Heads I

by Beverley Bie Brahic


Periwinkle blue is the sun
behind the church. And gold to the east where leaves
sift down off trees, splash
in gutters. Soon the team
of sweepers with their musical machines.

He lifts his bedroll to his arms,
carries it like something ailing
he settles in a corner of the sidewalk
until tonight.

Lit clouds skipping stone

by JKD, After Circulars by Sawako Nakayasu

Continuous air mid-hovers

which, that, of form, in love –

since film – captured – is

A reversal of status – circle

needs no reflection, form,

morning.

Cast///Case Studies (Statistics) by JKD

After Cask Number by Lisa Pasold

Shown hazard and (not) strung between just another person this
unexpected coding tv sectioned off that jut about to
if it is the same
torture for information advantage proposition pensions
if it is the same movement
if it is the same towered palace or wherein they were operating
a procedure if it is the person other always
hung between blackbox catcalled booby trapped
a nurse walks over a look (not here) to
wait that makes this count just as significant
just as if it were Mumbai New York Kadhimain
just as if a juxtaposition jostled front page heading lined
the undereye glanced to then don’t look (t)here in
case of insurgency complacency stagnancy operations
made for the tv-book movie-optioned prequel post-
apocalyptic hyperbolic stageset complete with Dan
Rather, Michael Jackson, Mickey Mouse plush
fresh out of the co-op curious feeling another’s light
skin surface damp another sandpaper hand state for the record
name rank serial inevitable interview(er)(ee) is not
this advantage that death combination so slight
slip through the suctioned door swoosh as curious as
fine a thin line strung between if it is the same body if
it is the same memorial this bagged foot tag if it is this close so
close as to sense heat filed down between swallowed
given (en)gulf(ed) backtracking if it is just a name just state for
the give it over up now recorded (be)foreclosing out into onto
the streets could be anywhere could be now here the one that
was not just going after anyone then wear your hard hat in case
of work objects people falling 10 or 121 or 1,332
the record says it just says in numbers

NEW: Cask Number, by lisa pasold

showing. not showing. torture & standard operating procedure.
if it is the same thing.
if it is the next day.
if it is the other person.
ah, it is always the other.
a hazard strung between two winter trees, waiting for another season. a nurse walks past (do not look here)
expected unwritten body, if it is packed in ice?
that photograph or, the skin curious-feeling. another's surface. alright, remember it like that for the inevitable interview, the made-for-tv movie, the book.
"Men may say, 'But it is not death'; yet of what advantage is this?" a combination of slight and great, that gulf
a blur, smudged into the camera. waiting, tearing down, that makes
eleven.

( 'put in ( words mouths ) ) by sean s

after Sweetest Counting by JKD

John Gardner said to Raymond Carver
Glory belongs to the act of being constant to some
thing bigger than damn ego.

Raymond said, Tess' friend Emily tells me
the purple host of burst rejection slips
comprehend sore need more forbiddenly than flags.
And you're published.
So what do you know.

My sister said, You're a cold shoulder
anyway, John. Warmth doesn't write
about morality. Your moons are caught like
icepicks in bare trees, even summers,
characters arctically haloed.

H said: I'm buried.
Double-spacing yourself and stamping
for delivery to others' approval. Your poem
uncaved me a little, that hazy stairway for
toddlers reaching up the cliff at the
end of the beach, fooled a faster ink
through me than adheres to that rock
for eons, reachable by train to south of France
and a tour for walking blood from stones.

I said: Migraine is an icepick I haven't had the
pleasure. But my eyes have been jittery lately. Some
creeping through my head thing, confetti
rain, paper flame distended radio cheering. Once
more Alleluia with
my thickened ear closer to distant matter.
Decoding after a day with a walk around the block.
The dryer colder air lets my key out of
the mailbox lock more easily. Leaving
short-memoried crumbs in my footsteps on the
sidewalks, under the transparency of bare limbs,
dwindling to a crumple of clothes,
motleys, farragoes.

J said, Sunday morning couples are everywhere
in their mussed mops. I only get annoyed when
they come out Mondays! Massing in pastel doorways with
their bluegray morning arms around their coffees,
English toffees, dissertations.
I hope the new year will bring a calmer carnival,
a dunking booth would be an improvement, the
brief lash of splashes, wiping the eyes now
and again. Thank you for remembering me the
many payoffs and layers of the coatly
word, portmanteaux.

K said, Be happy
that you are distractible by grass,
dunes, sand spitting on your fingers, spending
on skin, on clothing, watching lovers kiss
in nightclubs.
Do you want to place a sum in my column?
Consider that you will vanish.
I vanish, a whisper, a bumperstickered
car pulled parallel to yours at
a red light. Then rowing apart through
the rippling fen of curbs and glass. But, I
had dreams of you. Those limbs will come
together again, at least.

My cat said, I told him, John, he was
going to pay more rent.
Now wasn't I right?

De- Cadence by JKD

after 20 Nov 2007 posts, Decadence by Nick Urban and Peacock by Brandon Shimoda

Bran ville size declination meters angelish artless craving
The meatless formation of a year, or central nervous system
Capted. Caption to get in, brighter, bit then lightened
Transcrption. Struck whale meets weathering gatherers.
When to or wind-to gargoyles wintering lush cravings: to
Scavenge the strikes, hickory less prejudicial when smoked.
Stoke to collapse, sham of arm chains roped to graced water-
Fall as voodoo whodoo swami edicts grease the penance-
Seekers. Familiar as Chen in China, Li or Leopoldine
Tensed to solarize counter-models. At which careless
Invention weathered metals mire in this eyelet, lack from
The casing meant history when they let History bound.
Been in viceroy strings picknicked peacocks. Victory to
Get so underinvolved. Involuted darkness cooled into
Silhouettes removed from the source. Neck-wrangled, the very
Stall again, grovelling columns bare sentenced declinings.

Terminal by Jonathan Wonham

after "Woolly Time" by jkd

Close down in the apple seed
Extinction in the morning wave's maw
Wipeout for the clueless kid
Final procedures at the ivory store
Radio-silence under the last rock

On the Contrary, A Reversal of Status Takes Everything Very Easily by Jonathan Regier

After Circulars, by Sawako Nakayasu

Brontology comes on. Where would you go? Do you have a brave face or a cowardly face? Would you take yourself for a swine, a lion, a parakeet, a red block the very color of a solar limbec? Would you give me the best gift you've ever gotten? What did David Porter say when lightening struck him beside an apple tree in a wet field, near to a lake that was not blue?

"Would you take from me the best gift you've ever gotten?"

Circulars by Sawako Nakayasu

After “a reversal of” by Jill Darling and “Tuesday” by Rufo Q


Grill the hamburgers over the rain.
Of course the form of heaven is lake & stone, skipping posies.

Faster water is doing just fine. Put another kick on it –
I need clouds under the lake to remember you by.

Continuous lakes enjoy ending steps.
The air mid-hovers which, that, of form, in love, is.

We – since film – captured.

Chimpanzees circle the zoo. A reversal of status needs
no reflection, form, morning.

a reversal of - by jill d.

after Sunday by Sawako Nakayasu (hi Sawako!)

grill the hamburgers of form the heaven is lake, stone, skipping, faster. Water muddy, reflected, clouds on walk(9) to remember to need you time, the lakes the leading steps, the air mid-hovers which, that, of form, in love, is need. We since film, captured. Bananas rain during moments, many the one started it, get to need you all. Chimpanzees with zoo, a reversal of status, like the rain over the grill needs quickness of reflection, form, continuous(ly) circles.

Woolly Time by jkd

After Tuesday by Rufo Q

kick back time’s all woolly
up under the lake and it's ebony
sporadic time winnowed
woolly to back up all lake
luster morning waves rainy
and it’s all ebony mouthing
sporadic clues a which way
was what so this time’s a-
rainin’ hadn’t a kickback to
less sporadic hooligans in the
shenanigans under the lack
this rock’s all woolly would
be rainy-morning waves clued
into when ways were where
ended doing’s just fine, just finales
and its ebony morning not so
windowflashed the flush of
this kicked missed musings
on the whole woolly nature of
winnowing that clue’s lake
shimmer simmer back to
time’s all muster and bravado
click hand-fed stack it all up to
this clued-in Crusoe rainy back
balked, radio-silence under the
last rock erosion of then would
be this ebony woolly lake under
time this when what was clue

Tuesday by Rufo Q

after 'Sunday' by Sawako Nakayasu

Put another chimp on the grill,

the pansies you planted in the
rock garden are doing fine,

time to kick back and enjoy
the clouds like soggy pancakes
hogging the sky
..................I once had a friend
whose head was all woolly, hadn't
a clue which way was what
................................ended
up under the lake and it's ebony
sporadic, rainy-morning waves

and then there was that lady

went awry,

..............her teeth gone, living
off her daughter's hand-fed 'nanas

NEW: Sunday by Sawako Nakayasu

A zoo with chimpanzees is all you need to get it started. One of the many moments during which it rains bananas – capture it on film, since all we need is love - in the form of – that which hovers mid-air. The steps leading up to the lake are all the time you need to remember how to walk on clouds reflected on muddy water. Faster than a skipping stone, this lake is heaven in the form of hamburgers on the grill.

Empire Glued to Their Screens by Jonathan Wonham

After "quiet kentish home" by Sean S, "Sweetest Counting" by JKD and "Poem for November" by Rufo Q.

Ours and everyone’s earthquakes may be less
for today's stopped shaking, heaped up.

My chances of survival by definition were defeated
by long-ago radios, the breath of Darwin.

Now, I'm anxious, sorest about the hazardous success
of the upstairs butcher’s shop, that den

of wildness softly pressed
to the ceiling. All ears are not asking to be convinced

as they watch the empire glued to their screens.
It's like nothing had ever burst for them

clear of the forbidden denial.

"quiet kentish home" by sean s

Ah, English. How you pilot your
ship in Asian waters. The hearth
under your mush-mouthed empire,
spelling countries as if chewing on a biscuit.

Thinking of San Francisco and watching my
nephew grow.
The wildness there is under your feet
(not over your head, child of midwestern plains),
shore saw grass, dunes, hills accreted on hills.

Darwin's waves lap even here.
If I'm there my chances of surviving
earthquakes may be less, but his
may be more.

Sweetest Counting

After Emily Dickinson's N° 67 "Success is Counted Sweetest" posted by Garrison Keillor on the Writers' Almanac for today's election (click on that link to go read and listen). A cut up process with Dickinson's poems and other words taken from political speeches and the press.

Here, far from my counted sweetest domain
Wherin to comprehend huddled need,

Not one elsewhere, but multiplicitous, flag
Glued to screens, clear of the pounding on whose forbidden

Nothing so much burst agonized and native:
A country of those who wait, nectar

Massed in some portal, all purple ears
Pressed to bluegrey morning-song.

Success is this public never succumbing,
Impatient, anxious. What’s that which requires sorest

Long-ago felled Hosts? We who took to radios,
Eye the definition so tricolour, confetti defeated, dying

Shine as if strains of Triumph! today
Can tell bright Victory! This secreting

Below our ear, awaited, closer to distant matter,
Thinned as an oboe almost tuned, to hear joy’s pure receding.