Jeremy- Three Poems

Cradle Guard

automaton prime
you indoctrinate us blind
feeding on the fine
fueling it with crime
do you think about our future
when you plan on your own time

automaton prime
did you see good language die
do you know what's in our eyes
living such a lie
avoiding real solution
so your cradle guard can fly

automaton prime
defining reason and rhyme
drawing every line
crafting every sign
spread this addiction
in our infant information
captured our attention
with cosmic valuation
spoiled our existence
by extreme anticipation
neglecting all creation
symphonizing circulation
orchestrating automation

selfish is defined
monsterously blind
more entangled through time
we're all in this together
our turn to face the weather
without breaks or rewinding
it takes all reminding

every day is today
for the love



Conscious Evolution

Good that we have created games to keep our fight challenged, without having to harm ourselves, for what would we be able to become without fight?

Rats deprived of physical and social play become less intelligent at problem solving; compare this with our society that causes us to avoid and alienate each other, living in boxes and brainwashed into a slave machine that supports the absurdly indulgent of power through an invention of money, information and law. Good and evil don't actually exist, only consciousness in a transition of birth from the animal ego, with arbitrary intelligence.

Such an honorable daydream of humanity is used to distract us from an overpopulation that flows with an addiction to comfort, taken advantage by disqualifying a circulatory wisdom. Free education is not only about the opportunity for people to earn their power through understanding, but so truth can be uncensored, that reality can prevail.

Only shedding light can ever solve a problem, as truth inverses evil.

They think sacrifice gives power, that to be rich you must have the poor, but it's a tyrannical fantasy to justify slavery, an apotheosis of ego, the vindictive monster of vanity. Inventions of terrorism and the illusion that strangers want to hurt you is keeping this machine well oiled; we are gears, turning against each other, as our hope is being worn like a mask.

What army could possibly be stronger than an intelligent, healthy and loving people? Art is better when it's not trying to be something because then it can make the best of itself.



Lobster Monster

blooded beyond unrealistic surrender
bothered by a profound pretender
engendering this cosmic doubt
a runaway train on a suicide route
why die now - when bound to find out

the insurmountable coercion of time
confirming the wisdom of nature
thrusting untappedly - this mortality
to swim with sharks and join brutality
powerfully

eyes voracious by rapacious thought
bone and flesh by sand and rock
a tear rolls and rips and drops
no message is sent not wickedly bent
by benevolent twist it stops

Ian C. Smith- Three Poems

County Killarney

A foul wretch, I slink like a ravaged hound

from the mildewed caravan we rented

(for campers, a step up from in-tented)

to distance her from my rank smell, the sound.

She hurries through the shadows to find a phone

speaks to a doctor, urges him to come.

They clean and comfort, he injects my bum

asks no fee, leaves us drained lovebirds alone.

From Slieve Mish, my weakness in abatement

we look down on our deserted campground

that Edenic scene of my debasement

camera clicking three-sixty around.

South, the Channel Islands and sexy France

east, the harbor at Cork, north, Galway Bay

westward the Atlantic, the U.S.A.

but my view is the grim view of lost chance.

I fear, back with the crack in the city

she’ll have nothing left for me but pity.  

Patrick paints a picture

Red lilac & gold, our son

reflects his mother’s lovely face &

so important is this

study of devotion he

caresses each detail in

complete concentration &

I criticise his grey attitude

towards all responsibilities

except his island of art

I, who can’t even attract

his mother & don’t understand

a computer’s psyche

don’t know what love is

love, abstract facts of hope & grief

blurred, with no clear outline

Refugee

The patrolman, this middle-aged migrant,

wonders what has become of his dreams.

In the hot days he wakes, worry like a bruise.

Now his torchlight shakes, earlier arrivals,

midnight rats, whisper across shined shoes.

This stretched summer, his memory of sad songs,

he considers his wife’s epic regret,

his son’s sneers, her recital of wrongs

while his new car’s curved flanks dazzle

like any parked status symbol’s should.

The son sings of kookaburras in gum trees,

collects footy heroes, baulks

bewilderment in a hybrid accent

mocking seniority, talks

of failure to grasp the rules of new games.

Then, out of shadows one fatigued night,

a neat circle head-centre in frosted glass.

Police find no shell near the warehouse

but our patrolman quits while he can,

gives his son a gun story, leaves out the fright. 



Bio:  Ian C Smith’s work has appeared in Axon:Creative Explorations,The Best Australian Poetry, London Grip, Poetry Salzburg Review, Quarterly Literary Review Singapore, The Weekend Australian,& Westerly  His latest book is Here Where I Work,Ginninderra Press (Adelaide).  He lives in the Gippsland Lakes area of Victoria, Australia.

Richard Schnap- A Poem

PHOTO ALBUM

First there’s the bright-eyed toddler
Beaming like a newly opened flower
Eager for his first taste of the world

Then the unsmiling youngster
Who’s learned that life is a journey
On a road rife with pitfalls and traps

Next the black and white teenager
Posed stiffly in a suit and tie
As if he’s found it best to play dead

And finally the matured adult
His face concealed by a mask
So he’s mistaken for somebody else

Jeremiah Walton- A Poem

SCRAPS

I’ve found apathy under my scalp
harboring a dagger.
Mouth is whetstone.
Tongue is splinter
covered in paper cut. 
Gun is hole capped pocket.
I am kite full of whiskey,
caught in own tail,
too pathetic to find new lips.
That is a metaphor for suicide.
(That was not insult to your intelligence.
I'm just imagery laden and tired.)
The magnitude
of your individual existence
is a seismograph
breaking.


BIO:  Jeremiah Walton is 18, was raised in N.H., and is currently traveling cross country.  He manages W.I.S.H. Publishing, The Traveling Poet, Nostrovia! Poetry, and is an editor for UndergroundBooks.  Jeremiah blogs at Gatsby's Abandoned Children, where most of his collections are available free.

Michael Johnsen- A Poem

Untitled

Millions of tiny lives

Tiny windows

Tiny lives

The currents

The bursting stream

  So minute

He used to be

A glimmer in the stream

Of tiny lives

He looked at them

And was separated

She looked into the horizon

From the obelisk she could see

Millions of tiny lives

She felt a longing

To join them

She saw herself

Forced

Like the triangle

In a circle peg

He opened up a beer

Drank to those who read

And those who fucked

Up there

In their tiny bedrooms

With their tiny pillows

Insignificant

She put on a dress

And knew

What it represented

Fashion

It’s time

It’s fleeting

Like most things

She turned away from

It

He wondered if anyone

Felt the way he did

That they could meet

Maybe talk

Maybe then he would see

How irrational it was

Tiny lives blurred about the day

Just living

Nothing else

No dreaming

Routine

Nothing else

They were really

Going to do this

He grabbed a belt

She tied the rope

Stood up

And dropped down

The little tiny lives

Becoming what they always were

Little tiny puppets

Christopher Kenneth Hanson- 3 Poems

" A Contingency Of Sorrow"

My gesture sings replete;----
Shall we now crow in stark circumference?
In deep blue cantos, we as prophetic,
Sung in the devious mid-day sun
I, as hunted for thy prism-
I, as demon hawk elegy
Of the stoic cohorts-
This unwelcome consortium
This somber casket;
A dapper coffin of despair-
Sung into a grainy pea green fog now
As myriad rain paints the still of your tongue
As still drops wilt the back of my somber throat.



“Of Bedside Manner”

In shade,
Said noon crept through
Blood red curtain.
Now, crisp yellow light ensnares
The worn oak panel-
And dust lined cabinets:
were stained dark green.
Sounds of autumn wind
parade through the sky
(*)
And hounds still barking-
echo from chained cellar doors:
A black bird could perch and
survey the scene-
Ducking its head through:
multiple planes
In dim light,
I want to wither here alone-
Inside pale linens.
As candle wax lay,
soft scent of magnolia.
by the by-
 I will refuse to note
an alternate time.



"The Day Watchers And The Week End"
                                                       {for little Jeanie et al.}

Said sun came quick on Saturday;
As for blue skies--- definite.
And reigning daffodils
carry certain quips sought
for boundaries unmet, namely.

These day watchers, with big watery
eyes peer the sky line mesmerized-
hooked off the gleaming arcs;
of the congealed orange/red marked lines--
as an egg sun would crack over these white yolk clouds.

Moon left quick on Sunday
 as for the deep pallid skies---a gale
Of lingering----pulped ruby roses wept
for boundaries, not shared.

Michael Keshigian- Three Poems

BOSTON COMMON

In order to think,

to contemplate and appreciate

dilemmas brought on by modern life,

he often took to strolling

through the public gardens,

just far enough away

from the street crowd and traffic noise,

building at the intersection

of Bolyston and Tremont,

amid the calmness of time honored trees

and sprawling greenways

that survived the patriotic acts of revolution.

Distractions down the winding,

narrow tar paths were minimal,

no vendors, beggars, prostitutes,

or public speakers attracting crowds

this day, only a place to find refuge.

So he reflected upon his quickly dissipating,

limited allotment of time,

his acquiescence to a battle

once valiantly fought,

his lack of owning responsibility,

the feigning privilege and apathy

gathering years seem to imply

and the folly of those who still engage.

A female runner skirted by,

lithe, youthful, amazingly trim,

stealing his daydream.

Boston is wonderful, he muttered,

the air so full of rebellion.

He wandered off again

into a comic reverie of pursuit

and the tender excitement of discovery.

I must find my running shoes, he mused.

CLOSET IN THE BACK BEDROOM

This was the house’s charm,

acres of seclusion

with a Victorian façade

and a veranda that rambled.

Inside, the hand carved wood décor

hid spiders and various phantom creatures

from the view of antique chairs

and furniture randomly scattered

about the living room.

It was abandoned quite sloppily,

by a woman claimed

to have suffered depression

after her husband disappeared.

Empty boxes, petrified flowers

in waterless vases, matted hair

tangled in dust kittens,

crowded the grimy tables,

while strewn on the rickety couch,

a pair of woman’s underwear.

One hundred years ago,

the home was an estate, now a relic

before deconstruction

by a family desiring isolation,

akin to the former proprietors.

Their tour uncovered

a partial portrait of the old woman,

chests and drawers full of dresses,

sweaters, purses, old report cards,

and oddly enough three pairs of eyes

and three red tongues

of apparently blind and speechless

teddy bears,

their dead corpses found later,

stuffed in the closet atop each other,

gagged and buried

beneath a comforter

in the far back bedroom.

THIEF

Two days ago

the sun caught me stealing light

to illuminate a poem,

demanded restitution,

then reported me to Mother Nature

who posted my likeness about the land.

Soon, the ocean, forest, birds, flowers, et. al.

filed suit for substantial abuse

and complacent philandering without permission.

I pleaded guilty;

admitted taking breath from wind

for deliverance,

marshmallows from the sky to sweeten song,

and rage from the ocean

to instill a sense of urgency.

Convicted and confined to a windowless room,

no writing, visitation

or glimpses of stolen sights,

I was sentenced to imagine beauty

without embezzlement

and the wholesale exploitation of words.

Donal Mahoney- A Poem

Marcia and the Locusts

Marcia was 17 the first time 

thousands of locusts rose 

from the fields of her father's farm 

and filled the air, sounding 

like zithers unable to stop.

Her father was angry 

but Marcia loved the music 

the locusts made. 

She was in high school then 

and chose to make 

locusts the focus 

of her senior paper. 

At the town library 

she learned locusts 

spend 17 years 

deep in the soil, 

feeding on fluids 

from roots of trees 

that make them 

strong enough 

to emerge  

at the proper time

to court and reproduce. 

Courtship requires 

the males to gather 

in a circle and sing until 

the females agree

to make them fathers.

Courtship and mating 

and laying of eggs 

takes almost two months 

and then the locusts fall 

from the air and die.

Marcia remembers 

the iridescent shells 

on the ground shining.

She was always careful 

not to step on them.

She cried when

the rain and the wind 

took them away. 

Now 17 years later Marcia is 34 

and the locusts are back again.  

Her dead father can't hear them

and Marcia no longer loves the music 

the way she did in high school.

Now she stays in the house 

and keeps the windows closed 

and relies on the air-conditioner   

to drown out the locusts.

Marcia has patience, however.

She knows what will happen.

She reads her Bible 

and sucks on lemon drops,

knowing the locusts will die.

In the seventh week,

the locusts fall from the air

in raindrops, then torrents.

"It is finished," Marcia says.

She pulls on her father's boots

and goes out in the fields

and stomps on the shells 

covering the ground

but she stomps carefully.

At 34 Marcia's in no hurry.

Before each stomp, 

she names each shell 

Billy, John, Chuck,

Terrence or Lester, 

the names of men 

who have courted her

during the 17 years 

since high school. 

They all made promises 

Marcia loved to hear, 

promises she can recite 

like a favorite prayer.

She made each man happy

as best she could.

They would grunt

like swine the first night,

some of them for many nights. 

But then like locusts 

they would disappear.

-----------------------------

Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, Missouri.

Michael Cluff- A Poem

Untitled

Alena bought no farms
took no primrose path
or ever wore rose-colored glasses

Instead
she fell into loin lust heat heavy soul strafing love---
that was enough
to send platitudes
to the far edge of the
Crab Nebula.

B.Z. Niditch- Three Poems

 BENEATH REMAINS
(for Margaret Atwood)
BIRTHDAY NOV.  18

The nightfall sky
fades by rain
where your nature
still reaches out to us
on our shadows
in an Autumn repose
of dissolving darkness
with your mysterious
presence of language
flies like the mourning bird
will return to us as new life
with its clairvoyant
voice by the woods
where wan memory
resides below
I can still hear your novel voice
on the B.B.C. and C.B.C.
at us earth-wise who read you.


 
ON THE NORTH SEA

Surprised by the anonymity
trembling on the frozen sea
in the staring eyes
of distracted tourists
eager for a ship's ride
toss silver coins
by emptying their pockets
for good luck in the ocean,
gulls rise on the silent sky
then hang out by the boat
water lashes my jacket
with a last collection of words
of a poisoned love letter inside
the wind sweeps by the porthole
in cold breathless air
I'm always carrying
a poet's still harbored notes,
with galleys of navigation
under my pale sleeve.



IN THE SKIFF

My teacher called me captain
speaking in French
of this bi-coastal skiff,
I was just a school boy enraptured
with rowing out here by waves
so black and blue
it almost tears and foams
wet with these wavered colors
wreathed in a sailor suit
at dusk, full of stars
and sprinkled with eclipses
when the sky moves higher
by a bird cloud horizon
soaring from silken water
its breath beyond gull voices
resounding over the silvery Seine
from a procession of Parisian light
asking the moon's exiled laugh
not to forget the face
of a deeply blue chilled poet
enjoying wildly the winds,
half-kidding in a threadbare coat
to answer all the jokes
directed toward my rowing
by grey shadows
backside at the dock
this young poet takes shelter
from his sleepy weariness
contemplating the night's air
like a newborn embracing
these decomposing notes
of a day dream world
releasing his silky thoughts
on board with words
that will survive this voyage.

Paul Tristram- A Poem

F-Ward (Here We Come!)

On the verge of another breakdown,
suicidal to the very bone
she takes another shot
of gin and misery.
And screams perfectly
inside her head
as her soul falls backwards
in upon itself.
And the squirming starts
again its movement
and rhythm of anger.
The clawing inside her
brain and face
makes her fidget and jump
like a bag of drowning rats.
She tries to focus
and concentrate
upon the curse that is circling her
but again
she ends up too dizzy.
Collapsing from exhaustion
her mind ledge-leaps
into sleep
which is the safest place
for her at the moment.

© Paul Tristram 2013

Paul Tristram is a Welsh writer who has poems, short stories and sketches published in many publications around the world, he yearns to tattoo porcelain bridesmaids instead of digging empty graves for innocence at midnight, this too may pass, yet.

Richard Schnap- A Poem

ART NOIR

There’s the painter whose forte
Is covering canvases with his blood
Screams at the father who never smiled

The dancer who pirouettes
With a medical school skeleton
Making love with her betraying husband

The performer who swims naked
Across a poisoned river at night
Caught in the clutches of bullies

And the actress who crosses stages
Dragging the heads of old boyfriends
Stained memories fused to her heart

Alan Catlin- Three Poems

Doom Fox

She arrived in planet

bar as if she had been

airlifted from a Vegas

casino where she had

been performing a one

woman revue that

revealed more of her  

body that what might

have been in her mind.

Someone had loaded her

up with high grade snow,

then given the word to

Scottie to "beam 'er down"

and began taking notes

for a possible inter-

galactic comedy of errors

that would reveal the baseness

of human emotions when

confronted with the ultimate

sexual play thing.  I couldn't

imagine why a neighborhood

bar in Upstate New York

had been chosen for the site

of this particular experiment

in terror but I could see

that when the results were

tabulated, what she was doing

with the flies at the bar, was

going to rate in the Top Ten of

All Time personal appearances.

In fact the way these guys

were tripping over themselves

trying to impress The Fox made

me think this was a new kind

of spontaneous reality TV thing

like the Romans used to have

in The Coliseum though instead                        

of being voted off the island or

out of the bar, you were eaten

alive and the corpse left for

the birds to pick apart once

the show was over.

   

                The Porn Star and the Detective, Off Hours, Talking in a Bar

In the circles she traveled

taking your clothes off and

getting it on with complete

strangers was thought of

as glamorous just because

someone was getting it all

on film and johns would pay

real money to see what most

people did in the privacy of

their own homes.

She thought of herself as

a kind of movie star but

he disagreed.

"What do you call what it

is you get paid to do?"

"I'm a porn star."

"Now, where I come from

they call taking off your

clothes and sleeping with       

strangers a whore."

"I make $2,000 an hour.

Sometimes more. Show me

a whore who makes that

kind of money."

"You take money for sex,

correct?"

"Yes, but this is different."

"You take money for sex,

you're a whore.  You could

look it up."

Now that her balloon was

thoroughly deflated, you could

see her losing her composure,

see her body minders flexing

their muscles ready to rumble.

What happened next depended

upon which book he suggested

she look whore up in.  My money

wasn't on the Holy Bible but

you never knew.  That cop was

one crazy son of a bitch and

the law was on his side.         

                                                 The Dropouts                                                   

They seem to gather

for impromptu meetings

of The Dropouts of High

School Unwed Mothers

of Schenectady at local

Dunkin Donuts where

a woman worker of age

is considered past her

prime, old before her time

& a rare beast who must

be incredibly desperate to

work for no benefits,

bare minimum wage &,

by-osmosis, sugar &

caffeine buzz. The not

working girls are dressed

for bigger and better things

in transparent pants so tight

you could read size, design

& washing instructions on

their underwear while waiting

on line as they trade

pregnancy horror stories:

massive weight gains, water

retentions, near toxemia,

constant spotting, traumatic

post partum blues, plaintive

low notes that keep on

playing all through the night.

J.J. Campbell- A Poem

where the corn once was

a day of sunshine

rare anymore it

seems

the power went

out last night just

as i was reading 

a letter from a fan

some would take

that as a sign from

god

i simply thought

these assholes out

here have a hard

time driving in 

the rain

one hour later i

was trying to figure

out how i can afford

a generator simply

so i don't have to

reset all these damn

clocks

a day of sunshine

a cool breeze

leaves starting to

gather where the

corn once was

i believe i found

my pulse

bio

J.J. Campbell (1976 - soon) lives and writes on a farm in Brookville, Ohio. He's been widely published over the years, most recently at Miracle Magazine, The Camel Saloon, Gutter Eloquence Magazine, Regardless Of Authority, and ZYX. He's been collaborating with the Swedish artist Janne Karlsson over the last few months for a project that will hopefully see the light of day sometime soon. In the meantime, buy his latest creation, Sofisticated White Trash (Interior Noise Press, 2013) on Amazon.com, Powells.com, etc. You can find out more on his poetry, his obsession with sports, and other mindless ramblings at his blog, evil delights (http://evildelights.blogspot.com).

Robert Demaree- A Poem

NEIGHBORHOODS

The places we lived when we were thirty,

Streets of friends on the way up,

Fairfax County, Jefferson Parish,

Super Bowl parties, seven-layer dip,

Dads walking in the street

Halloween night, beer in hand,

While kids rang doorbells.

And yet that time, that chemistry

Proved delicate,

Could not withstand divorce,

Transfer to Armonk, New York.

So now, as the eighth decade rolls on,

New bonds and chemistries at Golden Pines,

Fast friendships formed, short-term investment,

Monthly breakfasts,

Names of grandchildren learned,

Symphonies and speakers heard, small trees

Cared for in young yards—Golden Pines

A posting not subject to transfer:

Shifts in population accepted

With a certain wistful equanimity,

Budgets for memorial gifts,

Extra coffee cakes in the freezer,

Against the inexorable day when

No one on our street

Remembers when it was new.

("Neighborhoods" appeared in Pyrokinection, July 2013)