Poem
Poet Story
Peter Bushyeager
Poet Story
The steel taps on
Mayakovsky’s size 13 boots
scraped the smear off his surface
when he wrote while striding
the Rockaway boardwalk
each metallic rap on the planks
a refugee thought gathered
so he cou...
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Poem
Hand Job
Ron Kolm
Hand Job
It’s my first day on the job
In a plant making hand trucks.
“You’ll be rubbing acid on new
Welds to seal them,” the foreman
Tells me. “Here’s some rubber
Gloves,” he says, tossing me a pair.
...
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Poem
NEW YEAR’S EVE IS THE HARDEST
Anton Yakovlev
NEW YEAR’S EVE IS THE HARDEST
By June he was done and done with politics and painting.
He couldn’t care less where he’d dropped his KGB card.
The shame at being blacklisted only sped up his breathing
two or three...
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Poem
RAIN
D. James Smith
RAIN
Still vast, lung-wet, I lie there, awhile,
Trickling out of the tiny cracks in my wrists.
I waken slowly, cold as the sea and remember.
Days I drove home weeping for nothing
I could name but the bruised aft...
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Poem
Dawn Patrol
Max Blagg
Dawn Patrol
Lord I am risen from that misery and I wait for you
Like the sleepless man waits for dawn
The light was up at 5.45 am and I rose to meet it
first hours of the day filled with rain
lightning over Montauk so...
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Poem
MUSICAL
Norman Douglas
MUSICAL
memory is the mother of muses
(of which some
say there are three
others count nine).
and what is music
but that which comes of muses
musing deep enough our
hearts do ...
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Poem
Veil
Mia Hansford
Veil
In a little while I’ll let go of your hand but for
now I’ll rest it in the flashing blue-night dark,
in the lights cross the water and along the bridge’s
quiet: leather, radio, a nervous handler opening
...
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Poem
Mom Used To Say
Suzi Kaplan Olmsted
Mom Used To Say
Life is Rashomon, my father plays King Lear
Mom plays Lady MacBeth or Katherine, the shrew, depending on the moment
Brother Tony and I were both busy choosing our own roles, We weren’t always certain ...
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Poem
after my younger sister’s memorial service
Kelly Cowan
after my younger sister’s memorial service
Robin’s
reclining chair
& end table
sitting near
the bay
window -
ice box
snow -
find
in the drawer
her reading
glasses,
Bic
disposable lighter
& a stack
of ph...
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Poem
after cecil taylor concert
steve dalachinsky
after cecil taylor concert
sing not song but string tuned harp(ie)s-chords
lyric rhyme well constructed chaos nite –
now a room floats about us
enfolds & possibly loves us –
a completi...
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Poem
125th Street
Carl Watson
125th Street
Once there was a Harlem of the mind,
In a New York of green youth and mystery,
Steaming manholes, fevered sleep,
When I was a pilgrim without ambition.
Characters with metal teeth and top hats,
Sn...
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Poem
A conversation between landing craft in the Odessa Port
Jenny Wade
An excerpt from Mayakovsky Maximum Access, selected poems by Vladimir Mayakovsky, translated and with commentary by Jenny Wade.
Buy it on Amazon
A conversation between landing craft in the Odessa Port
Feather-clo...
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Poem
Narcoleptic Blues
Valery Oisteanu
Narcoleptic blues
To Ruth
Sleeping poems burning in my brain
“Solitude” tarot card cries out love supreme
Submerged ice flows turning to blood
Rising and melting through twisted clouds
Waves carry the tsunami tow...
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Poem
Stop
Sarah Sarai
Stop
In an ad agency, Traffic is like
Department of the Shepherds,
or an escort service, housemother, Charon,
ferrying files from account exec. to writer
to art director to the shop to editorial
back to writer...
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Poem
Fake Lies
Jeffrey Cyphers Wright
FAKE LIES
The donor class is warping the loom.
Domination is damnation.
Defiance is a shortcut to de-finance.
We have to scrap for all that’s left.
Make of your suffering, charms.
The best things are free (like me...
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