raises her head and we’re eye-to-eye.
And I stop. And I hope; and I hope.
But her eyes whisper, “Thanks, but please move on”.
And so I leave, through a flock of grounded gulls
not yet ready to resume soaring.
The Book Of Eternal Life
The book of eternal life is a telephone book.
An updated edition arrives each year.
A divinely diligent editor
skims across cheap, thin paper
erasing older names, inserting newer ones
and reshuffling the numbers.
Here in the attic I found an eighty-year-old phone book.
And if I were to dial the number for any name,
I’d get a wrong number, dead air
or a notice of disconnection.
It’s Life that’s eternal, not lives.
Thin Spectrum
Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet,
Roy G Biv twists through myriad prisms.
Slow wavering is red, a fast flutter is violet,
and sandwiched between infra and ultra,
between radio waves and cosmic rays
is our wafer of visibility.
Bees see ultra violet and vipers sense infra red
and we stumble in between,
blind as a bat to most of the universe.
Yet it’s neither bee nor viper nor even bat but only we
who discern the segue shades of gray.
Minute Hope, Hourly Desire
Years ago the hours and minutes stopped somewhere between 12 and 12.
The glass was too scratched to see exactly where,
and he was too drunk to care precisely when.
But he has rewound, tightened hi metaphorical main spring.
No longer a panhandler,
he seeks to measure his remaining time
with blinking hours, minutes, and seconds
or the graceful sweep of watch hands.
Then passersby instead of pretending to look away
will approach and ask nothing from them.
A panhandler measures days
by meal to meal, drink to drink, fix to fix,
or bankruptcy to bankruptcy.
Yet he’s been sober long enough,
and earned and saved almost enough
for that digital Casio in the drugstore display case.
A Rolex remains a distant dream.
But he rubs his still naked wrist, and hopes.
Blanket Existence
Cerebral cortex,
Defined by Webster’s unabridged as a superficial overlay.
A layer of neural gray cells, a wispy membrane rousing
a dream-walking being into self-awareness.
For when the frog doesn’t even know it exists,
likewise the frog in the jaws of a snake.
Or the snake in the talons of a hawk.
But we can ask why, judge right form wrong,
dream, know we’re dreaming, and fulfill those dreams.
All the threads that weave an immortal soul
rest in a mortal meshwork blanket-thin.
Cloudy New Year’s Morning
Surely last year she left someone or someone left her,
the way she sits on the bench by the 69th street pier,
Slowly tossing crumpled bread to the gulls.
She even tires feeding the manna form her open palms,
but the feathered Israelites refuse her handheld charity,
preferring to peck on the ground.
Thus with downcast eyes and slumping posture
she anoints herself the center of the gull’s attention
and so I move toward her.
And what am I doing here this cloudy New Year’s morning?
We two alone together on a pier so deserted
that even the daily fisherman are absent.
I walk past her and instead of happy new year,
I blurt, “It will be better this year”.
And she raises her head and we’re eye-to-eye.
And I stop. And I hope; and I hope.
But her eyes whisper, “Thanks, but please move on”.
And so I leave, through a flock of grounded gulls
not yet ready to resume soaring.
The Book Of Eternal Life
The book of eternal life is a telephone book.
An updated edition arrives each year.
A divinely diligent editor
skims across cheap, thin paper
erasing older names, inserting newer ones
and reshuffling the numbers.
Here in the attic I found an eighty-year-old phone book.
And if I were to dial the number for any name,
I’d get a wrong number, dead air
or a notice of disconnection.
It’s Life that’s eternal, not lives.
Winter Tree
The voracious season has come
with its wrinkled bark and nakedness,
when the vegetative slumber of winter
overcomes you.
And in the doze before true sleep
you imagine the difference of squirrels.
You dream your leaves are done for
and dying into the dirt at your feet.
A storm blows down your extra fingers.
This is the frightening monument
before the deep dreaming overtakes you,
when you can still scent the faint song
of autumn. You press your roots to earth.
You pretend you are not paralyzed
with the inevitable,
But growing fascination with languor
overcomes your plaited sorrow.
The sleep huddled in your highest branch
stretches its leaves and falls on you like a blanket,
warms your fears just in time for snow.
with its wrinkled bark and nakedness,
when the vegetative slumber of winter
overcomes you.
And in the doze before true sleep
you imagine the difference of squirrels.
You dream your leaves are done for
and dying into the dirt at your feet.
A storm blows down your extra fingers.
This is the frightening monument
before the deep dreaming overtakes you,
when you can still scent the faint song
of autumn. You press your roots to earth.
You pretend you are not paralyzed
with the inevitable,
But growing fascination with languor
overcomes your plaited sorrow.
The sleep huddled in your highest branch
stretches its leaves and falls on you like a blanket,
warms your fears just in time for snow.
How rain arrives
This morning you called
long before the sky slipped
on her sunrise skirt:
early stars blinked quietly
the way a heart beats
beneath the covers of sleep.
When the phone rang
the whole house
seized awake.
She died in the night,
was the first thing you said.
I listened to you describe
her fall, nodded my grief
into a phone gone suddenly
hard and cold.
You didn’t hear her go.
You couldn’t have known
how you’d sewn guilt
into your end of the conversation,
scratchy and strange the way
a mended sheet rubs
on a bare foot at dawn.
By the time my bed was made,
clouds shrouded the sky’s face.
When I started the car,
rain had already stained
the road dark and wet.
long before the sky slipped
on her sunrise skirt:
early stars blinked quietly
the way a heart beats
beneath the covers of sleep.
When the phone rang
the whole house
seized awake.
She died in the night,
was the first thing you said.
I listened to you describe
her fall, nodded my grief
into a phone gone suddenly
hard and cold.
You didn’t hear her go.
You couldn’t have known
how you’d sewn guilt
into your end of the conversation,
scratchy and strange the way
a mended sheet rubs
on a bare foot at dawn.
By the time my bed was made,
clouds shrouded the sky’s face.
When I started the car,
rain had already stained
the road dark and wet.
Foraging for wood on the mountain
This time the wooded mountain gave up words. Wild,
unbridled verbs thickened the air.
Noun feathered the ground. It was clear
the leaves were distressed, by the harshness,
the unveiling, as if secrets and belief
were meant to hide forever. No one knows
how the trees’ bark peeled, how to distinguish
the truth among so many naked trunks. Versions
differ. Too many adjectives were lost, What is
disaster, anyway? Words can only describe sorrow.
unbridled verbs thickened the air.
Noun feathered the ground. It was clear
the leaves were distressed, by the harshness,
the unveiling, as if secrets and belief
were meant to hide forever. No one knows
how the trees’ bark peeled, how to distinguish
the truth among so many naked trunks. Versions
differ. Too many adjectives were lost, What is
disaster, anyway? Words can only describe sorrow.
Ian C. Smith
1954
A boy
seen in the lamp's refulgence
enduring
his father’s base criticism
focuses
on the private place
where he dwells alone
voluptuously alone.
He reads
the voice pleads his mother keeps her mouth shut
no apostrophe with swears
his father glares in rage appeals to his wife.
The boy rehearses his life
as if he senses the road ahead
conjures a blanket of rain
to cushion sound
and sweeten the atmosphere
turns another page
yearns for those other worlds
strains to unmask the future.
He switches his focus to that rain
swells it to a deluge
a freak flood
seizes the voice
its bleak cry of distress
holds it under
until it is drowned.
Hamstrung
The boy’s imagination meanders
away from organized games
their rituals their monotony.
He carries home on the sweaty bus
an enriched account of school sports
the drama of his participation
his sacrifice of mind and body
straining to reach the finish
despite his wavering interest.
His father’s imagination
during the trek of marital sex
has stretched like perished elastic
stranding him limp and bereft.
This father sighing for a false past
tunes in to their son’s complaint
a nagging twinge suffered
in the long run up the final straight.
The boy points to the back of his leg
ask his mother, surely not
the same girl his father married,
Mum, is this your G-string?
There’s No Going Back
The aspirations of childhood.
We know what their horoscope says.
A boy, his dreams of gold despite his blood,
grows up to spend driven days
tracing his family like a private eye
of crime fiction, aunts, uncles, misfits,
battered, scattered, their history a cry
in the overhanging night, a clan kinghit.
Through public records and heartrending
tales, he finds them by burrowing back.
All that is missing is a happy ending.
He sees the scene, hears a soundtrack,
a reunion with strings or pan flute.
He sends his story to LWTV,
convinces a man in a suit
to fly his parents for a surprise party.
The ratings zoom, with stifled sobs on cue.
Later, their crowd loud in a London hotel,
our man, his golden dream come true,
musters his old mum, urges her to reveal
how she feels, now, with her sister again.
He wonders if she understands what he did
to bring this pack together, past pain.
His mum responds: She still owes me ten quid!
1954
A boy
seen in the lamp's refulgence
enduring
his father’s base criticism
focuses
on the private place
where he dwells alone
voluptuously alone.
He reads
the voice pleads his mother keeps her mouth shut
no apostrophe with swears
his father glares in rage appeals to his wife.
The boy rehearses his life
as if he senses the road ahead
conjures a blanket of rain
to cushion sound
and sweeten the atmosphere
turns another page
yearns for those other worlds
strains to unmask the future.
He switches his focus to that rain
swells it to a deluge
a freak flood
seizes the voice
its bleak cry of distress
holds it under
until it is drowned.
Hamstrung
The boy’s imagination meanders
away from organized games
their rituals their monotony.
He carries home on the sweaty bus
an enriched account of school sports
the drama of his participation
his sacrifice of mind and body
straining to reach the finish
despite his wavering interest.
His father’s imagination
during the trek of marital sex
has stretched like perished elastic
stranding him limp and bereft.
This father sighing for a false past
tunes in to their son’s complaint
a nagging twinge suffered
in the long run up the final straight.
The boy points to the back of his leg
ask his mother, surely not
the same girl his father married,
Mum, is this your G-string?
There’s No Going Back
The aspirations of childhood.
We know what their horoscope says.
A boy, his dreams of gold despite his blood,
grows up to spend driven days
tracing his family like a private eye
of crime fiction, aunts, uncles, misfits,
battered, scattered, their history a cry
in the overhanging night, a clan kinghit.
Through public records and heartrending
tales, he finds them by burrowing back.
All that is missing is a happy ending.
He sees the scene, hears a soundtrack,
a reunion with strings or pan flute.
He sends his story to LWTV,
convinces a man in a suit
to fly his parents for a surprise party.
The ratings zoom, with stifled sobs on cue.
Later, their crowd loud in a London hotel,
our man, his golden dream come true,
musters his old mum, urges her to reveal
how she feels, now, with her sister again.
He wonders if she understands what he did
to bring this pack together, past pain.
His mum responds: She still owes me ten quid!
Sean Kilpatrick
The Only Weapon Left
When blinking at Christ is another chore,
it helps to draw a laundry list of kneeling.
Dragging ass to kiss the grail, ichors
puddles our scalps, slows the procession.
Day pass in the ripple. Feminine lengths
metastasize. Hammocks swing their bones
in a thong of lichen, teasing until the crab
trees finally cater and weep a violence of fruit.
For all occasions in which we refuse to self-destruct,
let us then claim “accidents of judgment”, and,
pious, recall how magistrates house
their tans in the lipstick sundown.
these garden monuments liquefy diurnally,
holocaust shade waxed ear to ear.
“Take off,” jealous parties whisper
between gate slits, “that mosaic of genitalia.
I saw a girl yesterday whose shirt began
at her neck and ended at her collar bone.
But every torture goes out of fashion.”
Aerobics DVDs bombard skid row,
jutting lectures at the wine tangled
manes of the almost dead.
“You’re doing great!
Remember to check your pulse”.
Cackles enlighten the alleyway.
A pant leg is lifted
so the rats can crawl home.
Night after bed sick night,
a homecoming for every wrinkle,
grandmothers fumble out stains of granite.
We braid our kindness into their stretches,
paramedics glue more smiles on,
it is the only weapon left,
and it trigger’s greased.
First Date (from fuckscapes - first published in Ink Stains)
She came over
wearing just an umbrella
we shaved our heads
and rubbed them together
the sparks formed little swastikas
romance was in the air
I pinned back her clitoral
hood with six tooth picks
when she said uncle
I tied myself into a knot
I can break eggs
in ways you’d never think
she said
and I felt my tears
flow as the lights went
down and the newsreel
footage began
spinning
and spinning
Victim logy (Part 2 - The Fashionably Dead)
“Time destroys all things”
-Gasper Noe
I was delivered, hands at three and nine, a wrist-watch Christ,
guilty for Coca-Cola, the cock teaser billboards towering
over Projects nationwide, Mickey Mouse with all
his rectal sutures combed loose in the overhead
--that was the influence of my birth.
I am killed by shrugging post-dinner walks.
Stuck dead by a welfare influenza that perhaps, ironically,
I first sneezed. After all, how many times have
I been caught laying my silver elbows on the window
sighing my slurs at the newspaper?
It really pinches, muting one’s life to commerce.
On the sidewalk, as he pounds it in,
think what a miserable story I can peddle
like sympathy’s prostitute. I need this,
a new excuse for breathing. I will live from shoulder
to shoulder. Break down while using a tampon.
My friends, purpled by varicose gossip,
trays of cow like red mirrors in the kitchen,
fiddling loose their jealousies, and my husband,
a stronger dose needed to lift his eyes to mine,
share the pills--so I can stuff them into my wound,
but nothing will shrink me back to scale.
Tell the ambulance men to stop for coffee.
I have felt the future spend itself,
now I want to check my makeup.
The Only Weapon Left
When blinking at Christ is another chore,
it helps to draw a laundry list of kneeling.
Dragging ass to kiss the grail, ichors
puddles our scalps, slows the procession.
Day pass in the ripple. Feminine lengths
metastasize. Hammocks swing their bones
in a thong of lichen, teasing until the crab
trees finally cater and weep a violence of fruit.
For all occasions in which we refuse to self-destruct,
let us then claim “accidents of judgment”, and,
pious, recall how magistrates house
their tans in the lipstick sundown.
these garden monuments liquefy diurnally,
holocaust shade waxed ear to ear.
“Take off,” jealous parties whisper
between gate slits, “that mosaic of genitalia.
I saw a girl yesterday whose shirt began
at her neck and ended at her collar bone.
But every torture goes out of fashion.”
Aerobics DVDs bombard skid row,
jutting lectures at the wine tangled
manes of the almost dead.
“You’re doing great!
Remember to check your pulse”.
Cackles enlighten the alleyway.
A pant leg is lifted
so the rats can crawl home.
Night after bed sick night,
a homecoming for every wrinkle,
grandmothers fumble out stains of granite.
We braid our kindness into their stretches,
paramedics glue more smiles on,
it is the only weapon left,
and it trigger’s greased.
First Date (from fuckscapes - first published in Ink Stains)
She came over
wearing just an umbrella
we shaved our heads
and rubbed them together
the sparks formed little swastikas
romance was in the air
I pinned back her clitoral
hood with six tooth picks
when she said uncle
I tied myself into a knot
I can break eggs
in ways you’d never think
she said
and I felt my tears
flow as the lights went
down and the newsreel
footage began
spinning
and spinning
Victim logy (Part 2 - The Fashionably Dead)
“Time destroys all things”
-Gasper Noe
I was delivered, hands at three and nine, a wrist-watch Christ,
guilty for Coca-Cola, the cock teaser billboards towering
over Projects nationwide, Mickey Mouse with all
his rectal sutures combed loose in the overhead
--that was the influence of my birth.
I am killed by shrugging post-dinner walks.
Stuck dead by a welfare influenza that perhaps, ironically,
I first sneezed. After all, how many times have
I been caught laying my silver elbows on the window
sighing my slurs at the newspaper?
It really pinches, muting one’s life to commerce.
On the sidewalk, as he pounds it in,
think what a miserable story I can peddle
like sympathy’s prostitute. I need this,
a new excuse for breathing. I will live from shoulder
to shoulder. Break down while using a tampon.
My friends, purpled by varicose gossip,
trays of cow like red mirrors in the kitchen,
fiddling loose their jealousies, and my husband,
a stronger dose needed to lift his eyes to mine,
share the pills--so I can stuff them into my wound,
but nothing will shrink me back to scale.
Tell the ambulance men to stop for coffee.
I have felt the future spend itself,
now I want to check my makeup.
About Art - Louvre Pyramid
The Louvre Pyramid is the large metal and glass pyramid which serves as the main entrance to the catacombs and has become a landmark for the city of Paris. It was commissioned by then French president Francois Mitterrand to be built in 1989 by the architect I.M. Pei from New York. The structure, which is constructed entirely of glass segments reaches a height of 70 feet (20.6 meters) and is 115 feet (35 meters) wide at the base. Its construction triggered considerable controversy as many felt this futurist edifice would look out of place in front of the Louvre Museum with its classical architecture but their fears have been proven wrong. The main pyramid is actually only one of several glass pyramids which includes the down-pointing La Pyramide Inversee that functions as a skylight in an underground mall in front of the museum. On March 30, 1989, President Mitterrand lead the first visitors into the Pyramid and the 20-tons of glass built at an estimated cost of 117 million Euros took its rightful role as a maker at the intersection of two walkways of one of the largest, oldest and most important art galleries and museums in the world. It became famous once again when it was used as an important element in the blockbuster movie The De Vinci Code. The website is: www.louvre.fr.
Research information provided by: http://www.wikipia.org/.
The Louvre Pyramid is the large metal and glass pyramid which serves as the main entrance to the catacombs and has become a landmark for the city of Paris. It was commissioned by then French president Francois Mitterrand to be built in 1989 by the architect I.M. Pei from New York. The structure, which is constructed entirely of glass segments reaches a height of 70 feet (20.6 meters) and is 115 feet (35 meters) wide at the base. Its construction triggered considerable controversy as many felt this futurist edifice would look out of place in front of the Louvre Museum with its classical architecture but their fears have been proven wrong. The main pyramid is actually only one of several glass pyramids which includes the down-pointing La Pyramide Inversee that functions as a skylight in an underground mall in front of the museum. On March 30, 1989, President Mitterrand lead the first visitors into the Pyramid and the 20-tons of glass built at an estimated cost of 117 million Euros took its rightful role as a maker at the intersection of two walkways of one of the largest, oldest and most important art galleries and museums in the world. It became famous once again when it was used as an important element in the blockbuster movie The De Vinci Code. The website is: www.louvre.fr.
Research information provided by: http://www.wikipia.org/.
Kostas Hrisos
This Scar
This scar on my right arm
Is not from a fearsome battle,
Nor from a sporting accident,
Or from a marshal bout in a Dojo.
This scar on my right arm
Is not form an infamous fight
With a drunken clod at a pub,
Or from a fight at match,
Or from a clash with the police.
This scar on my right arm is the result
Of a momentary laps of concentration
While getting a pizza out of the oven.
The high-raised flats.
They are knocking down the flats
by the coast road,
Ordinary lives,
still echoing around
on a blue wallpaper strip
of the children’s bedroom,
on gapping kitchen’s drawers,
muffled by the abandoned sofa.
From a broken window
on the ground floor
aided by draughts
through a missing door
a dirty red curtain is flapping
defiantly,
the cape of the matador
inciting the bulldozer.
Blessings
I was blessed with
The labor of the golden wheat:
Bread for the flesh.
I was blessed with
The labor of the fleshy grape:
Wine for the blood.
I was blessed with
The labor of the sweet olive:
Oil for the kantilli
Kantilli: the little light that burns
with olive oil-oil near the icons.
Just Like Them
Congregated
In a Holy Bible
At the bottom of a drawer
The Holy Trinity,
The Virgin Mary,
Angles, Demons,
Prophets, Apostles,
The Devil
The Four Horsemen,
Among so many others.
Some move with such dexterity
In half-tone gray landscapes,
Sleeves rolled up ceremoniously,
Whispering in hushed and weird tones,
Deliberate their predicament,
Yearning for attention.
Others demonstrate in discontent,
Shouting out loud as in a march,
Or at a football ground,
Demanding my attention.
I hear them all.
I don’t answer.
Nut & Bolt
Spiral threads perfectly match.
Stretched tightened up.
Secure for quite a while, now rusted.
To loosen:
tighten slightly first
or
heat up with an intense flame
or
use some corrosive spray.
Do not use a large spanner,
it will strip the threads away
or they will break.
This Scar
This scar on my right arm
Is not from a fearsome battle,
Nor from a sporting accident,
Or from a marshal bout in a Dojo.
This scar on my right arm
Is not form an infamous fight
With a drunken clod at a pub,
Or from a fight at match,
Or from a clash with the police.
This scar on my right arm is the result
Of a momentary laps of concentration
While getting a pizza out of the oven.
The high-raised flats.
They are knocking down the flats
by the coast road,
Ordinary lives,
still echoing around
on a blue wallpaper strip
of the children’s bedroom,
on gapping kitchen’s drawers,
muffled by the abandoned sofa.
From a broken window
on the ground floor
aided by draughts
through a missing door
a dirty red curtain is flapping
defiantly,
the cape of the matador
inciting the bulldozer.
Blessings
I was blessed with
The labor of the golden wheat:
Bread for the flesh.
I was blessed with
The labor of the fleshy grape:
Wine for the blood.
I was blessed with
The labor of the sweet olive:
Oil for the kantilli
Kantilli: the little light that burns
with olive oil-oil near the icons.
Just Like Them
Congregated
In a Holy Bible
At the bottom of a drawer
The Holy Trinity,
The Virgin Mary,
Angles, Demons,
Prophets, Apostles,
The Devil
The Four Horsemen,
Among so many others.
Some move with such dexterity
In half-tone gray landscapes,
Sleeves rolled up ceremoniously,
Whispering in hushed and weird tones,
Deliberate their predicament,
Yearning for attention.
Others demonstrate in discontent,
Shouting out loud as in a march,
Or at a football ground,
Demanding my attention.
I hear them all.
I don’t answer.
Nut & Bolt
Spiral threads perfectly match.
Stretched tightened up.
Secure for quite a while, now rusted.
To loosen:
tighten slightly first
or
heat up with an intense flame
or
use some corrosive spray.
Do not use a large spanner,
it will strip the threads away
or they will break.
About Acting - Mette Marckmann
In the premiere issue I introduced you to a long-time friend from Denmark. Now, I’d like to introduce you to his sister, a well-known actress who has been kind enough to tell you about her career and what she finds rewarding about it. We met during the summer of ‘85. I was on my way back to Germany after having finished a photograph exhibition at Mosegard Museum in Arhus. Peter had suggested that I stop and meet his parents who lived right on the train route back to the German border. Peter’s father, by then retired from his medical practice, met me at the train station and drove me to their comfortable home near a watery enclave. Mette was still living at home and agreed to let me take some portrait shots of her at a lovely spot on a sandy beach within walking distance of the house. As I took the pictures, she told me of her dream of becoming a actress, of breaking the mold of following in both her father’s and grandfather’s footsteps by becoming a doctor. And that’s exactly what she did and here’s her story, in her own words:
An actress in Denmark! That’s what I am. I’ve been working as an actress, mostly on the stage, for 15 years now, learning that if you want to survive in this business you have to be able to be: a good theatre/film/TV-actress, a writer, a director, a producer, a speaker, a cartoon-dubber, a dancer, a singer, a teacher, a politician and much, much more. I graduated from the Danish national Theatre School in 1992 after 4 years education. Then, slowly at first, I went through what I call my “free-lance” period in order to get my real education. Now, I do cabaret shows in the summer and more serious Danish drama in the winter along with voice-overs for commercials and cartoons. My career includes a lot of things. Find out more about me and the members of my fellow troupe of improvisation actors at: www.tripleplay.dk. My website is: www.mettemarckmann.dk. Look forward to hearing from you.
Cheers…Mette
In the premiere issue I introduced you to a long-time friend from Denmark. Now, I’d like to introduce you to his sister, a well-known actress who has been kind enough to tell you about her career and what she finds rewarding about it. We met during the summer of ‘85. I was on my way back to Germany after having finished a photograph exhibition at Mosegard Museum in Arhus. Peter had suggested that I stop and meet his parents who lived right on the train route back to the German border. Peter’s father, by then retired from his medical practice, met me at the train station and drove me to their comfortable home near a watery enclave. Mette was still living at home and agreed to let me take some portrait shots of her at a lovely spot on a sandy beach within walking distance of the house. As I took the pictures, she told me of her dream of becoming a actress, of breaking the mold of following in both her father’s and grandfather’s footsteps by becoming a doctor. And that’s exactly what she did and here’s her story, in her own words:
An actress in Denmark! That’s what I am. I’ve been working as an actress, mostly on the stage, for 15 years now, learning that if you want to survive in this business you have to be able to be: a good theatre/film/TV-actress, a writer, a director, a producer, a speaker, a cartoon-dubber, a dancer, a singer, a teacher, a politician and much, much more. I graduated from the Danish national Theatre School in 1992 after 4 years education. Then, slowly at first, I went through what I call my “free-lance” period in order to get my real education. Now, I do cabaret shows in the summer and more serious Danish drama in the winter along with voice-overs for commercials and cartoons. My career includes a lot of things. Find out more about me and the members of my fellow troupe of improvisation actors at: www.tripleplay.dk. My website is: www.mettemarckmann.dk. Look forward to hearing from you.
Cheers…Mette
Halvard Johnson
How To Be A Private Eye
1.
Eat two pork sandwiches, a side order
of Brunswick stew, and a cup of gritty black coffee
at Foster’s Barbecue hut. Order another cup of coffee to go.
2.
Take up your stake-out position in the rear lot
of Cooksie’s Texaco station looking out over an unmowed
meadow toward a one-story frame house.
3.
Make your coffee last until sunset, letting the last
few drops go down like chilled linseed oil.
4.
Watch as someone drives up and parks parallel to the house
under the cork elms drooping over the front porch, pausing
in the light of the porch light to look up and down the
street before knocking, looking right up at Cooksie’s for a second.
5.
When the big man doesn’t see you, let your breath out
in a nervous burst.
6.
Get out of your car and scamper down the incline
behind the service station into the meadow beside
the house. Creep around to the back, climb to a
rickety screened porch, ease your way through the
unlatched door. Step up onto an old railway bench
to see what you can see.
7.
Count yourself lucky that the same loud rock
music that prevents you from getting any kind
of good recording muffles the telltale bump
and creakings of your maneuvers on the bench.
8.
Take a couple photographs and step down from the bench,
knocking loose as you do a slat
from the back of the bench, which falls
clattering into an empty metal basin underneath it.
9.
Hop through the door and down the dilapidated rear
steps, moon rolling out from behind a cloud
to spotlight your getaway. Avoid revealing
the location of your car by heading for a
drainage ditch instead of Cooksie’s.
10.
Crouching low in the grass, watch the two
men come out onto the porch, down the
exterior steps, and into the dewy September
meadow. Hear the smaller one shout, “Leave
us alone. Leave us alone!”
(source text: “Unlikely Friends” by Michael Bishop:
Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, November 1982)
How To Be A Private Eye
1.
Eat two pork sandwiches, a side order
of Brunswick stew, and a cup of gritty black coffee
at Foster’s Barbecue hut. Order another cup of coffee to go.
2.
Take up your stake-out position in the rear lot
of Cooksie’s Texaco station looking out over an unmowed
meadow toward a one-story frame house.
3.
Make your coffee last until sunset, letting the last
few drops go down like chilled linseed oil.
4.
Watch as someone drives up and parks parallel to the house
under the cork elms drooping over the front porch, pausing
in the light of the porch light to look up and down the
street before knocking, looking right up at Cooksie’s for a second.
5.
When the big man doesn’t see you, let your breath out
in a nervous burst.
6.
Get out of your car and scamper down the incline
behind the service station into the meadow beside
the house. Creep around to the back, climb to a
rickety screened porch, ease your way through the
unlatched door. Step up onto an old railway bench
to see what you can see.
7.
Count yourself lucky that the same loud rock
music that prevents you from getting any kind
of good recording muffles the telltale bump
and creakings of your maneuvers on the bench.
8.
Take a couple photographs and step down from the bench,
knocking loose as you do a slat
from the back of the bench, which falls
clattering into an empty metal basin underneath it.
9.
Hop through the door and down the dilapidated rear
steps, moon rolling out from behind a cloud
to spotlight your getaway. Avoid revealing
the location of your car by heading for a
drainage ditch instead of Cooksie’s.
10.
Crouching low in the grass, watch the two
men come out onto the porch, down the
exterior steps, and into the dewy September
meadow. Hear the smaller one shout, “Leave
us alone. Leave us alone!”
(source text: “Unlikely Friends” by Michael Bishop:
Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, November 1982)
Contributors Biographies
Amber Nelson: grew-up in small town Washington. Even though she is now a city girl, she retains a childhood fondness for roller coasters and cows. She is the poetry editor of Alice Blue. Her work can be found online at Dusie and in print at Slightly West. She lives in Seattle, WA. Visit her online at: www.alicbluereview.org
Richard Fein: was a finalist in the 2004 Center for Book Arts Chapbook Competition and has been published in numerous web and print journals including Touchstone, Windsor Review, Exquisite Corpse, and Paranassus Literary Review. He also has an interest in digital photography. Samples of his photography can be found at: www.pbase.com/bardofbyte.com. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Christine Klocek-Lim: was born in the coal-mining region of northeastern Pennsylvania. She received a BA in Professional writing form Carneige Mellon and has worked as a technical writer in Manhattan. Her poetry has appeared in Nimrod, Lily, Simply Haiku, and elsewhere. In 2006, her poetry was selected as a finalist for Nimrod’s Pablo Neruda Prize For Poetry. Her website is: www.novembersky.com.
Ian C. Smith: uses the pen-name of S.M. Chianti. His poetry has appeared in many journals including Best Australian Poetry, Descant, Magma, The Malahat Review, and Meanjin & Westerly. His latest book is Memory Like Hunger (Ginninderra Press). He has a wife and four sons and lives in southeastern Australia, Reach him at: bridge foundation@kilmany.org.au.
Sean Kilpatrick: is a two-time Pushcart Prize Nominee. His poetry and short stories have or will soon appear in over seventy magazines and anthologies including Exquisite Corpse, Snow Monkey, Elimae, 3AM Magazine, andwere, and Unlikely Stories. His first book is forthcoming from Six Gallery press. He lives in Detroit where he is a photography major leaning towards forensics work. His blog features interviews with poets and can be found at: www.anorexicchlorinesextoymuseum.blogspot.com
Wes Magyar: finds inspiration for his paintings from a combination of both personal experience and observations of our culture. His paintings are meant to tell us something. They are meant to be rich with meaning and alluring to the eye. He was the first Denver-based painter to be hosted by Syntax- a denver review. Both his father and brother are painters as well. He received a BA of Fine Arts from the University of Colorado in 1998. He lives in Denver, CO. His website is: www.wesmagyar.com.
Kostas Hrisos: is the founder and editor of Interpoetry online, which began when it took over the very successful Greek and International Poetry website with over 1000 visitors a year. He writes in Greek and English. A collection of his work, In Other Words (2000) received excellent reviews. He is currently finishing the translation of Basil Bunting’s Briggflats. A native of Greece, he has lived in Newcastle, England, since 1975. His literary website is: http://www.interpoetry.com/.
Mette Marckmann: was born in 1967 and grew-up in Sonderborg, Denmark. She studied acting at the National Danish Theatre School from 1988-1992. She made her acting debut at Riddersalem in 1992 and has appeared both on stage and in TV commercials since then but is mainly connected with the theatre. She has also worked with such film directors as Lars Von Trier and Thomas Vintenberg (director of the film Festen/The Party). She has been a member of the board of Danish Actors Association since 2004. She is a wife and mother of two and lives in Copenhagen, Denmark. Her website is: www.mettemarckmann.dk.
Halvard Johnson: is the editor of Hamilton Stone Review. He admits he has a taxman who doesn’t snicker when he identifies himself as a writer/teacher, even though the amount of money he’s made from writing is roughly equivalent to the amount of money he’s found on sidewalks and in parking lots. He’s used some of it to finance extensive trips to Europe and Asia. He shares an apartment in New York City with his wife Schor, along with all his childhood allergies. They share a website at: www.earthlink.net/~halvard.
Closing Notes: The editor would like to thank the contributors for the use of their work. Each contributor reserves all original rights. The next issue goes online on March 1st. Copyright 2007 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.
Also visit his personal blog at: www.copyat5.blogspot.com
And his music blog at: www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com
Amber Nelson: grew-up in small town Washington. Even though she is now a city girl, she retains a childhood fondness for roller coasters and cows. She is the poetry editor of Alice Blue. Her work can be found online at Dusie and in print at Slightly West. She lives in Seattle, WA. Visit her online at: www.alicbluereview.org
Richard Fein: was a finalist in the 2004 Center for Book Arts Chapbook Competition and has been published in numerous web and print journals including Touchstone, Windsor Review, Exquisite Corpse, and Paranassus Literary Review. He also has an interest in digital photography. Samples of his photography can be found at: www.pbase.com/bardofbyte.com. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Christine Klocek-Lim: was born in the coal-mining region of northeastern Pennsylvania. She received a BA in Professional writing form Carneige Mellon and has worked as a technical writer in Manhattan. Her poetry has appeared in Nimrod, Lily, Simply Haiku, and elsewhere. In 2006, her poetry was selected as a finalist for Nimrod’s Pablo Neruda Prize For Poetry. Her website is: www.novembersky.com.
Ian C. Smith: uses the pen-name of S.M. Chianti. His poetry has appeared in many journals including Best Australian Poetry, Descant, Magma, The Malahat Review, and Meanjin & Westerly. His latest book is Memory Like Hunger (Ginninderra Press). He has a wife and four sons and lives in southeastern Australia, Reach him at: bridge foundation@kilmany.org.au.
Sean Kilpatrick: is a two-time Pushcart Prize Nominee. His poetry and short stories have or will soon appear in over seventy magazines and anthologies including Exquisite Corpse, Snow Monkey, Elimae, 3AM Magazine, andwere, and Unlikely Stories. His first book is forthcoming from Six Gallery press. He lives in Detroit where he is a photography major leaning towards forensics work. His blog features interviews with poets and can be found at: www.anorexicchlorinesextoymuseum.blogspot.com
Wes Magyar: finds inspiration for his paintings from a combination of both personal experience and observations of our culture. His paintings are meant to tell us something. They are meant to be rich with meaning and alluring to the eye. He was the first Denver-based painter to be hosted by Syntax- a denver review. Both his father and brother are painters as well. He received a BA of Fine Arts from the University of Colorado in 1998. He lives in Denver, CO. His website is: www.wesmagyar.com.
Kostas Hrisos: is the founder and editor of Interpoetry online, which began when it took over the very successful Greek and International Poetry website with over 1000 visitors a year. He writes in Greek and English. A collection of his work, In Other Words (2000) received excellent reviews. He is currently finishing the translation of Basil Bunting’s Briggflats. A native of Greece, he has lived in Newcastle, England, since 1975. His literary website is: http://www.interpoetry.com/.
Mette Marckmann: was born in 1967 and grew-up in Sonderborg, Denmark. She studied acting at the National Danish Theatre School from 1988-1992. She made her acting debut at Riddersalem in 1992 and has appeared both on stage and in TV commercials since then but is mainly connected with the theatre. She has also worked with such film directors as Lars Von Trier and Thomas Vintenberg (director of the film Festen/The Party). She has been a member of the board of Danish Actors Association since 2004. She is a wife and mother of two and lives in Copenhagen, Denmark. Her website is: www.mettemarckmann.dk.
Halvard Johnson: is the editor of Hamilton Stone Review. He admits he has a taxman who doesn’t snicker when he identifies himself as a writer/teacher, even though the amount of money he’s made from writing is roughly equivalent to the amount of money he’s found on sidewalks and in parking lots. He’s used some of it to finance extensive trips to Europe and Asia. He shares an apartment in New York City with his wife Schor, along with all his childhood allergies. They share a website at: www.earthlink.net/~halvard.
Closing Notes: The editor would like to thank the contributors for the use of their work. Each contributor reserves all original rights. The next issue goes online on March 1st. Copyright 2007 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.
Also visit his personal blog at: www.copyat5.blogspot.com
And his music blog at: www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
