Artwork
| * | illustrations for this issue contributed : a1, a2, a3
Poetry I (5 from David McLean )
| 1 | semina motuum by David McLean
| 2 | Dagon, the fish god by David McLean
| 3 | (ushering) God back in by David McLean
| 4 | the savage god by David McLean
| 5 | for anne sexton II by David McLean
Visual Poetry
| 6 | 16 days in a shelter by E.Charlie
| 7 | Photophobic by E.Charlie
| 8 | DRAW THE BLOODY CURTAINS by Chris Major
Poetry II (3 from Rob Plath)
| 9 | torturing young poets by Rob Plath
| 10 | the cats of ennui by Rob Plath
| 11 | belts of nails by Rob Plath
Poetry III (3 from Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal)
| 12 | After Evening by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal
| 13 | Matchbook XIII by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal
| 14 | I Know How You Feel by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal
Poetry IV
| 15 | A Sense of Castration by
| 16 | In the Gray Folds
| 17 | Where's a porno store when you need one? by Bryan Wehr
| 18 | Disease and Damnation by
about the authors
Saurabh Mehta is a fine artist/illustrator from the Chicago area, who works mainly with charcoals, pen & ink, pastels, and watercolor.
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David McLean was born in Wales and has lived in Sweden since 1987. You can find out more about him at his myspace page: http://www.myspace.com/david_mclean.
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E.Charlie is a poet who contributes some concrete poetry.
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Chris Major is an English poet. An e-chapbook of his visual, concrete poetry called 'Concrete and Calligram' is due out sometime this month by Why Vandalism? E-Book Publishing.
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Rob Plath is a 37 year old poet from New York. he has published a shitload of poems in the small press. he has 1 collection of poetry and 5 forthcoming this year.
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Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal works in the mental health field in Los Angeles. His first chapbook, Without Peace, was published by Kendra Steiner Editions in July 2007.
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David LaBounty lives in Royal Oak, Michigan with his wife and two young sons. His novel, The Trinity, has just been released and it is available at Barnes and Noble and Amazon. More info at my very boring blog - davidlabounty.blogspot.com.
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Bryan Wehr is a 38 year old writer who holds a BA English in Writing and is currently pursuing Teacher Certification.
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Suchoon Mo is a retired academic living in the semiarid part of Colorado.
semina motuum
by David McLean
the seeds are sown in the seminar,
the seminal seminary
that cemetery for words
growing knowledge whole
through God's incisive schism -
meaning meaning's manipulative scissions
his recessive decision the depressive position adopted
here, where
a garden is a lovesome thing
and poem a loathesome song to sing
God wot, meaning his reasoned
"Not"
(and there are plenty of things outside the text
though the text conceptualises all of them as death)
Dagon, the fish god
by David McLean
the stethoscope and the aubergine
are heiresses to the wind,
her silence;
death has laughed in the shoe-box
and mother was a Sioux Indian -
her maxim-box was full of sandwiches
and love behind the refrigerator
in dustballs there.
the dry sequencings of ice have found me
and eaten beauty -
the pear-tree which grew on the mountain Hebron.
days have grown there
and slain to the wind,
the nipple.
cold fish, dead apples,
the palimpsest we writ in.
(ushering) God back in
by David McLean
an unconductive redux productive of “Nothing”
missive God continually gives His canonical opinion
fictional fission His mission in all religions the Book being written
nightly seminary seeding seminal everything
for night’s children
disdain’s refrain collective con-trick
pictorial depiction mission e-mission
the Book of Light’s sub-mission to waters over
off-white tonight rats live on no evil star
Phantasy’s ratty simulacra
King Nobodaddy as rotten log sodden
God of frogs you dogged the tain of the real [His] mirror
tainted by browning minions dropping
No-thing the thong unknown to song
the Devil got it on
inevitable deviation this refractive station
light to-night
where words dwindle mingling lingering feeling
bowed before silence under rays and clouds
and day today the sun so proudly loud
the logos on the face of the Waters the watery daughters
stain down to ground surrendered surrounded sensurround
sound walls wither Jericho a slithering sliver
C-r-e-e-p that love be craggy Craig
“please don’t hurt me”
subreptive delectation predilective iterative commie complaint again
dressing down world in
words a mantle down to ground light’s Cattle
battle dressed in dodgy white like stars
where rats in fact are and smell like that
“i’ll do anything you want
to be instead of me” refuting tootling masturbatory legations
legions of smelly delegates from memory’s meaning the world
my whorish floor but heaven my concealing ceiling
unrevealing when words run down
and all we want at poetry’s red end
is an inarticulate sound roaring mourning
its morning and greed-needy greedy as the hungry sea
around me washing rinsed oblivion
a box of apples with truth in
or love or something
Wood-doom for woldy love welded
never quite enough or quiescent quiet
time already always re-tired re-tried
always already the infamy they’ve all got in for some whining “me”
theoria was ever queer so
“insert wor(l)d here []”?
who cares
4
the savage god
by David McLean
is death’s eroticism, the passionate violence
a palliative for tortured guinea-pigs,
let sex resolve to silence, words
and the popular skull beneath the skin.
we are all thin men, a new century of hell,
where weak words only express the depressive
fascination, but their god is not
as beautiful as the old Death,
She, the maiden, the pale mistress,
and we are not Dadaists -
don’t want to take any other victims with us
just sew mouths shut with sowish metal,
my piggy dumbness.
we are alone in this life as death shall be –
terminal this obsession is antique
though all words are Death’s words
heard
in my possible absence -
you need not live for words to mean to the reader
in their living presence, pretention pretending this
protention, and i feed on the dead like everybody else
rotting in their bliss, drowning in a corpse’s piss.
this decade’s face defaces a century
that already degraded humanity.
the savage god’s sudden death prevails again,
but words will never reconcile to death or living,
getting dead or making children.
5
for anne sexton II
by
remitting sufficient suffering to the succulent nothing
that is heaven,
her suicide's best intention,
thus latterly she her "She" invented,
no evil star starting at heart
where rats dance
(forgetting eternal punishment
for when a self is tardily aborted
Mistress Mercy gets bent)
foreclosing precocious protention
unmentioned, memory's incestuous meaning
being Being's obscenest dream
(& so we cast aside our tired bodies like t-shirts on the hall floor,
we paint God on the walls, though not from memory at all,
empty after all. shall we fall?)
8
DRAW THE BLOODY CURTAINS
by
a2
9
torturing young poets
by
how should we torture
those poets whose poems
are built diligently
like 12th grade
science experiments
whose flames are stoked
by being dumped
after dating someone
for a week & a half
what painful method
should be applied
to those soft, little bodies
in order for them to forget
the periodical table
& the formulas
& the objects they never
really held
maybe slide the edge
of a matchbook
across their eyes
slit open their vision
just before punching
a few cigarettes out
on those hairless forearms
so they can braille
the blisters just
before they reach for
the fucking typewriter
again
10
the cats of ennui
by Rob Plath
the cats of ennui
slowly pace
my brain
so numb they
dont even paw
@ the 3lbs of mush
& splinters
i pour wine for them
but those
opposites-of-christ
w/ dull hairy tongues
turn it into
a weary lake of ooze
& the cats of ennui
slowly pace
my brain
belts of nails
by Rob Plath
lay down the line
sharper, harder, pal
lay down something
that resembles those
spike-strips that the police
lay out on the road
to bring a high speed chase
to its end
steal their tools
but steer clear
of the cop-soul
be the outlaw in the car
they're chasing
lay down the line, pal
belts of nails
After Evening
by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal
The voice in the moon
whispers nothing sweet.
It disturbs me from sleep.
In the next room a
mad woman hears a
cloud, her eyes fill up with rain.
After evening wolves
patrol the hallways.
They howl at the voice in
the moon, which shines its
light through my bedroom
window. The mad woman
knocks on my door, says
the wolves have gone, asks
if I'd like to join her.
13
Matchbook XIII
by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal
This is it. Here it is. You can do it. It is the right thing to do. If you just set it on fire, I
will reward you. Hear my voice. I am all. You don't have to be afraid anymore. This
will heal you. I will take care of your pain. These gates will open wide for you. This
matchbook and that lighter is all you need. I command you. You are so good, my
disciple. Let the fire burn the sins off your skin. It is good, this fire, and this sacrifice.
in the emergency room
the burn victim
clings to life
14
I Know How You Feel
by
I know how you feel.
I am the oval-faced
angel in the cloudless sky.
I am the voice of
ultimate kindness,
leading you into the free land.
Nothing stirs in this
land. Plants do not bend
in the wind. Worms move steadily.
I know how you feel.
This is why I'm here.
inside your thoughts: God's implant.
15
A Sense of Castration
by
homogenous
dull
I cruised the aisles and the shelves
blowing dust and building steam
I didn't check anything out
and instead
I went home, turned on the TV and
flipped through the three hundred channels of satellite TV
homogenous
dull
I collapsed on the couch,
gathering dust and generating steam.
a3
16
In the Gray Folds
Hell has nothing
to do with fire
and brimstone.
Hell is regret.
Hell is self-doubt.
Hell is waking up at 3am
wondering,
"What am I doing with my life?"
Writhing
in the gray folds,
we are
our own
devils
and saviors.
17
Where's a porno store when you need one?
What's that?
Cary asked, pointing from his car seat.
It's a cemetery,
I answered, dreading the direction
this conversation could take.
That's where we bury people that have died.
He thought for a minute and asked,
Who killed them?
Did they get shot?
No, I answered.
Well, maybe, some of them were shot,
but most of them were just old and
their bodies were tired.
Silence from the
back seat.
I waited for the inevitable question,
Are you going to die, daddy?
Fuck, I thought.
How do you explain death to a 3-year-old
without giving him nightmares?
Should I lie?
When we die honey,
we go to heaven and
live with angels.
Should I change the subject?
Hey how 'bout that Tom? Do ya think
he'll ever get to eat Jerry?
Why a cemetery?
Why did we have to pass a
cemetery?
Why not a porno store?
Dad?
(Here it comes), Yea?
I'm hungry. Can we get McDonalds for lunch?
What? Sure, McDonalds it is.
As we drove to get lunch,
I waited for The Question,
but he never asked it.
I thought about bringing
the subject up again,
but decided not to.
His question was answered.
He knew what a cemetery was.
18
Disease and Damnation
by Suchoon Mo
dear doctor
your diagnosis is cheap
my disease is expensive
dear priest
your blessing is cheap
my damnation is expensive