Elizabeth Kate Switaj
Career Crisis Alchemist
She'd made so many maps
wise text & newspaper patchwork lands
with hand-drawn Fibonacci trails
& computer-graphic fractal roadsevery monument city statue mountain kami
calligraphy with sound etymologyshe didn't recognize your glint
even when you kissed her Gold
beloved transform again
Jason Wilkinson
The Haberdasher
...wants a
perambulant to phone
electrodes snatch the bluff,
how this road curves
like the flat aciculate spine
of a Mayan dagger
around it
freckled & gelid
water shifting hotel candles
thrown light some say
that the old man used
butterflies to paper
his dinsome albatross
;wings clap to a forgotten trance...on the landing she takes your coat,
demure plaits gray
wooden eyes
evaporate behind a
calamitous perfume of sliding doors
obliquely she imagines your voice
receding, into the distant rain-
miasmic fingers tug at a silvern hasp
buoyant and perspicuous
tin flowers...there's a boathouse down the strand
its long roof scribbled against
freckles of indigo
anarchic branches heaving cleverly
tapping just above our heads
cables in their tweed
dusty jackets criss-crossed
beneath the orange lamp
our skin appears tenuous
the canonical sotto voce
of jaundiced newsprint
upholstered, scatological
its staid countenance
regarding us with anesthetic despondency
through holes in the unshod timber.
Tethered Dials
What fashion built us downstairs
amid the range of unvented
kettles we upturn
to avenge the day ruckle
plaits corseting voluptuous
teakwood globes fell me
with recurrent music
pinions uncircumcised
wilderness bleating their
dinsome flute jargon
tethered-
one way dials
beyond whom leaf and
amber silhouetted eyes furrow
a loud garnish chipping
off where lighted
candles bled ignominiously,
flayed hours piqued record
store girls beneath a carapace
of idle hands.
Maurice Oliver
"& Riddled With Ambiguities" Sonnet
Start with a dog's head out the open
car window. A city that progressively
grows westward. Any love song worth
memorizing. Buffalo wandering the
open plains. Paper clips. Cotton candy.
A hall devoted to a chorus of clocks.
Palatial arcades. Copper steeples.
Ten words welded to a sentence. An
extra set of house keys. A leather
leach. A full water bowl. Canyons that
send your yells back to you. Empty
cardboard boxes. Sturdy wooden
buckets. A heavy snowfall worn like a
beautiful coat. Mini-skirts. Frat clubs.
A tiny shop that only sells ice cream.
Light switches. Stacks of comic books.
Or even all-the-above will do in a pinch.
Or Distinctly Odd Circumstances
The bed in the guest room died while I was asleep.
It must have gotten up in the middle of the night touse the restroom or maybe to grab a bite to eat
from the frig and took a misstep on the stairs. Therunner is loose in places and I've been meaning to
get around to putting a nail or two in it. Anyway, Iwoke-up this morning and saw its silky broad
mattress sprawled out on the hallway floor. Therewasn't a bruise on it and not a drop of blood to be
found. It just lay there staring coldly up at the coatrack as if this was not so much the end of it all but
the beginning of something worse.
Rodney Nelson
Song of Yo Mismo
you started wiv it
Wal Witmin
ess spanish
oh company arrow
all vat shee
I tried to do the opposite, sing everyone not me and
be the one in the song, in youth an
instrumentalist
writer of
classical music
until I got it that
classical
meant
classroom
had not yet heard of
Harry Partch
or the
chicken-ranch
alternative, in my long postyouth I turned to the
written word
fiction
journalism
not knowing what
writer
meant
Thomas Mann to
aitch-el
Mencken
Ernest Hemingway to Karl Kraus
you had to find room in between
oh company arrow
meantime I learnt a popular
Stück
or
shtik
the
married man
with a verb
to nest
which helped me divine a wisdom in the acquiring of
unneeded expensive furniture with checks that bounced
and to piss on it
now the times made or let you
modulate to a new key in
another scene the Golden Gate
change you chune
as parahippie I did it loud in the streets that led to
the enforced harmony of a Maoist commune where
the words were both unpatriotic and antisoviet
you would not stay in it but did
not return to the
gee major
triads that you had
trained on, a next role
licensed psychiatric technician
had me sing to the mad not the masses and paid my
warble therapeutics well, then I got it that
biomedicine
not what I did was in the coming
treatment model
had to switch costumery
regionalizing Dakotan
a not very prodigal son
but anyway home to hymn it
in which I edited a Dakota
litmag
read on radio, acted as
writer
copyeditor
in hearty local publications and somehow turned to
championing
dissidents
in the
eastern bloc
the refrain both antisoviet and patriotic, until I got
it that all my audience were dead or fled, took the
copyediting
to Arizona
a Mogollon transposition
pine woods in which you would climb high
alone forget the concert stage
meant
back to school
all vat shee
not
classroom
however, in university
administration
I intoned the cantos of the
Chicago manual
to an unheeding gallery but went more of the time to
the wild with a sidetrek into
radical environmentalism
you were too old to sing lead in
a redwood tree yet did have a
part in the abetting chorus
the wild way did not head toward deeper
engagement
though, went it seemed to the very
yo mismo
my song had avoided
Wal Witmin
you have found in now what had been
remnant in memory the sound
of whom you had tried not to be
imposture had brought me to self, I get it that I was
on the tongue of the child age three who organized a
kindergarten runaway to the open road, that
you were in the words you hummed to
her in Golden Gate Park only
wrote so that she would remember
I reclaim this moment
yo mismo
belated or not
oh company arrow
Island Park
Flooding river used to engirdle it
before the dike went in and now there is nothing
more to do
the city cannot turn this
one into a playing field or a storage lot
and will just have to leave it to tennis
but mainly oak
if it had not happened to be
so hilly and downtown the park might have
taken in more than the
wye-doubleyew-cee-ay
the pool
the community theater
all on its periphery
too bad and too late
though the city may think of something yet
might as
well not move the statues in the meantime
only two remain
someone vandalized
the third
Miss Liberty
that a crew took away
in grief and rage maybe
had stood in view
over
Fourth Street
you would have to walk to see the
lesser damage to the one of
Henrik
Wergeland
russet from time and weather toward
the island's high middle
a man on a
rock plinth in what they used to call a frock coat with
a weird tilt to the head that does not look
down the intervening apron of snow at you
the vandals
have snapped off the walking stick
he holds behind to nightstick length and given a
cigarette to the mouth
who was this guy
oh a
poet champion of
the weak against
the strong the father
of Norwegian
literature he opened
Norway to the Jews
lived eighteen eight to
eighteen forty-five
you read on the rock
and an incut name at the
base of the statue
Gustav Vigeland
that you do not know either
this poet would look
like what they called a hobnobber if it
were not for the cigarette which makes him fit in
here almost
with the bums of your boyhood
when the word
bum
had an old and half-romantic
meaning
you have another memory
of the park on such a January forenoon
young attractive
girl in an unfitted
band uniform
her trumpet case
the snowy walk
of whom you would watch the fledging into
a beauty that hurt
why do you think of her now
who would not have looked up at
Wergeland
or you
she was only living
it would not have
had to be here among the dormant oak
the low gray sky
was over the whole region
is
and the man on the plinth means to say
I
only lived
nothing matters but that to the men
of the park district or to you either
Andrew Burke
poem beginning with a line by Fanny Howe
and ending with a line from Reuters"Those born on the last day will have no name"
and come swimming out of one language
into the rocky mouth of the next out of
some lingua franca of muttered remnants of
father's post-coital snore and mother's desire
amphibious tongues licking wet wombs
"feel that! did you feel that? he moved!"
shouting out at the first fresh breeze
the art of Mandarin is in pronouncing it tonally
"Israeli PM to visit China on heels of Iran official"
Maxianne Berger
These Are the Particles
You'll notice these particles when the ice
melts inside a plastic tumbler. In space,
those possessed by integral spin cannotbe distinguished from the ones standing
alone in the dell. Like modest wall flowers
they shrink from the music of spheres,producing visible auroras when their orbits
cross the Earth's. Their blush shrieks as purple
as a meteor's. Scientists use a sweep magnetthat traps and holds particles which standard
filters cannot catch, in order to gather specimens
for Show & Tell. Field operators dissect them,rearranging protons and neutrons, wanting
to create and annihilate particles that can't be
sorted, classified, or coloured inside the lines.These carry the push and pull of gravity, slog
along the bottom of the human mind, clogging
DNA with off-key sing-song. Buildings provideno refuge: air indoors is permeated with modified
particles as stale as smoke. Health effects include
(but are not limited to) perma-grin and prematuredeath. On Earth, nearly all known matter
combines protons, neutrons and electrons.
Long-lived particles known to bear grudges,they damage spacecraft, and some say,
in a parallel universe, a red shovel
idles in a sandbox where no children play.
Somewhere Between Maroon and IndigoA gargoyle sputters, uncouples from its drainpipe,
cobbles its desperate way across the flagstones.
An owl swivels, ears marauding beyond its gaze;
treble flickering, the hourglass fills with moths.
Violets, breathless from the moon's touch,
wonder where nightmares go to rejoice.A cross gargoyle uncouples pipetones. The way it flags,
drains a sputter from the cobbles, it's desperate.
With flickering ears, marauding moths treble.
An hour swivels beyond glass; the owl fills its gaze.
Breathless nightmares go to the moon
where violets rejoice from wonder's touch.Moths rejoice across the moon's ears where
a gargoyle swivels with nightmares. The hour
fills pipes; its glass violets drain; its cobbles
go from breathless gaze to flickering sputter.
Way beyond the flagstones, a marauding treble
uncouples from wonder, its owl-touch desperate.
James Davies
Film (268)
Man on sofa, in considerable agony, lifting left leg
(amount of lifts and speed of lifting variable)He says –
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift
"Leift(number of times said and duration of film variable)
Study of Manchester Bus Numbers
2
2A
48
111
192
Sally Van Doren
Morning
Sugar and Benadryl
coast along the capillaries
opening the barking ache
which fertilizes every dogged
acceleration in this hesitant,
honking, weedy mound we
call talking.
Listen to
the white oak's skin, the recording
you just missed. Ignore
the starched cuff tightening
on the hirsuit. Breathe,
chirp and tick.
A drawer slides out.
Wind animates the maples.
In the shower you saw it
and it spoke, reminding you that
darkness and heat take want from you
leaving you wet, innocent.
Friday
In quest of a question
Caroline carved lines
in her back, beckoning
reflective responses
flecked with vespers,
the sponges of the sage,
jeopardizing only the only,
the pejorative dope-
pushers, supine, rushing
to kept tactics, pet
kittens caught in nets
meant for fish. Amen.
Soffits high and low
hid the owl's gift.
Simon Perchik
*
Into this headwind
easily, my strut
reminds each bird how it first danced
and the sky from everywhere at onceas if a wing resting too long
won't remember the paws
or swipes :I'm circlingto retrieve my feathers
to gather the sky closer :a gesture
a swath and the headwind
—a few top branches
all that's left from claws
from leaps I never forgotand those who stayed aloft
recognize this circle, they hear
my knees :that contagious strokewould become their song :gusts
still imbedded in my knees
in these branches filled with streams
that overflow then dry :my shadow
too heavy, follows forever and the birds—in my knees the Earth
still hears its first bird
roots and all
circling higher, wings
as if my heart
weighs more than its shadow
more than the night and these fields.
Michael Young
That Once Was
Habit urges me down the block,
the same side each morning,
walking to work, stopping in the coffee shop
where the ease of cliché keeps me
in the bounds of "hello" and "thank you"
and months of repeated visits mean
that now I don't have to give my order
but their kindness has it ready beforehand
and I can absently pay and leave
to finish the walk down Broadway
sipping the warm coffee
that once was the drink of monks
to help them remain attentive
through nights of meditation and prayer.
Changming Yuan
Chinese Chimes: Science or Superstition:
The Ancient Theory of the Five Elements Accounts for Us All1 Metal (born in a year ending in 0 or 1)
/-helps water but hinders wood; helped by earth but hindered by fire/
he used to be totally dull-colored
because he came from the earth's inside
now he has become a super-conductor
for cold words, hot pictures and light itself
all being transmitted through his throat2 Water (born in a year ending in 2 or 3)
/-helps wood but hinders fire; helped by metal but hindered by earth/
with her transparent tenderness
coded with colorless violence
she is always ready to support
or sink the powerful boat
sailing south3 Wood (born in a year ending 4 or 5)
/-helps fire but hinders earth; helped by water but hindered by metal/
rings in rings have been opened or broken
like echoes that roll from home to home
each containing fragments of green
trying to tell their tales
from the forest's depths4 Fire (born in a year ending 6 or 7)
/-helps earth but hinders metal; helped by wood but hindered by water/
your soft power bursting from your ribcage
as enthusiastic as a phoenix is supposed to be
when you fly your lipless kisses
you reach out your hearts
until they are all broken5 Earth (born in a year ending in 8 or 9)
/-helps metal but hinders water; helped by fire but hindered by wood/
i think not; therefore, I am not
what I am, but I have a color
the skin my heart wears inside out
tattooed intricately
with footprints of history
R. L. Swihart
Honeypot Ants and Plate Tectonics
Minus the body and clothes, the chair juggles only a pair
of glasses, a keyboard and a Rubik's cosmosHaunting a Borgian library, panic hands empty shelves
looking for a rumored bookTired of harnessing the Gulf, engineers play capture the flag
or jigsaw the moon's obverseThe Kennewicks of the world unite, demanding more than
a proper burialRibboned to blue Sea-Monkeys, Vernal Regard will disappear
because the night is black and white
Roger Day
At night I lie on a neat stack of mustard-wrapped bundles
I fold and re-fold a Jackson
foreseeing disaster
at each turn of a leaf
the White-house is splattered
with jam
Jefferson smiles benignly as Erdinger bitter
spots his forehead
the walls are covered with Lincoln and Grant
Shiloh burns and young men cower by an unknown riverbank
I plink one string ... again ... again ...
the single C vibrates alone at midnight
rowers sweep up C-notes with their dark blue blades
birds line their nests a bright green shade this year
Jackson — who remembers him now? — lines the aircraft hold
the new order of the ages comes to the banks of the Euphrates
He will favour our venture in the depths of the sands
a sussurant wind catches the green-backs and the sands sing sang-froid
foreskins stacked like trash at the foot of the believer
here, Mother, wipe your eyes with this sawbuck
it won't bring him back but he died for the cause
thirty bucks for your youngest
enough for a Dragunov
may Allah be with you
and death to the Infidel!
Mary Rising Higgins
Two Sections from ShoreTrace
Each day waves respin me
none of this where exact lets up
to seal off or transform lavish with wound centers
The page performs beside an empty chair
sounding out and not while
what I don't yet know writes you
Sunvapor calligraphs colordrip and stoke
where I borrow my time
through heartbeat thrive dharma
Fear and equanimity bow to never ready
complete impossible a natural course events
red squirrel and Howler climb the pole together
In sleep a self not folded
but lifting off by
brookbrink step away guesswork counts
Freeway entrance truckrace morning
blackbox channel technosignatures the
same tunes backmeasured overthetop disguises
Today the water heater tunes winter strings to
wild voicetilt towerfields while the
furnace blasts deep bass against the cold
Create your own wave of
ready at the crowded intersection
flashing a borrowed mood ring
Step toward not what you knew then
soul drags no actual history out on
dusk's moonstone schorl accelerating
Zigjog walk evening cellphone shout
under a cloudclipt moon basket
through burning tire bouquet
Give up to what does not abandon
where lookstep paths thicketing neutral
imagines at rest
Time and distance profuse
this you in question along
starlimb scramble grasps unanswered
And while I am doing nothing at all
lie with me of
news that stays new
What I would tell you
braids an invisible spiral
clause wires arch
Seismic events will moment a country
weapons of afterward project
following targets crossed off
Plummeting time backcomb rakes the
inextricable what am I when
and whether you know it or
Quickfacts mesh how to
turn around oilslicked waters in freefall
corrupted towers clutch
Nothing entitles arrogance here
amid home helled flaws that
sometimes asks too much of
To do what you are necessity builds
like a business of hopes with
four more corners to travel from
Incomplete arrives at
prepare for try again's gateway the
millennium once here takes a chance
Jazzlit trope shears
cutting as it is whether or not
loose catch burst diamonds band
Political names for war sustain
lifewaste trauma voteflip spoils alongside jetstream drama rounds
When breakthrough pain waves
tin sheetwork along the spine
nothing to do but
At Shackleton Crater we'll meet
to talk real estate in 2021
one dialect of here
Line point gesture spoke art
the primitive timeless reads
snowfired permafrost methane pools
Weapons of collateral
weapons of afterward
to whose art of mattering then
A coat of orange red pulp tanning
at fulcral snap
transliterates precise
So little sense walls off the typical
we're all collateral river
where floodlands depending upon
Unanswered through problem disguise the
latest gadgets repair to
go over those old questions
*
Whitespace hostage stake slant ribbons Speedread fans Worldcodes bar according to retail king
nostalgia realms groom
detonating
&just when I think I've
arrived
somewhere
Reality tags the snowlapped yard Angelroll ,armsweep Snowheaps figure someone to remind
me of you
an us
as this
ornamental yardlap
grassplumes
a whitebent daymirror
How the pilgrimage will look from here depends upon which preference we project you framed
relaxing
to arrive later
where used copy also images
as if I messages
prevail
present or not
The encyclopedic barcodes
predates edge crossing
at the if this
then in case
it is the last along
sentiments we offer inhering Entrancefire villageworld relays along tent remnant soma
plates
Settle for
never enough time
we wouldn't see earlier
loss logics
energyfloat
thread displace along the bright prismwise path slope smolder Over softer raincolors promised
Machinemade
toothcircuit
testtubes
stack here
where the cede sketch diverges from our own
thick
weft legend Lathed engines unfurl Myth libretto stream forge Funhouse jam queries airtorch
Waketrail sway under weight of gypsy moths Shoretoshore adharrows glossdrench salestretch
dollarcults babybrandhomegirl spraypaint
sentiment nexus
washclear
eraseply scrawls
offer
Bypaths loosen out of doubtstream escapes I tell you Inyourface agreement hindsight overthrow
belief counts on
remembering easily
constructdestruct
interferes
builds the
tall bluestem fringe
upwardbrush
In constraints of given circles You must find yourself where kickwire rush hooks hedge
obliteration risks
indirect steps out of
a triangle orfor example
constrains
to offer the
Flatscreen scratchcodes who you are thenthen easeflash forage One wrong word burns down
a house
the evening star climbs
new onto
December's cobaltplane
how fine a net each
beatbrace sets out
How much we knew then
tagtiers layer
image debraid
sedatepoint curveslips
freshwater ships in
rope scale side catch The extent to go through makes personal Raspseige weightgrips refract
Everything is asked of you Deep wood roads twining may not exit Lazegaze lessonskip balance
tastetouch fragplunge where
snapcorridor
by means of
doubleknot
does not unlace
H\s
H A M I L T O N S T O N E E D I T I O N S
p.o. box 43, Maplewood, New Jersey 07040