April 27, 2005
nor would she shepherd all the sitting still
missing chore
of steps ad hoc
hardens to see-
through stone.
as if magnification
slapped open
the inherently
large image.
if iambic at least
upward in motion
sequenced to show
more and more
the lattice
of seizure rhythms
fleshing out
the self as if by rote
sheila e. murphy
***
I bought a musical pedometer.
Now I'm a wandering minstrel,
striking dulcimer tunes, sweet
with each beat of earthbound drum.
Flat-footed rhapsodic, these tiny
crescendoes peel like Mozart's laughter.
Ann White
***
overheard snap / crossing the campus
But seriously though
I know I deserved
the mark I got but
I know what
my parents are
going to say out
all night making
out with the boys But
I really need
that psychology mark and
shit that exam
really sucked
Wednesday April 27 2005
Douglas Barbour
***
He is peering into the camera in his own inane smile; his shoulders clenched
towards the spine, and hunched forwards. The head is tilted towards the film
plane, signalling humility.
It appears that he has been speaking. The others beam at him.
It is clear that they are pleased, but not that they have been listening.
One seems to have woken up as the film was exposed.
There is no single crowd. They are together as a herd of cattle is.
Lawrence Upton
***
hey
i just felt a breath
air coming in
going out
hint of cloves
cardamon
cool around the edge
taking form
alive
remembering
for an instant
gone
Peter Ciccariello
providence, ri, 11:40 am
***
Searchg for words?
No, the words come unasked for
but gratefuly received.
What is the word?
Does it have meaning?
Is the sound the allure,
the syllables that make the tongue flap?
Are they the true meaning?
Sound is noise.
Syllables are luring.
The total word a mystery.
Sometimes a misdemeanor.
Harriet Zinnes
***
huddled in the warmth of
a modern glass&brick unit
by the postcard beach
seven women and two men
in a writing club
talk relationships.
sands run over footprints,
dunes cover indents of
flesh pressed on flesh -
the moon is outshone
by streetlights. waves
break along the shore.
at the doorway
the group zips up
and drives individually
to various addresses.
next month's theme -
'meeting on a train'.
Andrew Burke
***
A Canto of Mutabilitie
Through the headphones Bryn Terfel,
Wagner's condemned Holländer
Despair will the cycle be unbroken
he cannot know sacrifice will free him
his belief lost but not his dirty hope
misery passes and so may joy
both crushed underfoot fallen weeds
the same fate as fallen blossoms
mutabilitie lasts change the only surety
perhaps a name for what we believe
fortune turn thy wheel already
Kenneth Wolman
***
blossoms falling
popcorn on green carpet
snow's smell lingering
Deborah Humphreys
Newark, NJ 10 am
***
while waiting for
the scool bus --just now--
my neighbor, John
tells me one of his
son's classmates
collapsed and died
last night at soccer
practice and
then walking back
to my house
all that goes
through my head
is that while we
last (and after we
are gone) we last,
we last through
our luck and
lack of luck,
through our life's
crummy times--
the ones sometimes
we are stuck with--
we last with friends,
with others and
we last alongside
the dead and with
all the living left,
of all we do, see,
think until we
last no more
Gerald Schwartz
West Irondequoit, New York, United States
8:20 AM
***
Late Massage
skin memories
do not resist
aversions
among their oil
and flowers
if she never believed
you how could
she understand
what she feared
the touch causes pain
it can in textbooks
and fusty discourse
be explained
this on that
the tightness
of the world
and you how
could you have
preferred other
how stuck
are hands
this was nothing
about being held
they roll you
up to night
careless
winnowing
the season sighs
outside
you never think
of her sister
only she
of quiz and hurt
that's other made
don't explain
autumn slows
the dark
and gone
Jill Jones, St Leonards, 9.00pm, 27 April 2005
***
The Inaugural Lecture From Hell
The topic is: Humour in Eighteenth Century Verse Epistles.
My ex-wife will be turning up with the ex-wife of the lecturer.
My children were apparently invited, but neither bothered to tell me (and
neither are going).
A pre-lecture private social seems to be comprised of previous and current
Professors with distinctly Left political views but an equally Right
academic stance.
(But not the lecturer himself.)
Odd, that.
Be interesting to see how the Mad Graduate Students play it -- boo(m) or
boycott?
Fun, whatever, and it will at least get me out the house.
Robin Hamilton / Loughborough / 30 mns after noon
***
O sleek and slender greyhound
slouching your elegant slouch
politely at the leash
you with your delicate muzzle
your cyclamen-bud head
are you the dog that barks to wake the sunrise
are you the dog that howls at the heels of night
with your delicate long muzzle
your cyclamen-bud head
O sleek and slender greyhound
are you the dog that pees against my gatepost
are you the dog that craps upon the pavement
slouching your elegant slouch
politely at the leash
stand still I beg you
let me tie up your front end
approach the other with a cork
joanna boulter
11.15 am 27 April
Darlington UK
***
SITE SECRETARIES
as one
of the
few here
who subscribes
to The Allotment
and Leisure Gardener
-Journal of the
National Society
of Allotment
and Leisure Gardeners
I would
like to quote
perhaps
a found poem
in the current issue
page thirteen
bottom of the page
right hand side
on Management of Sites
Society Funding
and Membership
'Site Secretaries
should be able
to read and write'
pmcmanus 8am
Raynespaarkuk
***
Before My Time: Old Snaps
A rare visit to New Zealand gets me wondering
about my father, dead forty years.
My sister in Auckland likes to say:
teachersı children are like the shoes
of cobblersı children, neglected.
But he planted trees.
Soon Iım driving south into wild
North Taranaki, keen to check Awakino,
the aging trees in the school grounds.
The rain-forest mountains part in a river valley
(thereıs the coast), and I overshoot the turn-off.
Does Awakino still exist apart from that forlorn pub,
and a handmade sign dunniesı?
Next stop down the coast is Mokau,
signs of prosperity, cafés (whitebait fritters),
and an old shop now the Tainui Historical Museum.
I step in, warming to the clutter of rusty relics,
booklets on bygone crafts and trades,
the chatting volunteer staff, and a man at a computer.
I say how I missed my Awakino errand at the school.
Name? Richards. In a flash he brings up on the screen
my lost Dad, and mother too. Seven years before my time.
The slim young couple, closer than I remember seeing them.
I seem to have her skinny ankles (good on a woman).
Another: Dad on horseback! Never since then, surely.
The school, with its young trees. The school with older trees.
Just images, I donıt know him better,
but the years between are briefly bridged.
He was young, he aged, I lost him scarcely known.
The snaps are on file. I pay and know
theyıre emailed to me in Melbourne.
Where now I sit (older than he ever was),
still not grieving, searching for words.
11am, Wednesday 27 April 2005
Max Richards,
North Balwyn Vic
***
Objects hold residual.
Objects hold what is residual.
What is residual?
This envelope will be gone.
Limited postage gets one only so far.
Death the elimination of oasis.
A flexible straw the terminal feeding tube.
"His vital signs are all present."
The see-saw between present and oblivion.
To watch closely. Breath by breath.
Father and son. Blind, Homer caught it so well.
The weave. The unweave. Penelope in tatters.
What knows does not know.
The extended shadow.
White, blazing, the gift of Rhododendrons.
Salute.
Stephen Vincent
Alison Croggon
Blog: http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
Editor, Masthead: http://masthead.net.au
Home page: http://alisoncroggon.com
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