Irony What brought mankind to Its knees wasn't a nuclear Bomb, or a movie villain Or even an army But something You can't see or Feel Or even fight Man's own creation Turned on him To destroy himself Tommorow we wake up Hoping the movie will be Over..Read more "Erren Geraud Kelly – Irony"
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Robert Allen Beckvall – a jazz poem
shh sh shhhh crack, “hhmmmm” he hums while he waltzes shh shhh shhhh shhhhhhh shh crack he waltzes shhh sh shhhhh shh crack, pop oh two at a time I watched the man in the white suit, night after night, dance the soft shoe, then tap dance on the cockroaches, under the light by the pawn shop sh shhh shhhh sh, crack “hhhmmmmmm” He seems so happy.Read more "Robert Allen Beckvall – a jazz poem"
THE EDITORS OF CACTI FUR BRING YOU: FLORIDA MAN by MICKEY J. CORRIGAN
AVAILABLE NOW: FLORIDA MAN by Mickey J. Corrigan. You know how it’s funny and abhorrent because it’s true? You know how you laugh until you cry by stuffing cocked pistols between your eyeballs and lids?
FLORIDA MAN ~ Mickey J. Corrigan ~ $5.00
This chapbook contains 17 poems and 4 drawings
Dimensions: 3 3/8ths inches by 5 inches
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CHRISTOPHER BARNES – 5 POEMS
The Dance …lilac Nehru jacket, ploughman’s amble, gadabout eye-flicker - you doorstep… * …pare sweet breads into morsels, deform, hand out. Tump with cauliflower… * …retreats into a dive, yells. “Something titanic, icy, flush and gin.” The barman… * …we’d never waltz on shingle, ripple-drenched feet, as vinyl purred… Horizontal Vision …barrows to-and-froed. Hagglers impressed, lurking. I corner nosegay oils, you earmark… * …tilt steamer on disengaged hob 10-15 minutes. Baste… * …check-up. Paramedic eurekas - something woefully awry – deduces tip-off… * …metro expired at Wallsend, bus green-lighted an hour to cloud-gather, you’d never essentially… Earth …peachy-keen upbeat guitar seesawed your hips. Taffrail clover, dribble… * …rattle all footloose. Chip walnuts. Grease loaf tin… * …ventured into Bronx Flea Market, bisected dummy cornered into a pin-stripe… * …lick-and-promise miasma Overhauled drained instincts. Only traffic faded… Fixations …in rag-order knee-highs yodelled, single-filing my alley. No cur whined… * …kibble, tooling rutty blade of mincer. Dissolve ½ oz… * …Pegasus’ foals vamoosed, so the knight… * …we quick-timed hours. An invisible… Not Quite June …gabby-guts rooks air-cleared your nickname. Evening shade diffracted urgency… * …groundwork panade. Turn out as for béchamel, stargaze an hour… * …wolfed my quill.” “What shall I do?” “Take advantage of a crayon…” * …rule-breaking headaches spared, though we blethered all…Read more "CHRISTOPHER BARNES – 5 POEMS"
JON HUERTA and TIM STALEY -POETRY INSTRUCTION BATTLE – HOW TO WRITE ABOUT A SPECIFIC PERSON
POET STALEY’S TOP 10 RULES FOR WRITING ABOUT A SPECIFIC PERSON
1
allow yourself to acknowledge that you care about someone
then sweep that someone out of your mind
and onto the pages of your journal
2
dump the dust pan of that person
as fearlessly, honestly and quickly as you can
3
surround that person with the concrete nouns
that person surrounds themselves with
then deliberately inject action verbs
or slip them in when no one’s looking
4
keep writing everything you can about that person
not worrying about the direction your writing is going,
try rhyming about that person,
try listing things about that person,
try moving that person around in time,
try writing from that person’s point of view
5
describe the person as though you’re describing the details of a photo
6
let your journal pages marinate overnight in the refrigerator or at room temp
7
cut away all the lame stuff
cut away all the stuff that doesn’t deeply satisfy your aesthetic
cut away the stuff you put in there just for the teacher
cut away anything you’ve heard or read before
8
replace boring verbs with better ones
cut away all the fake words
sprinkle in literary devices until a poem appears
(if no poem appears repeat steps 1-5)
9
break your lines. make it look like a poem. not a paragraph.
10
proofread and read out loud and tweak and fix and submit
~~~
Huerta’s rules about writing about people you know and people you don’t
1. Conversations about a past event will entice the reader to forge ahead.
2. Objects around the poems location bring realism to your story and will build a bond between you and the reader. Common household products and animals, for instance, are worthy objects. Politics and trauma are questionable.
3. Never write about your feelings or love loss. You’re better than this and no one cares.
4. If writer's block is something you are suffering from, try your hardest to live in the present with an unapologetic eye for your surroundings. Read the room, write it down. Repeat.
5. Creating a mad lib style game will force your imagination. Pick up the daily paper and create a story using the police blotter and your comrades.
6. Always mix imagination with reality. Because the best shit happens when the fresh river meets the salty sea. Where the tears from your fears clash with consciousness to create a story worthy of telling again and most importantly for someone else to repeat it.
JOHN DOYLE – KENTUCKY FRIED SON OF A BITCH
Kentucky Fried Son of a Bitch War - it's good for something, Edwin, like keeping munitions factories steadily employed rather than earnings gone on horses, booze, ass-grooves impressed so deep on bar-stools archaeologists in 500,000 years might consider them completely different species - anonymous maximus; War gave us Rupert Brooke, Siegfried Sasoon, Richard Whidmark, Florence Nightingale, dogs who carry honorary ranks Walt Disney make wholly distorted films about, but hey - it's all good, Edwin. Sometimes I feel like a Kentucky Fried Son of a Bitch having these conversations over and over. How Dresden and Coventry united us as a global community, yin and yang like two sages sitting beside me, neither satisfied at how far I will take them, before the fluttering wings of waitresses twist on the stench of spilled draught and bathroom odours, reminding me of wars still raging. Yeah, he's a Kentucky fried son of a bitch they say, passing elbows elbows nudge me like shells pounding on Dresden and Coventry. The thrill of it all.Read more "JOHN DOYLE – KENTUCKY FRIED SON OF A BITCH"
RICKY WINTERS – 3 POEMS
“ghost” my disguise is my only friend but at times it stabs me in the back too “caraphernelia” this portrait of beauty still remains upon my eyes the soft colors that dance around my sorrow and mock the ache in my chest the blinding lights of the heart you have broken and carved out have dimmed their glow to an absolute fog they too have fallen into the pits of regret and anguish just as I “damien” his eyes were clouds and the rain never stoppedRead more "RICKY WINTERS – 3 POEMS"
MARK ANTHONY PEARCE – 2 POEMS
SEATON As we walk across Seaton Beach My Grandfather Asks me of my prospects ‘I’m 75’ He said ‘Soon I’ll be fucking dead’ He seems to think life will work out for me But for a brief moment We are lost Eventually we find my mother And grumpy Grandma Before eating fish and chips My eyes looking up towards the sun Bristol, August 2006 GULAG Where he worked He lived And did not like To be reminded That he did He was always reliable But found others far from it He cursed them Under his breath As the days rolled by With cigarettes and coffee To try and ease the strain Sometimes it rained Sometimes it was windy And jobs would not be done He sat in his chair Made phone calls Annoyed Often cynical He would nonetheless Face his humiliation With a rare bravery One day One of his sons Wrote on a piece of paper ‘GULAG’ And stuck it on the wall Of his office He snarled At his sons sense of humour Because by Christ It felt like one Colchester, April 2007 Mark Anthony Pearce lives and works as a Receptionist in Bristol, England. His poetry has been published in University of Essex Poetry Journal, BS Poetry Magazine and online, Inefável, Coronaverses, Winamop, Horror Sleaze Trash, Duane’s PoeTree & Piker Press. Mark’s writing has also featured in ‘Anne Bean: Self Etc’ (Live Art Development Agency and Intellect Books, Autumn 2018)Read more "MARK ANTHONY PEARCE – 2 POEMS"
Joey Nicoletti – To Razor Shines
To Razor Shines Dear Mr. Shines: Razor, do I have to live a life others want for me, just because they’ve chosen it for themselves? When I look at your baseball card, I see the back yard of the house I grew up in, where hubcaps bloomed beside black-eyed-Susans. I see myself sitting at a round, burgundy spray-painted wooden table, slurping a glass of iced tea as I read and memorize the names of ballplayers and the various cities and towns they hail from. For instance, Razor is your middle name. Durham, North Carolina, intrigued me: it was somewhere and something different from what I knew; hundreds of miles away from the constant yelling, screaming, kicking, and punching; from the rubber boots, pumps, and knives the adults in my family hurled at each other as well as me. Your name; your career in The Show; your time as a Montreal Expo became a hope that I could make a different reality for myself; that I could find my own way to be present in the moment without knowing precisely how things would work out. And I am grateful to have this card, this marvelous window, where I can still see and hear some chickadees, perched on a clothesline; their gold chatter cracking a concrete patio.
~
Joey Nicoletti is the author of four books and four chapbooks, most recently Boombox Serenade (BlazeVOX, 2019) and Counterfeit Moon (NightBallet Press, 2016). Of course we are partial to his collection THUNDERSNOW because we published it.
Read more "Joey Nicoletti – To Razor Shines"Quincy Staley – November 3
good morning.
I hope it is, at least.
as it feels like the world is looking at the sky,
one foot hovering over the threshold of their bomb shelter.
and suddenly I’m caught between feeling
extremist for calling it a bomb, and
guilty because I know others are actually being bombed, and
suffocated by the idea that –
if I just repost one more graphic
if I can just memorize the right data
if I have “the hard conversations”
– maybe I can fix it.
good morning.
maybe it can be, if we let it.
the sun is so bright this morning
(that’s not a metaphor, it literally made me squint)
and yes, it’s a sun that is piercing our ozone
and giving weight to the smog we create
but it’s shining.
and drawing the shades tight,
tugging on the top of our twitter feed like a toddler at a hem
trying to get what they want,
will not change that.
we have tried to change so much.
and we have.
as companies proclaim “BLM” across the street from the house of a man
who fights back with “all lives matter”
we can see change.
as grandparents and uncles and siblings and friends soften to new ideas of justice
and switch the sign in their yard
we can see change.
as metal straws clang in reusable bottles
and wedding cake is smushed by a man into his husband’s mouth
and The Daily is a suggested podcast
even for people who “don’t get political”
we can see change.
and finally, as the number of people voting this year soars past 2016’s record, yes
we can see change.
so let’s rest.
just for a day.
battering our own mental health as some sort of penance
won’t change the outcome.
and the outcome won’t necessarily
change the fight.
so let’s allow ourselves a moment
to just be.
be kind to ourselves, to our neighbors
to those who feel unsafe, to those who may have gotten too comfortable.
give yourself and others grace,
if just for today.
we’ve posted and protested
we’ve pleaded and prayed
we’ve scrolled (and scrolled and scrolled)
we’ve lost friends and learned facts,
each point of data chosen meticulously
to help others understand.
politics have become deeply personal
and our emotions are somehow partisan
so today, on this most political day
let’s protect those emotions.
keep them safe, snuggled up away from what’s been weighing on them for
weeks, months, years.
for one day
one good morning.
~
Find Quincy here
Read more "Quincy Staley – November 3"
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