writers

POETRY: POST-SECONDARY – LUKE NORMSY

Post-Secondary

mom has 2 Masters’ degrees and a Ph.D. and her
husband does too

they are alumni of the same university as me

and when i was there as a student she said

“Steven and I put $5 bills in our doctoral
theses at the university library so we’ll know
if anyone’s read them!”
so
i went to the library, found their
theses, and took
the fivers
a few weeks later she was on campus again
she was all smiles
“Somebody read my thesis!” she squealed,
“and Steven’s, too! We put another $5 in them!”
so
i went to the library, found their
theses, and took
the fivers
it worked 2 more times before they switched to $1 bills
i took those, too
they were satisfied that their scholarly
efforts were appreciated
i had money for drugs
everyone was happy
 
 
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REVIEW: LOST ON MY OWN STREET – TIM STALEY

Review of Lost on My Own Street by Tim Staley (Pski’s Porch, 2016)

Review by Kyle Flak

The exciting thing about small press poetry is that anything is possible.  There are no strict rules.  The artist is completely free to do as he or she likes without worrying about what the big mainstream institutions will think.

Tim Staley has for years been the editor of Grandma Moses Press in Las Cruces, New Mexico.  For five dollars, a customer can receive by mail a tiny delightful chapbook of unique and wild poetry accompanied by weird and wonderful drawings by the editor.  The chapbooks, of course, never hit the New York Times bestseller list or get the attention of major superstars, but they always contain good honest poetry–poetry written by people who honestly love poetry for its own sake.

Now Tim Staley has his own full length collection of poems out from an equally exciting small press publisher, Pski’s Porch.  As someone who loves all aspects of books, I will say that Lost on My Own Street by Tim Staley is a beautiful book in every way.

First of all, the cover art was done by the author himself and it is a whimsical sea blue dream of a cover, clearly illustrating the true joy of being a small press poet.  The image is of a jolly dandy of a man strolling down the street with a marvelous cloud of daydreams floating above his head.

Of course this book reminds me of the first edition of Leaves of Grass, a volume of poems that Walt Whitman self published and aggressively self promoted all because he believed in the dream, the dream of saying what he really needed to say, the dream of sharing his most important messages to the world.  It seems that no matter what anyone personally thinks of Walt Whitman, he will always be The Original Small Press Poet.

Staley’s poems are sincere, funny, friendly, unique, and diverse.  He does not stick to a single formula, scheme, or gimmick.  He writes what he wants to write.  He has no ulterior motives.  He is not thinking about what the authorities will say about him.  He is someone I am happy to place on my list of New Walt Whitmans to Definitely Pay Attention to Who Boldly Go Wherever They Want to Go.

In a poem called “The Waiting Game” Staley writes, “Vikings never ask are we there yet, / they just scan the horizon, armored hips against the railing.”  I think that sums up his poetry and the joy of being a small press poet pretty well.  In the world of small press poetry, one writes purely for the joy of writing without asking for approval or money or fame.  One writes for the thrill of it, the exploration of it, the pure adventure of it.

It is in this spirit that I highly recommend Lost on My Own Street by Tim Staley.  It reminds us all of what’s truly important–that original “carpe diem” thrill of just reading and writing poems for the fun of it.

–

Kyle Flak’s debut poetry collection I’M SORRY FOR EVERYTHING IN THE WHOLE ENTIRE UNIVERSE is forthcoming from Gold Wake Press.

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POETRY: ROOTED – LUCAS HERNDON

Rooted

we planted flowers
we planted flowers in the garden bed
they’re already coming up
too late for spring,
just in time to be wilted by summer heat
when we planted flowers it all seemed so real
like seeing them grow was inevitable
and now,
well
I’m here
and they’re growing
and I can’t figure out why you’re not
you’re like the bees
you buzz in and out
I feel like I need you
or I’ll wither
but maybe you’ve already
done for me what I could not do for myself
and now I must bloom
and die back again
and take this energy and store it up
because i’m using too much
chasing you around
stuck rooted here
turning toward the sun and asking
where’s that bee?
and he won’t answer me back
he just shines on,
slowly creeping west to avoid the answer
great, more avoidance
more pain
if only someone would come and snap me up
put me in a bouquet
where I could shine as part of a whole
and then wilt
having brought joy to someone else temporarily
but I remain
rooted

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POETRY: Roberta Pantal Rhodes – India

India

1

 

Seventeen zillion, twelve

gazillion, one

trillion, sixteen

billion, three

hundred thousand?

 

No one knows

for sure

how many people

Inhabit India.

 

Scared cows

wander into

traffic.  All movement

halts.

 

2.

The Bengal tiger’s

stripes blend in

with tree branches.

 

Women peek

from behind veils.

 

Pink blossoms line

the path,

and float in a

nearby fountain.

 

A dead dog drifts down the Ganges.

 

Pink, yellow, orange, crimson,

rose, purple, violet, gold,

magenta, scarlet saris dot

the landscape.

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POETRY: MOONLIGHTING – STEPHEN MEAD

Moonlighting

The graveyard shift has a solitary pace,
a long distance run for some thoroughbred
putting itself out there.
How I prefer these cloaked night owl
passages, the clock idle, and the mind
freely roaming, if keen with intention.
This babysitter concentrates.
A house watchman sprouting

hooves, the couch now a brook and,
nearby, nylon screens commanding some
mistral. I lie here opening. It’s
an intricate job. Across

the street, by moonlight, a machine is
devouring lilacs for a parking lot.
Seems rather dumb, the large merciless
rototiller lapping up sweet bunches…

Severity bleeds mute, says it’s humane.
I turn, trot on, become

a notebook momentarily. The flanks,
bulging images, succumb to the dignity
which language unbridles.
By sunrise, a Benzedrine mare,
the words will reclaim themselves

as the barn beds me down.

 

–

Check out Stephen’s website.

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POETRY: SEDONA CHAPEL – GARY EVERY

Sedona Chapel

The beautiful church is perched high atop a red rock cliff
gazing across an open valley
so that people in prayer
can gaze upon nature and reflect.
Of course, it was designed long before
subdivisions and miniature Mcmansions
filled the valley floor below.

I kneel in the chapel pews
while the people come and go
some of them speaking of Michealangelo
but most mentioning their favorite television shows.
I find it hard to pray
or deeply contemplate
as another tour bus unloads
and the tiny private chapel
becomes packed.

So I rise and go to the gift shop
which is unbelievably crowded
as if this center of commerce
is where the real worship takes place.
On a spinning metal rack
little action figures of the saints
are for sale.
There is St. George battling dragons,
St. Francis speaking to the birds,
and St. Patrick all dressed in green
like a comic book super hero.
There are lots of action figures of all the saints
except for Saint Peregrine,
whom I have never heard of before
but his shelf is all empty
except for one tiny, lonely doll
and as I examine it,
the description says,
“Patron saint of cancer patients.”
I stare at the empty shelf,
go back upstairs to the chapel and pray.

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POETRY: Richard King Perkins II – Stopover in Jasper

Stopover in Jasper

During the bus trip, we sit next to each other,
growing further apart with each mile.
At the stopover in Jasper, we order food,
hoping it will bring more than an easement of hunger.
I consider the reanimation of once-living dust,
wondering if thoughts can be annulled.

Like worn ridges on a tire, we’re left with separate lives
and a nakedness that defines gender.
Driving past wind-forged cliffs at the speed of god,
we resist the folding of souls
and a quietness in which nothing is learned—
though both of us are listening; trying so desperately to hear.

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POETRY: HOLLYWOOD MEN – ROBIN WYATT DUNN

Hollywood Men

On the balustrade of Sunset here we come,
the morning hours,
flush with piety and pity,
Hollywood men.

Born somewhere else
and born here again,
Hollywood men.

Light cuts our skulls open for surgery,
with heavy anesthetic,
in the doorways of WGA,
kissing our lips with a cool whore’s regard,
ushering us into our seats for the movie.

The director argues with the other director
and the woman holds the boom like Achilles his spear,
waiting for the painter to make his sketch.

Hollywood men,
we’re Holywood men,
cut from ash,
made new,
born bolder,
hotter,
naked,
soldiers in a war we can never understand.

We’re hollywood men.
I made the world collapse over a woman’s face,
and then she cursed me with France,
all before the cops showed up,
And I ratted out the second producer,
And the peasants revolted.

I fed them water.

Knelt at graves on the studio lot,
which was only an old nuthouse,
collapsing into ghosts and dust.

We’re Hollywood men.
Shamans.
Showmen.
Hollywood men.

holly, burn my cheek with the scar of these months,
I’ve killed all your gods but you won’t kill me,
you made me a god,
like Pan his boy,
and I dance for you still,
my voice stretched over the sky in concertina wire,
screaming with joy, and announcing the kings.

We shall not see them.
They are kept away.
I have a picture of one of them but it would burn out your eyes.
We keep their names inside our air conditioned brains,
under our silver reflective eyes,
naming. We’re naming.
or some of us are,
Jews with names,
ushering in the world.

We’re Hollywood men. Got new names and new faces.
I grew a beard.
My grandfather shaved his.
Cut from glass to catch the light.

We’re Hollywood men.
Waiting in line.
Watching the faces.
Listening.
Eavesdropping.
Ordering whiskey with a glamorous flourish,
and a look over the shoulder,
asking for the cigarette tray,
in David Lynch’s seat,
under the tree,
watching the tables,
plotting revenge.

We’re Hollywood men.
We still see the old gods.
They know us too.

Marching at parade.
with our armory.

Decamp for a week,
Learn the new names,
Negotiate. Like a leper for bread.
How much bread for this divorce?
Your name, your sweater, can I get it in red?
What are you reading?
Have you seen the sky? So dark, over my face,
I think I might be in love.
Be careful, that’s dangerous,
We know who’s in love with Hollywood men.

It’s grounds for divorce.
Bullets and fists.
The rook sleeping under the asphalted king
growing a tree for the bum to sleep on.

Who’s in love with a Hollywood man?
Fighting fierce, shaved down to a husk,
Shoulders and baritone musk and the roach clipped to his ear,
listening for voices that are not there,
pigeons flying around his face,
Underneath the shadow of Larry Flynt,
and the lawyers.

Who’s in love with a Hollywood man?
is it you?
Tucked far away over the U-store-it Tower?
We’re Hollywood men.
Murdering innocence, which is only to say,
making you less harmless.
with our pharmakon show,
of snakes and planes,
bad motherfuckers and whorish wives,
the aspirants,
like doves, around the hierophant’s altar, dipping in a ladle for the
blood . . .

We’re Holywood men.
No god can scare me.
for I am one.
Powerless, unafraid, without a name or a face.
Sergeant. Mexican. Stern and stalwart.
Hunted and alone,
catcalled,
Wretched,
Reader of books in the most beautiful alleys you have ever seen.

Who’s in love with a Hollywood man?
It’s grounds for divorce.
A suspended sentence!
A long night.
By the freeway.

But Hollywood, that’s something else.
Hollywood men keep out of Hollywood,
as knights from their princesses.
Four hundred meters from kerchief to lips
polishing our smart phones with the cusp of our sleeves.

Announcing the regulars.
Tall, shadowed, and still with some humor.
Violent and relaxed,
our car a musical device, with only one chord,
like a koan,
samsara-ing into the night,
with our swords.

Cutting through shelters singing ringtones,
clouding the subways with pot, jersualems without number,
we can duplicate them,
we can replicate them,
in cgi,
and in the poem of blind mexican nursemaids,
oublietta milkshades,
we bring the holy city with us,
the tabernacle is contractually obligated
for a period of five years
to lay down his name for the boundary line
lay down your life for the boundary line,
where names meet faces,
and old jews become young river gods,
and harem girls sing pop music,
through ice cream colored t shirts,
outside the one bookstore still remaining.

Who’s in love with a hollywood man
with his ancient face
and his fading memory
with his hands
without garments
without traces
heroic
and nameless
and unafraid
with no plans
no family
no eyes.

rock and roll sunsets on arrakis,
or is it venice,
with some saxophone,
and heroin,
or maybe just frisbee and weed,
who’s in love with him?

waiting for the volleyball to come back
waiting for the right decade to arrive
waiting for the right language to express the feeling
born on the asphalt
next to the freeway
standing under the 7-11
with one cup of bad coffee
and the sunscreen explodes in your hand,
from the pressure of the city,
making a noise like a girl sobbing,
from her audition,
wearing her witch’s hat.

we’re hollywood men,
deadly perfect.
unknowable.
delirious.
solemn.
righteous.
musical.
Mandated to serve
the king and his country
for eternity
one billion years.
one trillion years.
Okay, half a trillion years.
with a side of yams
and meringue.
Lopsided.
and rambunctious.
Heroic.
These heroes,
shadowed from sand,
are dead,
we’re dead men.

We’re dead men.

we come here to die.

This beautiful graveyard.
has anyone ever seen a more beautiful graveyard?

 

–

This poem was first performed at Roar Shack in Los Angeles, May 15 2016.

–

Check out Robin’s website. 

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