Month: February 2021

time changes

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Time Changes
–Robert M. Drake
The hardest part
is
accepting how
people change
and
that alone
changes everything.

Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash

polycystic

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Polycystic Study of Intimacy

 

But where do the breasts go first is my question.
I understand their fantasies of fleeing south. 

The winters are loud and long and white 
and by March, well. I wonder why I’m still 

in it too. Now the round pits thumb up 
beneath the skin, tender and hot to the touch, 

crushed by my new weight. This island I’ve 
had to make of myself brought a bevy, 

angered by easy pleasures: sugar, soy sauce, 
potatoes, ice cream. My love’s language 

is to make a meal, ask what I can take in, 
ask what maladies to avoid. As for my house:

touch is far and few between. Desire wanes 
between compresses of cloves cinnamon turmeric 

and honey.  But in the mornings, a gulf between us, 
my hands are kissed. The blinds drawn to keep

the sun from disturbing my sleep while we wait 
patiently for my body’s quiet prayer of thanks.

Photo by Tamanna Rumee on Unsplash

february and my love

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February & my love is in another state
–José Olivarez

so when i walk down the street, i hold hands
with the wind. there’s a chimney coughing
up ahead & a sky so honey, i could almost taste it.
a cat struts away from me & two yellow eyes

become four: just like that,
i’m the loneliest creature on this block.
soon the streetlights will come alive
& television sets will light up with blues.

stay with me. while the sky is still golden,
hold the ladder so i can climb, & from
the highest rung, i can scrape away a drizzle
of light to wear around my neck. alone

is the star i follow. in love & in solitude:
alone is the home with the warmest glow.

Photo by Hannah Troupe on Unsplash

heirloom

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Heirloom
–Nikky Finney
Sundown, the day nearly eaten away, 

the Boxcar Willies peep. Their
inside-eyes push black and plump

against walls of pumpkin skin. I step 
into dying backyard light. Both hands 

steal into the swollen summer air, 
a blind reach into a blaze of acid, 

ghost bloom of nacre & breast. 
One Atlantan Cherokee Purple, 

two piddling Radiator Charlies 
are Lena-Horne lured into the fingers

of my right hand. But I really do love you, 
enters my ear like a nest of yellow jackets, 

well wedged beneath a two-by-four. 

But I really didn't think I would (ever leave), 
stings before the ladder hits the ground. 

I swat the familiar buzz away. 
My good arm arcs and aims. 

My elbow cranks a high, hard cradle
and draws a fire. The end of the day's 

sweaty air stirs fast in a bowl, the coming
shadows, the very diamond match I need. 

One by one, each Blind Willie
takes his turn Pollocking the back

fence, heart pine explodes gold-leafed in 
red and brown-eyed ochre. There is practice

for everything in this life. This is how
you throw something perfectly good away.

Photo by Krzysztof Niewolny on Unsplash

biographical notes

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Biographical Notes
–Andrei Codrescu

my biography

in the absence of facts,

rests on shaky ground

every day
i add thousands of new entries
to my biography

without me
my biography
is your story

when made into a play
my biography
speaks with an accent

when alone
with my biography
i give up life

you
are
in my biography

the pictures that go with my biography
haven’t yet been taken

Photo by Alexander Andrews on Unsplash

subway wind

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Subway Wind
–Claude McKay

Far down, down through the city’s great gaunt gut
      The gray train rushing bears the weary wind;
In the packed cars the fans the crowd’s breath cut,
      Leaving the sick and heavy air behind.
And pale-cheeked children seek the upper door
      To give their summer jackets to the breeze;
Their laugh is swallowed in the deafening roar
      Of captive wind that moans for fields and seas;
Seas cooling warm where native schooners drift
      Through sleepy waters, while gulls wheel and sweep,
Waiting for windy waves the keels to lift
      Lightly among the islands of the deep;
Islands of lofty palm trees blooming white
      That led their perfume to the tropic sea,
Where fields lie idle in the dew-drenched night,
      And the Trades float above them fresh and free.

 

Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash

accounts receivable

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Poem
–Alan Dugan

The person who can do
accounts receivable as fast
as steel machines and out-
talk telephones, has wiped
her business lipstick off,
undone her girdle and belts,
and stepped down sighing from
the black quoins of her heels
to be the quiet smiler with
changed eyes. After long-
haired women have unwired
their pencil-pierced buns, it’s an
event with pennants when
the Great Falls of emotion say
that beauty is in residence,
grand in her hotel of flesh,
and Venus of the marriage manual,
haloed by a diaphragm,
steps from the shell Mercenairia
to her constitutional majesty
in the red world of love.
Photo by StellrWeb on Unsplash

i am new york city

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i am new york city
–Jayne Cortez

i am new york city
here is my brain of hot sauce
my tobacco teeth my
mattress of bedbug tongue
legs apart hand on chin
war on the roof insults
pointed fingers pushcarts
my contraceptives all
look at my pelvis blushing

i am new york city of blood
police and fried pies
i rub my docks red with grenadine
and jelly madness in a flow of tokay

my huge skull of pigeons
my seance of peeping toms
my plaited ovaries excuse me
this is my grime my thigh of
steelspoons and toothpicks
i imitate no one

i am new york city
of the brown spit and soft tomatoes
give me my confetti of flesh
my marquee of false nipples
my sideshow of open beaks
in my nose of soot
in my ox bled eyes
in my ear of Saturday night specials

i eat ha ha hee hee and ho ho
i am new york city
never change never sleep never melt
my shoes are incognito
cadavers grow from my goatee
look i sparkle with shit with wishbones
my nickname is glue-me

take my face of stink bombs
my star spangled banner of hot dogs

take my beer can junta
my reptilian ass of footprints
and approach me through life
approach me through death
approach me through my widow’s peak

through my split ends my
asthmatic laugh approach me
through my wash rag
half ankle half elbow
massage me with your camphor tears
salute the patina and concrete
of my rat tail wig

face upface downpiss
into the bite of our handshake

i am new york city
my skillet-head friend
my fat-bellied comrade
citizens
break wind with me

Photo by Wilhelm Gunkel on Unsplash

 

game

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Game
–Octavio Paz

I’ll plunder seasons.
I’ll play with months and years.
Winter days with the red faces of summer.

And down the gray road,
in the silent parade
of hard, unmoving days,
I’ll organize the blues and gymnastics.

A rippling morning
of painted lips,
cool, as though just bathed,
with an autumn dawn.

And I’ll catch the clouds–
red, blue, purple–
and throw them against the inexpressive paper
of the black and blue sky,
so that they’ll write a letter
in the universal language
to their good friend the wind.

To help the shopkeepers,
I’ll make luminous billboards,
with spotlights of stars.

Maybe I’ll assassinate a dawn
so that, bleeding,
it will stain a white cloud purple.

In the shop of the seasons,
I’ll sell ripe autumn apples
wrapped in the paper of winter mists.

I’ll kidnap Spring,
to have her in my house,
like a ballerina.

The wind will change its schedule.
Unpredictable crossings of the clouds.

And down the highway of the Future, I’ll rush toward Winter,
for the surprise of meeting it later,
mixed with Summer.

On the green felt of space,
I’ll bet on days
that will roll like dice.

I’ll play with months and years.

Original

Juego

Saquearé a las estaciones.
Jugaré con los meses y los años.
(Días de invierno con caras rojas de verano.)

Y por la senda gris,
entre la muda procesión
de los días duros e inmóviles
colocaré a los azules y gimnásticos.

Una mañana ondulante
y de labios pintados,
fresca, como acabada de bañar,
con un crepúsculo otoñal.

Y cogeré a las nubes
—rojas, azules, moradas—
y las arrojaré en el papel inexpresivo
del lívido firmamento,
para que escriban una carta,
en el lenguaje universal,
a su buen amigo el viento.

Para ayudar a los burgueses,
haré anuncios luminosos,
con foquitos de estrellas.

Quizá asesine a un crepúsculo,
para que, desangrado,
tiña de púrpura una nube blanca.

Venderé en la tienda de las estaciones,
manzanas maduras de otoño
envuelto en papel de neblina invernal.

Me raptaré a la Primavera,
para tenerla en casa,
como una bailarina.

(El viento alterará sus horarios.
Travesías inseguras de las nubes.)
Y por la carretera del Futuro, arrojaré al Invierno,
para tener la sorpresa de encontrarlo después,
mezclado con el Verano.

En el tapete verde del espacio,
apostaré a los días,
que rodarán como los dados.

Jugaré con los meses y los años.

Photo by Heather Gill on Unsplash