at the estuary at the estuary
sandlings dig bait, tailgate the first ripple of a returning tide a mercury whisper of tipped-in light rushed in, in front of itself; swirls of wrung-out rags, scrow clouds scuffed…
Jul 30, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Tom Pickard
Outside Less Outside Less
I have been outside less, I have taken to saying, in the days since my daughter was born— passive, as though it were somebody else who bore her. And bore her, I also have taken to…
Jun 17, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Natalie Shapero
Twin Twin
He resembled me. I held him up to my lips, then threw him into the salty water. He sank to the bottom. I heard a giggle. An invitation to play together. (Translated from the Polish by Piotr Gwiazda)
Jun 2, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Grzegorz Wróblewski
Zero Visibility Zero Visibility
He moves in front of me. I can hear words… A prayer? A snake bite? I enter a fog tunnel. The guide falls silent. No way back. I grope my way forward. (Life is unbearable.) (Translated from the Polish by Piotr Gwiazda)
Jun 2, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Grzegorz Wróblewski
Dark Night’s Fly Catcher Dark Night’s Fly Catcher
Thatched myself Over with words. Night after night Thatched myself Anew against The pending eraser.
May 12, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Charles Simic
Uninvited Guest Uninvited Guest
Dark thought on a sunny day Languid miss in distress Everyone’s blind date With a look of having a secret Knife drawer in a madman’s kitchen A lone crow flying about in the head Suicide’s friend Soft-footed gravedigger of our hopes Hell’s night nurse Bending over a cradle.
May 12, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Charles Simic
Silent Film Silent Film
O winter evenings, When mother led me by the hand Into darkened cinemas Where a film had already started Like a dream someone else was having Into which we had walked in To find a young woman writing a letter And pausing to wipe her eyes In a room with a view of the gray sea And a bird flying about in a cage No one was paying any attention to, Nor to the white ship on the horizon, Perhaps drawing closer, perhaps sailing away. It was an occupied city, I forgot to say. We trudged our way home Bundled heavily against the cold, Keeping our eyes to the ground Along the treacherous, dimly lit streets
May 12, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Charles Simic
Night Owls Night Owls
Addicts of introspection Inmates of inner prisons Drawn and quartered Between body and soul Eyeballing time and eternity Making burglar tools Out of your brief exultations To pick the lock of their mystery Scribblers of briefs and writs Against a dissembling God Mad dogs of mystic love On your way to the pound Fellow sufferers, wretches like me And you pretty ladies too Each nailed to their own cross Let’s get some sleep if we can.
May 12, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Charles Simic
Crash-and-a-Half Crash-and-a-Half
Mourn the poem or porn locked inside or fried, the white scrambled pre-word, impulses so electric they’re post-, just the paths, the pulse. The embarrassment of backup forgotten, Alzheimer put on like a coat you paid a lot for, months owed to a machine. Here— take this, my life in numbered bundles. Don’t forget. Such blackness arrives always sudden and sad but peaceful, not even an accident this time. And you, half-brained, mea culpa the air where the data hadn’t risen to cloud height, so suitable for burial, disremembered, dismembered.
May 6, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Terese Svoboda
Demon Demon
“Good news,” said the doctor, “it’s a demon.” I asked for its name: was it No One? Was it Superego? He said it wasn’t those but he couldn’t guess the name. “Who knows,” he said, “It mightn’t even be a demon. It’s what we call a ‘diagnosis by elimination.’” Explaining he couldn’t operate, the doctor said let’s go ahead and medicate the hell out of it, make it sleepy. I named him “Demon” after his identity. I put him to sleep twice a day, one short one long; three times a week he did sport; he grew to six foot two; I said he was good; I went to the door of his room and left food.
May 6, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Kathryn Maris