and the pages of cities by sean s

after white spaces by maitresse

pages used to
be bound by medieval glue.
sewing.
trade routes.

now it is markup
the index to you no longer between (you)
but in (me).

the hiccup of a knife
point between
the materiél
ancient letters (threads, roads) shudder,
disintegrate.

now you, the nearness of you is the
knife.

parting me to reveal yourself.

we are closing with our indices.

the aether learning to read.

one day, the tattoos
will be coded into my cells

all skin will rise from earth
written through

and through

each other.

The difficulty of activating anyone by JKD

After yesterday’s strike plus October 2008 rewords poems, What’s Enough by Jonathan Regier and the form of All those Choices by George Vance


I.

To
the extent that rain is its own Metropolis of strikers
in
lament against the accepted guard, we stand
at
the iron drawbridge of the palace, crossed, a crossing, no luck, staring
into
the sun, of entering
there
is barricaded—we have no chance of getting through.

II.

For
Galileo an Armageddon of what was said, to
take
cover, rain can't ever, a certain voice hearing, over
take
running is still the break rushing to greet its brethren walking
forth:
the blind masses blinded, blinding sunrays, rise.

III.

Hours at our windows
here
climb upward to the past, back forever going
over
windows lit from the upward rushing future stars night
fall
we call "The Streetlights of Tomorrow" ancestors
blushing
strongly upward grazed to see us here, immobile.

IV.

To
say the old faith is that I believe in, as in I
believe
in a Universe without Void,
in
the Plenum, in the Vertical lacking Emptiness, to
fill
with touch its creatures I am among the
new
faith, say, I in the rain mass chest of Metropolis
rolling
forward. This blank page is just the sign we
needed.

Explaining the Train

When a driver gets into a train
he is its brain. The driver
conducts the train towards
its nutrient: the passengers.
Sometimes the passengers
like to be fed to the train.
Sometimes it's too much food
and a relief to be spewed up.
Sometimes the train is not hungry
and the passengers go stale.
This is called hunger strike.
Then the passengers remember
that the train has a brain.
They look at their stale hands
and sneak off home for a bath.

How Better than MetroBoulotDodo by gv

Gulls in night-heat

honk hack and hee-haw

telling jokes each on its own chimney-pot

rrurrga rrurrga rrurrga rrurrga

Model T horn treble clef

aaaahh’unnk aaaahh’unnk ha’ ha’ ha’ ha’

inpressing air-snuffing wrap flung-open shutters blot of sky

harr harrdee har-har awwrruppp yâh yâh yâh

behind-me-mocking conscience

kluck ! kluklukluklukluk

bright-lit moth white in flight
dark flit-sloth parked on stark bark

gooorrlglawk quawk quawk quawk gooorrlglawk quawk quawk quawk
yakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyakyak

^^^^^

Squall by JKD

A variant and reversal of Lisa Pasold’s Snow Squall

the trick with being constant, like weather,
is to tromp downstreet watching some dog-owner instead

of being part of a Sunday carnival of bare limbs,
footprints on the frontwalk, to recognize

in frosted glass panes, a bevel of ice, standing
before the white window, the duvet pulled tight

while in the driveway (everytime, it’d bleed if it could)
the struck stone and bleeting snowplow backing up

hazel-eyed, the morning curling white
doubled-over like angels waking in snow

Intermeeting by Jennifer K Dick

After Lauren Elkin’s “White Spaces”


How many white hours spaced my life
from yours, time

and timing someone else’s night
flares

against my own weightless
beating

white spaces by maitresse

after The Waves by Virginia Woolf and "Somedays" by Regina Spektor and "Society" by Elizabeth Bowen

How you snatched from me the white spaces that lie between hour and hour… Yet those were my life.

Some days aren’t yours at all
they come and go like someone else’s days.

How you snatched from me some days that weren’t yours at all, the hours that lie between days and days, the intermeet of then and now,

Interserted between me and me.

The white spaces between someone else’s days
and my own. They lay on mine

(all these beating hearts)

weightless.

New: Casser la hanche by ELS

Two men, overheard, rest against the bar,

"So hard to break her hip! Break the

line that resists the pressure of birth." But,

pleased that the ruptured body,

triumphantly laid across the mantle,

overflows each side -- hair swarths her face.

snow squall by lisa pasold

after 'simple neighboring' by barbara beck

waking up like snow angels, the doubled-over,
hazel-eyed morning, curling, while

the back-up snowplow beeping, hits that stone
(every time, it would bleed if it could) in the driveway

walking to the window, pulling the white duvet
standing, the glass panes frosted, a bevel of ice

the front walk, and footprints i want to recognize.
i miss Sunday's carnival of bare limbs

watch some dog-owner tromping down the street,
the trick with being constant, like weather.

Tromped (trumped) once around the block (as if a defining) by JKD

After Down to the Felt by Sean S, Simple Neighboring by Barbara Beck, my December reword Wing-Clipped, & Amanda Oak’s poem lost petition: for an endangered species from her Pretty Fnmess blog and book dreams that would drown most men (Rose of Sharon Press).

Could recognize as her, a dwindling to a crumple in expansion, your explaining.

Mussed nearly together Sunday's carnival of bare limbs, musings being
lashed in parallel of couples everywhere bluegray constant and distractible.

On her skin it is the same as always, the other person rounded by curbs or glass
she forbiddenly pins her hopes on gambler Icarus, sulking down to the green felt
about space kicking him in, says it’s less the onslaught than wearing the traitor.

Simple neighboring where are you on the brink of brutish upholding,
a close upkeep, of what she does half beside the sacred grace, the angle
uncavernous, a little pleasing enclave or uncaving old bones, to swell
deeper than you, double pleasured in the aimless morning of this aimless self.

Stay therefore unknotted, done, burnt bride of this praised columbine
who visits your dreams, a reminder crossed towards that shallow sacred
river, seven times seventy, says it is an old man, a hag’s ancient messaging
to be silent crackle hear the wax melted tumbling Icarus goaded into
the have-known abstinence of a pretty, but metal, feather exhaling him.

Open, she is sown to, thrice-stitched as a down feather on fire,
glacial to touch fingers quickening lips cementing into caged missives:
what to telegram from our amassed carnival of tender alembics? To
meet in the mid-haze mire of streetlamps frothed fog as oceans broil
means to be a stone’s throw, to roll around in our rusty double skin,
ghost guided, wolves met halfway speaking, shouting thunder.

Don't tell spitting lightning, of golden silence wild in your pockets
cupping bodies cropped in the nudity of dawn’s loose change, lost buttons
in the middle of snow, the world still sleeping, ounces of collection seeping out
what it means to be shouldered, given alike as planes strapped to her knotted
burnt hideous kinky abstinent pout, why does she feel like she’s strongest
just before the tumble, Icarus? Death split over featherless thousands, dice
thrown down stripped through an atmosphere slicker than this crackling species.

Down To The Felt by Sean S

after Wing-clipped by JKD

Flippity flop. Wax never claps.
Snow in Las Vegas. Planes hit the straps.
Columbine stitched round his lips in a pout,
gambler Icarus sulks down to the felt.

My knotted burnt bride, done hideous kinky,
aimlessly abstinent, why do I feel like
I'm strong? I Icarus falling like snowy shoulders.
Wearing in my rack my own traitors,

a death split over featherless thousands, dice
throws down an atmosphere slicker than ice.

simple neighboring by barbara beck

mostly after (put in (words mouths)) by sean s

what she does half beside the sacred
angle uncaves a little pleasing
pleasures double in the morning

stepwise the same hazy street
for walking blood closer
to stone's share

could recognize as hers
dwindling to a crumple mussed nearly
together Sunday's carnival of bare limbs

lashed in parallel couples everywhere
bluegray tromping around the block
being constant and distractible

by curbs or glass spitting farrago
payoffs she hopes forbiddenly about space
kicking in less onslaught

on skin it is the same day
always the other person rounded
shoulder she gives alike

Insomnia by JKD

after Epiphany by Rufo Q, Hearing Her by Sue Chenette and Obverse by George Vance

an inch
and a half
of
time
breaks/wakes
emerging
wrinkled
behind the world-like gutter
the sun sifts through

cinnamon.

*

bed flying to dawn night
sparks converge
emerge
supine
meteorites (from which
body’s darkness

chipped?)

*

languid
–showered language braceleted
leveled leaves
silver/
sliver
(a flip of the)
[effects
feveredream
fervent]
where from out
fire
contained

soundwave /// spike

Gutter change by Rufo Q

after Obverse by G Vance, Tailings by J Wonham & Heads I by BBB

Fly me to dawn,
the end of night

bed, and above me rain
falling like gold on zinc
....................

hearing her by Sue Chenette

..........after Sliver by JKD

hearing her
sparks converging
emboldened splotch of meteorites
(from which supine body?)

chipped darkness
spittle-showered
braceleted in languid language

mother-of-pearl-rippled
wavelets
leveled fever dream
(leaves
[effects]
sliver where from out
contained fire
soundwave spike

breaks/wakes
emerging

***

Sliver (new, by JKD)

.....chipped mother-of-pearl-fever dream

.......................................................contained...(from which body
emerges?)
...................Well sparks..............(converging
...............................................when supine
.....................................................................leveled
languid language
..........leaves wake ripple-effects......................soundwaves
wavelets
...................spikes.....................................[brakes] or
[bracelets]
splotch of meteorites
...................................showered spittle
...............................................................(or)....fire

(where from out emboldened darkness)
................................................................hearing her

OBVERSE by g vance

after Tailings by J Wonham


Gold is the chapel
its doors, change

wrinkled behind the world-like gutter
the sun sifts through moneyfall

I fly my bed to the dawn of night,
cling to no polluted home



^^^^

NEW: Epiphany by Rufo Q

.......
Eleven o'clock,
an inch
and a half
of
cinnamon.