Pathos

You are

a pale-yellow

in infinite distance;

you are the moon,

a nub

of my soul,

chiseled away.

And I

am the sun, destined

to forever burn for you –

faraway –

so you can glow

(and sometimes melt

almost like a candle)

in solitude.

 

It’s a pity

we would never be

together.

 

-Cavaliere

© All rights reserved.

A Glasgow poem

Hairy Mary fell in love
she planned to marry Joe
She was so happy about it all
she told her faither so
Faither told her, Mary doll
You’ll just huv tae fin another
And I’d just as soon yer mither didnae know
But Joe is your half brother
So Mary put aside her Joe
and planned to marry Wull
but efter tellin her faither this
he said there’s trouble still
ye cannae marry Wull ma doll
and please don’t tell yer mither
but Wull and Joe an several more I know
all are your half brithers
but mither knew, and said ma doll
just do whit makes you happy
Mairry wull or mairry Joe
cos your faithers no yer pappy

 

-Rod Macfarlane

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Decree Not Me

I am a woman you never dreamed of

Worshipping not your trodden ground

Submitting not to petulant dictations

Caring not for ego manifestations

Feeding not insecure desires

Craving not cloying acceptance

Yielding not to possessing prohibitions

Recognizing not blistering boundaries

Trespassing as I please

I answer only to me

I am not the woman you always dreamed of

No, I am not she.

 
-Eva Wojcik

© All rights reserved.

Trace your name

I placed my hand against the pane,
I traced you name into the frost
What was it that I’d hoped to gain?

Alone – but then I can’t complain
I said goodbye, I knew the cost.
I placed my hand against the pane,

Each argument retraced, inane.
I drew the line and then you crossed
What was it that I’d hope to gain?

Each moment now a constant strain
I’d hoped you’d know just what you’d lost…
I placed my hand against the pane

And traced the letters that contain
the doubts inside I can’t exhaust
What was it that I’d hoped to gain?

If only I had tried again
And held inside the words I tossed…
I placed my hand against the pain
what was it that I’d hoped to gain?

-Words We Never Said

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An Interview with Gabriela Anaya Valdepeña

1. When did you first know you desired to become a poet and at what point did you feel comfortable calling yourself a poet? Did you begin writing under an assumed name, and if so, what made you feel confident enough to “come out” with your poet-identity?

The muse was lounging on my cerebral stem for quite some time. I always sensed her lithe frame on my brain. But over time she grew zaftig (she hates when I call her fat) and the pressure became too great. I even remember the moment when I said to my muse “Okay, it’s time to work you out.” I was ironing my husband’s shirts. Ironing is often cathartic, though poetry itself is fatal.

My mother named me Jennifer. I was on my third husband when I started writing, so my last name then was Moore. But I never felt like a Jennifer, and this new era in my life was a time to come clean. I should have been named after my beloved grandfather, Gabriel, who wrote his poems on company stationery and paper napkins. So I fixed that error, and taking his entire name, I legally became Gabriela Anaya Valdepeña. My mother objected to my name change on many grounds, just as she is now mortified by my poetry and visual art. I thought “Fine, I’ll ask my grandfather if he minds.” Since he was dead, I had to find some special consultation, and I’m pleased to report that 9 out of 10 mediums agreed my grandfather was pleased with the name change. So there, Mom!

2. How do you cope with the self-exposure of writing and doing nude self-portraits? Have you ever been made to feel ashamed or intimidated by the intimacy of your creations? Have people made you feel compelled to explain or defend yourself or your poetry? What are the risks and rewards of expressing yourself so openly?

I can’t be any other way. Holding back is not even a possibility. It would be like shirking my calling, like staying home from work, and I’m no slacker. I’m no malingerer, either; though I do like to write in bed and nurture my malaise.

3. How important is literary “salon” (or community) to you — for mentorship, support, critique, and opportunity? Have you found it to be an invaluable help or is it ultimately a bit of a distraction?

I began to attend poetry readings when I first started writing. I made friends with some excellent writers who were kind enough to act as mentors. I also encountered several detractors, who were not shy with their comments. Sometimes their critiques were arbitrary, but also often on the mark; I was open to all of it for better or worse, and this stiffened my resolve to work harder at my art. I don’t attend readings at coffee shops as often now, mostly because the one I went to most is now defunct. But I do have my own circle of artist friends, and we often get together to share our art, visual as well as poetry.

4. Looking back at yourself as a beginning writer, and considering what you know now — what would have been the most important piece of advice that you wish you could have given yourself?

My current self is reluctant to give any advice to my former self. I might steer her wrong.

5. What are the poetic forms that you use most often and which comprise your signature style?

I like the challenge of writing in meter. But free verse is not really free either. I’m not conscious of my own style. I hope someone will bother to analyze it, after I’m dead, and explain it to me.

Wedge of Swans © All rights reserved.

YESTERDAY

Here we are facing each other,
with only a wooden table
dividing us
with the sea lapping behind us
and seagulls hovering above us
waiting, waiting for a morsel of food.

 

You eagerly throw a piece of your pepperoni
pizza, only to see a seagull dive toward it,
like a fisherman throwing a line to catch cod.
Yesterday we would have spoken more,
but today it is your cigarette that consumes you,
as you try to unsuccessfully inhale it’s flame.

 

The traffic lights distils the candle light on our table,
throwing shadows on everything else
and the noise drowns out all attempts at conversation.
Yesterday we were as frail as thinned porcelain,
but today we are jam melting in the sun.
I stretch my hand out to you,

 
but you do not receive it,
and like an unwanted gift goes back into the drawer,
which is my lap.
Yet we kiss, shoulders leaning over the cotton cloth
and our shadows impregnate themselves onto nearby walls,
the image blown-up onto it like a cinema screen.

 
Your lips taste of sugar and salt
as your tears mix with the tiramisu
still lingering in your mouth.
You are happy you say, but I know different.
We come together after supper
in our hotel room,

 
our carnal embrace lasting as long as the wind
that envelopes our bare backs
in the interceding dying sun
that shines through the broken plastic blinds.
The window is partly open,

 
but still our panting is heard
and in the momentary breaks between my gasps
I picture your coffin
and me on top of it naked,
straddling it, legs splayed open.
Yes I will always love you.
 
-Katherine Lockton
 
© All rights reserved.

NOTHING TO SEE HERE … MOVE ALONG, PLEASE

I remember that summer.

We met.

Bathing suits and

sandals with

worn soles.

Baring souls on a sand bar

over dirty

martinis.

I was waiting for your friend

and you were

just waiting

for something, anything

or anyone

and I was there

Wait. I think I’m making this up. I remember the martinis but I think you did all the talking and I wasn’t listening to a word you said…

 

Take 2:

 

A single look was all it took

A glance that sparked a fire

Then came the touch

At once I knew

You were my heart’s desire

Strike that. It was lust. And “body’s” has too many syllables. Maybe something shorter…

 

Take 3:

 
Dark blue eyes on you

Splendidly symmetrical

A summer haiku

Oh, please. I will not sink to this level just to have something to write about. This absolutely sucks.

 

Final version:

 

Girl. Boy. A drink. A dance.

Intense. Fast. Separation.

Together we weren’t poetry

Just free association.

 

Perfect.

 
-Danielle Cross
 
© All rights reserved.

PROVENANCE

Of an amoral moon
of a sinister and seedless tree
of a undeniable wound
a gratuitous plague
of a small heart that dreamt
too big not to fail
of a sun that cannot endure
of a great hole in God’s heart
of indiscreet winds
of love and its fragments
of entire cities buried beneath tradition
of pyramids
ice hotels
numbers, tusks, and dead end streets
of super-surrealism
water, forgiveness
the kiss you gave
of loud flowers
false optimism
of contrived irony at a moment that
calls for direct speech
of a mystics third eye
of the blind, indefatigable reaper
of your obscene handwriting
well-formed brows
your heart’s endless lending and my poor credit
of Einstein’s red door, glial cells
film noire
of this voice that is not mine
of these fingers that type
of the world that starts again
each time you kiss me
of these beautiful scars which are all yours
of empty cathedrals and impotent statues
of my ability to change into everything I am
of your sins
of your past
of a future in which war is a gross abstraction
and leaders negotiate at the poker table
of your lies that grow like phalluses
of the women who repent you
of the magniloquent sea, the night of a million moons
that delivers you to my door
of floral scents that feed nostalgia
the rook in your palm
the alleyways of love
of the silver leaf of pleasure, this living death
the wish to move into your soul and displace all others
of the need to be possessed, to be delivered, ex machina
into the nothing that survives.

-Gabriela Anaya Valdepeña

© All rights reserved.