californicationery
Jun. 29th, 2009 | 11:52 pm
* June 30: Da Poetry Lounge, Los Angeles
GreenWay Court Theater, 544 N. Fairfax Blvd, Los Angeles
9 p.m., $5
* July 1: The Ugly Mug, Orange, CA
Two Idiots Peddling Poetry
The Ugly Mug Café, 261 North Glassell, Orange, CA
7:30 p.m., $2 cover
* July 2: Noisy Voyeur: poetry, photo exhibition, live erotic photoshoot, music, and more!
at the 2nd City Arts Council Gallery
435 Alamitos Avenue, Long Beach, CA
8-11 p.m.
$10 at the door, $5 if you come erotically costumed... bust out those boas! lace up those corsets! buckle up those boots! Hosted by the fantabulous Mindy Nettifee!
Featuring poetry by the Wandering Uterus Tour, plus photography by Alexandra Gibson (http://alexandragibsonphot
* July 3: Hollywood CA
Hollywood Institute of Poetics
8-10 p.m.
at Stories Bookstore, 1716 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles
Marty and Tristan, with Corrie Greathouse
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Wandering Uterus update and Bay Area invitation
Jun. 18th, 2009 | 12:29 pm
Tuesday the 23rd we're in Sacramento, Wednesday the 24th at the Berkeley slam! Hope to see you all somewhere...
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Chicago poetry competition
Jun. 14th, 2009 | 02:30 pm
The Guild Complex is pleased to announce the 16th anniversary of the Gwendolyn Brooks Open Mic Awards (GBOMA) for poetry. Twenty semi-finalists will be selected from open submissions. These 20 poets will perform their work in front of an audience on Tuesday, July 14. Poets must be 18 years of age or older by the date of the reading and a legal resident of Illinois to enter.
The winner will receive a $500 cash prize.
Submission guidelines:
• Work must be previously unpublished.
• Only one submission per poet – no exceptions please. (If you can’t decide which poem to submit, ask a friend to help you decide, but not the Guild Complex.)
• Submissions must be typed in a legible font, no less than 12-pt. type size.
• Submitted poems must be performed by the poet in 4 minutes or less. You will be timed. For the pleasure of the audience and that your work may be heard and enjoyed, please edit your poem to fit comfortably within the time limit. Poets who read work that is too long or read very fast to fit the time limit historically have not done well in the competition. (The audience is the judge, and they will judge on their listening experience.)Those poets who go beyond the 4 minute limit will not be eligible to advance in the competition. No props or musical accompaniment are allowed.
• The poet who wrote the work must be the poet who performs the work.
• The poet absolutely must be available to read on Tuesday, July 14. If you are not going to be in town, please do not submit. This is a performance competition.
Please send submissions to:
Guild Complex
P.O. Box 478880
Chicago, IL 60647-9998
Attn: GBOMA
or electronically to ellenw@guildcomplex.org with the subject line GBOMA.
A $5 entry fee should accompany each submission. (Because of the tight economic times, we have cut the entry fee in half this year. The submission fee helps to assuage our costs for the venue and the cash prize.) Electronic payment is available through paypal on the Guild Complex website: www.guildcomplex.org
Please DO NOT send submissions c/o the Chopin Theatre at their address. The Chopin is our venue, not our organization. Any poems delivered there WILL NOT be included for consideration. Also, hand delivery is not possible.
Please note: the Guild Complex is a small shop, so following the instructions carefully raises your chances of having your work arrive successfully. E-mails can get lost – especially if the subject line is not marked as directed above. An acknowledgment e-mail will be sent for all submissions that are received by the deadline and have paid their submission fee.
Poets should include their contact information -- name, address, telephone number, email address and the title of the poem – on a separate sheet. (If you’re sending an e-mail, please attach your contact information separately from the poem.) Please DO NOT put your name on the poem. Submissions must be post-marked by Monday, June 29, if sent through the postal service. Electronic submissions must be time stamped by 5:00 p.m. on Wednesday, July 1.Notification of semi-finalists will be sent on Monday, July 6. Remember, the competition is Tuesday, July 14.
Again those key dates are:
• Monday, June 29: last chance to send your poem through the mail.
• Wednesday, July 1: last chance to send your poem by e-mail.
• Monday, July 6: Notification of semi-finalists.
• Tuesday, July 14: Competition.
Reading location:
Chopin Theatre
1534 W. Division (intersection of Division, Ashland and Milwaukee), Chicago, IL
Reading begins promptly at 7:30 p.m.
We wish good luck to everyone. Please spread the word. You may contact us with questions @ ellenw@guildcomplex.org or 877.394.5061. (E-mail will get the most prompt response.)
For those who wish to attend the performance – which are always amazing – we will request an admission fee of $5 for adults, $3 for students, children under 12 are free. (Please note that many of the poems have adult content.) The Guild Complex presents 95% of our readings free of charge. A few times a year, we ask for admission to help us underwrite additional costs for that particular reading. We know these are tough economic times. No one will be turned away.
Thanks,
The Guild Complex
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stuffalupagous
Jun. 13th, 2009 | 10:39 pm
Things haven't gone exactly according to plan with putting this together, as I underestimated the upheaval that would be moving and looking for work and getting started at a new job, and Andi couldn't have foreseen the family and business issues that would keep her from being able to hit the road... but the uterus wanders on, regardless.
So I'm posted up here in Daemond and Inti's gorgeous home, with a stove and tea and wireless and enough allergy medicine to keep the cats out of my lungs. Their home is organized, ergonomic, and ecologically sound -- very Seattle, in other words.
I will need to go out and have more adventures, so as to have things to write about here.
I went for a walk today, and tried to find a yard sale for which there were many, many signs that seemed only to take me in circles. With me on this walk I took: keys to the house, and $10. Also, I wrote the address of the house on my stomach, because if I got really sweaty I figured it would smudge off my hand.
Um, I have a new haircut. Thanks to my brilliant stylist-slash-girlfriend. And a hairstylist at Milio's in Chicago, who stripped and dyed my hair just before the LAST Wandering Uterus Tour, and to whom I was randomly assigned by the receptionist when we called for appointments. Insert Twilight Zone music here.
Tomorrow night is the show in Bellingham, a town whose name I can never remember and therefore always want to refer to as Birmingham, or Binghamton.
Also, the kind gentleman who hosts it calls himself The Podfather of Soul. I think he's interviewing us tomorrow. I'll give you the link then. Don't hurt yourself with the waiting.
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holy. cows.
Jun. 8th, 2009 | 10:19 am
I will be in Seattle, Portland (no show in Portland, just family, unless somebody wants to hook a girl up last-minute), the Bay, and LA. If you are there, I'd love to see you! Details below.
In sad news, Andi Strickland won't be able to hit the road with me because of family and business stuff. But Tristan Silverman will be sitting in as a special guest for the Cali shows. So that rocks. And I'm psyched to finally do shows with Karen Finneyfrock and be on the road with Emily Kagan Trenchard.
Tour Schedule, as of now...
June 15-20: with Karen Finneyfrock.
June 23-July 3: with Emily Kagan-Trenchard and special guest appearances by Tristan Silverman
June 15: Bellingham, Washington
"Poetry Night" -- open mic and feature. 8 p.m. all ages
The Darkroom, 310 W. Champion Street
June 16: Seattle, Washington
Richard Hugo House with special Seattle guests
7:30pm, $5, all ages.
June 17: Seattle, Washington Poetry Slam
Spitfire, 2219 4th Ave., Seattle
7 p.m., $5 cover, 21 and over, ID required
June 23: Sacramento Poetry Slam
Mahogany Urban Poetry Series
Queen Sheba Restaurant, 1704 Broadway, Sacramento CA
8pm, $5 cover. All ages.
June 24: Berkeley Poetry Slam
The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave, Berkeley, CA
7:30 p.m.
June 25: possible house concert -- details TBD
June 28: possible workshop -- details TBD
June 30: Da Poetry Lounge, Los Angeles
GreenWay Court Theater, 544 N. Fairfax Blvd, Los Angeles
9 p.m., $5
July 1: The Ugly Mug, Orange, CA
Two Idiots Peddling Poetry
The Ugly Mug Café, 261 North Glassell, Orange, CA
7:30 p.m., $2 cover
July 3: Hollywood CA
Hollywood Institute of Poetics
at Stories Bookstore, 1716 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles
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you must submit Saturday...
May. 23rd, 2009 | 11:57 am
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you must submit!
May. 16th, 2009 | 12:19 pm
•••CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: BEST NEW POETS, AN ANTHOLOGY OF 50 EMERGING WRITERS, ACCEPTING SUBMISSIONS FOR ITS OPEN COMPETITION
Deadline: June 1, 2009.
Entering poets cannot have published a book-length poetry collection by November 2009 (chapbooks do not affect your eligibility). Entry fee: $3.50. Each entry can contain two poems. Selected poets receive five copies of the print anthology. This year's guest editor is Kim Addonizio. In 2009, we're taking entries through ManuscriptHub. To create your submission, go to www.bestnewpoets.org for details.
•••CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: ANTHOLOGY SEEKING POETRY BY MEN ON WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A MAN TODAY
Deadline: June 30
Interested in poems that explore the complex psychosocial issue of male identity. Please avoid poems that project an overripe machismo. Submit to John Smelcer, P.O. Box 234, Binghamton, NY 13905.
•••CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS FOR BELLEVUE LITERARY REVIEW’S ANNUAL PRIZES
Deadline: August 1, 2009
$1,000 Poetry Prize (Judge: Tony Hoagland)
$1,000 Fiction Prize (Judge: Gail Godwin)
$1,000 Nonfiction Prize (Judge: Phillip Lopate).
Looking for exceptional writing about health, healing, illness, the body, and the mind. Entry fee: $15 ($20 includes subscription). Submit online: www.blreview.org.
•••CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: THE TEACHER'S VOICE, A LITERARY MAGAZINE FOR POETS AND WRITERS IN EDUCATION.
A free online magazine and teacher resource, they seek poems, short stories, creative nonfiction, and essays about the promise and hard truths of teaching in our schools and colleges. Chapbook and poetry contests too. Send to: The Teacher’s Voice, P.O. Box 150384, Kew Gardens, NY 11415. Query: editor@the-teachers-voice.
•••CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: AESTHETICA MAGAZINE, A UK-BASED INTERNATIONAL ARTS PUBLICATION, ANNOUNCES COMPETITION
Deadline: August 31, 2009
Three recipients to receive £500 (approx $750) each in three categories:
Poetry, fiction, artwork & photography
The 2008 Aesthetica Creative Works Competition provided a huge boost for the winners and finalists involved. Since the publication of the Creative Works Annual, some of the winners and finalists have enjoyed further publications and commissions, as well as exhibitions around the globe from London to New York.
For complete details: http://www.aestheticamagaz
Pauline Bache
pauline@aestheticamagazine
www.aestheticamagazine.com
•••FELLOWSHIP: MENDOCINO COAST WRITERS CONFERENCE AND POETRY CONTEST IN CELEBRATION OF ITS 20TH ANNIVERSARY July 30-August 2, 2009.
Deadline: June 9, 2009
The Mendocino Coast Writers Conference is an intimate conference limited to 100 participants where you will be encouraged to find and express your own voice by excellent writers who are outstanding teachers. You will explore how your writing can shape the world. Whether fiction, nonfiction,or poetry, words are a powerful instrument for change. Faculty includes: Ellen Bass, Charlotte Gullick, Gennifer Choldenko, Robert McDowell and many others. A generous donor has offered to fund a full fellowship to the poet who wins the conference poetry contest.
For details on the poetry contest, other fellowship opportunities, and the conference program, see info@mcwc.org or 707-962-2600, ext. 2167.
***
The Ruskin Art Club Poetry Award is for an unpublished poem. This year’s judge is Kate Gale. Award is $1,000 and publication of the awarded poem in The Los Angeles Review published by Red Hen Press. Submit up to three poems of no more than 120 lines and a $20 entry fee. Include name and title of each poem entered on cover sheet only, and send a SASE for notification. Entries must be postmarked by September 30, 2009.
The Benjamin Saltman Poetry Award is for a previously unpublished original collection of poetry. This year’s judge is Nick Flynn. Award is $3,000 and publication of the awarded collection by Red Hen Press. Entry fee is $25, and there is a 48 page minimum. Name on cover sheet only, and send a SASE for notification. Entries must be postmarked by August 31, 2009.
www.redhen.org
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Chicago! what are you doing Friday night?
May. 5th, 2009 | 11:33 am
a pay-what-you-can workshop open to the Chicago poetry community
every 2nd and 4th Friday at 7:30 p.m. SHARP starting May 8, 2009
(arrival at 7 p.m. encouraged)
2nd Fridays: WRITING, 4th Fridays: PERFORMANCE
Facilitated by Andi Strickland and Marty McConnell, with occasional guests.
Email voxferus (at) gmail (dot) com by the Thursday prior to workshop to RSVP and for location (registration is filled on a first-come, first-served basis.)
Vox Ferus After Dark is a structured workshop designed to build a community of writers and performers interested in improving their own craft by investing in and exploring the work of others as well as their own.
Each workshop will include analysis, critique, and development of new writing (2nd Fridays) or practice of performance techniques (4th Fridays.)
All are welcome, but RSVP is required as space is limited.
www.voxferus.org
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napoWriMo draft something or other
Apr. 15th, 2009 | 11:12 am
the man in the night taxi
could be driving us toward anything
strobe lights in the window
of the neon sign store throb
and what the hell is night. what
is a kiss but a long-distance call
the blinds of every townhome stay closed
as if we were modest or it mattered who saw us
god after god takes a pass. the night
is a puddle made for drowning
we kiss as if plucking the lips off
chilly embryos, as if required by contract
we fight, ordinary as rats in a dumpster.
anything holy in this went extinct
with yesterday’s cigarette. stop
the car. this is where we get off.
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good-bye.
Apr. 13th, 2009 | 04:28 pm
BY DEBORAH DIGGES
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napoWriMo 30/30 draft something something
Apr. 13th, 2009 | 12:55 pm
paper soaked by an unpredicted
storm, when everything you swathed
in plastic gets damaged by the wrapping
and not by the rain – that is not the day
for long drives across glaciated plains.
all that sky. fields of flat accusation. you
and the radio and gas station coffee
too hot to drink. tick off every dumb
impulsive thing you’ve ever done wrong.
these are the names of your children.
what you’ve made and sent out into
the world. you never thought
you were perfect, but here is proof
if ever you needed it. you taste it
with every boiling swill of caffeine,
every stale truck stop croissant. regret
is a small word. the devastated city
of your chest is governed by a man
with no arms. he leans forward
as if to embrace you. as if he
were the only one who still can.
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napoWriMo 30/30 draft something
Apr. 13th, 2009 | 12:53 pm
the old sofa. the door only slams
on one finger, the grease fire
in the kitchen is easily doused.
only one of the milk cartons spoils
in your hand, the ceiling leaks
but the sewer pipe does not overflow,
the frogs that fall from the clear sky
have the most beatific look, almost
a grin, on their broad, exhausted faces.
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napoWriMo 30/30 draft nine
Apr. 11th, 2009 | 02:02 pm
we circled, three small sisters,
a fanged menagerie – fat
Jenny with the stringy hair
and house that smelled
like a basement and the brother
half our age who showed us
his penis, jumping out
of the hall closet bared
as if this were something
he’d made or at which
we should be amazed
and because my sisters looked
first at me and then down
at him I twisted my face
into an adult’s, into the look
Mom gave the men who came
door to door selling vacuum
cleaners and long-distance
calling plans and said,
"let’s go. it’s probably time
for dinner." and despite it being
maybe three o’clock in the afternoon
they nodded solemnly and we filed out
of that house with its rust carpeted
hallways and the TV perpetually tuned
to Flash Gordon toward our old
converted farmhouse of a house
with the blue metal swingset out back,
the white plastic seat snapped clear
in half where Jenny had jumped
for no clear reason and we laughed
and pointed as if our hands
were their own animals, nothing
we’d made, and nothing we
would call our own.
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amazing workshop opportunity in NYC
Apr. 10th, 2009 | 05:06 pm
If you are anywhere near NYC, I highly highly recommend that you register and take this workshop. If you know their work, you know why. If you don't, look it up! Astonishing. And the workshop? $30 if you register by April 20. That is insanely cheap for a workshop with poets of this caliber. For real.
Sigh.
***
the louderARTS Project presents a workshop with award-winning poets
DORIANNE LAUX and JOSEPH MILLAR
Sunday, April 26
4-7 p.m.
242 W 27th St, Suite 3B
New York, NY 10001
To register, email workshops (at) louderARTS (dot) com or visit www.louderARTS.com.
Advance registration (before April 20): only $30!
Late registration: $45 from April 20th - April 24th if space is still available
A finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, DORIANNE LAUX’s
fourth book of poems, "Facts About the Moon" (W.W. Norton), is the
recipient of the Oregon Book Award, chosen by Ai. It was also
short-listed for the 2006 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize for the most
outstanding book of poems published in the United States and chosen by
the Kansas City Star as a noteworthy book of 2005. Laux is also
author of three collections of poetry from BOA Editions, "Awake"
(1990) introduced by Philip Levine, recently reprinted by Eastern
Washington University Press, "What We Carry" (1994) and "Smoke"
(2000). "Superman: The Chapbook" was released by Red Dragonfly Press
in January 2008. Co-author of "The Poet's Companion," she’s the
recipient of two Best American Poetry Prizes, a Best American Erotic
Poems Prize, a Pushcart Prize, two fellowships from The National
Endowment for the Arts and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Her work has
appeared in the Best of the American Poetry Review, The Norton
Anthology of Contemporary Poetry and Best of the Net, and she’s a
frequent contributor to magazines as various as the New York
Quarterly, Orion, Ms. Magazine and a host og on-line journals. Laux
has waited tables and written poems in San Diego, Los Angeles,
Berkeley, and Petaluma, California, and as far north as Juneau,
Alaska. For the last 13 years she has taught at the University of
Oregon in Eugene and since 2004, as core faculty at Pacific
University’s Low Residency MFA Program. Her summers are spent
teaching poetry workshops in the beauty of Esalen in Big Sur, Spoleto,
Italy and Lake Atitlan, Guatemala. She and her husband, poet Joseph
Millar, now live in Raleigh where she has joined the faculty at North
Carolina State University as a Poet-in-Residence.
JOSEPH MILLAR is the author of Fortune, from Eastern Washington
University Press. His first collection, "Overtime," (2001) was
finalist for the Oregon Book Award and the Robert H. Winner Memorial
Award from the Poetry Society of America. Millar grew up in
Pennsylvania, attended Johns Hopkins University and spent 25 years in
the San Francisco Bay area, working at a variety of jobs, from
telephone repairman to commercial fisherman. His poems have appeared
in numerous magazines including The Southern Review, TriQuarterly
Review, Prairie Schooner, Shenandoah, DoubleTake, New Letters,
Ploughshares, Manoa, and River Styx. His work has won fellowships
from the National Endowment for the Arts in Poetry, Montalvo Center
for the Arts and Oregon Literary Arts. In 1997 he gave up his job as
a telephone installation foreman and moved to western Oregon where he
now teaches at Pacific University’s Low Residency MFA Program and
yearly at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur. Pulitzer Prize winner Yusef
Komunyakaa has said, “There's a tenderness at the core of Fortune,
where the commonplace becomes atypical and fantastical, and each poem
possesses a voice that summons and reveals. Joseph Millar is a poet we
can believe.”
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naPoWriMo 30/30 draft day seven
Apr. 8th, 2009 | 11:04 am
warning signs
when the teakettle whistles and whistles
and your husband is sitting. right. there.
fur raised along the spine preceding
the bared canines. your daughter’s hands
on the coloring book flicker into claws
and back again. your left leg collapsing
in the middle of a run. a partial carcass
on the trail. everything tastes like sand.
the cracked eggs spill yolks that spell
her name. that blonde on the playground.
lips pulled back to display the front
teeth. this is before the hiss, the pounce.
you can’t get out of bed. a person who runs
when frightened may trigger a chase
response. the bedknobs pivot and stare.
the toddler climbs on the counter
to get at the cereal and eats
off the floor. the danger is greatest
during the animal’s courtship
and mating season. Easter,
Memorial Day, anniversaries. events
involving chocolate. you are proud
of yourself for figuring it out. the house
concurs. the water runs hot enough
to burn. the front door sheds its red
in miraculous sheets, the husband
is stunned, how could paint undry
and run. the toes of all his shoes
have curled into fingers of accusation
and you are still. your throat
a dry river, your tongue every
bloated fish in its bed. provocation
may increase the toxicity of the venom.
you lay down to keep the linoleum
silent. how cool it is here, how honest.
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NaPoWriMo 30/30 draft day six
Apr. 7th, 2009 | 09:37 pm
there is no yesterday from here. a perch
so close to the window the glass billows,
warping the pavement and the parked cars
below. fry oil gone bad on the back
of your tongue. Buddha, Mohammed,
a Jesus fled on the earlier train. it’s you
and the chemical night that is all
you know. yesterday is actually
everywhere. the sheets run with it
like Atalanta before the apples,
before seduction, the taps
on the bathtub are bronze
knots you twist until steam
fills the room, hits the window,
the metal shifting in your hand
like a live branch. you look
down. water rising around the wheels
like a hurricane’s wish. what now?
the storm’s long gone. you’re a myth.
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all over the map
Apr. 6th, 2009 | 03:22 pm
APRIL SHOWS!
April 8: Normal, IL
April 9: Lincoln, Nebraska
April 11: Omaha, Nebraska
April 17: Columbus, Ohio
April 18: Columbus, Ohio (workshop)
April 20: Chicago, IL
*
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NaPoWriMo 30/30 draft day five
Apr. 6th, 2009 | 11:04 am
dust. without water, a sweater
shrunk to doll-size in the dryer.
when I am not with you, my heart
waddles from room to room
like a drunken toddler. lost.
I did not mean to need you.
though I did intend your mouth
and its several magics. now? now
when it rains I open the windows.
let the sky in to drown me
if that’s what it desires.
2
I am not a patient girl.
but I know things about skin.
about what it takes to fill
a bloodline, how to prepare
a body for ink. your cough
there are no substitutes
for the organ you’ve become
-- you are not an appendix
or the gall bladder, nothing
so scantily missed. I will not
leave you. here. my heart
in a soup tureen. arteries
running with rainwater.
your favorite broth.
3
tell me something
about fire. the lighters
littering your mattress.
you watched me sleep
the first time. since then
it’s been my turn. I record
your murmurs and sighs
on the sheet in expensive
eyeliner. this is my version
of faithfulness.
4
you feed me catfish
and bacon, though not
at the same time. boil water
for tea and hold my body
like a fleeing animal
while we sleep. I have never
stood so still as the first time
your eyes louvered to ice.
one time a bear came so close
I could hear him breathing.
a bag of dinner trash
in my hand. it’s April
and the rain has turned
to sleet. you and I
are a peculiar miracle.
the lighters on your bed
compasses spinning
in their tiny plastic cases.
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NaPoWriMo 30/30 draft day four
Apr. 4th, 2009 | 05:21 pm
when the dead rise again it will be
with our faces in their gritty fists.
the language of hunger has something
to do with love. subway cars
in their dark quarters dream
of being submarines, or coin
dispensers. on film, you look
just like your uncle. his eyes
bloated with secrets. you
give nothing away, your pockets
lined with old razors, your face
a locked gun closet. no matter
how expensive the fabric, the shroud
swaddling your heart shreds and shreds
as that persistent beast claws toward the light
again and again. next time, try kevlar. try
a good linen, pervious to smoke
and blood. we have traded
so many injuries our wounds
consider themselves cousins, refuse
to marry. if there is some resolution
to be had here, it will have to do
with food. with what we fork
into our corrupted mouth-parts.
good thing you don’t take
the subway. good thing I live
3,000 miles away. things
would get complicated if we started
telling the truth. if the train stopped
between stations for days in an effort
to become a lighthouse or a microwave.
what would we say. what would we pull
from our leather shoulderbags and feed
one another in the haze.
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NaPoWriMo 30/30 draft day three
Apr. 4th, 2009 | 10:20 am
the language of love has something
to do with hunger. if I ravel the veins
from my thighs into straws. if I open
my kneecap and let you suckle
on the ligaments. if I scoop out
my vertebrae, spoon the marrow
out of each cradling cup, will you
believe. if I restring my tendons
to sing your name with each step
if I twist my knuckles like dials
so each is always facing you if I
watch you while you sleep. if I make
your lap my bed and plate and grave.
if I pull out each tooth and shape it
into an animal, present you
a menagerie that has tasted
everything I’ve taken in the mouth.
will you turn your face to me.
lay down your suspicions
like turned meat. eat
until your perfect, toothy heart
believes.