Daisies on his pink shirt
Daisies on his pink shirt
The stone crusher, buttoned up for BBC
Hammers rocks into stones and stones to chips
Shards fly
Anger and spite from the stones losing matter and mass
Blisters line the Nubian’s palm
One leaches pus
The other is a starfish in the white sweaty palm
Cheeks pock marked shimmer in the sun
Rouged
For BBC.
Ponderers will ponder
Instead of playing
That full moon
We sang
To the broken harp
We sang
Of broken men and sorrow of the lake lost
Of frost framed willows
Of moonlit stream
Instead of breathing
Frigid air
We danced
In swirling Incense of full bodied hair
We danced
To the joy of broken men on haunches
Bleary eyes and closed palms
To the smiles of the destitute
Instead of whispering
In each others ears
We whispered
To leaves
We whispered
To rotting logs
Clad in bright moss
And viper holes
Instead of crying
In tears on the crackling fire
Bursting with angst
The tree with his story untold
We cried
Of Ophelia
And her muddy death
Of love lost in strange places
Justice comes in coal sacks said the tiny elf. Let me show yours, the elf said. And reached out inside the coal sack and brought forth a chip no bigger than his fingernail.
“That
Is what you shall have
For coal is scarce
And your role in this world menial”
“Justice is for men of honour
Not men of my extraction
We study life
Men of honour practice life”
And thus I spoke to myself. Words came in whispers softer than the Scottish stars. What, but a clump of manufactured pain. Till it demanded, teasing out…strand by strand. Nothing remains but a shining bland plate.
“Aye”
Said the funny little elf
“shed for salvation
And you will do fine”
Putting the chip of coal in my pocket, I strode forth. For a grand day that awaits.
• Ritwik Deo says "I am a post grad at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. Most of my writing is dull and uninspiring; meant for the industrial wastescape. But then, every now and then I jot down the insufferables."
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Thursday, February 14
Two poems by Ritwik Deo
by
Charles Christian
on Thu 14 Feb 2008 09:04 AM GMT
Tuesday, February 12
Three poems by Bernard Gieske
by
Charles Christian
on Tue 12 Feb 2008 07:50 AM GMT
THE SUN’S STILL THERE
There’s the sun always the sun during the day rain or shine sometimes it thunders and sometimes it lightnings and clouds breaking op- en bursting white blizzards tornadoes hurricanes tsunamis on all the just and unjust and the sun’s still there not caring not caring at all. Some say it’s all God’s will. A BEGINNING white canvas all bleached what first a broad wash across the horizontal hesitation this is not art so much waiting for the details what will blend what will bleed so much there before we started looking now the changes the seasons the reasons WE CANNOT dam the emotions that plunge from our hearts. We can only channel them into foreign parts. • Bernard Gieske lives in Kentucky and says... "Poetry for me is a challenge. I enjoy reading it and hope to make my contribution." Sunday, February 10
Two haibun by John Irvine
by
Charles Christian
on Sun 10 Feb 2008 11:41 AM GMT
Sheep or donkey?
Sitting here at my PC at 5:48am, the sun yet to roll over the eastern hills, composing an obsequious email to the editor of some obscure online poetry magazine. Editors can be pernickety buggers given to flamboyant rejections, so pandering to their egos is essential. Well, if you want to be published in their crummy magazines it is. Few offer payment, assuming that the privilege of appearing on their hallowed web page for a month is sufficient recompense for any poet. The rhetoric congeals in my mind’s throat so I pause, gazing out my second story window across dawn-lit paddocks. I reconsider my submission, wondering if a three-line publication is worth prostituting myself to some faceless wannabe. decisions to make – over the back fence the old donkey brays Thorny business Heritage climbing roses adorn our deck. Pink and white, they attract thousands of bees. Heaven on a long stem. A couple of over-grown shoots offend my eye, so I fetch the secateurs to lop them. Two down, one more out there... I miss the top step and begin a short journey to the concrete paving. Half over the top railing I fling an arm around a bunch of rose stems, hug them to my chest. The thorns bite into my hand and bare arm, I teeter a moment, stop. A thousand nervous bees circle my head. on the thorns of a dilemma – all that bites is not necessarily your enemy • John Irvine writes... "John Irvine is an Old Aged Pensioner in New Zealand with delusions of immortal failure and a cynical view of life. He has a mole under his left arm, and a wife who hates pizza and tripe. He hopes to die painlessly one day without warning, and with a minimum of leakage. "He had a volume of poetry published in 2005 by Zenith Publishing Group – www.zenithpublishing.co.nz – of New Zealand called Man of Stone. It has been positively reviewed in NZ's Takahe magazine by Raewyn Alexander, in Valley Micropress by Tony Chad and given a thorough pizzling by Sam Smith of The Journal in the UK. John's pathetically grateful for all of that. He also has a web site where you can waste some time www.cooldragon.co.nz "He has been published in a number of print and online magazines, including Australian Reader, Wicked Karnival, Black Ink Horror, Illuminations, Sam Smith’s Select Six, Whispers of Wickedness, Scifaiku, Stylus, the NZ Poetry Society's 2006 haiku anthology and NZ’s own Magazine. And now he may be read in that truly amazing, splendiferous, astounding, heroic online magazine Noneuclidean Café. "Oh, yes... and Preshrunk Press has published a volume of meaningless poetry (by me) about rats some time in 2007, which has been cleverly illustrated by Australian self-confessed teabag squeezing genius Dave Freeman." Friday, February 8
Two poems by Fiona Boyle
by
Charles Christian
on Fri 08 Feb 2008 12:46 PM GMT
Speaking Volumes
When it grabs you, poetry is a book on a pinhead: pricking your soul, scratching your mind, dancing in your brain. Cheating Angel The wing of a soul tipped the sun that tilted the earth. The moon smiled, and a woman lit a candle for the baby she never saw. • Fiona Boyle is a second year student reading Creative Writing at Winchester University. Tuesday, February 5
BLACK AND BLUE by Peter Asher
by
Charles Christian
on Tue 05 Feb 2008 07:36 PM GMT
BLACK AND BLUE
Maybe, it is a colour two shades darker than grief black. It has a blue cast to it. It goes through the hues: possibly; perhaps a little deeper than black – and, perhaps; possibly a tad deeper still than that, before reaching its true self – a colour colder than navy. Bluer than an ocean and the ships with their dead beneath it – and the hopes those dead had beneath even that. Black and blue as mortality – that's the colour maybe. • Peter Asher lives in Scunthorpe. Monday, February 4
Sampierdarena - by Julian Stannard
by
Charles Christian
on Mon 04 Feb 2008 07:58 AM GMT
Sampierdarena, 1990
Do you sometimes remember the night you were born? Rosalba was our gynaecologist of choice. She smoked incessantly, little flickerings of ash transforming her consulting room into a not unreasonable display of pointillismo. Her babies were born in a fix of nicotine. A gynaecologist who smoked was bound to do well in those heady days when smoking was almost a necessity. But a gynaecologist who smoked and who was blessed with an eye that twitched… You were born in the hospital of Sampierdarena in the early hours of March the sixth, 1990. You were crowned in the sweetness of placenta and several little daubs of excrement. Rosalba worked nimbly, her cigarette, her twitching eye that sudden dragging of you into the world. Your mother was led away to recover and I was left holding the baby. We walked, startled father, startled son, along the hospital’s marble corridors edging away from Rosalba’s one good eye. And of course I knew there would be a bar across the road so I put you into my coat pocket like a kilo of trofie and we slipped into the world of senses. Everywhere there were bancarelle of mimosa and I drank coffees laced with grappa and little flakes of brioche landed on your head. Jack, how many hours did we sit there in Bar Franco? Do you recognise the child, Rosalba asked a little strangely. Do you know, Rosalba, I have seen him somewhere. I have seen him in the breaking dawn of uptown Castelletto I have seen him in the labyrinth of the city I have seen him in the languid Bar of Mirrors I have seen him floating in the waters of Sori. • Julian Stannard teaches creative writing at the University of Winchester and has published 2 collections with Peterloo Poets. Saturday, February 2
Coniston, Ontario – by Mike Montreuil
by
Charles Christian
on Sat 02 Feb 2008 05:46 PM GMT
Mike Montreuil writes "The following was written in response to Andrea Porter's Coniston. You'll see why once you start reading it..."
CONISTON, ONTARIO, CANADA 1. I pass by on my way to Sudbury and catch a glimpse of what remains of the copper smelter. Two large stacks remind me of the past and of my grandfather, before obsolescence and Alzheimers. 2. It was a better future for a young man and a young family proud of their small company house with a yard. It was an uncertain future, sweating out each shift, supplying the war machines of far off Europe. 3. Memories of the good times remain with me, memories of this proud man who would take my hand and walk me down the wooden sidewalk to his garage workshop where I thought I was really helping. 4. The old house remains but the shop is gone along with the garage by the lane. I can still see him there, planing another board, while a little boy in awe smells freshly cut wood. • Mike Montreuil lives in Ottawa and can be found at a hockey rink cheering on his son. Friday, February 1
New e-book available
by
Charles Christian
on Fri 01 Feb 2008 01:17 PM GMT
Regular IS&T contributor Gwilym Williams has made an e-book of 20 of his shorter poems from 2004/5 – it all prints to 22 sides of A4. Anyone wanting a free copy can find the simple 'how to...' instructions on his blog at http://poet-in-residence.blogspot.com
Another 650 readers in past 3 months
by
Charles Christian
on Fri 01 Feb 2008 10:40 AM GMT
Latest
web traffic stats show that visitor numbers to the Ink Sweat & Tears webzine have increased
by 650 over the past three months to 31st January 2008, with last month
(January) IS&T clocking up a record number of 4450 distinct hosts served
and just over 10,500 page views.
• IS&T Sans Frontieres... We've also added a new Feedjit widget to the site – you can find it at the foot of the lefthand column – that provides a geographic representation of the locations of the last 100 visitors to the blog – and we are pleased to see we have such a large international readership. |
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