Shreveport 1982: A downtown church on Christmas eve, well loved, well cared for, Worshippers in fine clothes crowd together In the old walnut pews– it is too warm for furs: Married daughters, handsome nephews In from Houston, people we do not know: Of all the places one could be this night, As lonely as any bus station or manger. But there is this: The particular tears of Christmas, The precise fragrances, the harmonies That make it palpable, That release memory’s stubborn catch Differ for us each And for every home far from home. I hear the sound, thin and sweet, O Holy Night, Scored for the voices of teenaged girls, The white light of candles Dancing on their faces.
Raleigh 2008: There are twelve of us for Christmas, three generations, ours the oldest. A benign weariness: Food and gifts, family jokes and tales, Small stresses let quietly pass. Cousins cavort, careen, compete. Our daughters, friends too, consider vegetables; Their husbands assemble a soccer goal While the gravy cools. As we are leaving, I think I see Traces of a tear on Julie’s cheek; Her smile lingers, quiet, faintly moist.
Robert Demaree is the author of four book-length collections of poems, including Other Ladders published in 2017 by Beech River Books. His poems have received first place in competitions sponsored by the Poetry Society of New Hampshire and the Burlington Writers Club. He is a retired school administrator with ties to North Carolina, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire. Bob’s poems have appeared in over 150 periodicals including Cold Mountain Review and Louisville Review.
You can find more of Robert’s work here on Ink Pantry.
I cannot make it cohere above the cigar butts, against this blackness. Here error is all in the not done, what follows within & persistently, funda- mentals in critical moments. These stones we built on to put land back under tillage,
not knowing, beyond that, dry spring, a dry summer, locusts & rain, gates all open. Hot wind came from the marshes seeking a word to make change. To this offer I had no answer.
Letter to a young poet
Setting out to visit all those wonderful places that your mother sends
postcards from is no ex- cuse for not working — remember that travel
is often confused with travail. & be aware that pterodactyls will come at
you with the sun at their backs, tout comme ta maman, whom they closely resemble.
alongside an episode
Bushfires in south-east Australia, thick sea ice thinning in the Arctic Ocean, the British economy — your browser does not currently recognize any of the video formats available. All you can find now are morsels of information about diverse mixing skills in consonance with electronic dance music; & how, due to test-score pressures, the resulting outcomes have been far worse than predicted.
I / tried to / reel her back
After a year of witty banter, the first firemen at the scene said “start the conversation with an open- ended question, otherwise bumps will appear at the injection sites.” It’s really a form of manipulation,
they agreed, but the only other thing that might possibly negate the out- break is the arrival of a new flavour of ice cream, & that’s hard to arrange.
Mark Young’s most recent books are The Toast, from Luna Bisonte Prods, & The Sasquatch Walks Among Us, from Sandy Press. Songs to Come for the Salamander, Poems 2013-2021, selected & introduced by Thomas Fink, will be co-published in October by Meritage Press & Sandy Press. Mark is editor of Otoliths.
You can find more of Mark’s work here on Ink Pantry.
Has a purpose, unless it’s only point is being savoured in its perfection— in the service of teeth, bursting its blue blood like some kind of sacrifice, submitting itself to sustain life or enhance it, both emblem and archetype: avowal of Nature’s deathless bounty.
What can be said of the ripe prize, chosen against its incognizant will; at least not forsaken? Its use being useful, its best self inside a beak or blender, transformed, in effect, into something else, like that first apple, only opposite: its meaning derived from grandeur, not grief.
We enjoy it, extol it, we eat it, paint it, photograph it, write about it.
What, then, can be said for the withered one, neglected, stockpiled, sullied by time, consigned to limbo between vined and corrupted? What does its neglect signify, if Fate forsakes its function—consumed or admired? Not unlike sad men, their pruned, sour skin
a fruitless reminder: now it’s too late.
Knight and Squires, Redux
My inbox is empty, which isn’t to say there aren’t any messages in there. But the one (I know better than to hope for two—or more) confirming something, anything, with regards to my genius (Obvi I’ll use a lower-case-g because only dead people and sociopaths can employ capital letters on their own behalves). Okay, maybe not genius but an affirmation, an acceptance, or the opposite of the formulation every rejected writer reads like a lifelong series of not-so-gentle reminders: you’re not the witness this world seeks. I can’t go on, I’ll go on, one of us wrote, but he could go on since he’d already been admitted entrance, earned the tailwind necessary for something we call a career, an annuity, succour from the squall.
Had Melville used email could he have looked in Hawthorne’s draft folder and seen the unsent missive, declaring, at long last, that he got it, he appreciated it, God-Damn it to Hell, he envied it, which is why he’d never send it, same as all the confederates and critics who had bigger fish to fry, industry events to attend, and cocktails to consume with other insiders and those born or bred with the burden of being a Genius? Believe me, Nathaniel might have said, it’s better to do the work without distraction, without ever trusting who your friends are, sensing that reviews and plaudits and money are all dust once you’re done, and who knows how the world will measure you— and your work once it no longer matters? That’s the story of my life.
But poor Herman could not see, and never knew all the things not awaiting him in classrooms and graduate seminars and reprints, even Movies and Biographies: an entire industry, built plank by plank, salt and blood and belief alive in every splinter—a bible of sorts for us, the ones who seek solace and inspiration, The One we might turn to when we wonder about our own unread messages and the fate that awaits us (no hints, it’s too painful to actually peg the future), fellow mates aboard a bigger boat, where attainment and acceptance mean less than solidarity, or sweat, or something. No, that’s a lie: all of us need a sign that signals, ballast for our belief—or lack thereof—that obliged us to take a pen, find some faith, and compose in the first place.
Dog is God Backwards or Vice Versa
Dogs are never not alive until they’re not; And it’s not that they’re gone so much as we aren’t.
It’s not about earning or appreciating each and every nap; It’s the peace of not needing approval. And who owns whom?
Dogs rely on routine, a reminder they’ve already evolved; Perfected in accordance with man defining what he needs.
Sean Murphy has appeared on NPR’s “All Things Considered” and been quoted in USA Today, The New York Times, The Huffington Post, and AdAge. A long-time columnist for PopMatters, his work has also appeared in Salon, The Village Voice, Washington City Paper, The Good Men Project, Memoir Magazine, and others. His chapbook, The Blackened Blues, was published by Finishing Line Press in July, 2021. He has twice been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, and served as writer-in-residence of the Noepe Center at Martha’s Vineyard. He’s Founding Director of 1455. Read his published short fiction, poetry, and criticism here and on Twitter.
Low, the winter sun crosses the sky At highest noon, I greet him eye to eye Almost
Dandelion
Down drifts up light as a dream released by a breath
it floats from sight to set new roots, to bloom again and send out seeds on another wind.
Gravity can’t hold a spirit freed nor roots restrain a hope in bloom. The smallest breath with words said clear sets loose the tether that held me here.
Dale Walker is a poet from North Carolina.
You can find more of Dale’s work here on Ink Pantry.
It starts like nothing else does – with a simple marker: felt-tipped, Harlem black, that liquorice smell that is supposed to warn of something toxic to the human survivals; a simple line drawn down the earlobe so that something has been earmarked for something else, set aside like an antique lamp for resale; that craven Velcro way you run from the schoolyard bully, his brutish uncapped marker on the rampage.
Isaac Newton Reinvents the Charcuterie in His Own Cold Meaty Likeness
Such a cinch to move, all those electricals sent down from the fuse box, Isaac Newton reinvents the charcuterie in his own cold meaty likeness if I didn’t know better, unplanned sit-ups in the dark; the court jester before the castle, it is the laughers reverse engineered by able tear duct sheddings, humanzees in the mezzanine drumming up interest – where you end up is the sum of floppy meanderings, painted streetwalkers lining easy street, vacuums to fill in the dusty ballast-less drooping; this sky bridge of Damocles hammocks on the slow dangle, tiki bar umbrellas chasing off the rains in miniature.
Every Band Needs a Train Song
Every band needs a train song before everything goes off the rails as I stand over this sink that has seen better days, look away for a moment and when my eyes return, the sink is gone. I look away again without a thought and when I look back the sink has returned. I finish brushing, spit and rinse before turning out the light. If such things still phase you, you are groping minnows on someone else’s dirty water. Jack-knifing with gassy trucks on the diesel plan. A hint of darkness and I am gone. Back down into the tumbling catacombs of my vaulted lint-trap mind.
I wonder
if Greta was ever Garbo’s real name
or if she knew the dyslexics would would read it and see her as Great before anyone else
so that word of mouth got around
from all the bigs to the smalls
like the nefarious gum lines of some New York travel agent
who wonders why she never left the streets of New York once she got there
falling in love with a city and never a man.
Kain Crescent Park
A slim meander off Robertson to that pavement-painted blue arrow, then four steps up, count them as you go: one, two, three, four… and now you are in Kain Crescent Park looking across the flats to some picnic table by wood’s edge, on the lean and so well forested that ravenous mosquitoes eat better than you; yes, those buzzing little blood-devils, in front of a large uncut stone like the one Jackson Pollock can’t help but lie under.
Ryan Quinn Flanagan is a Canadian-born author residing in Elliot Lake, Ontario, Canada with his wife and many bears that rifle through his garbage. His work can be found both in print and online in such places as: Evergreen Review, The New York Quarterly, Ink Pantry, Impspired Magazine, Red Fez, and The Oklahoma Review.
You can find more of Ryan’s work here on Ink Pantry.
So Long, Marianne, Leonard Cohen had sung when I was a thing of the future and still unborn, intuiting the ways of the world from an unhappy womb.
My father died when I was six months old. My eyes cannot recall his mien, my ears his voice, too preoccupied with the milk that mixed with diluted salt.
“So Long,” she whispered when I became only one, entrusting me to what she deemed trustworthy hands, rescuing me from penury by severing a sacred bond.
And who says food is more important than love! A child gets more sustenance from a maternal hold. Now I feel as starved as when I was an infant bereft of home.
So Long Mariannes, Miriams, Marys and all wretched mums.
Tedium
The drab features of the dullest of days, a frowning sun and a languid moon that’s loath to scintillate, a mast-less ship that has loitered for a hundred years in yonder bay.
The minutes that tick on the mantelpiece the passage of time, deafening my ears, an unnerving similitude of reiterative ills in yonder abyss.
The bland voice that dictates the norm to which homo sapiens has conformed continues to drawl in every soul beyond yonder walls.
The desk that has harassed necks and spines irreverently reclines upon the ground, sluggish with pride, a monument for lives ill-spent in strife in yonder hives.
A Reading of the Film Bee Season
I always associated magic with evil deeds, with hags and cauldrons, with boiling snakes, with sowing discord amid matrimonial seeds, with ruptures, with effigies, with psychic disease, with a trail of misfortunes that never cease.
Kabbalah was one word that filled me with fear, a cultural legacy that ignorance had reared, but it took a movie with Richard Gere to show me how words transcend their spheres to attain a hearing in God’s own ears with a possible response from the Mighty Creator.
What Is? [For my Loulou Spitz]
What is in this white, little paw? A pledge of friendship, A tenacious hold, A grasp of firmness in a very ephemeral world.
What is in this rubber-like, tiny nose that nestles to every item of clothes, that sniffs each fragrance, each odor of socks, and hoard them like bones?
What is in these fluffy, drooping ears that capture the pulse of inward fears, that yearn for footsteps, for the rustle of treats, for fluttering heartbeats?
What is in this proud, arching tail that heralds a storm of greetings, that eloquently commands attention and praise, and orchestrates the art of hailing?
Susie Gharib is a graduate of the University of Strathclyde with a Ph.D. on the work of D.H. Lawrence. Her poetry and fiction have appeared in multiple venues including Adelaide Literary Magazine, Green Hills Literary Lantern, A New Ulster, Crossways, The Curlew, The Pennsylvania Literary Journal, Ink Pantry, Mad Swirl, Miller’s Pond Poetry Magazine, and Down in the Dirt.
You can find more of Susie’s work here on Ink Pantry.
TO EXIST BETWEEN ETERNITIES WILD NOTHING LIKE THE EYES OF THE SKY AXIS INFINITY DICTIONARY OF OBSCURE BLISS /COME FORWARD WITH YOUR VISCERA AND VIOLENCE AND SHARE MY WINGS/UNLEASH YOUR SPIRIT BENEATH THE RAMJET ALLEGRO TEMPLE OF THE NIGHT SKY A NEED FOR MIRRORS AND COUNTLESS SKIES/SHAKE YOUR INFINESSENCE SLOT CANYON HIGHBREATH NARCOTIC ERUPTIONS CLOUD NOTHINGS EXOTIC PULSE A NAME BEYOND DESIRE SEMAPHORE SIN PLAY AT YOUR OWN RISK TALKING TWILIGHT/ INTO A SPHERE OF YOUTHFUL SYMPATHY RIDES THE THIEF OF YOUTH THIN AIR ADDICTIONS MELANCHOLY BODY SACRILEGE TATTOO HIGHWAY INSOMNIA PUNK/ TEENAGE BLOOD REPETITION OF A THOUSAND HUNGRY EYES/SOMETIMES WE ARE ALL ETERNAL IN THE CONSTELLATION OF MIDNIGHT MOSAIC FACTION/ MY GREEN UNQUEEN GALLERY CRUSH HYPERRITUAL AUTUMN CRY OPULENCE LIKE A TRIANGLE AND A DUEL/SOME TALK TO MEN WHILE OTHERS TALK TO GODS DANCE IT VISCIOUS RIDDLE OF THE SANDS CHAMELEON CHARADE STAR CODE CHALICE/ASK THE DESERT ORACLE THESE POISON DECLARATIONS THE REAL UNREAL CONVERSATIONS WITH A NEW REALITY/DISSOLVE THE ILLUSION IN A SPIRITDANCE/NATURE’S SYMPHONY DRAFT INTOXICATION
You can find more of Rus’ work here on Ink Pantry.
To our cottage on the pond, I ascribe human attributes, And why not: Four generations of Idiosyncratic postures, Favourite chairs, The smiles of grandsons Around each corner, In every splash off the dock, Scent of decades of pine rooms, My father’s shaving brush, Memories in other artifacts We did not buy.
So when we leave, Packing up board games Along with Beth’s shy grin, We ease out onto the lane, Regret visceral Until about the Massachusetts line. The cottage, at first forlorn, Has figured out what’s going on, Recognizes the red kayak, An intruder in the guest room, But, relaxing under its cover of Newspaper, moth balls, Frayed bedspreads, Like an old bear we know, Dozes off for the winter.
2.
Cold October rain Scatters unwilling leaves, Crimson, orange-gold, Before the holiday, Slick paste on asphalt. I pack my painting tools Under the house: The can of grey stain Will not survive the winter. In the tight wood On a hill back from the pond Green clings to green, A few leaves fall unturned.
3.
Late October: SUV’s headed out, mostly Pickup trucks on the lane. They are the surrogate residents On the pond in the off season, The people who shut off the water, Drain the pipes, Winch up docks up onto land, Check in winter for snow on the roof. We have a common concern For a tight seal around the chimney, The grey birch by the Turtle Rock That needs to come down. We discuss The judgment of the selectmen, The Red Sox’ chances for next year, The merits of metal roofing. We entrust them with precious things, Sacred ground, these folk With whom we share a love of place Until we come back again In June.
Robert Demaree is the author of four book-length collections of poems, including Other Ladders published in 2017 by Beech River Books. His poems have received first place in competitions sponsored by the Poetry Society of New Hampshire and the Burlington Writers Club. He is a retired school administrator with ties to North Carolina, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire. Bob’s poems have appeared in over 150 periodicals including Cold Mountain Review and Louisville Review.
You can find more of Robert’s work here on Ink Pantry.
I aim a spray of bleach. the bathroom smells strongly of swimming pools.
expecting visitors, I touch my mask, and scrub the toilet spotless.
an attendant, tired and early morning, long on a hot summer’s day.
One shouldn’t fit
on a bus, and seeing the mind inside each of these people. a lady who smells. a man with a book. a kid looking somewhat uncomfortable. the cone of thought backward, expanding all colours and size – infinite large in shape and not knowing collision. thought in there. there’s so much person in everyone’s head that one shouldn’t fit on a bus. like going to a tent in wexford, in growing season. seeing how sunlight makes strawberries.
The overly personal poems
flying our interest like flags at a football match.
animals hidden amongst other animals;
robins in gardens fighting christmas decorations.
camouflage – the rage and futility of display.
Fear of losing
what you’ve managed to get. or reducing your income. or only maintaining it.
fear that the job will be different next year. fear that it won’t be.
that my girl- friend won’t marry me. that she will. that she will
sometimes. all these thoughts driving nails in the soles of my feet. I sit at a table
outside a cafe eating a fried breakfast sandwich. traffic honks,
snarls and sends smoke through my mouth and they finger my collar.
it’s saturday. the weekend a scramble. the weekdays some eggshell which got in the pan. a truck
could be sideswiped, could come off the road.
I wouldn’t get out
of the way.
The train goes thwacking
grown tired of my novel, I stretch, scratch my legs. everyone here is sat down; sleeping or freezing in snowdrifts of quiet conversation.
it’s late. outside the train goes thwacking like a galloping animal over countryside.
in here we’re all sealed in.
it’s very quiet. steel tore the ground like a tight pair of shoes and left it red and wounded and we run across it together in silence ignoring each other.
DS Maolalai is a graduate of English Literature from Trinity College in Dublin and recently returned there after four years abroad in the UK and Canada. He has been writing poetry and short fiction for the past five or six years with some success. His writing has appeared in 4’33’, Strange Bounce and Bong is Bard, Down in the Dirt Magazine, Out of Ours, The Eunoia Review, Kerouac’s Dog, More Said Than Done, Star Tips, Myths Magazine, Ariadne’s Thread, The Belleville Park Pages, Killing the Angel and Unrorean Broadsheet, and has been twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize. His work is published in two collections; Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden ((Encircle Press, 2016)) and Sad Havoc Among the Birds(Turas Press, 2019).
You can find more of DS’s work here on Ink Pantry.
