Issue 19 of Word For/Word is long overdue, but it is under construction and will be worth the wait, as it will feature new poems by Annah Browning, Kathleen Rooney, Cindy St. John, Joshua Kryah, Shira Dentz, Kristina Marie Darling, Kevin O'Rourke, William Cordeiro,Derek Henderson, Brad Vogler, Lynn Strongin, Gautam Verma Emileigh Barnes, Tim Shaner, Jeff Harrison, Dorothee Lang, Moriah L Purdy, Rachel May, Brian Strang,, Crystal Gibbins, Brian Lucas, and Mike Sikkema, plus reviews of new books by Arianne Zwartjes, Arpine Konyalian Grenier, Charles Bernstein, and Kent Johnson.
In the meantime, here’s a preview of issue 20.
A LONG-ABANDONED BREATH, by Wes Bensen
A long-abandoned breath
heard between apologies
unmaps the world.
I switch on the kitchen light.
Appliances emerge
as if by choice.
With regard to supplication
I’m dead to difficulty.
Am I what I think I am.
Am I error’s dancehall:
low-ceilinged,
refrigerator-growled.
23 November 2011
22 August 2011
Invocation, Annah Browning (forthcoming in issue 19)
***
The antlers are massive.
They are sitting outside
in the rain. I am outside, too.
I put my head down
next to them. Be, be,
I say. Be, be.
---
Nothing attaches. Nothing
is strong enough.
Then, if we are clever.
Then, if we are wily.
The whole house falls down
clear of itself.
To be destroyed. To be free
of the Maker.
The antlers are massive.
They are sitting outside
in the rain. I am outside, too.
I put my head down
next to them. Be, be,
I say. Be, be.
---
Nothing attaches. Nothing
is strong enough.
Then, if we are clever.
Then, if we are wily.
The whole house falls down
clear of itself.
To be destroyed. To be free
of the Maker.
08 August 2011
01 August 2011
Vilnius, by William Cordeiro (forthcoming in issue 19)
Another dusk slips its guillotine. Mummy-shriveled, I have lost
myself down narrow, cobblestone streets in the Jewish quarter
that wend as corkscrewily as crotch-hairs; cloud-sludged sky-
lights perma-grey within defunct Soviet apartment complexes.
Expect continued snowfall. Prepare for fresh-cleaned, starched
infirmary sheets. A star-needle skips on the soft tissue of a voice
box. Tourists traipse through guessing games; guilt trip on gelt
in a city of pinchbeck disco and swirly-doo onion domes, a Frank
Zappa statue, and a basketball team best remembered for their tie-
dyed warm-ups. Chug Pixy Stix and stagger back to hail a gypsy
cab. Drop a dimebag in a busker’s hurdy-gurdy case. Professional
mourners resume protocol. But nobody offers them the time of day.
This is a dry run. Or has the gentle reader turned to leave the room?
myself down narrow, cobblestone streets in the Jewish quarter
that wend as corkscrewily as crotch-hairs; cloud-sludged sky-
lights perma-grey within defunct Soviet apartment complexes.
Expect continued snowfall. Prepare for fresh-cleaned, starched
infirmary sheets. A star-needle skips on the soft tissue of a voice
box. Tourists traipse through guessing games; guilt trip on gelt
in a city of pinchbeck disco and swirly-doo onion domes, a Frank
Zappa statue, and a basketball team best remembered for their tie-
dyed warm-ups. Chug Pixy Stix and stagger back to hail a gypsy
cab. Drop a dimebag in a busker’s hurdy-gurdy case. Professional
mourners resume protocol. But nobody offers them the time of day.
This is a dry run. Or has the gentle reader turned to leave the room?
04 July 2011
Summer Vacation, by Cindy St. John (forthcoming in issue 19)
To speak/swallow highways you take to
horizontal your fist on the horizon squint one eye
To sink/eat/starve 500 miles in a car you don’t own
with lips that are not your own and a language you have only half-
memorized to get here
To crack/break under the sound of wind
of box fans like no sound or white light or distance
To strum/tap the glass remember the body
sweat in the sheet of stars soundless
To stomp/tip toe over faces/names/tequila bottles
To swim/wade/dive your field of vision infinitely
multiplying the weight of your arms you lived/ died
Break the glass
To fade/disappear into the landscape isn’t that
what you wanted?
horizontal your fist on the horizon squint one eye
To sink/eat/starve 500 miles in a car you don’t own
with lips that are not your own and a language you have only half-
memorized to get here
To crack/break under the sound of wind
of box fans like no sound or white light or distance
To strum/tap the glass remember the body
sweat in the sheet of stars soundless
To stomp/tip toe over faces/names/tequila bottles
To swim/wade/dive your field of vision infinitely
multiplying the weight of your arms you lived/ died
Break the glass
To fade/disappear into the landscape isn’t that
what you wanted?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
