LETTER TO PHIL FROM MANITOU SPRINGS by George Kalamaras
for Philip Appleman
Did Darwin name the world, or did you, Phil, in creating him for us? I swear a Galápagos tortoise inhabits my sleep. A dream broth. A cup of Genmaicha tea containing roasted grains of brown rice. It lays its eggs across the coral reef of my brain. Blonde. Blind. Without fish-mouth or salt. The three readings for the day from the Church of Francis Ponge would most certainly be “The Oyster,” “The Mollusk,” and “Abode of the Gray Shrimp.” What am I looking for here in Manitou? Surely not a man. Or two. More like the primordial pulse of the manta ray let loose through the fossils of an ancient mountain pass. Imagine the ragged shore of the Baltic Sea and a big black wolf in 1835 that we believed was the other side of the world. Imagine Apollo, patron of shepherds, associated with wolves—though only out of fear of certain parts of ourselves that might never die. We kill hundreds of thousands of breaths, regularly, when we breathe mindlessly, without focus. A shaman in Siberia shakes his maraca, reaching into me, and holds my liver right there in a basket before me, telling how to track my past. How my mouth might finally be the beautiful, brutal slaughter of 4,000 geese in the spring hunt off Cape Krestovskaya. Your poems are more beautiful than the Crimean dead, than the Japanese glaze of a soap dish waiting to cleanse my mouth in the Manitou Crafts Co-op. I still remember your class. 1978. How Jennifer and I noticed the sweet peculiarity of your blue suede shoes. Did they evolve from the bellowing blast of yak leather? From the low vocabulary in the underbelly of an ox? How many people know that the musk ox is more closely related to the North American mountain goat than to the bison? How much chocolate can one possibly eat in this tranquil tourist town of Manitou without vomiting a goldfish, forcibly, all the way down from the watery restlessness of the brain? I keep returning to Stevens because I don’t understand, though I love the sound of his verbs. Come. Go. Stay. Be well, he seems to say. Even when sounding like the rarely glimpsed freshwater mountain shrimp of Borneo. Once, when writing about Vallejo, I quoted Stevens by mistake, saying, the ordinary of his commonplace. Once, writing you, I asked if you were a mirror of the purest milk, my most moist lice, or just my mouth, thirty years older than the rest of me.
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LIE DOWN WHERE THEIR FACES ARE by James Allen Hall
The woman across the street
on her knees again, shut out in the snow
by her husband. Every week, this ritual:
a man, a crying woman, the blue cold
earth that marries them. When he lets
her in, she lays in bed next to him.
He cries in her armpit. Even their
dog lays down, tree-chained heir,
his head between his paws. In the morning,
the woman is a satin worksong
torn by passing cars as it limps its hope
across the road to my ear. I want to stop
before I can be infected, I am humming
and counting out the pills I think of
as last. She sings to make her dress less
permeable to the snow. I want to know
the way to leave without leaving
soiled clothes behind. The song says
love will change the world, but spring is
a field of goldenrod, framed by thwarted
engines, rusting red in their back
yard, each empty socket eyeing its season
of repair. I can almost taste the weeds,
their waxy stems thick among the dented
fenders. So much land, every curse and love
too could be buried here. One night, late
March, the dog escapes into the forest.
Black fur a mangy blur against the trees.
They call for him all the next day.
The chain waits for him, its rusted collar
tight around my throat. If he returns,
he won’t be seen alive again. Fled,
he will live forever.
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PERSONAL AD #1 (Pairs Only Matter In Poker) by Michael Schmeltzer
After C.D. Wright
I wear garish makeup and make faces in the mirror.
Which reminds me…do you want to hear
my favorite joke?
Two clowns walk into a bar:
one with a sad face, the makeup frown
thick and chalky as a hotdog bun; the other
no face whatsoever.
There never was a happy face.
Let me start over.
There are two expressions we carry like dumbbells
to balance ourselves in public.
People are often
two-faced and falling flat
on both of them. If you look carefully
I always lean to the left.
I love honesty
the way a lazy-eyed child loves playing pirate.
How far sunk do you think
a treasure must be
before we call it buried?
What about desires?
For reasons unknown I often find trouble.
My ex-lover phoned me
after an absence of six weeks, drunk and high on meth.
He always called it “Tina” or “Crystal”
as if a drug could wear jewels
or flaunt a slinky dress.
He added lime to his beer and dubbed it a cocktail.
Ever hear of heterochromia?
For a sucker like me it means exotic.
Plus, he was handsome. He had one
hazel and one blue eye.
They were both beautiful
but I never knew which color to trust.
My problem is whatsoever my right eye sees
my left ignores
so he got away with a lot.
His eyes glittered like Vegas
when all I needed was Branson.
By the end there was nothing left to gamble.
All I wanted then
was to slip a penny over each eye
and watch the world bury him.
Listen to Michael Schmeltzer’s reading below…
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THE CITY by Helwig Brunner, translated by Monika Zobel
Die Stadt zu Linien vereinfacht,
abgeschminkt das eigene Gesicht.
Häuser, Schritte und Gedanken
sind aus demselben Material,
Grafitstaub und Diamanten.
Die Zeit steht, senkt deine Lider,
um einmal jetzt zu sein, inmitten
der schlafenden Welt, hellsichtig
zugewandt den tappenden Fragen
der Somnambulen.
Helwig Brunner‘s work has been published in numerous literary magazines and anthologies in Europe and elsewhere, including New European Poets (Graywolf Press, 2008). Brunner has published eight books of poetry, most recently Vorläufige Tage (Leykam Verlag, 2011) and Die Sicht der Dinge: Rätselgedichte (edition keiper, 2012), as well as some novels, short stories, and essays. He has been the recipient of several literary prizes in Austria and Germany.
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The city simplified to lines,
makeup removed from your face.
Houses, footsteps, and thoughts
are made of the same material,
graphite dust and diamonds.
Time stalls, lowers your lids,
to be now for once in the midst of
a sleeping world, clear-sighted
turned toward the groping questions
of the somnambulists.
Monika Zobel‘s poems and translations have been published in Redivider, The Cincinnati Review, Beloit Poetry Journal, Cream City Review, Mid-American Review, The Adirondack Review, Guernica Magazine, West Branch, Best New Poets 2010, and elsewhere. A senior editor at The California Journal of Poetics and recipient of a Fulbright Scholarship, she currently lives in Vienna, Austria.
- Published in Issue 3, Poetry, Translation
ECHOLOCATION: AERIAL SCRIPT by Helwig Brunner, translated by Monika Zobel
Echolot. Luftlinienschrift
Die Fledermäuse, an ihre Laute gedacht,
unhörbar, das Horchen also hinein in eine
Stille, die keine ist; sie ziehn den Blick
in den Dämmerhimmel, das Zickzack ihres
Flatterfluges, samtpelzige Beinahvögel,
die mit den Ohren schaun: Bilder hören.
Wenig später sind sie entzogen, entflogen
hinter die schwarze Jalousie der Nacht,
gesättigt an den Blindstellen des Echos
und ich denke sehr banal, wie wenig ich
auslote mit Worten.
Helwig Brunner‘s work has been published in numerous literary magazines and anthologies in Europe and elsewhere, including New European Poets (Graywolf Press, 2008). Brunner has published eight books of poetry, most recently Vorläufige Tage (Leykam Verlag, 2011) and Die Sicht der Dinge: Rätselgedichte (edition keiper, 2012), as well as some novels, short stories, and essays. He has been the recipient of several literary prizes in Austria and Germany.
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Echolocation: Aerial Script
The bats, reflecting on their sounds,
inaudible, thus eavesdropping on a
silence, which is none; they drag the gaze
through the twilight sky, the zigzag of their
flutter flight, satin-fur nearly birds
that see with their ears: listen to images.
A little later they diminish, vanish
behind the black blinds of night,
satiated by the blind spots of the echo
and I think how little I sound out
with trite words.
Monika Zobel‘s poems and translations have been published in Redivider, The Cincinnati Review, Beloit Poetry Journal, Cream City Review, Mid-American Review, The Adirondack Review, Guernica Magazine, West Branch, Best New Poets 2010, and elsewhere. A senior editor at The California Journal of Poetics and recipient of a Fulbright Scholarship, she currently lives in Vienna, Austria.
- Published in Issue 3, Poetry, Translation
THE SUPERINTENDENT by Justin Bigos
The air as still as bathwater, no breeze
from Sheepshead, we carry clear plastic bags
of empty bottles and cans, blue plastic bags
of plastic bottles and milk jugs, we squeeze
flattened boxes into open boxes, then tie
it all in twine – but do we cover it
in tarp in case it rains? He says, Forget-
about-it, just like on TV. (I’d died
a little when he asked me for my help
after mumbling something about the blacks
and Jews, this man who once refused to attack
his neighbors in Croatia, then fled that hell
– I’ve heard it said – with three-thousand cash
inside his socks.) And next we do the trash.
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DEVIL DANCER’S DAUGHTER by Laura Sheahen
What does your father do
Dance
Where in the jungle
The jungle
When
In the night
With feathers sharp feathers
To what sound
The beat from the heart of my mother
extracted
Where are the flames from
The devil
Where is the dance from
The devil
And the red mask from
The devil I hate the devil
And the knife moon from
The devil
Why is he dancing
To cure me
Listen to Laura Sheahen’s reading of “Devil Dancer’s Daughter” below…
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Gate Mudaliyar A.C.G.S. Amarasekara, The Devil Dancer’s Daughter. (Oil on canvas)
Laura Sheahen composed this poem in response to The Devil Dancer’s Daughter, a painting by the Sri Lankan artist Gate Mudaliyar A.C.G.S. Amarasekara (b. 1883 – d. 1983). The painting is housed in the National Art Gallery of Sri Lanka and is reproduced here with permission.
AFTER SAMSON BURNS HER FAMILY’S HOUSE AND GRAIN-FIELDS by William Kelley Woolfitt
Two ruined bodies, galena-black, tar-black,
charred flakes of cloth, countenances gone.
No ears, or eyes, or lips. Father, sister, offered
to a god, fat and gorged, that I deplore;
hands folded at the breastbone, as if fire
was a balm that soothed, gave them repose;
no hair to dress, no skin to wash and stroke.
Old moon when I sleep, when I rise, no cave
where it can roost, vacant haze, thread of shine,
me in the starless night,
interlunar, the night through all my joints
and bones diffused, the scorched kernels I gnaw
from the stalk, burrows where I hide, water
seeping from stone, the fox that licks my hand.
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Susan Worsham, “Drowned Persimmons.” (Photograph)
William Kelley Woolfitt chose Susan Worsham’s original photograph to accompany his poem. The poet explains: “‘After Samson Burns…’ reflects my interest in the stories of unnamed figures in historical and sacred texts, such as the sister of Samson’s wife who was offered to him as a consolation prize in the Book of Judges. I see in Worsham’s photograph several echoes of elements in my poem, including fruit(fulness) spoiled, the color black, and water seeping from stone.”
ANTIPHON FOR THE OFFICE OF THE DEAD by William Kelley Woolfitt
a powder box and swans-down puff
her limp stocking, a green satin fan
spangled with dragonflies, curling-tongs
small muslin bags, a pumice stone
bits of skin, cut-glass bottles, cuticle
knife, a darner, nail powder, sealing wax
spirals of her hair, glove buttoner
orangewood stick, gauze balls, shoe lift
velvet brush, rabbit’s foot, pots of rouge
lip salve, cold cream plumbed by her
tired fingers, silver trays of hatpins
hairpins, safety pins, to hold, to prick
foxtail scarf with chain, scrimshaw
manicure box with sweet pea vines
carved in the whale-bone lid, hand-mirror
holding her breath, a smudged cloud
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Aaron Blum, “Bittersweet.” (Photograph)
William Kelley Woolfitt chose this original photograph by Aaron Blum to accompany his poem. The poet explains: “I gave this poem its current title after reading Traci Brimhall’s wonderful ‘Dirge for the Idol.’ I had imagined an altar-like dressing-table laden with the dead parts of humans and other animals; naming the poem ‘Antiphon for the Office of the Dead’ was my way of naming that table a place of commemoration and lament. I see another kind of altar in Aaron Blum’s photograph ‘Bittersweet,’ a suggestion of mourning and mending, with a lamp that may burn for the lost and the quilt-like table runner that may gather pieces of the old and put them together again.”
LOOKING THROUGH A TELESCOPE AT THE MOON ON THE DAY NEIL ARMSTRONG DIED
by Raena Shirali
we locate apollo’s landing site on a map that shows
there are two sides to everything
& one is always dark, maria,
unfathomable ocean. the dome above is cracked
& only a sliver of seven-o-clock sky peeks
down. how dizzying: these fickle attempts
to track my lover’s swells, swift black shifts
like a night sky peeling. we are determined
to find armstrong’s footing—
all expectation & no satisfaction; all wax,
no wane. & yes, we drift in cycles
i don’t keep track of anymore.
on the wooden viewing platform,
the cincinnati observatory employee tells me
the moon in this lens is reversed,
so i see east where i should see waning curve.
even if things were right-side-up,
our wrongs don’t follow laws,
or adhere to astronomy. in the end,
nothing negates, & what is bright is too much here.
i cannot find the grounding crater.
the selenic overwhelms
& i clutch the eyepiece, a teetering drunk
unsteady even with my heels off, my lover
smiling up at me from the ground.
did you find apollo? he asks
& i think, o, what a tease you are,
moon: a contradiction, a lie of light
& dark. your surface reeking of gunpowder,
your tendency to decompose liquid.
Listen to Raena Shirali’s reading of “looking through a telescope…” below…
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DOLOROSA by Molly Rose Quinn
(The Chapel at St. Mary’s School for Girls)
where the pillar falls at the edge of morning the teachers
beg us to tug down our skirts they offer their palms
for our gumballs and your god is here to say that beauty
is easy like cutting teeth and your legs and your legs
and yours and I in the pew wish to scrape down
to nothing cuff myself kneel better and what could be
worthier hair voice and loudly I beg for ascendancy
dear classmates your legs in neat rows pray as you do
with fists up and the sun in here bare pray for safety
the teen saint she is the girl to win it all for I beg my
mariology as she sets the way that girl she never once
begged for sparing she begged for death like wine
she begged the best she supplicated she died this dying
begs for me I give it such pleasure and legs and the pew
and the alb and the bread and all other objects beg to be
candles when you are a candle you can beg to be lit
each of you in the pew you beg to be lit I’ll never shine
bigger as we know teenagers beg to be begged and we do
you girls you begged me to hold you begged me to take
what I took you beg bigger and better and for that
you’ll be queens the chimes chime and bells bell
and dear god I know I can be the greatest girl ever
by anointing all alone and being loved the very best
and she says what is so good about anger god killed
my son for himself I suppose and this halo it’s nothing
I asked for and of course she’ll be lying and your legs
and your legs and yours tanned and the best thing all year.
Listen to Molly Rose Quinn’s reading of “Dolorosa” below…
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Henry Darger, Sacred Heart. ©Kiyoko Lerner 2013 / Artist Rights Society (ARS), New York. (Click to enlarge.)
Molly Rose Quinn selected Henry Darger’s work to accompany her poem and explains: “The girls of Henry Darger’s epic novel, illustrated here in Sacred Heart and elsewhere, were closely derived from popular media (recall the ‘Coppertone baby’ or ‘Morton Salt girl’). The novel itself, undiscovered until Darger’s death, details the girls’ war against child slavery, neglect, and abuse. They are cartoonishly feminine in appearance, divine in their acts, and pure of moral being. The narrative weaves darkly into Christian mythology and Darger’s childhood experiences. My poem, using Mary as its vessel, hopes to crash together female adolescence and religious fundamentalism, therein the inherent mythologizing, fetishism, zeal, envy, lust. I am drawn to these images for their moralizing, their uncertain deviance, their mystic pity, and the great heart’s wink at the literal.”
Please note: Reproduction, including downloading of Henry Darger’s work, is prohibited by copyright laws and international conventions without the express written permission of Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
THE SAW by James Allen Hall
Galeria Hermandad, Toledo
A hand made this, hammered flat a hot length of iron,
cut one side jagged, a row of teeth. The criminal
would be hoisted up, tied inverted, the saw
at his scrotum. The act required two men
before and aft, their breath ragged, flesh straining
through flesh, a saw coming for his eyes. Once
he followed a plainclothes soldier home. Kissed him
open-eyed. Saw the night shredded down to morning.
Saw what was approaching, was breaking in the door
even now: in the closet, a row of uniforms,
legs halved by hanging. The wrack the maiden
the noose the saw. Sierra. I’ll never say it right.
We are standing in Toledo, in dry museum light.
I’m pressing my hands against the stained glass
of the wrong century. In a cathedral down the street,
a row of white pointed pontiff hats, preserved
behind glass, eyeing my wrists. Last night I was suspect,
legs spread. And you, soldier, tied them wide.
I leave my hand in yours and follow you home,
the way I’ve always done, wanting to be wrong
about why you won’t touch the rest of me,
why there’s something that loves me cut apart.
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