THE MONTUCKY REVIEW

A.g. SYNCLAIR REVIEWS "WATCHING IT BURN", A NEW BOOK OF POETRY BY MIKE MERAZ

2012-03-07T09:11:00.002-08:00

Writing poetry, it would seem, is one of those things that every living, breathing, American thinks they can do, and do well. In reality, most cannot. While that statement is not intended to sound pompous or pretentious, it likely will be taken that way by some, and I am fully prepared to accept that. As the editor and publisher of a popular and successful literary review, I am privileged to read some very good work written by those who actually can and do capture the nuances of life in those small paragraphs or stanzas that we call poetry. One such individual is Los Angeles poet Mike Meraz. In his new book, Watching It Burn (Dog On A Chain Press) Mr. Meraz takes the reader on a journey through life’s hits and misses, navigating effortlessly through forty-one short, punchy, poems that should resonate deeply with even the most hardened reader among us.

In The Great Poets, Mr. Meraz channels Bukowski through a metaphor-free ode to hard working writers and the often demeaning submission process. On Viewing a Painting by Jackson Pollock accomplishes the rare feat of being both sympathetic to its subject matter, and free of the sort of trite, fluffy, language that is too often used to illustrate admiration. In fact, Meraz goes one step further here in describing Pollock’s art as effortless, while he himself effortlessly documents a poetic thank you to an artist and his work. This kind of successful juxtaposition is often missing in the work of less accomplished poets. Raw at 63 veers into some familiar territory, and any fan of the beats will surely appreciate straight ahead urban poetry, tempered with a tip of the hat to Ray Heinrich. Street-wise, haggard and damaged folk inhabit Meraz’s world yet, these broken souls become sympathetic creatures, rather than objects of scorn and revulsion, thanks to the author and his deft pen. One of the strongest pieces in this collection, The Life of a Writer, is quite atmospheric in both tone and temperament, weaving in and out of almost allegorical colorations to end as a simple, yet powerful metaphor.

Watching It Burn is a fine collection of contemporary writing that can stand proudly alongside anything produced by the small presses in our modern age. Anyone who appreciates the often overlooked and under-appreciated art form called poetry should check out Mike Meraz’s work for a gracious sampling of what modern day poetry can offer.

http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/watching-it-burn/18825886

A.g. Synclair
Editor/Publisher
The Montucky Review
6 March, 2012

2012-03-06T13:13:00.000-08:00

You descend like rain
on fleece and I am
a second hand circling
nights around your
face. Bowed in sleep
you form in clusters
past the window ledge
and burrowing deeper in
the sheets set fires.

About Charles Bane, Jr.
Charles Bane, Jr's work has appeared previously in The Montucky Review, and other print and online journals. His second book of poetry, New Poems By Charles Bane, Jr. will be published by Curbside Splendor in March, 2012.

HER MEASUREMENTS

2012-03-01T09:17:00.000-08:00

It’s been raining indoors for days.
There’s a depression
beside her in the bed.

Raw fires once merged there.

Cold, she keeps her back turned now.
Sometimes she spins and looks—

hoping to find a body of water
to name after him.

About William Crawford:
William Crawford is the author of Fire in the Marrow. He has been published in numerous journals and anthologies. William lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and is an animal rights activist.

http://www.neopoiesispress.com/12401/46923.html

THINGS THAT GO DOWN

2012-02-29T10:23:00.000-08:00

falling off
feels like flying
until you realize
gravity is a constant event
it’s not that i mind
the downward spirals
it’s the ground rushing up
that terrifies me

About Melissa Fletcher:
Melissa Fletcher has appeared in Newsweek, Indigo Rising, Pregnant Moon Review, X is for Xylophone and others. She was raised with polite Midwest sensibilities but has lived all over the place just because. Although currently residing and teaching in the Twin Cities, she steadfastly remains a Wisconsin Badger football fan.

SKETCHES

2012-02-28T14:14:00.001-08:00

her comparisons were too intriguing
a deafening train, pillaging
along dark iron tracks
nearing the indistinguishable edge

with disdain, she said it must be her job
to hurl herself in front of it
and she often did

a sputtering plane nearing
impact with a mountain range
of teeth looming below a false
coverlet of vapor down

her voice could almost be
that of stern reason, even
with the wry lift of her lips

that silken night when logic
dodged a bullet and lay quietly, panting
on the monochromatic wool rug

mosquitoes hummed along
and time filtered though her irises
of a picture you hadn’t seen, with
the words you hadn’t written

© 2.22.12 heather brager

About Heather Brager:
Heather is a professional multi-tasker, mother and life-long procrastinator. She collaborates and co-habitates with writer A.g. Synclair in SW Montana, and her poetry and drawings can be found in a variety of online and print publications.

TWO PIECES BY STEPHEN CARATZAS

2012-02-24T12:41:00.000-08:00

THE ASKING PRICE

The wind is crueler
In these climes
Than in most other
Places

A hand over your
Heart
Tells me everything
About the weather

Hearing the floorboards
Creak
Is a sign of life
And of loss

When I have courage
I more easily see
The possibilities in
Love

LIKE YOU’LL NEVER LET ME GO

After all these years
Finally hearing
John Denver’s version of
Leaving on a Jet Plane
Made me cry
And there’s really nothing
To be done about it.

About Stephen Caratzas:
Stephen Caratzas is the author of It Will Be A Train (2004), The Incredulity Tour (2005) and Past Present Suture (Drifting Man Press, 2011). His poetry has appeared in Terra Incognita, the tiny, Maintenant 5, Tattoosday, Lyre Lyre and other publications. When not writing he plays guitar in the lo-fi experimental band Gert Fröbe. He lives in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York.

2012-02-19T15:25:00.000-08:00

the mistrals sweep
like ghosts
through France
to warm blue seas
haunting Corsica

eyes of Ciste à fleurs
gape wide
and watch his apparition
fade to Summer

About Michael Ashley:
Michael Ashley is a 30 year old from the county of West Yorkshire in the United Kingdom. Most of the time he is either working the 9 ‘til 5 or walking his dogs, but in between this [and the rest of the menial tasks that come along with life] he writes a little poetry. You can get more of his stuff at www.michaelashleypoetry.wordpress.com

SAVE SWEETNESS

2012-02-18T08:09:00.000-08:00

Gunmetal gray, rain-pocked
lake surface and sweaters
with worn elbows, the prism
of his glasses, gray-streaked
black hair, morning-damp, obscuring
sharp and even teeth. It’s chilling,
this gunmetal risk, hard-edged,
bone-aching. I crave fire, orange.
Willing to tread cold. Wetter than rain.

About Jessamyn Smyth:
Jessamyn Johnston Smyth’s writing has appeared in American Letters and Commentary, Nth Position, Abalone Moon, Qarrtsiluni, Wingbeats: Exercises and Practice in Poetry, and many other journals and anthologies. She won listing in Best American Short Stories/100 Distinguished Stories of 2005, and has received a Pushcart Prize nomination. Her dog, Gilgamesh, is epic.

FOUR FEET

2012-02-14T13:14:00.000-08:00

She drowned in the shallow end
on her knees at the very bottom
her red swimsuit a shimmering
smear of blood from where I stood
her eyes glued to white tile and
mildew, shoulders shaking as she
tried her hardest to glean oxygen
from the chlorinated water.

About Nazifa Islam:
Nazifa Islam grew up in Novi, Michigan. She has been published by Anomalous Press, Phantom Kangaroo, Flashquake and From the Depths among other publications. She regularly updates her blog Thoughts Interjected and is currently living in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

WRONG-OF-WAY

2012-02-14T06:49:00.000-08:00

The roots
of the
growing
trees
pushed up
the
sidewalk.
The
marriage
of the two
was short-
sighted.
What
seemed
like a
good, young
couple
didn't
age well
for
passersby.

About Gregory Liffick:
Gregory Liffick has had over fifty poems published in a variety of print and online journals and has had two chapbooks published. He is also an artist and a special education teacher.

THE MOON

2012-02-12T04:23:00.000-08:00

Our eyes met from across the street.
It was an empty moment, a missed opportunity.

The moon sang her old lady blues
and our footsteps kicked off brick walls like bells.

The wind blew abandoned papers
down the sidewalk.

We met in the middle and looked at the moon.

The dim shine reflected from the glass
and played 7 card stud in my hair.

The homeless cats mewed long and hard.
They refused to lick and clean one another.

We walked together for awhile, you and me.

You looked like a chimney,
burning inside.

I was as I always am, indifferent.
The moon slid between us.
We had nothing, carried nothing in our hands.

About April Michelle Bratten:
April Michelle Bratten is a writer currently living in Minot, North Dakota. She has had recent work published in Southeast Review and San Pedro River Review. She co-edits the online literary journal Up the Staircase Quarterly.

THE CROW

2012-02-01T05:59:00.000-08:00

Still, hidden still
Behind old shirts and pants
Like an inflated sock
Hung on a slanting coat hanger

With a prophecy stuck in its throat
Probably too dark or ominous
To yaw, even to breathe

No one knows when or how
It will fly out of the closet, and call.

About Changming Yuan:
Changming Yuan, co-author of Chansons of a Chinaman (2009) and Three Poets (2011) as well as a 4-time Pushcart nominee, grew up in rural China and published several monographs before moving to Canada. With a PhD in English, Yuan teaches independently in Vancouver and has had poetry appearing in nearly 450 literary publications across 18 countries, including Asia Literary Review, Barrow Street, Best Canadian Poetry, BestNewPoemsOnline, Exquisite Corpse, London Magazine, Poetry Kanto and Poetry Salzburg.

CHILDHOOD IN THE SIXTIES

2012-01-28T05:50:00.000-08:00

The rusty gun,
a murder weapon,
found in Grandma’s flowerbed, prize winning iris,
heavy and once the color of precious metals,
hey LBJ,
how many boys you killed today,
I killed seven myself,
my lucky number,
Charlie, Charlie, don’t sing to me,
not in the daylight you son-of-a-bitch,
my cousin was a war hero,
twelve years older than me,
nineteen a young age to die,
he had a funeral,
they played a trumpet by the grave,
made my brother cry,
another brother laughed,
I missed the funeral feast,
watched the fight instead,
Dad was pissed,
dirty underwear in public,
and on a day like this,
I didn’t see no underwear,
but I lost my damn gun,
and don’t know where,
I already looked in Grandma’s flowerbed.

About Douglas Polk:
Douglas Polk is a poet living in the wilds of central Nebraska with his wife and two boys. He has had numerous poems , three books of poems, and two children's books published. Poetry books are: In My Defense, The Defense Rests, and On Appeal. The children's books are: The Legend of Garle Pond, and Marie's Home.

THE UGLY TRUTH

2012-01-25T13:35:00.000-08:00

The Ugly Truth speaks with a deep voice,
walks with a slight limp, and
wears his high blood pressure on his face
dripping crimson and angry down his thick neck.
The Ugly Truth gestures with an addict's trembling
hands, searching for failure, and wears a
mouth that lost its smile in 1932.

The Ugly Truth holds the Ten Commandments in one hand
and a leather strap stained with the blood of the saints in the other.
He’s reserved a place in Heaven, but, unknown to him,
Satan has cleared out a cold cell for the bastard in hell.
The Ugly Truth sleeps in the bed of the past
and pays for a bed in the future like a harlot
hunting on Sunset Boulevard.

The Ugly Truth was born to a beautiful
woman who crocheted doilies with bitter lies.
And he cried for his mama's tender
touch long after she left, leaving him scarred
and hungry for a taste of her sacred milk.
The Ugly Truth can’t remember his father but
he smells the old man's liquor and knows
he would've made a damn good father if he
hadn't been a leech sucking on the heart.

About Brenda Rose:
Brenda Rose is an artist, freelance writer, and blogger who made the mistake of mispronouncing Butte, Montana during a visit there in 1989. She dreams of sleeping in that magestic place of rare beauty again. Her works have appeared or are forthcoming in Flycatcher: A Journal of Native Imagination, Ginosko Literary Magazine, and The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature.

ON WRITING

2012-01-25T04:50:00.000-08:00

Blow me
off-ten lines supine
often, these are my arms
layed down.

About Glen Clark:
Glen clark is a guy who likes to write sometimes.

WMD

2012-01-18T17:48:00.000-08:00

The spider waits in its orb,
glitter in the woods.
A trapped fly
wrapped in a shroud

of web. Miles above,
contrails. Below,

a kettle of vultures,
mass of black flags
against blue sky.

About Barbara Brooks:
Barbara Brooks, author of “The Catbird Sang” chapbook, is a member of Poet Fools . She has had work accepted in Hospital Drive, Margie Review, Broken Plate, and Third Wednesday, online at Marco Polo, Earthborne Online, and Poetry Quarterly among others. She is a retired physical therapist and lives in Hillsborough, N.C.

SUDDENLY, IT'S MID-DECEMBER - THE RIVER

2012-01-18T03:55:00.000-08:00

Suddenly, it’s mid-December–the river clenches itself, fish bundle up in the mud–
your grandfather is dead, his forgetting flown into the ether, such relinquishment your
sorrow or nostalgia or both and you speak of leaves, burning–

I can’t help you, in a sense, this is your grey moment–we don’t all die in trucks
by the side of the road, unnoticed for a day, as he did–but we all, invariably,
fall solo out of this world, the brain eroding away from its narratives, stories becoming

the kind of sand we have here–with bits of disconnected machine in it–a cog, a nail,
something else unnameable to me–and so on-from the shore’s old mind I watch you, alive,
him dead, or just appear to be attached to resolution when really, I could be that leaf too,

the bird’s negative capability, intimate with what moves around me, towards, as I refuse
to be distinct about what is air or water, both evident forms of good, you see, and
not those darknesses, dividing us, you choose to imagine.

About Catherine Owen:
Catherine Owen is a poet from Vancouver, BC. She has published nine collections of poetry and one of prose, including the award-winning volume Frenzy (Anvil Press 2009). Her work has appeared in periodicals across North America, Europe and Australia. She works as an editor and plays bass in metal bands. These poems are from a work called The River Sequence. Her website is www.catherineowen.org.

CARINA NEBULA

2012-01-16T15:19:00.000-08:00

There it is, the panoramic view from Hubble &
it’s like looking into the sky and seeing God,
much the same as the pilot poet John Magee
must have thought soaring high in the sky.
He wrote his famous sonnet days before
his mid-air collision. A farmer said he saw
the Spitfire pilot struggling to push back
the canopy and stand up to jump from the plane
but he was too close to the ground for his parachute
to open. Years after Challenger’s tragic fall to earth
Reagan roused the inconsolable angels with the
young poet’s “slipped the surly bonds of Earth
to touch the face of God.“ Raise your hands
to the awesome God. Raise your hands & sing.

The other day thousands of blackbirds fell from the sky
and nobody knew why. David came to the house
this afternoon with a plate of Inari-Zushi
& little pieces of Oshinko with the wasabi I like
because his sister likes to cook & sends over delectable ,
dishes. I told her no one can ever make up for the 120,000
incarcerated Japanese Americans. She has nightmares
of the internment camp. I download the Carina Nebula

from the Hubble and it is like a painting in the sky.
and though David doesn’t see it, I see Michelangelo’s
iconic hand of God giving life to Adam - see it in the
Carina - a sculptured figure with powerful arms
reaching out & penetrating eyes looking down from
heaven. The evening news reports more blackbirds
falling from the sky - thousands more. Later I will
fall asleep trying to picture the face of God,
the taste of wasabi on my tongue.

About Nancy Wahl:
Nancy Wahl's awards include the Bazzanella award for short stories and a Bazzanella award for poetry. She has won two First Place awards, one in Literature Alive and one in Tiger’s Eye, plus three Honorable Mentions in the New Millennium. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her work has appeared in The Tule Review, New Millenium, the Sacramento Anthology: One Hundred Poems, The Poets Corner Press Anthology, Convergence, Poetry Now, Wild Edges, Kyoto Journal & The Christian Science Monitor. She has two chapbooks: Pony Fish and Blueberries on Mars from Poets Corner Press. Her interests are, her two boys, art, and the theater, where she has performed live on stage in Sacramento, Stockton, Salt Lake, and elsewhere.

SOUTHBOUND

2012-01-15T03:59:00.000-08:00

A guy's walking his dog at the edge of the empty commuter rail parking lot, with his dutifully helmeted daughter on her bike, maybe six. She wends her way to the pay phone at the bottom of the platform, picks it up, and carries on half a conversation with a person unknown. Any boy, of any age, would check the coin return for change and be off. Invidious? Politically incorrect? Stereotype? Nature? Nurture? Your call.

* * *

A guy hands a lost dog flyer to a woman with a cane on the commuter platform. She's repeating his tale to us. Not entirely coherent; choppy. Seems sort of simple. And she's blocking my view of the arriving CSX freight train. By now I've snap-judged her, unfairly dismissive. She's a K9 cop, whose dog latched onto the armed robber she and her partners were chasing. He shot her in the leg. That's not the story I expect.

* * *

Waiting for the Providence train, dude in a hoodie expounds to his Asian pal, who owns a waist-length ponytail: "Weird shit's happening" in the Antarctic Ocean and along every fault line on earth, there will be mega-quakes and thousand-foot tidal waves, the only safe place will be in the air or maybe the moon would be OK, too. I'm hoping Hoodie hasn't reproduced. Then he says it came from the Internet. What a relief.

About Ray Scanlon:
Ray Scanlon. Massachusetts boy. Has grandchildren. Extraordinarily lucky. No MFA. No novel. No extrovert. His work has been published in more than one place. On the web: http://read.oldmanscanlon.com/.

FIRST POSTCARD FROM CHEYENNE

2012-01-13T08:51:00.000-08:00

The drive from Spokane to Cheyenne
was long and dry
like the wheat fields we witnessed,
their golden stalks woven tightly
into a quilt of sunshine.

What lies beneath
guarded by herds of antelope
and wild buffalo united by the past.
They watch cars float by on the highway,
sniff the air, and then gallop away--

afraid of the noisy, iron ghosts
that make the earth tremble
rattling the bones of ancestors
they were so careful not to disturb.

About Sandy Benitez:
Sandy Benitez is the founder and editor of Flutter Press and Red Poppy Review. Most recently, Sandy's poems have appeared in The Camel Saloon, Catapult to Mars, and Subliminal Interiors. She resides in California with her husband and their 2 children.

WHAT IT'S LIKE

2012-01-11T18:53:00.000-08:00

I had thought it must be like
having random pages torn out,
so it becomes difficult to remember
character names, plots, and settings,
until one night, washing dishes together,
her muscle memory smoothly
moving her from sink to cupboard,
she stopped in the middle of drying
the large stainless steel colander
she had bought years before
and said, “You know how sometimes,
at a party, you’ll be in the kitchen
talking to someone for a long time
and when you go back out
everyone has left without you
knowing it. You had thought
they were still there, and the party
was still going strong, and then
when you go into the living room,
you suddenly feel as if . . . as if . . .”
She stood and turned the colander
in her hands, then, after a moment,
she put it back in the sink as if deciding
that probably was a safe choice
for something like that, whatever it was.

About Joe Mills:
A faculty member at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, Joe Mills has published three collections of poetry with Press 53: "Love and Other Collisions," "Angels, Thieves, and Winemakers," and "Somewhere During the Spin Cycle." In April 2012, the press will release his fourth book, "Sending Christmas Cards to Huck and Hamlet."

TWO PIECES BY HOWIE GOOD

2012-01-09T19:42:00.000-08:00

THE BEREAVED

That son of a bitch,
my heart, waving and shouting

what sounds like hi! Hi!
when there’s nobody there

but clocks and mirrors
smashed in the street.

MY LIFE & HARD TIMES

1

He comes toward me,
jingling a paper cup.

The kind of books I write
aren't the kind that sell.

2

I stand knee-deep
in the noise of spiders.
Old cuts begin to bleed.

If they won’t love me,
an angel is thinking,
they can still fear me.

3

An ungovernable city of chill and gloom.
Every street ends in an ellipsis. . .

Only a stranger, or madman, would stop here.
I step down off the bus.

About Howie Good:
Howie Good, a journalism professor at SUNY New Paltz, is the author of the 2011 poetry collection, Dreaming in Red, from Right Hand Pointing. All proceeds from the sale of the book go to a charity, which you can read about here: https://sites.google.com/site/rhplanding/howie-good-dreaming-in-red

FROM THE ELEVATED PLATFORM, I SEE A WORLD OF ROSES AND COMPLAINT

2012-01-08T10:16:00.000-08:00

one two three four five taxicabs in a line
one to bite the beast and two to beat the bread—
a carnival of conditions
and I feel better than Chicago —
gunshot city, weather watchers,
complainers and animosity, angst
and mediocrity, gut wrenched trees,
flash drive passions,
four corners, six corners, uptown,
downtown, the park Roger named,
fear seeker, bullet heads,
gray down on the rooftops,
pock marked and feckless,
store glass, white automobiles,
black heads and blemishes,
acne scabbed and oozing,
the train crossing,
pigeons on the platform,
garbage cans. Splinters,
tears, cracks and holes.

Silence is afterbirth,
downed wires, downed trees,
a bird's nest with three spilled eggs.

About Michael H. Brownstein:

Michael H. Brownstein has been widely published throughout the small and literary presses. His work has appeared in The Café Review, American Letters and Commentary, Skidrow Penthouse, Xavier Review, Hotel Amerika, Free Lunch, Meridian Anthology of Contemporary Poetry, The Pacific Review, Poetrysuperhighway.com and others. In addition, he has nine poetry chapbooks includingThe Shooting Gallery (Samidat Press, 1987), Poems from the Body Bag (Ommation Press, 1988), A Period of Trees (Snark Press, 2004), What Stone Is (Fractal Edge Press, 2005), and I Was a Teacher Once (Ten Page Press, 2011). He is the editor of First Poems from Viet Nam (2011).

Brownstein taught elementary school in Chicago’s inner city (he is now retired), but he continues to study authentic African instruments, conducts grant-writing workshops for educators, designs websites and records performance and music pieces with grants from the City of Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs, the Oppenheimer Foundation, BP Leadership Grants, and others.

BAR STOOL BLUES OR HOW I REMEMBERED I’M NOT USELESS

2012-01-04T18:14:00.000-08:00

Crunchy guitars
synthesizing
with nicotine
Clouds
of
slim women
and
burn outs.

This living
dance
of
solemnity
to make
it
with someone
always
comes with a
tab.

About Zach Fishel:
Zach Fishel is a recent pushcart nominee and working on his Master's at the Univ. of Toledo. He collects scars and heartbreaks, and has had work appear in Yes, Poetry, The Legendary, Amphibi, Mad Swirl, fourpaperletters, horrorsleazeandtrash, and others.

THIS FALL

2012-01-02T11:46:00.000-08:00

I.

I am millet and mustard strength
Small faith, tossed into hard time
Seed thoughts scattered, left to grasp
At empty air.

II.

Under earth's barrow
I press at packed earth,
Ready to dig
With both hands.

About Anna Husain:
Anna Husain's’s poetry has been published in Moon Journal, Tallgrass Writers Guild Black & White anthology, Cram, Arsenic Lobster, Poems From the Valley of Virginia, The Chicago Tribune, Wordslingers, chicagopoetry.com, The Indian Diary and others. Former Managing Editor of Whetstone Journal, Former Asst. Editor of Barrington Courier Review’s ARTS & LETTERS/a Pioneer Press newspaper). An Illinois resident, Anna has devoted much of her time to teaching children about poetry; was judge/coordinator for BAAC’s Young Writer’s Project.

THE LIGHTS ON LUDLOW STREET

2012-01-01T09:26:00.000-08:00

lips asked
if i may kiss your cheek
you leaned in

the tip of my nose
and lips caressing
the smoothness of your face
you moaned into a sigh

every electric light
Christmas bulb
and neon marquis
on Ludlow street glowed
more intensely

as did we

the bell rang

About Alicia Young:

Alicia Young is a poet, pacifist, mortician, actress, musician, medicine woman, mother of twins, and reveler who once again hails from Kentucky bourbon country after a twenty seven year visit to Cincinnati. She has been featured in, as well as contributed to American Funeral Director and American Cemetery Magazines, and the Moronic Ox Literary & Cultural Journal. She is currently plotting a book of short stories and historical poetry.

A.g. SYNCLAIR REVIEWS THE NEW CHAPBOOK BY STEPHEN CARATZAS, "PAST, PRESENT, SUTURE."

2011-12-28T18:08:00.000-08:00

In the cluttered world of poetry publishing where chapbooks--self-published or otherwise--multiply and breed like feral rabbits, it's refreshing to stumble upon a compact volume of work that stands up against the best of the best. In Past, Present, Suture (Drifting Man Press) poet Stephen Caratzas has woven together a tangled web of street worthy ruminations that will suck the reader into his world, a world rife with darkness, longing, compassion, love lost, regret, and despair. In other words, life, as most of us will know it at one time or another.

In Life Among The Cubicles, Caratzas captures the banality of life as an office drone in five simple, yet artfully written sentences that will resonate loudly with anyone who has ever trudged through a day in corporate America. That Waitress With A Black Eye Reminds Me Of You, Joan is a moment in time captured with an economy of words that any contemporary poet should admire and emulate. The Trick is a jazz riff disguised as poetry, an improvisational solo of fractured lines and crooked words that redefine language and spatiality in modern poetry, and is one of the more impressive writes here.

As a collection, the 28 poems presented in Past, Present, Suture represent the work of a poet who adheres to the "write what you know" philosophy quite closely, while avoiding the black hole of banality that can often overshadow on-your-sleeve style writing. Individually, each piece in the chapbook can stand alone, but as a collected work, Past, Present, Suture is a glimpse into the future of modern, contemporary poetry. And the future looks bright, indeed.

A.g. Synclair
Editor & Publisher
The Montucky Review
28 December, 2011

QUINCY, ILLINOIS:1962

2011-12-26T13:44:00.000-08:00

long before Barack Obama

In 1962 my father toiled in Quincy,

two weeks, no more,

and saw no blacks except for

two young ladies

who moved like swans

bussing dishes

in a farmer's cafeteria.

Daisy badges on their uniforms

announced their names,

their years of service.

He still remembers how

throughout his meal

he wanted to stand,

a stranger in a

seersucker suit,

and shout:

"How can you live here?

Where, except in church,

can you clap your hands

in emancipation?"

About Donal Mahoney:

Donal Mahoney has had poems published in The Montucky Review and other publications in the United States, Europe, Asia and Africa.

IN EXTREMIS

2011-12-23T06:09:00.000-08:00

I’m dressed in a French-cut suit the color of a cloudy day. A cadaver dog approaches, hesitant and mannerly. There’s no effective pill. There never was.

Knives and hammers merge into one vast night. Hardly anyone else is listening. I pass the sixth day translating another misery into lights and voices. Meanwhile, the tired waitress steps down off the bus and shivers. The gods respond to questions only in the summer when all the windows are open.

Somewhere there’s a picture of me with a different face. Why bother to force a giraffe into a flower pot? I seem to be thinking. Great sages never phoned, and even if they had, their language would’ve been gray and obscure. My cuts bled. The hole in my favorite T-shirt also refused to heal. Only one thing left to do, the fat lady said – sing.

Higher and higher, past thickets, boulders, grievous ravines, floats a horse, broken and crumbly, gnawing its side. I stand knee-deep in blue grass. There’s a haze between me and the rest of the world. In the sudden start, somebody lost his hat. Nobody stops to pick it up. Tonight we’ll water our horses in the Tennessee River. The stars will be hard to see.

About Howie Good:

Howie Good, a journalism professor at SUNY New Paltz, is the author of the forthcoming poetry collection, Dreaming in Red, from Right Hand Pointing.

TWO POEMS BY LAUREN TIVEY

2011-12-20T12:10:00.000-08:00

Kharola Pass

Prayer flags snap in a cutting wind
above, a glacier clamping the mountain

at a merchant cart of decorated yak skulls
a boy of six, cheeks chapped by altitude

a hanging gob of snot, no parka.
Our Jeep ignites a flame in his eyes

its promise of money, food
he grabs my sleeve

points finger to mouth
wolfs cookies, staring up

my heart thumping
his booger rattling

and I tissue it off
before he skips away.

The gleaming yak skulls leer
as Himalayan winds whistle

over the lunar landscape;
not a tree or a mother in sight.

Eating the Dead

If it’s not vultures
summoned by shamans

to tear the meat
atop Tibetan hills

or Aghori Sadhus
(those lovable kooks)

trawling the Ganges
for blue-bloated floaters

then it’s us, our various
holy Books, blood-spattered

breaded bodies of Christ.
By God, it’s Keith Richards

snorting our father’s ashes
off a picnic table, Amen.

About Lauren Tivey:
Lauren Tivey has been living in China for the past two years, where she works as an English Literature teacher in the American Program at a Chinese high school. She received a MFA in poetry from Vermont College of Fine Arts, and her work has appeared in Deuce Coupe,The Literary Burlesque, and Gutter Eloquence, among other publications. Her chapbook, The Breakdown Atlas, is due out in July of 2011 from Big Table Publishing Co. She lives for poetry, photography, travel, and adventure.

SLEEPWALKER

2011-12-20T05:45:00.000-08:00

She appears in the middle of the night,

following a path

carved out of the black orchard.

Nobody sees her arrive

except the wet grass and apple blossoms.

I hear her footsteps

enter the house –

and see a slight girl

standing with her eyes closed,

walking around the kitchen.

Sometimes I think

she is an actress

from the nearby college,

studying for an upcoming role.

Sometimes I think

she's a Sister from

the convent

who's gone mad.

Like a spirit, she leaves

as the dawn light approaches.

About Craig Shay:

Craig Shay lives on Long Island, NY.

I ONLY ARRIVED

2011-12-15T16:30:00.000-08:00

I only arrived from Mombasa

late last night and saw the city

raise her arms in lights, and

I hurried down the Champs

Elysses to meet you in the Parc

Monceau and all the lamps said

she is there, lifting up what we do

not know.

About Charles Bane Jr.:

Charles Bane, Jr. , is a widely published poet. His work has appeared in Clutching At Straws, Durable Goods , The Indian Diary, museumviews.com and The Criterion: An International Journal In English, among others. His July release, The Chapbook: Poems by Charles Bane , Jr. ( Curbside Splendor) is available at Barnes and Noble Booksellers and Amazon.com.

BELL BRIDGE

2011-12-14T10:07:00.000-08:00

The wind ringed like crystal

inside the empty train bridge,

I am heartbroken

by the lesson of this carillon

and the kneeling trees.

Rain painted over the sound,

I changed my voice

to join the opening of a way

unseen to the soul and metal

always demanding a victim.

Everything moves in a light

of birds back into the dark source,

I reclaimed the hour of birth

for an instant again unmolded

to listen and become a world.

About John Swain:

John Swain lives in Louisville, Kentucky. Thunderclap Press published his most recent chapbook, Fragments of Calendars.

PERIGEE

2011-12-13T11:38:00.000-08:00

When the easterly wind

paused in the field

then turned on its heel to head back

there was a point at which

the wheat straightened

perpendicular to the plain at its roots

and was as close to heaven as it would ever be.

About Mary Box Carlsson:

Mary Box Carlsson is a visual artist and poet in the San Francisco bay area. Her art work has been exhibited in galleries and museums throughout the U.S including the Laguna Gloria Arts Museum in Austin and the Orange County Center for Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. Her work has appeared in several books with the writer Lily Hsueh as well as in journals such as the Cimarron Review in the U.S. and Unitas Literary Monthly in Taiwan. She graduated from UCSD in 1981 with a B.A. in mathematics and has lived in Palo Alto, California for the last 20 years with her three sons and husband, Gunnar Carlsson, a math professor at Stanford University.

THE DEPOT

2011-12-13T07:11:00.000-08:00

I stand in the train yard studying

the trains as they arrive and depart

reflecting out loud

about days gone by

and how I am haunted

by a paler version of a better night

tucked beneath the stars

and smashed against the rails,

a crisp midnight that has become

my emotional response

to everything,

and yet I heard nothing

but a waste of words falling into,

pelting the engines like heavy rain.

And when it rains like this,

it pools between the steel parallels,

floods the yard,

the rush of water stopping

the trains, swelling

garbage and oil around me

as I begin to wade

in this newly formed river,

body saturated,

thinking how a river like this

should flow faster than the Hudson,

should force past me,

knock me down,

drown my failures in an audible roar.

About Ariana D. Den Bleyker:

Ariana D. Den Bleyker is a Pittsburgh native currently residing in a small town in New York where she is a wife and mother of two. She earned her B.A. in English from William Paterson University. Her work has appeared (or is slated to appear) in scissors and spackle, Stone Highway Review, Golden Sparrow Literary Magazine, Grey Sparrow Press and other fine journals. Her chapbook, Forgetting Aesop, was recently released by the publishers of scissors and spackle.

MY MIND IS FULL OF OLD SUITS

2011-12-05T08:48:00.000-08:00

My mind is full

of old suits and dirty underwear

the undone laundry of my life

I live in the squalor of my past

lovers saved in envelopes

worn shoes in plastic bags

old friends hung

like baggy pants on a line of clothes.

I don’t remember when they left

but I store their memory

in a cardboard box

labeled “A” to “Everyone.”

About Neil Ellman:

Neil Ellman lives and writes in New Jersey. His poems appear in numerous print and online journals throughout the world, including Anastomoo, Bolts of Silk, Counterexample Poetics, ditch, Haggard & Halloo, A Handful of Stones, Indigo Rising, Mad Swirl, Nether and The Poetry Super Highway, among others.

PAPERBOAT PROMISES

2011-12-02T14:01:00.000-08:00

Heartbreaks, arcana of

life lessons, images with

grinning faces, leering

posthumously.

And yet, a blind compulsion

makes me pick at the remainders

of paperboat promises,

destined for drowning.

About Sanchari Sur:

Sanchari Sur is a Bengali Canadian who was born in Calcutta, India. Her poetry and short fiction have been published or are forthcoming in Asia Writes, Corvus Magazine, Red River Review, Red Poppy Review, Urban Shots - Crossroads (Grey Oak Publishing, 2012) and elsewhere. She blogs at http://sursanchari.wordpress.com.

THE LAST BEAR ON PETIT JEAN MOUNTAIN

2011-11-30T14:27:00.000-08:00

So they went with guns and with knives

for the white tails. They crunched dead

leaves as they passed through the Eye of the Needle,

like hunched over camels, all their gear

on their backs, and millions of years

of sandstone arched over head, lichen

creeping down boulders split by Cedar Creek.

Rising up from the tree littered valley

like an ancient dirge is the fog

of the ghost of that French maiden, scarlet

and delirious with Swamp fever,

her grave just below. Early morning,

the winds from another county howl

and swirl in and out of the mouth

of Skull Rock. From behind the turtle rocks

came a black bear, massive head, narrow muzzle

rooting the ground with gripping, rhythmic steps.

The hunters clawed up a rock wall into the mouth

of a cave as the bear drew close a dark shadow

chilling the ground and in the distance

the people of the valley heard rifle burst;

and dark bear blood splattered the trees.

Here I stand now in the hollow next to Bear Cave

in the shadow sandstone. It’s a breezeless

morning, no howling wind, no coolness

on sweat beads, and no dark shadow

to drag across the fallen leaves,

just the empty, voiceless crevice of fog.

About James Dunlap:

James Dunlap is a Creative Writing major at the University of Arkansas. He received an Associates of Art at Pulaski Technical College. He's been published three times through PTC, one piece in the scholarly journal Milestones, and twice in the Literary Journal The View From Here. He received awards for Best Prose and Best Poetry from PTC as well. He has written for the school news paper at UA. Recently, one of his short fiction pieces was published in Sliver of Stone issue 3, one poem was published by Red Fez. A poem is forthcoming in Niche Literary Magazine. He also received honorable mention in the Tails from the South Literary Festival and read the same story for their syndicated radio show.

SOUTHERN COMFORT

2011-11-28T08:16:00.000-08:00

Carolina heat sasses humid

at the sun, but the gators

aren’t impressed and fall asleep.

At night, cottonmouths gig

for bullfrogs, and Yazoo snappers

suck algae off water-logged

tree limbs. They bunk with bullheads

in bottom mud.

In the backwater, a thirsty bayou

sips itself, but never to excess. Pine

sap webs my fingers into gar fins,

and chirping tree frogs cover-tune

my whistle.

About Kevin Heaton:

Pushcart Prize nominee Kevin Heaton was born in Kansas, and now lives and writes in South Carolina. His fascination with history and love for the outdoors have led him on a journey to better understand life beyond the city limits. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in 150 publications, including: Raleigh Review, Foundling Review, The Honey Land Review, and elimae. His fourth chapbook, Chronicles, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press in early 2012. He is a Best of the Net 2011 nominee.

TO NOTHING

2011-11-23T12:28:00.000-08:00

There is an old brown leather couch along
the far wall of the living room with notches in the finish.
Cigarette burn holes march across a small section of the seat.

It doesn't recline

comfortable, but you can only sit there
for so long, listening to the listing second hand
on a second hand clock click the seconds off.

Listen to the dog lick his balls because he can,

before you throw your hands up, stand
and begin counting the steps
to the kitchen, to the fridge, to the phone that doesn't ring,
to the door, to the toilet, the porch, and back again

where you put on one shoe but not the other
because you cant find it, since you haven't
had anywhere to go in days.

Two socks, one shoe. 38 to the kitchen, 9 to the fridge,
15 to the phone, 32 to the door, 2 to the porch, 32 back.
Throw the one white rubber Chinese made piece of swooshed shit at
the only decoration on the wall, frightening the dog who doesn't realize

the scariest thing is, it is only mid afternoon.

About Glen Clark:
Glen Clark is a guy who likes to write sometimes. He can be found here:
http://www.facebook.com/?ref=tn_tinyman#!/profile.php?id=100000085106136

SCENT TO MEMORY

2011-11-23T07:48:00.000-08:00

You always smelled like your dog,

and I usually found stray fur on your coat.

The coat was always plaid flannel.

None of this suited me.

Most nights, I close my eyes—always thinking—and I imagine how it should have been:

No carcasses skating in scalding water

No white feathers atop rubber boots.

No peeling away layers of cotton and flannel.

No dry-skinned hands pulling slowly over thighs.

No sighs suffocating in couch cushions.

No blood-scabbed fingers between teeth.

No chafed heels against toes.

No orange fire breathing below,

no roasting sets of feet.

Remember the night we ate the fruit from the bowl.

I said, “I don’t wanna be wrapped up in you.”

These thoughts call to memory the scent that seeps from an orange.

I insert my thumb, open the neon flower.

Breathe you in.

About Monic Ductan:

Monic Ductan is a Southern fiction writer and poet from rural Georgia. She has an undergraduate degree in English from Georgia State University, and she currently studies Social Work at the University of Georgia. She has published in several literary magazines, including The Blue Moon Literary and Art Review and Black Magnolias Journal. Her work is forthcoming in Sleet and Stone Highway Review.

TWO PIECES BY C. MALCOLM ELLSWORTH

2011-11-21T08:46:00.000-08:00

Farm Girls*

i
We knew how to keep warm.

We pulled the dog across our laps,
his hair matted with cockle burrs and seed heads,
stinking of carrion and cow pies.
In winter wind, we laid on shaggy horses
in open fields and pressed our backs
against the south side of tree trunks.
We crouched with our knees in our jackets
and our hands in our sleeves, we sought shelter
in machine sheds and chicken coops and haylofts
until called to supper.

ii
I remember the creek
and the swallows’ mud nests under the bridge
and black knots of hair on willows
and the tracks of animals into cloudy water.

She remembers only the apple trees,
how they faced the road,
how their white blossoms,
sharp as wings,
churned blue sky that smelled of broken earth,
and the fruit that, even when ripe,
tasted green.

iii
We were children
who wrote on rocks
with rocks,
who wrote on wood
with ashes;
we built houses of sticks and mud,
scolded by blackbirds,
as our father scratched a line
on the edge of the world.

*Originally published in the 2011 Rethink Topeka Chapbook.

Chrysanthemum

There is a cup on my desk
in front of the picture of me kissing my husband
on our wedding day; the cup is filled with pencils
and sharpies and an xacto knife,
my husband clasps his hands
in the small of my back,
pressing my hips against him,
but I am looking over his shoulder.
On the cup on my desk
there is a chrysanthemum
with cross hatching
where petals converge and attach,
an approximation of shadow.

The dog sleeps on the bed, all black
except her pink tongue sticking out.
She is a kind of hole, except for her tongue.
She must be having a sweet dream,
a dream without hunters or prey,
not even a rabbit,
maybe only a spot of sun
and the absolute absence
of all hunger.

About C. Malcolm Ellsworth:

C. Malcolm Ellsworth has a BA in English and an MFA in art from the University of Iowa. Her work has appeared (or soon will appear) in The Flint Hills Review, Scissors and Spackle, Blue Island Review, Stone Highway Review, Everyday Other Things, and The Christian Science Monitor. She posts erratically at http://topekastories.blogspot.com

UNTITLED

2011-11-18T12:14:00.000-08:00

And now, owl rises
from sagebrush near
this moonlit path
the brief shriek of
a long-tailed form
pierced by talons.

About Ayaz Daryl Nielsen:

ayaz daryl nielsen is a poet/father/husband/veteran/x-roughneck (as on oil rigs)/hospice nurse - editor/custodian of bear creek haiku, his poetry has been in publications including Yellow Mama, Lilliput Review, Shamrock, Lynx, Magnapoets and The Montucky Reivew.

LOVE SONGS AND SIREN LIGHTS

2011-11-17T07:49:00.000-08:00

it’s hard to argue with
a felony warrant
or a nickel-plated revolver
to the head.

if we hurry
we can make
the matinee.

meet me at
the gas station
just down the street from your church.
I’ll bring liquor
if you’ll steal some pills
from your mom.

wear that skirt,
the one I bought you
in Poughkeepsie.
I’ve always liked
the way you move in that skirt.

I’ve got a bad, bad feeling
about that car
we just passed
but you,
you are beautiful
when you lie.

About yossarian:

yossarian (note: lack of capitalization is intentional & desired) was last seen cavorting with the wildlife somewhere in the backwash of Fennario, which is rumored to be near northeastern Mississippi. He is to be considered armed & dangerous, but generally docile when approached with offerings of Pabst Blue Ribbon. His somewhat menacing visage can be found on post office walls & rap sheets across the mid-South.

STOPPING TWICE FOR WATER

2011-11-15T09:13:00.000-08:00

We make our way

to and from Bald Knob,

the highest point

of the Cass Scenic Railway—

an altitude of 4700 feet.

The first time we stop,

on the way up, the conductor

plucks a low branch

from a Mountain Ash,

brings red berries aboard.

The engine lets off steam,

and a few cinders fly by,

as we rise at a 7% grade

with Shay #6 pulling us

(rather than pushing),

after we’ve gone through

one of the switchbacks.

On the return trip,

trunks of trees are black,

and it’s cooler on the train.

We move at faster clip

(because gravity assists us).

Still we must stop

to take on water,

as the sun sets in rays that shine

through smoky air. We see

fallen tree branches,

a blaze of fall color

from far-away hills,

moss and yellow-green ferns

with flowers that look fuzzy,

large rocks from which

actual gardens sprout,

the evergreen Red Spruce.

About Helen Losse:

Helen Losse is the author of two full length poetry books, Seriously Dangerous (Main Street Rag, 2011) and Better With Friends (Rank Stranger Press, 2009), and two chapbooks. She grew up in Joplin, MO but now lives in Winston-Salem, NC and is the Poetry Editor for The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature.

UNTITLED LOVE POEM

2011-11-14T10:27:00.000-08:00

the poet Jamison Gilley once told me
of his penchant for lying naked
in a fetal position

on the cold tile floor
in the bathroom
of his Manhattan loft.

unable to move for hours
waiting to feel something
anything

and feeling nothing, seeing
nothing, being
nothing.

and I thought
if I could lie down
on some milky black night

and detach my retinas
swiftly, like opening a vein
I could use my mind's eye

to see
how you pulled me in
gutted me

disemboweled me
and bled me out

how you opened me

skillfully.

About A.g. Synclair:
Enough has been said already...

CLIFF

2011-11-10T07:58:00.000-08:00

There may be enough rock
up past those ravens,
the corvids eating the old wolf
kill.

There just might be enough
granite to call it a cliff.

This arithmetic
leads to all names,

and a thousand feet
more of elevation
will grant epithet
after epithet.

About Tony Burfield:

Tony Burfield lives in Boulder, Colorado and works at the public library. When not running wild in the hills or pounding his drum, he reads, writes, and edits an online journal. His poetry collection Canid won the Green Fuse Press 2010 Chapbook Contest.

YELLOW DAFFODILS

2011-11-09T07:51:00.000-08:00

we have grown tired of flowers.
we have grown tired of the word

"poet."

we have become sick of the sunset,

the beach,

the horizon,

the cold winter night and the stars in the sky.

we have grown lazy when it comes to individuality,

authenticity, and originality.

I want to know what your coffee tastes like in the morning,

not the color of the daffodils in your garden.

About Mike Meraz:

Mike Meraz lives and writes in Los Angeles, Ca. He has been published numerous times online and in print. you can check out his work here

http://black-listedpoems.blogspot.com/

LIFE AT THAT DARKEST OF AGES

2011-11-08T12:13:00.000-08:00

are we unified in all of our telling
or letting what little fun we're still having die

are you seeing these restless leaves

rid of desire in the erstwhile trees

have you come to terms with our mock child

or unveiled another of its post-modern facsimiles

as you read this are you picturing

our epic, dear, or saving it to a file

are you going to will me your secrets

or try scratching them onto our crest yet again

About Mark DeCarteret:

Mark DeCarteret’s work has appeared in the anthologies American Poetry: The Next Generation (Carnegie Mellon Press), Thus Spake the Corpse: An Exquisite Corpse Reader (Black Sparrow Press), New Pony: Collaborations & Responses (Horse Less Press), Place of Passage: Contemporary Catholic Poets (Story Line Press), and Under the Legislature of Stars: 62 New Hampshire Poets (Oyster River Press) which he also co-edited. From 2009-2011 he was Poet Laureate of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. You can check out his Postcard Project at pplp.org.

THE TATTOO

2011-11-04T14:18:00.000-07:00

Unzipping her black dress from the neck down,
between her broad shoulder blades appeared
a tattoo of Saint Agatha of Sicily,
patron saint of bell-founders and bakers,
standing exquisitely naked from the waist up
her smile the focal point of seductive voluptuousness
her golden hair radiating into a wavering nimbus
her chest covered in blood dripping down to her hips,
offering with outstretched hands on a wooden plate
her own severed breasts pale as orchard moonlight.

About Bill Wolak:

Bill Wolak is a poet who has just published his third book of poetry entitled Archeology of Light. He was recently selected to be a featured reader at the 2011 Kritya International Poetry Festival in Nagpur, India.

RIVER'S WOMB

2011-11-04T07:47:00.000-07:00

wake trails silent,

I draw the paddle deep

canoe thrusts forward

current and I strong, stronger than we look

I trust her infinite wisdom and let go of the control

yellow warblers in the willows keep me company

how shy we both are

suspicious turtle pretends it's not there

slips into the water quieter than thought itself

I lay down upon the canoe ribs,

lulled by the gentle lapping of water

clouds slip by in three d effect

it’s awhile since I have known such peace

cradled in water ~ perhaps before my birth

About Paula D. Lietz:

Paula D. Lietz (pd lietz) is a published poet, artist, and photographer featured in many on-line articles around the world, in print, and on the covers of International magazines, the latest being Naugatuck River Review. Paula resides in rural Manitoba, Canada.

ANGRY SUN

2011-11-03T09:06:00.000-07:00

I cannot abide
this lifestyle
of noontime
arousals,
contradicting
myself with
Lillian Hellman
volumes
for pillows
and slothful
bits of taco
flavored
tortilla chips
trapped in my
beard with the
glue of cola,
the day’s sun
angrily staring
at me through
the garbage bag
curtains, waiting
for me to melt
like a deferred
toy soldier.

About Kevin Ridgeway:

Kevin Ridgeway is a writer from Southern California, where he lives with his girlfriend and their one-eyed cat. Recent work has appeared in Gutter Eloquence Magazine, The Camel Saloon, Pipe Dream and Dead Snakes.

TWO POEMS BY SHERI L. WRIGHT

2011-11-02T09:56:00.000-07:00

Morning Table

Papa thinks he's sober

slouched over his eggs

like runny yolks and

grease oozing the edge of his plate.

But he drags that barroom

with him all the time

like a friend who never leaves

no matter that kin comes begging

for a night home,

home we don't bother filling

with more than his picture

framed with his pride dangling

from a fish hook

reeled out of Salt Creek.

I know better than to speak,

that his words will stagger across the table

and his excuses stumble along

trying to catch up

before they topple over the edge

like a glass of beer

that should never have been poured.

I let silence grow as cold as his coffee

that fills the stained cracks of porcelain

spidering the cup

he clutches like a dead ember,

believing resurrection

is a prayer answered for the asking.

Father's Funeral

I recall the day

like pieces of a photograph

strewn across wind;

motes of memory swirling

like dead leaves-

the scent of death suspended like a haunting,

the hired condolences of a stranger

no one will remember,

the mingling of too many perfumes

that fail to mask sorrow,

how a casket gleams like a dead star,

the sound of rain on raw earth.

About Sheri L. Wright:

Sheri L. Wright is the author of five books of poetry, including the most recent, The Slow Talk of Stones. Her works of poetry appear numerous journals, including New Southerner, Out of Line, Chiron Review, Clark Street Review, Darkling and Earth's Daughters. Ms. Wright is the host of the literary radio show, From The Inkwell, at www.crescebthillradio.com.

A STACK OF OLD ZINES

2011-11-01T15:29:00.000-07:00

I light up another cigarette

a Menthol 100

and consider looking through

this stack of old zines.

The cat is asleep on top of them

and I don't want to wake her.

I pour another coffee

and ponder writing something

for somebody elses zine.

I sit alone in this chair

me, the cat

and a stack of old zines.

Old hip-hop playing

in the background

my thoughts come incomplete

and I wait

for what?

for my girlfriend to get home

for an old friend to call me back

for something

to come out of this pen

besides scratches of incomplete thoughts.

I do this a lot

scribble, scratch out

ponder what is happening

consider what I'll write

but life is 90% action

and unless I write

scribble, write

I'll have nothing to show

just this stack of old zines

and me

in a smoky apartment

pondering, considering.....waiting.

About Steven Purkey:

Steven Purkey resides in the Pacific Northwest where he divides his time between his zine, Modus Operandi and his band The Filthy Nightmares. He is currently between jobs, but is looking, so if ya got any leads let him know. Seriously, he needs a job.

PHONE BOOTH CASKETS

2011-10-31T11:33:00.000-07:00

while talking tight-lipped through
the shudders to a gaunt pair of hips
and gold fillings, remember
his poise was flat and hazy

especially when he held you by the wrists,
introduced himself over the stereo, slipped
small white capsules to your shot glass,
directed you toward the dimly-lit room,

copper-blue bodies frame the fringes
of the city like lost train ticket stubs,
soon he'll be one of them, frostbitten
night-shade, don't unbolt the door.

static-y payphone to living room,
before you let him speak to his son
on Sundays only, you must throw
away your pharmaceuticals.

About Brian Le Lay:

Brian Le Lay lives out of his car in San Francisco. He is the editor of Electric Windmill Press. He wrote the book Don't Bury Me in New Jersey. He is currently writing a poem about Leonardo DiCaprio. His work has been published by Dogzplot, Gloom Cupboard, The Prism Review, Kill Author, and Hanging Moss Journal.

CLEARING

2011-10-29T10:05:00.000-07:00

Sun thrums a fine squander

of vines. I wander through

the hum of summer, lumber:

swarms disintegrate & clear,

the gravel disarranged as

before, unruffled, a river

absorbs light tipped for its last

fire foreshadowed; rippled leaf

stuff nuzzles my face. Dusk,

nascent, dreamfast, is barely

stirring. No burr, only barren

ground, not one broken flower

or limb upon the firmament

leftover from our quick orgy.

Primrose, larkspur, or a shy

quirk we all have foraged for

over which bees bobble like

dragon kites; shadows bower

intransigent as any random

star our sight is nectared by.

About Will Cordeiro:

Will Cordeiro has previously worked as a NYC Teaching Fellow, a staff writer at the theater magazine offoffonline, and an assistant editor of Epoch. He has an MFA in poetry from Cornell, where he is currently a Ph.D. candidate studying 18^th century British literature. For two years he has been the Artist-in-Residence at Risley Residential College, and he also have been awarded residencies from the Provincetown Community Compact, Ora Lerman Trust, and Petrified Forest National Park. His work has been published or is forthcoming in journals such as Fourteen Hills, Brooklyn Review, Harpur Palate, Baltimore Review, Comstock Review, Leveler, Waccamaw, Paradigm, Verse Wisconsin, Prick of the Spindle, Sentence, A cappella Zoo, Jacket, The Prose Poem Project, Carte Blanche, Poetry Quarterly, Other

Poetry, The Brooklyner.

THE THINGS YOU LEFT BEHIND

2011-10-26T13:12:00.000-07:00

These chalky walls still echo your presence
and demise, bare as a brimless hat.
The moon is appalled by all this blankness,
spreading its cool tentacles across the stage
where the players have left
to no encore.
The cat drinks its lavender paw,
mewling like a curdled beast,
and the heat, the heat-

I picture you, mummified, arms
crossed over your chest, in the family
mausoleum. They buried you
with your glasses on and a new tie
and new socks
that your widow bought
just for the occasion.

She, among the menagerie of dead-
eyed vagabonds that floated
to your shore like sour apples.
How you despised those immigrants!
And yet you married one.

Selfish miscreant, who exited
this life too soon, leaving behind
this woman and this child.
Why did you have to marry so late
in life, knowing you'd never survive?

About Caroline Misner:

Caroline Misner is a graduate of Sheridan College of Applied Arts & Technology with a
diploma in Media Arts Writing. Her poetry, fiction and non-fiction have
appeared in several journals throughout the USA, Canada and the UK, too
numerous to mention here. She's also had work published in several
anthologies and web zines. Caroline also writes erotica under the pseudonym Cynthia
Lucas and her stories have appeared in several publications and anthologies.

In 2009 she was nominated for the prestigious Writers' Trust/McClelland &
Stewart Journey Anthology Prize as well a Pushcart Prize in 2010. In 2004 her novella received Honorable Mention in the L. Ron Hubbard Writers of the Future Contest. A short story was also a finalist in the same contest. A novel, The Glass Cocoon was a semi-finalist for the William Faulkner-William Wisdom Award the following year.

MAP OF SCARS

2011-10-25T15:44:00.000-07:00

Here where trees blanch, boulders calve,

I feel the menace: branches spread

like steel spider webs wrapped in clouds.

You appear, sprung from close by, I think,

coiled, not buoyant

but strange to me.

Wind scours

this dying place where no stone,

no fallen leaf or gully rib

urges memory—

wind edges you toward me,

your hand reaches my hand:

murky, you can’t be the man I knew.

Even this time is not my time;

your alien past intrudes.

How did you create this alien past,

your father’s past, his history,

his violent facts,

his certain loss?

Dick, you ghost me to his trail;

your scars map his way to me.

You say his company stole his land,

this land, and chained the cabin door

that weathers white and grainy

like a bone, turns orange

with staining rust from links

and lock whose iron

would crumble now

if petted

by his living hand.

Materialize, Dick.

Vacate this brown, anonymous ditch

down which the summer rains,

given life, would plunge,

fit for drowning

or a final, frantic dance.

Live with me, Dick, both of us

treading history’s hues and heft.

About Keith Moul:

Keith has recently been accepted for publication in The Montucky Review, Decanto, and Imitation Fruit. Two of his photos were recently accepted by Prick of the Spindle. His chapbook, The Grammar of Mind, was released by Blue & Yellow Dog Press 11/10 and one of his poem/photo combos was a 2010 Pushcart nominee.

On Hearing that My Good Friend Tried to Take Her Life, 28 Years to the Month After My Brother Billy Did Take His

2011-10-25T12:30:00.000-07:00

I think I’d just prefer

that everyone quit trying to die for my sins.

I don’t want anyone to die—

not my brother Billy; not John Lennon;

not even Jesus.

It always ends up that I feel

guilty and sick and alone

trying to atone for their sacrifice;

desperately trying to figure out where to put the knife

to return enough of their blood

and still leave me enough to carry on

and live.

No, I feel no need for your sacrifice.

If you feel still you must,

make it to yourself;

make it to God;

make it TO THE MOON

—but not to me.

For I am done with swearing.

About Chloe Wagner:

Chloe Wagner is a Quaker and a librarian-wanna-be residing in the Kansas City, MO area. She has been featured on the PoetryBlitz! CD and published in Thorny Locust, Prism Magazine, and The Corner Anthology.

THE DRIFT

2011-10-24T08:13:00.000-07:00

evidently

you've

survived

another

night, as

relentless

dawn

hoists itself

above the

horizon

and you

hoist yourself

out of bed

but this is

not

a life-

affirming

vignette

despite

the sun's

swagger

even while

muzzled

behind

a humid

shroud

of sky

and yes

yes

the haze

will burn off

but only

to reveal

deep

blue

drift

not unlike

your

own

deep

blue

blues

that

neither

sleep

nor drink

nor this

poem

can cloud

over for

very long

About Jack T. Marlowe:

Jack T. Marlowe is a gentleman rogue from Dallas, TX. A writer

of poetry and fiction and a veteran of the open mic, his work has

appeared in Carcinogenic Poetry, Red Fez, The Medulla Review,

Tree Killer Ink and many other zines. Marlowe is also the editor

of Gutter Eloquence Magazine (www.guttereloquence.com).

IMPENDING WEATHER

2011-10-20T07:36:00.000-07:00

A man came to my door

warning that low barometric pressure

would approach from the sea,

followed by torrential rains

guided by the hand of God.

I knew of this impending weather,

although Channel 4’s report

apparently lacked important details.

I had dug many curtain drains,

knowing the gravity of flood waters.

I had hauled tons of river rock

to stave off potential ruin.

But I had not known

that I would be the subject of God’s wrath

or that Channel 4 would abuse

my trust that it serve the public

at its frequency on the air waves.

About Keith Moul:

Keith Moul's poems have been published widely for more than 40 years. He also publish photos. His chapbook, The Grammar of Mind, was released 11/10 by Blue & Yellow Dog Press. A poem Keith wrote in response to one of his photos was a 2010 Pushcart nominee.

A BIRD LIKE YOU COULD SET THE WHOLE WORLD ON FIRE

2011-10-17T09:20:00.000-07:00

i am scaling a cliff side,
my stomach full of drop
and salt
like cold barren fields below.

there's a sparrow on the guard rail

and a fire
burning burning
in the sweet hay of a barn floor.

spark in the throaty warmth
of her voice, young flames.

open your mouth
in a slow and easing timbre
of smoke.

About Matt Lee Sharp:

Matt Lee Sharp attends Alabama's only liberal arts university. His Poems Can be found in various journals and e~zines.

DIRECTIONS TO REVOLUTION BLVD.

2011-10-12T08:35:00.000-07:00

He calls me late at night,

he’s drunk and I bet he’ll stay up

until that dirty sun makes its debut

over Tijuana,

puncturing the comfort in his line of sight

He tells me there’s something about me haunting him

He sloppily spills his remorse

onto the table

Slurring promises, drifting away -

coming back again, to say

“There’s just something about you”

He says I know it’s true,

he’s not the only one,

to have confessed this --

He says he doesn’t know what it is

Then, he contradicts himself,

stating that I deserve to know

what it is that makes them all love me so -

He says it was my eyes,

captivating, feline –

brimming in the color of envy

He over saturates the compliment

by saying he wants to be in me…

My silence folds him again

with regret,

If I would just go to Mexico,

he promises,

he’ll repay the debt.

About Lola Nation:

Lola Nation is a poet originally from Venice, California who is currently residing in Kansas City, Missouri. She writes short stories (Make it Short) and poetry (Insult to Injury Poetry) to keep her idle hands busy. She has had the honor of studying under the likes of Allen Ginsberg and Tom Robbins. She is a founding member of the Write the Future (WTF) a not-for-profit organization which hosts national poetry meetings, salons, publishes, and helps other writers network with one another. Her goal is to keep the writers on their meds. Her greatest accomplishment to date is breaking her leg at a poetry reading last October.

PROXIMITY

2011-10-10T15:02:00.000-07:00

The three-note song, the shallow remembrance

echoes I can feel lapping at me: fractal magic,

a study in layers, a natural pattern of macro-micro.

The sophisticated eye of the cinnabar-winged

black-bird knows its way around a marsh, knows

cattails stiff and bobbing; plopped unwittingly

miles away, it would still carry on the way it does

calling in the evening, rutting through the night

a study in place.

If my atoms bar the touch of you, why shouldn’t

the other parts of me? Trees, birds, they know the story:

instinct bears the ending, siphons doses of grief, loss

from water-wicked wings. But atoms, all they do

is buzz. And the spine

doesn’t tell the parts of the story I need to hear.

About Michele K. Johnson:

Michele K. Johnson is a first-year MFA candidate at George Mason University where she works in the University Writing Center. She has been published once before in The Ampersand Review and received the Edward T. Lewis Poetry Award from her undergraduate establishment, St. Mary's College of Maryland.

THE LONESOME FELLATIO POEM

2011-10-05T08:24:00.000-07:00

I hate the boyfriends

of my ex-girlfriends—

men blissfully unaware

of all the rogue teeth

and dry lips I’ve suffered

to sculpt their women

into prodigious dick suckers—

who believe the skills

at their waists are God’s

gift, so they send thanks out

to the wrong muchacho. I believe I deserve

a cheery Christmas card for the holidays

and balloons on my birthday,

at least—a candy gram with clever, vulgar puns

for every publication I make. And tell me

this isn’t poetic if you are a scraper

or have been scraped, and I will tell you kindly

you are pretentious and I do not like you.

But that’s presumptuous. Forgive me,

I am insecure and alone and there are people

out there who loved me enough—

just enough. What I mean to say is

I feel cliché like a half-empty glass,

like I’m missing the essential neurons that fire

contentment across synapses. So I chase girls

away to other laps because they don’t understand

how Larkin uses high windows as a metaphor

for redemption and hopelessness and how

those two are inextricably linked.

One reason is all we ever need

to leave. I think sometimes

there is too much confusion in this world

for poetry to perplex. I want to tell it

to you straight, all of it—

about the loving and the leaving—

but sometimes rather than words

comes the thought of high windows.

And then I can’t say it better

than a half-empty glass.

Today, I want all of them

back.

About T.J. Sandella:

T.J. Sandella is originally from Ashtabula, Ohio, but currently resides in Milledgeville, Georgia, where he shares a happy home with his dog, Rufio. He is a second year poetry student in Georgia College and State's MFA program. The winner of the Academy of American Poet's University Prize, TJ has had poems published in Foliate Oak Review, among others.

WITHOUT

2011-09-28T07:50:00.000-07:00

I’m lying in the back seat

without a man

to kiss

Just listening

to robins, some sparrows,

a cardinal chipping an evening sermon.

The garden of lake

breathes in the fading day – as blue

as unwrapped iris.

I am here

contemplating

the way sunlight bleeds

through maple leaves,

and the way I left you

because you cannot make a tree

sacred - or know the sweetness

of tapped sugar.

About Joy Gaines-Friedler:

For over twenty years Joy Gaines-Friedler earned her living as a photographer in the Detroit area. For her, the distance between camera lens and page is slim. Her poetry is widely published and has won numerous awards including First Place in the 2006 Litchfield Review contest for a series of poems based on the journal of her friend Jim who died from AIDS. Additionally, her work has been published in The Driftwood Review, Margie, The Pebble Lake Review, RATTLE, The New York Quarterly, and other literary journals. Joy teaches poetry for InsideOut Literary Arts Project which puts poets into Detroit Public Schools and for Springfed Arts that provides creative writing workshops for adults. She also works with young adults "at risk" at The Common Ground Sanctuary for Families in Crisis. Her first book of poetry Like Vapor was published by Mayapple Press, 2008.