August 26th, 2008
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James Doyle
SCHOOLGIRLSSchoolgirls in black skirts
and white blouses water flowers
that bloom only in the night.One of the girls wears a laurel
crown, another has a thin scar
down her leg and around her ankle.The teacher, at the far corner
of the field, sands the ancient
clapper which will call them in.The fence around the field
and school house is electrified,
but that doesn’t keep boyfriendsfrom trying to climb it.
Their bodies, strewn all over
the mesh, waste away muchtoo slowly. The janitor works
overtime to scrape them off,
but he can’t keep up. The girls arestudying biology, will get to stay
up late to watch the flowering.
When the clapper goes off, they linedouble-file in order of height, march
out of recess to classical strains.
The fence fills up again.
–from Rattle #28, Winter 2007
August 25th, 2008
Damien Echols
FIRST LOVEIn those days you were something
felt but not seen
as you handed me love letters
written in dead languages.The chain link fence behind me
made cold diamonds on my back
and your head was on my shoulder
with only one breath between us.Your hair against my face
smelled like woodsmoke and chocolate,
your lust was raw and new,
as jagged and dangerous as rocks beneath the waves.Now I’m trapped here like a ghost
haunting places that no longer exist,
feeding on frost and hummingbirds
during long November nights.__________
UNCLE CHARLIE
My best friend’s uncle
used to tell us stories
about life in Vietnam.
He smoked hand-rolled cigarettes
that turned his fingers yellow
and sipped whiskey straight from the bottle
as he explained how they’d used chocolate bars
to lure the children to landmines.
He chuckled while describing
the way the “gooks” exploded,
but told us we were too young
to hear about the whorehouses
he’d visit on his days off.
–from Rattle #28, Winter 2007
August 24th, 2008
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Alan Fox
A POET IS SUPPOSED TO LIVE HIS LIFE OUT LOUD
I know there are certain truths
I shouldn’t tell you,
and certain lies
I should.I shouldn’t tell you that my wife and I
made love last night
while waiting in line
for a fast food feast.I should tell you
that you’re my favorite
(fill in the blank)
and that you always will be.I certainly should say
“I miss you,”
even though I don’t.
I always get in trouble with that one.It gets worse
when I know there are certain truths
I shouldn’t even tell myself,
and certain lies I must.I absolutely, positively will lose
ten pounds in the next two months,
so stop reminding me.
I believe myself. I always believe myself.
–from Rattle #28, Winter 2008
August 23rd, 2008
Review by Karen J. Weyant
MY FLORIDA
by Kathleen Tyler
The Backwaters Press
3502 North 52nd Street
Omaha, Nebraska 68104-3506
ISBN: 978-0-9793934-6-4
70 pp., $16
www.thebackwaterspress.com
Palm trees swaying on sandy shorelines. Couples walking hand-in-hand into sunsets. College students going wild on spring break. Certainly, these images of Florida are often the first pictures that come to mind when we think of our Sunshine State. Kathleen Tyler’s My Florida, however, delivers a much darker landscape.
Tyler’s first poem, “Ars Poetica,” is significant to this collection. While “an art of poetry” poem seems to be a somewhat predictable way to start any collection of poetry, Tyler’s carefully measured lines serve the collection as a strong introduction:
They came on suddenly, storms did,
when I was eight. All morning I swung
upside down from a rope, arcing over
the lake. Trees strung from clouds. Hair raking
water, just beyond the snapping turtle’s bite.
Although we don’t know it quite yet, these opening lines show us what we will expect in from her collection: characters living in darkness within reach of danger. We see a landscape that seems ready to swallow a child whole, a dark world which will make its appearance again and again, along with characters eerily reminiscent of those found in the works of Flannery O’Connor.
August 22nd, 2008
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Daniel Stewart
SINGULARITYFired from God’s .45 she tore a hole
in me black as a crow’s wing.
She found the universe dull as a sitcom, the laughtrack
louder with the voices of the dead than October
rain’s gallop across the roof, and so
collapsed. She languished, lilac, leopard;
I prayed to prowl with her, prey with her, lick
blood and meat with her, but God sucked
my tongue into His mouth and
bit. Rain, you are song when I long
for arms; the birds tuck heads
under wing, wings are weapons, like the wind
in the leaves; wings are choices, like the sea
throwing up stars on the sand. She tore
a hole in me the size of God
so heavy with gravity not even light
escapes me.
–from Rattle #28, Winter 2007
