Category Archives: Poetry

“the things that are left behind” – Poetry by Joyce Chong

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Rind - M.C. Escher, 1955
Rind – M.C. Escher, 1955

Joyce Chong explores the remnants of loss in her powerfully moving poem “the things that are left behind,” one of two exquisite pieces she contributed to our Fall 2015 issue.

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AMONG OTHER THINGS: the fruit rind
ground down to the white,
the voices of my mother’s grandmother,
and little hauntings like
wind chimes on the ceiling
in the bedroom.

among other things:
the rooms to be cleared,
secrets, trinkets,
this silence. the things
that you did not take with you.

i’ve learned to count loss
without time, without
a metronome;
it’s everything immediate,
and everything scabbed over,
the sensation of a wound
healing and then fading;
mis-remembering is
as inevitable
as every breath
that comes next
from lung
to mouth
to sky.

loss is a syntax
that never takes long to learn.

{ X }

ndsbrt500JOYCE CHONG lives in Ontario, Canada where she writes fiction, poetry, and other types of lies surrounded by farm land and wine country. Her work has appeared in Cool Skull Press’ Goddessmode anthology, (parenthetical), and untethered magazine, with work forthcoming in Noble Gas Qtrly and Liminality. You can find her online at joycechong.ca, or you can follow her mundane (and occasionally excessive) tweeting at @JoyceEmilyC.

“New Orleans” – Poetry by Violet Mclean

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Storyville Photograph - E.J. Bellocq, circa 1915
Storyville Photograph – E.J. Bellocq, circa 1915

For our Fall 2015 issue, Violet Mclean contributed “New Orleans,” a gorgeous & stirring poem about our most favorite city.

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HE MAKES BLOODY MARYS IN SECRET because he is shy of anything too Louisiana. He flattened out his vowels and straightened up his consonants before I knew him.

There is a home of his I know – But then he says: Home is not heavy voices, air, lived in houses elevated from time and water. Home is not a magnolia blossom.

 Did you know the word “jazz” comes from bordello girls in the French Quarter with their jasmine perfume?

Yes, we are all familiar with Ken Burns’ work.

 May I ask this?

If I boarded the Mississippi in Minnesota and floated down her back, toes running the spine of the continent, would I know then? Would my arrival come in the morning with mundane Bloody Marys and walks down an ordinary street? Could we make small talk near Dauphine and Desire? Laugh over newspapers and sunglasses heralding the beginning of something old, a picture.

Maybe

A dream

Listing on a wall where we can see the form rise.

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FullSizeRenderVIOLET MCLEAN is an essayist and poet living in Northern California. Her work has been featured online at The Toast, What Weekly, the Human Parts collection on Medium, and in the journal Prose & Lore. She tweets up a storm @oh_my_vi. 

Another Excerpt from Nothing Granted – Poetry by Anna Meister

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Study of a Dead Crow - Marevna (Marie Vorobiev), 1955
Study of a Dead Crow – Marevna (Marie Vorobieff), 1955

Our Fall 2015 issue features three outstanding poems from Anna Meister‘s series Nothing Granted.  We posted one of those poems here back in October, a second one appears below, and look for the third to pop up on our site later this month. 

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BLINK & I’LL SAY OKAY / like a whip / ride
in the passenger / I’ll say it / just
like that / go on being never-enough

I long for you / turning noteless
numb  / ____ is all I say it is / that’s just
how it happened

something important in the mail / as I was
washing / water cutting bruises from my telling
I keep the blade near / hear a buzz overhead

next door the police  / step back
never help / stay soft like a crow

Tuesday around me everywhere / the distance
between summer & what / I accuse myself of
to get it right I give these boys / my navel

as an island / what it is to drag
a nail through it / fuck in a lushness
too predictable  / when I consider

the shit I believe I am / I would never
feel it in my face

when we hear about money / hear
I tried / to love the world / plump
& dumb / & my mouth chasing after

{ X }

anna_meisterANNA MEISTER is an MFA candidate in Poetry at New York University, where she serves as a Goldwater Writing Fellow. A Pushcart Prize & Best of the Net nominee, her poems are forthcoming in Powder Keg, Whiskey Island, Barrelhouse, The Mackinac, & elsewhere. Anna is a 2015 Saltonstall Foundation for the Arts Fellow. She lives & works in Brooklyn.

“Me” – Poetry by Adam Tedesco & Juliet Cook

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By Sebastian Ritter (Rise0011) (Own work) [CC BY-SA 2.5], via Wikimedia Commons
Photo by Sebastian Ritter (Rise0011) (Own work) [CC BY-SA 2.5], via Wikimedia Commons

“Me” is one of two beautiful dark twisted poems in our Fall 2015 issue that were co-written by Adam Tedesco & Juliet Cook. 

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1.

MY DIRTY HAIRBALLS
and feline creatures
doused in cheap champagne

After the party
the after party
was down in the canyon
of flattened emotion
of all the acts of disassociation
holed up in this trailer
doused in solvent

I try to stay quiet
as I strike the match
as if that will cover up
the triumph of our will

2.

Nobody can reach down
in this mess
Nobody can fix it

{ X }

IMGP3324ADAM TEDESCO has worked as a shipbuilder, a meditation instructor, and cultural critic for the now disbanded Maoist Internationalist Movement. He conducts the ConversexInverse interview series and analyzes dreams for the online literary journal Drunk In A Midnight Choir. His recent work has appeared or is forthcoming inSimilar:Peaks::, pioneertown, Funhouse, Cosmonauts Avenue, and elsewhere.

IMG_1359 - Copy (2)JULIET  COOK is a grotesque glitter witch medusa hybrid brimming with black, grey, silver, purple, & red explosions. Her poetry has appeared in Ghost Proposal, H_NGM_N, ILK, and Menacing Hedge. She is the author of more than 13 poetry chapbooks, including POISONOUS BEAUTYSKULL LOLLIPOP (Grey Book Press, 2013), RED DEMOLITION (Shirt Pocket Press, 2014) and a collaboration with Robert Cole, MUTANT NEURON CODEX SWARM (Hyacinth Girl Press, 2015). A collaborative chapbook with j/j hastain, Dive Back Down, is forthcoming from Dancing Girl Press. Her first full-length poetry book was Horrific Confection (BlazeVOX, 2008). Her second, Malformed Confetti, is forthcoming from Crisis Chronicles Press.www.JulietCook.weebly.com.

“Pharoah Sanders in the Cleaning Lady’s Bedroom” – Poetry by Manisha Anjali

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Flamingos in Flight - Arman Manookian, 1931
Flamingos in Flight – Arman Manookian, 1931

From our Fall 2015 issue, Manisha Anjali‘s poem “Pharoah Sanders in the Cleaning Lady’s Bedroom” is as jazzy & intoxicating as the musician it’s named after.

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I WAS BEAUTIFUL IN 1999
my flamingo legs flamingo’d you
moon me/ moon you/ moon two.
the stars saw/ the larks saw
Pharoah by Pharoah Sanders on repeat.
this cleaning lady flamingo’d to spaceland
in spaceland you are lost daddy
my flamingo legs don’t dance on their own
they wait for saxophones/ daddy two-times
they wait for the messiah/ the dreammaker
moon cool/ moon blue/ mmmmm
I flamingo’d you high/flamingo’d you wild
in the Village of Pharoahs in 1999
I flamingo’d you off you wino/ you old boy/
you black darling/ you old star
on Karangahape Rd hitchhiking to spaceland
with a suitcase full of larks & gin.
I flamingo’d to spaceland daddy two-times with
Pharoah by Pharoah Sanders on repeat.
in my blood room my moon shone through/
moon/watch me be a bright pink bird
true I could still flamingo you
moon me/ moon true/ mmmmm
I was beautiful in 1999

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manisha_anjali_2MANISHA ANJALI is a poet who lives in Melbourne, Australia. She grew up in Fiji and New Zealand. Manisha has been published in Blackmail Press, Mascara Literary Review,Seizure, Faint Magazine and The Adventure Handbook. She was awarded a Hot Desk Fellowship by The Wheeler Centre in 2013. www.manishaanjali.com.

“The World Smells of Boogers” – Poetry by B. Diehl

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Goldau - William Turner, 1841
Goldau – William Turner, 1841

Oddball humor & profound pathos collide in B. Diehl ‘s poem “The World Smells of Boogers,” one of many flappy lits featured in our Fall 2015 issue.

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I WATCHED THE SKY SWELLING
like a pus-filled boil.

And you ate your way to the core
of the apple of my eye
only to find a fat, ugly worm.

With cobwebbed lungs, I lifted my soul
from beneath the lilac bush,
wiped the crust from my yellowing eyes,

and we watched the sky swelling
like a pus-filled boil.

You swallowed me whole ­­––
spat out the flaws
like watermelon seeds,

but I see them now, starting to sprout
within the footprints of Christ ––

as the sky swells on
like a pus-filled boil.

Because it’s springtime again ­­––

so water my pain
and I’ll watch it bloom into a rose.

Play my spinal chord all day like an E minor ­­––

as the sky swells on
like a pus-filled boil.

You are a glacier in the middle of Egypt.
You are a genuine smile at a funeral,
the ticking of a rusty-handed clock,
the wrinkle on my cheek,
the hoarse voice, waking me
in the middle of a daydream:

“If you ever find happiness,
cut off its legs.”

But as the sky swells on
like a pus-filled boil,

my purpose is beckoning.
My purpose is a lighthouse
outside the storm,
gleaming brighter
with every last second.

So I’m heading west,
against the wind,
shunning the sky,

while tearing off the Band-Aid
at lightning-speed.

{ X }

Screen Shot 2015-08-29 at 12.20.51 PMB. DIEHL is a poet, quasi-recluse, and cat enthusiast from Phillipsburg, NJ. His poetry has been featured in Lehigh Valley Vanguard, Poydras Review, Torrid Literature Journal, Cartagena Journal, Foliate Oak Literary Magazine, Synchronized Chaos, and more. When he is not writing, you can usually find him at home, hanging out with his cats and/or feeding his social media addiction.

“Liftoff” – Poetry by Laurin DeChae

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Illustration from Mary Crary's "Daughters of the Stars" - Edmund Dulac, 1939
Illustration from Mary Crary’s “Daughters of the Stars” – Edmund Dulac, 1939

Take to the heavens with “Liftoff,” one of two awesomely extra-terrestrial poems by Laurin DeChae in our very cosmic Fall 2015 issue.

{ X }

THREE, TWO ONE. hop on board my bottle rocket. we’re taking off.
haven’t we landed on the moon? i saw it with my own
moon eyes. right through the television screen. one small step
means beam me up,  set me free. if you love something, if you love something.
but we’re all thumbs. we fumble and drop with nowhere to hitch.
to the moon, to mars, it doesn’t matter.
rev the engines, let’s go be alien somewhere up, up and away
sending smoke signals to the stars wailing past. you’re all just voices
in my head. look inside my metal cap.
maybe you’re the sick one, maybe i’m.
maybe i’m inkjet, maybe i’m rocket fuel. stardust.
on a scale of one to floating, is this a magic carpet ride
or helium? we’re all just spacing out and i’ll have what he’s having.
we’ll change our cosmic address, elope, become living time capsule,
a sanctuary in the nucleus of a trilobite. to know thyself is to blink
in fractals for eons and eons. the horizon is nothing more than an illusion
and so are we. we can’t even make food out of sunlight. ours has always been a story
of survival. a psychedelic spectra caterwauling.  far and away i hear the creak
of a door opening. it is the destiny of the stars to collapse.
we’ve always turned to the sky for answers, excreting
the tiniest tentacle into the outreaches, the out-of-bounds,
hoping something will stick to us like flypaper. and we’ll reel
it in, dissect and devour—for scientific purposes.
what’s our trajectory? don’t let this be an arc.
i can’t come right back down. earth is calling.
but i’m with the satellites now. no signal out here.
they tell me it’s inescapable. that i’m bouncing
off walls. so tell me, are you coming with me?

{ X }

DeChae_HeadshotLAURIN DeCHAE is an M.F.A. candidate for poetry at the University of New Orleans, where she acts as the associate editor for Bayou Magazine. She is active in the fields of education and composition, assisting in programs such as the Greater New Orleans Writing Project, Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, and the Tennessee Williams Literary Festival. Her work appears or is forthcoming in Harpur Palate, Cleaver Magazine, burntdistrict, S/WORD, and Rose Red Review.

“an inventory of instruction manuals” – poetry by Joyce Chong

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Bernafas (Breathe) - Nyoman Masriadi, 2004
Bernafas (Breathe) – Nyoman Masriadi, 2004

Oh, how we wish we could actually read the titles listed in “an inventory of instruction manuals,” one of two exquisite poems by Joyce Chong in our Fall 2015 issue.

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“HOW TO DISASSEMBLE ROBOTICS” “how to reassemble robots” “how to dissect the human condition” “how to extract meaning out of the inherently meaningless” “how to exacerbate the mundane” “how to be inanimate” “how to splice” “how to emerge whilst sinking” “how to build a shipwreck” “how to money launder” “how to tear apart” “how to reassemble the torn pages of an instruction manual” “how to wind up time like a toy” “how to spill” “how to endure melancholy” “how to breathe” “how to breathe” “how to breathe” “how to spill, convincingly”.

{ X }

ndsbrt500JOYCE CHONG lives in Ontario, Canada where she writes fiction, poetry, and other types of lies surrounded by farm land and wine country. Her work has appeared in Cool Skull Press’ Goddessmode anthology, (parenthetical), and untethered magazine, with work forthcoming in Noble Gas Qtrly and Liminality. You can find her online at joycechong.ca, or you can follow her mundane (and occasionally excessive) tweeting at @JoyceEmilyC.

An Excerpt from Nothing Granted – Poetry by Anna Meister

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Two Girls in the Flower Garden - Le Pho, circa 1955
Two Girls in the Flower Garden – Le Pho, circa 1955

Our Fall 2015 issue features three outstanding poems by Anna Meister, from her series titled Nothing Granted. We’ve posted one of these poems below, and if you’d like to read the rest, you can purchase the issue in print for $6 or as a good old-fashioned PDF for $3.

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REMEMBER WHEN I’D ALLOW HER TO TALK ABOUT PUSSY.
Expected flush, the natural heat of power. She runs
over my feelings with great sweetness, eyes
intent on me. She used to say You can be
whoever you want, but is tired of me now
that I look at her more. I show up & leave
as myself. Continue past the moment, say I am
thirsty. Pick a million tiny pieces up. We like loss
to ground us, learn to love people quietly.

Outside, flowers like lemons & not
the other way around. I remember her
mouth never closing. When I speak to the sun,
I’m dressed before we hang up. I speak over the light
while she wails & knocks. I exhale
loss, a pretty girl sleeping. If my love expires,
I’ll renew it for the weekend. If I fucked her less I would
be aggressively lonely. Outside, each flower makes
a face. Each looks, she says, the same.

Stopping for gas late, an angel kissed me.
I like how summer bent. We like loss to come,
like to feel it quiet. What a luxury to be without
hands. Whatever I got is enough
to drive back. The silver, long unraveled
eye, the motherfucker rinsing
another fork. We’re clean as the chicken,
but not that inspiring, just
bones in the water when they simmer.

{ X }

anna_meisterANNA MEISTER is an MFA candidate in Poetry at New York University, where she serves as a Goldwater Writing Fellow. A Pushcart Prize & Best of the Net nominee, her poems are forthcoming in Powder Keg, Whiskey Island, Barrelhouse, The Mackinac, & elsewhere. Anna is a 2015 Saltonstall Foundation for the Arts Fellow. She lives & works in Brooklyn.

Our 2015 Best of the Net Nominees Are…

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Our nominations for the 2015 Best of the Net anthology, which honors literary work that originally appeared on the internet between 7/1/2014 & 6/30/2015, are:

“ARG” – Anthony Michael Morena (short fiction)
“Street Music” – Emily O’Neill (poetry)
“Invocation: Joan of Arc Reads the Crowd” – Jennifer MacBain-Stephens (poetry)
“9 lessons in witchcraft” – Danielle Perry (poetry)
“The Rud Yard” – Vajra Chandrasekera (short fiction)

Congratulations & best of luck to all our nominees, as well as our eternal gratitude for contributing their amazing work to our weird little zine.