Leaves by Amanda Deutch after JKD's "Splintered"

Leaves

to look at you now splintered amongst missives
caught in light
delicate as all destruction
feather on fire
you lay naked craving tin
and the ping of raindrops on the roof
outer layers scabbed with bites
braille over body
this skin soft and flammable
shedding as embers
switch to strip to patter
hand greasy
green underneath layers
bury thought in dirt
knowing which trick will provide the greatest return

Splintered

by JKD, after "fire-making for" by Beverley Bie Brahic

Knowing which trick ( leaf ) fire will apply, the string of
twig-switch to fern-feather stripped tinder spark. Lay
underneath, as stone. Cool moss’ damp cavernous body
craving tin rooftop’s ping. Raindrops patter-hand greeny
underneath : outer layers scab-soften to startled birch.
Shy shedding of self. Then white-bark, starling-scatter
whisp of voice long-settled on shoulders. Skin, translucent
as embers. This, delicate as ashes with all destruction behind.
It’s one of those knowing missives, wind rising or letters transferred, braille over which leaf applies to the sting. Here’s where light catches, but here, too, dark returns. Thought burrowed, caught.

never without visions

by miranda after burning by beverley bie brahic, spare-ness by JKD and a beautiful burning by Sue Chenette

Whisper -- edge of things -- broken -- solidify -- solidify a window view. Look we've fallen -- not fallen -- would not have fallen. She sought sparks with me. The self is nasty. Edge of things. Whisper fallen for in this instant, many instants passed. If overheard, believe me, but you scratched out the contexts of everything - i said nothing. I showed nothing. Edge edge edge out of things. I will take uninformed beginnings and form them for you -- you'll see me. You'll see me through now. You'll take me whole. 

fire-making for

by beverley bie brahic


what tricks
body will play crave
rain on the roof
patter of love

One paw steals off
all itself picks
scab of the oak

When shy birches shed
white bark
starlings settle on their shoulders

you can light fires
ashes with
that It’s one of those

out-in-the-wilds-night
coming-on-wolves
girl scout tricks eg

knowing which leaf
applies to the sting. Here’s
ferns to feather twig

circle of stones First strip
the outer layers underneath

dry as tinder It
only takes a spark

Listen to the Blue

by JKD, after Lisa P's Drink & Jill Darling's (pl)ace

We step into a box
sky
over the land mass into
a
then
rattled
as in fire
the red, the black earth of it's
sky
a query lingering
swimming in the brown murk
could be the Tiger, the Thames
brockeraged slice off
this

the spin put on things
daily
sleep
circle as reaching black
back
memory's a scorpion-tail
flick
sting of harvest winds
sky of
this masked potential,
remoriated placement
singed

drink

by lisa pasold after box of sky by A Deutch and Burning by S Chenette


nowhere is a query lingering in the aftermath of that whiskey
the ice dissolved, sludge in the mouth the next morning. the window
a box of sky, the stinking glass on the windowsill, slide of water. why
these cityscapes, abbreviated land, one of us plowing. that corner
or this, sheets untucked, some ring lost, we'll never find it,
the circle never happened, a brazenly transparent memory, our
glass empty, whispering, hangover-like. look how
we've fallen together, melted, ring or not, brokeraged for a fresh bottle.

After Lucian Freud

by Amy Hollowell, after (pl)ace by jill d. and Box of Sky by Amanda Deutch

Utopia occurs heavy with tits, spilling naked on a torn ochre couch
unstuffed. Color is full frontal
without reconfigurations of mercantile primacy.
It’s a painterly unmasking from above, implicit with sky. Dirt in its place
is where we are, thick with grace, where we have all been before
cushioned in the flesh of folds
unboxed. Body hair darkens what remains ancient in us
and unabbreviated. Shadows too are bare. From behind,
boots filled with motion reflect
the language of as it is.

(pl)ace

by jill d. after box of sky by Amamda Deutch

Box of sky a rattling textual awareness, a positive sense dismisses utopia. We have all been to this place before. Swerve. Manage every account of money and goods. An endless video of unreminded wealth (or commodity as wealth) (fetish). Only a piece of what represents sky pokes through, from behind or in front. Listen for the blue, the thin, the message that tomorrow only occurs as potential, abbreviated, masked.

NEW: Box of Sky:Skeleton Poems by Amanda Deutch

Allow me to linger in your aftermath
box of sky. a (s)kill as in nightmare and whatever else.
some say, “See me tomorrow.” Some scream, “It’ll never happen.” on the corner of Great Jones and Bowery. Incidently, nowhere is no place it was before anymore which can be quite disorienting, but some may say, “At least we have televisions in taxicabs now and so many new condominiums.” On the subway she is reading, The Secret to Positive Thinking, as she elbows me unaware of her body. To my left, a man reads, Communication in Brokerage. Glass towers shoot back a liquidized reflection. Abbreviations leave a language that once was now in the was. how words can re fathom themselves without us knowing and masks behind masks pop on in the land of selves communicating with other selves. so many screens and reconfigurations to separate us with. delineations in place of dirt. hairless beings devoid of their hairy primacy. box of sky. silent. meeting.

burning

burning
by beverley bie brahic after a beautiful burning by sue chenette


memory’s
whispered
edge
hooks
shapes

such
glowing
solidity

fallen
panoplies

we’ve fallen to panoplies of ashes

by Jill Darling after spare-ness by jkd


staggering through each
letter, breath
(anti)hero
following our own best
mistakes stumbling
over continuous
moments
plot, character, trailing
behind narratives
misunderstood

the main players,
the story
or, a valley,
an oasis of disturbed
sensation
flaking
a full array of possible
beginnings, endings
what happens at each point
sliced
like armor made of sand
an epic tale of love
wandering
recognition
presented entirely in strokes
of red, grey, translucent

spare-ness

by JKD, after a beautiful burning by Sue Chenette and Sliced by Jill Darling

of memory's burning
brazen, strung out words languageless
images coated over imagining
grass undone
a flamerushed summer
gone to brush
whispered edge of cattails
cave-shadowed murk
moss and ponds hooked to
mind or flipping fins
shimmers shaped such tricks
of refused solidity:

look – we’ve fallen to panoplies
of ashes, sought sparks
within each scratched out letter
this self’s surface passing
unrecorded
the stretched sound
strung over field to the lip of yes
slipped hands, fern blades, blush
underneath, the gaze grazed
cool against the restraint
of fumbling syllables

sliced

by jill d., after jkd's past language, this writing

spare-ness of a word stretched out
covering like grass gone
undone
over a summer

each letter scratched out
from the past (un)recorded stretch
of sound strung
over field lot august
the slip of yes
cool against the palm
of restraint

a beautiful burning

by Sue Chenette, after how to write by Sean S, Point of View by Geo Vance, and Sighting by JKD

memory's brazen burning
whispered rush of flame
at the edge of cave-shadow

hooks for your mind or heart
shimmering shimmy-shaped
such tricks

even the glowing coals
refuse solidity:

look -- they've fallen together
ashes, and panoplies of sparks
....