Transcutaneous Electric Nerve Stimulation
(On Reading Whitman’s I Sing the Body Electric)
This TENS machine knows its job, electric impulses
sent out at just the appropriate levels to sting
and twitch the muscles in a rhythmic cadence.
I am reading Whitman by accident or on purpose.
I have all maybes locked into each beat of me
that feeds this aching body-soul Whitman calls up,
shaman to DNA before the helix, namer of parts.
Each pulse glints in the body, a salmon thrashing
up river, caught in the leap to join where it began.
I recognize the sympathy of hand when feeling
the naked meat of the body threaded with electric.
I sense the sugar of shock licking at the walls,
the thinness of each sweetness, pain, together,
the wonder in the flow that engulfs the house.
* Andrea Porter is a member of the poetry performance group Joy of Six, which has performed in Britain and New York. She has been published in a number of poetry magazines (both paper and online) in the UK, Canada, Australia and USA. Her narrative sequence of poems Bubble was adapted as a drama for Radio 4 as a drama by the RSC dramatist Fraser Grace. She writes a fairly successful blog We liked It But Not Quite Enough – www.welikeditbutnotquiteenough.blogspot.com – and promises the agent she will get the rewrites to the novel soon. She has a full collection A Season of Small Insanities coming out with Salt Publishing in April 2009.
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Tuesday, December 23
Andrea Porter's been reading Whitman
by
Charles Christian
on Tue 23 Dec 2008 10:00 AM GMT
Monday, December 22
Feeling awkward - two poems by Bernardine Freud
by
Charles Christian
on Mon 22 Dec 2008 12:09 PM GMT
Awkward
eating, taken out to lunch by someone I meet for the first time, someone I know I’ll like, want to like me. Eating with my pudding spoon, chorizo, braised celery, and things I don’t look at long enough to recognise because I’m staring at him as if he can’t see me examining his nose and the exact fullness of lips. He looks back at me, napkin to mouth, behind which he chokes on a green bean. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Haiku Snap Dad, fag stuck to lip, green eyes, hard like bottle glass, surrounded by us. Mum, squinting against the sun, print dress and cardi, is feeling the cold. My younger sister squats, knees up and mouth open, unkissed frog princess. The sulky one, me, cross legged, camera shy, wills time to pass. * Bernardine Freud is a working gardener, strangely fond of mud and rain and has a poem in next Smiths Knoll. Sunday, December 21
The Country - a Billy Collins animation
by
Charles Christian
on Sun 21 Dec 2008 09:56 AM GMT
Billy Collins reads his poem The Country – the
animation is by Brady Baltezor of Radium.
Big in Germany
by
Charles Christian
on Sun 21 Dec 2008 09:47 AM GMT
Congratulation to regular IS&T contributor Mandy Pannett, who has just had one of her poems – Picture in Grey (first published on IS&T) – translated into German. Another of her poems – Judgment Day from her collection Frost Hollow – is shortly going to be translated into Romanian. Follow the link to see the German version... http://poetrytrend.blogspot.com/search/label/093%20-%20Mandy%20Pannett%20-%20Picture%20in%20Grey
Saturday, December 20
New haiga by Rachel Green
by
Charles Christian
on Sat 20 Dec 2008 08:21 AM GMT
 * Regular IS&T contributor Rachel Green is a novel writer who will shortly become an novel author, but she starts every day with walking her dogs and writing poetry. Books of haiku available from www.leatherdyke.co.uk Friday, December 19
New podcast by Mark Waldron
by
Charles Christian
on Fri 19 Dec 2008 06:05 PM GMT
Here's our latest poetry podcast recording, courtesy of PoetCasting.co.uk. The poem – Look My Love – is by Mark Waldron. Mark was born in New York and grew up in London. He’s been writing poetry since 2001 and his first collection The Brand New Dark was published by Salt in October 2008. His work has appeared in The North, Rialto, Poetry London, Magma and Rising. He was one of the finalists in New Writing Ventures 2006 and is a regular performer at poetry events in London.
Roddy Williams is in the twilight zone
by
Charles Christian
on Fri 19 Dec 2008 09:24 AM GMT
November 2007
it’s like the night’s invaded afternoons these days, pushing back the border of dusk to the heartland of richard and judy. the front line of the war is approaching. they’ll soon be in occupied territory broadcasting their report on conditions with the curtains closed and the big light on and viewers phoning in to win a lamp. there’ll be a man with a fat black microphone reporting from somewhere in the twilight zone. richard will ask how the locals are coping and the man will say that spirits are high. judy will clutch her clipboard, look concerned and say something banal about dunkirk. * Roddy Williams lives, paints, writes and works in London. A radical atheist, his Haiku Diary of Common Sense can be found at http://hairybloke.blogspot.com/ Thursday, December 18
New haibun by Mike Montreuil
by
Charles Christian
on Thu 18 Dec 2008 03:09 PM GMT
MEDICATION
I was a super spy last night, thwarting evil deeds from the seat of my Aston Martin. The night before, I was making love to the most beautiful woman in world; a person way too rich for my blood. Yes, I have vivid and unrealistic dreams when I'm on cold medication. Golly Gee! You should have seen me pitch my no-hitter the night before. It was a gem! Even Hank Aaron struck out! Now, I wonder what tonight will bring. Being a pirate ship captain would be cool. I always wanted to rape and pillage and die in the eye of a hurricane. And to think, I could come back as the archeologist who discovers my ship wreck. Sudafed and Tylenol 3s my bed drenched from a harrowing experience * Mike Montreuil is a regular IS&T contributor and sends greetings from "snowy Ottawa". Wednesday, December 17
Gwilym Williams has gone Christmas shopping - and he still has the scars
by
Charles Christian
on Wed 17 Dec 2008 04:36 PM GMT
Christmas Shopping
Again today it's a moving pizza parlour Xmas shopping spree; and I'm squeezed in the steamed-up 37 and the seasonal sneezing amid floppy wedges of undercooked white pastry and waxy cheese in round child-mouths; the stench is nauseating. But I must be tolerant. It's Xmas after all. There's a blind girl with a beautifully sad face like a soft moon to fall in love with. Unfortunately she gets off at the next stop. I get out my latest Duffy. A couple gets on. She, an old bear in mink's clothing with kid gloves sits vis-a-vis. He, in his trench-coat, stands swan-necking over my shoulder. Bored with his eyes in my book; I can almost feel his warm unpleasant breath on my nape, I snap The World's Wife shut. Now he's pushing up to the front; berating the driver; it's a real Xmas shopping brainstorm. They've missed the stop. * Gwilym Williams is a regular contributor to IS&T – this is a seasonal offering from his recent collection Genteel Messages Tuesday, December 16
John Grochalski knows he's not perfect
by
Charles Christian
on Tue 16 Dec 2008 07:54 AM GMT
world's perfect asshole
you come in from running errands you said that dale called you on the cell phone he's wandering manhattan he's upset and feeling overwhelmed so you invited him over to watch movies on our last day off. you come in from running errands and i am in my shorts with weak knees and a week-old beard sweat-soaked in forty-eight degrees all the windows open and the place a mess with cds and dirt all over the floor. you come in from running errands and i tell you like hell i'm entertaining anyone today i tell you like hell and i'm half-drunk on wine and my soul is a mess and everyone out there just looks ugly to me. you come and tell me that this is your place too and you can socialize with whomever you want like i'm some kind of barbaric keeper i tell you that while this is true the place is mine as well and we bicker like a couple of roommates over the last slice of bread. you come in from running errands you come at me and i come at you the two of us like freight trains on the same track, it's so damned scary that i wait for the impact you come at me and apologize i come at you, and throw you out. you come in from dale and the bar you come to me on the couch where i have been drinking wine for three hours alone and watching television you come to me, i'm the world's perfect asshole and we just know enough at this point to let it all pass until i'm myself again. * John Grochalski is an American writer whose poetry has appeared in a wide range of magazines. His short fiction has appeared in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and the forthcoming anthology Living Room Handjob. My His collection of poetry The Noose Doesn't Get Any Looser After You Punch Out is published by Six Gallery Press. |
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