Myth
by Joseph J. Capista

Cross a thin ribbon of sky which is, of course, the river. A child pits a bowl of olives with the bone-handled paring knife. Its blade is whetted too thin; it holds everyone's reflection but her own. She is eight. Off with your finger she says to no one, then lops off a tip, pinches its skin, and extracts with her teeth the olive pit, which she spits into another bowl. Three bowls, in all: one for what is hard, one for what is soft, one for what remains untouched. From the hook she has lifted, draped along her neck, and tied at the small hollow of her back the night. Clock, upon clock, upon clock. Still, who is prepared for this moment? If you want to hear better, close your eyes, she says. If you want to hear better, cover your ears. Each olive in the yellow bowl is black. Lining the river bridge are houses identical to this house; windows on one side hold the world, but windows on the other side hold the world. She counts sparrows on ratlines. When you stop dreaming of ghosts, she explains, then you have become a ghost. When she dreams, the olives in her dreams are green.

from the journal SOUTH DAKOTA REVIEW

Joseph J. Capista on "Myth"
Art makes problems by solving problems, I tell students, and solves problems by making problems. After stepping away from the writing desk for some time―COVID chaos, teaching obligations, family preoccupations―I returned to it disenchanted with problems of received forms and accentual-syllabic verse. Where better to turn than the prose poem? Russell Edson defined the prose poem as “a burst of language following a collision with a large piece for furniture.” No injuries occurred during the making of this poem.

#poem #poetry #literature

https://mailchi.mp/poems/todays-poem-myth-joseph-j-capista?e=6ec42bce63

I Hear America Singing
By Walt Whitman

I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,
Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blithe and strong,
The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,
The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work,
The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the deckhand singing on the steamboat deck,
The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter singing as he stands,
The wood-cutter’s song, the ploughboy’s on his way in the morning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,
The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at work, or of the girl sewing or washing,
Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else,
The day what belongs to the day—at night the party of young fellows, robust, friendly,
Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46480/i-hear-america-singing

#poem #poetry #literature

To measure internal activity while it turns all I know to rubble
By Rusty Morrison

I repeat “dead” aloud enough times for its meaning to loosen

from sense. Once the word I repeat is no longer comprehensible,

it begins to attack everything else I know.

Giorgio Agamben says devastation is one face of a Genius

that exists inside us. The other face is creation.

The two sounds that begin and end “dead” echo in my ears.

Then a third appears between them. The middle sound, between

the coronal plosives of the letter d, is the ghost.

Agamben tells us that the Genius is within us only as long as

we realize it does not belong to us. Just as existence does not.

Now I begin to voice only the ghost, and watch it ‘not appear.’

Is the narrow space between my Genius’s two faces

where that ghost lives? When I listen for what will not appear,

I hear my own voicelessness amplify.

My hearing is most acute when I’m naked

in front of the bedroom mirror.

I want voicelessness to create an echoing hollow

inside every word I type.

I feel how listening to find disappearances makes my nipples erect.

Disappearance is my new self-seduction.

---

“I was dealing with the death of someone close. My feelings were complicated, leaving me exhausted. But something in me shifted when reading Giorgio Agamben. He freed me from grieving, allowing me to find a fierceness—a fierceness that asked me to plunge into this moment, then the next, to dive into everything changing. The poem took time to finish. I was standing in front of my mirror, as I describe, when I opened to see the many selves I am disappearing, as I asked myself who I am. Then I wrote the last lines, or the poem wrote them for me.”
—Rusty Morrison

Rusty Morrison
Rusty Morrison is the copublisher at Omnidawn. She has authored several poetry collections, including Risk (Black Ocean, 2024) and Beyond the Chainlink (Ahsahta Press, 2014), which was a finalist for the Northern California Book Award. The recipient of fellowships from UC Berkeley’s Arts Research Center, Civitella Ranieri, and Djerassi Resident Artists Program, Morrison lives in Richmond, California.

https://mailchi.mp/poets/september-02-2024-poemaday-12138304-331miebijr-12140576?e=2706955217

#poem #poetry #literature

Mrs. Butterworth, Uncle Ben & Aunt Jemima
BY Frank X. Walker

...walk into a bar in America.
Butterworth says, I’m being repackaged.
Ben says, I’m being rebranded.
Jemima says, I remember
when they branded my mama on her back.

The bartender says, I could stand in the middle
of Main Street and kill somebody
and I wouldn’t lose any voters.
Butterworth says, then I’ll take eight bullets
in my sleep. Ben says choke me to death
with your knee. Jemima says,
lock me in a holding cell and say
I decided to hang myself.

The bartender poured the drinks,
said he felt threatened
and was simply standing his ground
when he thought the thug
was reaching for a gun.

The headlines said Well-Loved American
Foods Resisted Arrest, Failed
to Comply, and Were Delicious While Black.

Butterworth’s daughter said here’s to progress,
we might finally get an anti-lynching bill.
Ben’s son said I’d rather they abolish
qualified immunity. Jemima’s kid said you know
they abolished slavery once,
then they hung my mama on that box.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/162299/mrs-butterworth-uncle-ben-aunt-jemima?mc_cid=a052b77ac1

#poem #poetry #literature

Unter dem Himmel des Herzens

tief am Horizont der Heiterkeit atmet leise
das goldene Geheimnis von Frohsinn und Freude.

Mit Anmut als Königin
dringt nichts Trübes in diesen edlen Raum freien Friedens.

---

Under the sky of the heart

deep on the horizon of serenity breathes softly
the golden secret of cheerfulness and joy.

With grace as queen
nothing gloomy penetrates this noble space of free peace.

1. 06. 2024

#ya #poem #gedicht

one of my latest ones

WHY WOULDN’T AUTONOMOUS CARS CRY AT NIGHT?
by Ryan McCarty

Awake and acutely aware
of each other’s proximity
to streetlights and the shifting
shapes of moons on their own
empty interiors, with enough
of them huddled in the lots,
why not honk? Why not holler
at the silent ones, identically dark
and empty on their left and right,
the whole still pile like a flicker
of a future scrapyard in the making?
Why not scream to call a crowd
of ghosts down from their squares
of light up there, those past
wanderers of these same streets,
subjects of their own lonely stories
now forgettable as algorithms,
broke codes that used to commute
in packs, hunter gatherers
heading into the sunrise chatting,
now silent, autonomous, floating
like a disconnected signal? And how
do we hear our children in the night
calling, but tomorrow all the same
just ride them silently to work?

—from Poets Respond

---

Ryan McCarty: “I keep thinking about this story about a lot full of autonomous vehicles that ‘get confused’ at night and start wandering around beeping at each other. It immediately seemed like they were scared or lonely or just kind of riled up, exactly like we might be when left alone on those dark nights when a little of that other kind of darkness starts to creep in. And it made me wonder what we’re making or, for that matter, what we’ve already made.”

https://www.rattle.com/why-wouldnt-autonomous-cars-cry-at-night-by-ryan-mccarty/

#poem #poetry #literature

ONE LAST POEM FOR LOULOU
by MICHAEL CHANG

the oldest story is richard gere in east hampton

& allen ginsberg ruining my marriage

in 1983

i was pronounced dead for several minutes

thinking of all the emails being sent

that i knew nothing abt

finally seeing what any nice girl wants:

testicles

apartment paid for

invasive species in the mystic river

in that order

(“ is that all there is ??? ”)

the slovenly gallerist chanting less is more

looks up at the big map of texas

failing to heed the age-old adage

that bald is better than bald-ing

remind me not to disappoint u

janelle monáe

the original supervillain

eminently-fuckable julien

red for the judges / black for the priests

we could for instance

change outcomes w. words

he writes down then crosses out

(“ who cleans on a monday ??? ”)

stupid hot

like ur from another decade

walked off the set of wayne’s world

underwear sorta crusty

baby pissy bully sassy

the only sadder job than poet laureate

is former poet laureate

hell if i know

the ballcap says kinda nasally

why don’t u google it

hang on ur prob a bing guy

before they discovered manscaping

i would bury my face in it

MICHAEL CHANG (they/them) is the author of TOY SOLDIERS (Action, Spectacle, 2024) & THINGS A BRIGHT BOY CAN DO (Coach House Books, 2025). They edit poetry at Fence.

https://www.havehashad.com/hadposts/one-last-poem-for-loulou

#poem #poetry #literature

Golden Retrievals
BY Mark Doty

Fetch? Balls and sticks capture my attention
seconds at a time. Catch? I don’t think so.
Bunny, tumbling leaf, a squirrel who’s—oh
joy—actually scared. Sniff the wind, then

I’m off again: muck, pond, ditch, residue
of any thrillingly dead thing. And you?
Either you’re sunk in the past, half our walk,
thinking of what you never can bring back,

or else you’re off in some fog concerning
—tomorrow, is that what you call it? My work:
to unsnare time’s warp (and woof!), retrieving,
my haze-headed friend, you. This shining bark,

a Zen master’s bronzy gong, calls you here,
entirely, now: bow-wow, bow-wow, bow-wow.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47252/golden-retrievals

#poem #poetry #poets #literature

#we
#nostrongman
#noassets #noagents #noofficers #noarchitect
#wecanstillmendthis

---

#accidentalpoem #accidentalquip #tagpoem #foundpoem #poem
#digitspoems #13145

TRUE STORY
by Bob Hicok

I can’t escape the possibility
I was meant to own a Zamboni
but got stuck with three can openers instead.
Or that I should have kissed your knees
last night when you got home
from being with your friend
who just had her cat killed. I know
I’m supposed to write “put to sleep,”
but can she wake her up now? No.
And it was kind of you to rush over
right after work and you deserved praise
in some form and your knees
don’t get enough attention, I guess
I’m saying. Where would we have gone
on the Zamboni? Dunno, but how
is certain: slowly. Here’s a headline
you never have to worry about:
Three Canadians Killed
in Zamboni Drag Racing Accident.
I’d buy a newspaper to tell the world
how much I love you. Tons. Geegobs.
And how many cats have we cried over
so far? Four, and one dog, and soon
we’ll start adding parents
to that list, then one of us
will look at empty chairs around the house
and hate them. So knees, elbows, hair,
and of course the more famous bits:
I kiss thee in life and in poems,
which are not life, more like a flashlight
turned on in a black hole. Geegobs
is a lot. Geegobs squared is more
accurate. But is amount really
the correct measure of love?
I love you greenly, gymnastically, variously
and Stradavariusly, I love you
with my heart shadow and my brain fog
and my suitcase-packing skills. The suitcase
I’m packing for when you go
to the next room and I have to follow.
Poor kitty. Poor friend. Poor us.
Who have to deal with mortality
using a limited toolkit. There’s crying,
drinking, toking, injecting, breaking
dishes and popsicle sticks, and loving
longer and softer those who remain.
How long ago did there cease to be a time
I can remember being without you?
1897, I think, the year the jumping jack
was invented, the year levitating
was added to the Olympics, the year
I first dreamed I was alive
and saw you coming around the corner
and thought, So this
is the famous happiness
I’ve heard so much about.

—from Rattle #84, Summer 2024

---

Bob Hicok: “I like starting poems. After I start a poem, I like getting to the middle, and after the middle, an end seems a good thing to reach. When the end is reached, I like doing everything that isn’t writing poems, until the next day, when my desk is exactly where I left it, though I am a slightly different person than the last time we met.”

https://www.rattle.com/true-story-by-bob-hicok/

#poem #poetry #literature

#august #poppies #memorial #war #remembrance #poem
In Flanders Fields
By John McCrae

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Jigsaw

Are we not children
of the universe? Splinters,
connected by mind?

© Simon J Ashcroft, 2024

#haiku #poem #poetry #PoetryCommunity

BUYING PRODUCE FROM THE MARKED-DOWN CART
by Lynn Levin

The Minor Virtues

I rescue them at times from the back of the store—
cellophaned oranges and apples
packaged good-side-up.
I imagine them as little brains
thinking of the days when they were on the tree
and full of promise.

Mostly I leave the rusty beans, blotched pears
to the gleaners, calling to mind my days
as a gleaner at Dominicks and Star
when I approached with furtive hunch
the scratched and bruised, bought them

with my meager pay. What a bounty of salads and pies
they made me who saved them from the heap.
More than anything I hate waste
and yet how much
of my own life have I let go unused.

—from Rattle #49, Fall 2015

#poem #poetry #literature

Time's Mystery

Where have these years gone?
Where may I find all they took
and hid, in darkness?

© Simon J Ashcroft, 2024

#haiku #poem #poetry #PoetryCommunity

From the just released Eye to the Telescope

What It Tastes Like
by Gerri Leen

He’s in the officer’s club
In the section that says
“Bad day, leave me alone”
When he sees her coming, wearing a
Sympathetic smile as she sets a glass of
What is probably his favorite
Bourbon in front of him and sits
She was his first officer
Now she has her own ship
Her eyes are full of compassion
“They were good people”
He raises his glass, unsure how
She knows this fast, but glad she does
“They were. To the dead”
She lifts her glass: “Never forgotten”
The bourbon tastes like sorrow and regret

He watches her find a table in the O Club
In the same section he did a few weeks earlier
She holds her side as she slides into the booth
“Two Shirley Temples” he orders
Then carries them over
“What are those?” Her eyes are wary
“Things that won’t interfere with
The no doubt very good pain meds you’re on”
“You brought two—you’re forgoing booze?”
He nods because for this she needs sober company
She survived the skirmish; others didn’t
Her first casualties
“You want to talk about it?”
“Really don’t.” But she does anyway
The Shirley Temple tastes like trust and pain

He has a bottle of champagne, is waiting for her
Even though he hasn’t asked her to come
But a captain they served under has made admiral
And he knows she’ll find him
And she does, her smile playful as she stops
At the door, as if she might not come in
But she does then bumps him with her hip
So he moves down the booth as she slides
In next to him, saying others are coming
Fellow crewmates, who smile as they join them
And then their captain now admiral
Pulling up a chair to sit at the head
With a huge grin on their face
He opens the bottle and they all toast
One of the good ones getting rewarded
The champagne tastes like liquid joy

He’s at the bar, enjoying a beer
She slides onto the stool next to him
Tells the bartender-bot she’ll order later
Not her style—he studies her
She’s blushing, also not her style
“We’re the same rank now and you’re
Not my boss and I’m not your subordinate
And I want to ask you out but if you’re
Going to say no, then just tell me now so I
Can flee and drink somewhere else… forever”
He’s marveling at how many words
She got out so fast and how red her
Face is but he plays it cool, waves over
The bar-bot and orders her a beer
“You’re saying yes?”
“I am. And thanks for asking first”
They clink their bottles, her eyes are
As soft as he’s ever seen them,
He’s pretty sure his are too
The beer tastes like respect and love and things
They never reached for before their time

—Gerri Leen

#poem #poetry #literature #SFPoetry

Rewind
by Steffan Triplett

When two men kissed there used to be danger.
On television where there once was danger, there is now vibrant color.
Color bursts & vibrates on screen, even if no one is there to see it.
Have you ever seen something that buzzes inside you?
I am watching two kids encounter each other with pure admiration.
Television shows me alternate pasts in technicolor.
Glimpses of the past will make you imagine safety where there isn’t any.
Tense is a lie, what is your present is someone else’s future.
A show I adore made me feel like we were living a warm, pleasant future:
Two high school boys go on a date & their parents know.
A boy I adore takes me back to my adolescent past.
Most days I can distinguish between my own experience & a character’s.
Some days my own adolescence feels as if it were extinguished.
A me I love’s past is disappeared, so I fill it with my guts.
I am watching two boys kiss on screen, & for once there is no secondhand shame.
There are flames there. Right here there are burning flames.

About:
When visiting my parents, I streamed a television show, “genera+ion,” in which a character encountered a brief, beautiful, queer love—all at the age of seventeen. I was so moved after witnessing the ease in which this pair approached one another, I stood up. Full of feeling as if it were happening to me. Time compressed. I went to sleep in my childhood bedroom after. Everything good felt possible in a space where once anything good had felt impossible. (The earliest seed of this poem was inspired by Xan Forest Phillips.)

Steffan Triplett on “Rewind”

from the journal TYGER QUARTERLY

https://poems.com/poem/rewind/#featured-publication

#poem #poetry #literature

#AlexeiSayle reads a slam #poem 'I Hate Keir Starmer'.

#comedy

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=zx_l9o0i37c

A New National Anthem
By Ada Limón

The truth is, I’ve never cared for the National
Anthem. If you think about it, it’s not a good
song. Too high for most of us with “the rockets
red glare” and then there are the bombs.
(Always, always, there is war and bombs.)
Once, I sang it at homecoming and threw
even the tenacious high school band off key.
But the song didn’t mean anything, just a call
to the field, something to get through before
the pummeling of youth. And what of the stanzas
we never sing, the third that mentions “no refuge
could save the hireling and the slave”? Perhaps,
the truth is, every song of this country
has an unsung third stanza, something brutal
snaking underneath us as we blindly sing
the high notes with a beer sloshing in the stands
hoping our team wins. Don’t get me wrong, I do
like the flag, how it undulates in the wind
like water, elemental, and best when it’s humbled,
brought to its knees, clung to by someone who
has lost everything, when it’s not a weapon,
when it flickers, when it folds up so perfectly
you can keep it until it’s needed, until you can
love it again, until the song in your mouth feels
like sustenance, a song where the notes are sung
by even the ageless woods, the short-grass plains,
the Red River Gorge, the fistful of land left
unpoisoned, that song that’s our birthright,
that’s sung in silence when it’s too hard to go on,
that sounds like someone’s rough fingers weaving
into another’s, that sounds like a match being lit
in an endless cave, the song that says my bones
are your bones, and your bones are my bones,
and isn’t that enough?

https://mailchi.mp/poetryfoundation/6n8xcxno8d?e=58c6df03ad

#poem #poetry #literature

#poem #wordsworth
Splendour in The Grass
by William Wordsworth

What though the radiance
Which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass,
Of glory in the flower,
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;

Hammering Home

I have heard the waves
tell me how they both divide,
and join, distant lives.

© Simon J Ashcroft, 2024

#haiku #poem #Poetry