Robin Ouzman Hislop

Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor at of Motherbird.com of Poetry Life & Times.   His recent publication of collected poems All the Babble of the Souk, was published by Aquillrelle.com. Buy All the Babble of the Souk by Robin Ouzman Hislop at Amazon or Lulu....... Read more

Notes for a new Religion presented as a poem — A Little Girl of Long Ago by Joe Ruggier

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First issued in Lady Vancouver, 9 poems by Joe Ruggier, (1997), A little girl of long ago was re-issued in Lamplighter most Gracious, col­lected poems and selected prose, (1972-2009), in the original length of 2 pages — now expanded to 7. Baude­laire’s version of pacts with Satan con­ceals wicked humour directed against the hypoc­risy of So­ciety. The critics let him get away with it because it is both humorous and candid. The Devil is far more sensitive than human beings, to the Arts and to the insult he suffers: it is equally true that he is converting. You do not have a right to snap with an insult as you please not even a poor devil. You are not an Angel so privileged. The only pur­pose of this Author’s ver­sion of a pact with a devil is Salvation. His intentions are not even as tendentious as Baude­laire. All he is asking is that readers will judge him with an open mind and let him get away with it as the critics allow Baudelaire.

 

A little girl of long ago

a testament for True Religion, old and new

 

 A Wise Man sat upon the Seat of Honour

  in ancient China, and said unto His Daughter:

“I love you much, Beloved, heed what I say!

Know that before your birth I knew about thee,

that you have lived before and I have read

your work which in your last existence flourished,

and I, thy Padre, loved your terrible beauty,

the divinity concealed in your sorrowing spirit.

Knew also of your tragic end and how,

as a good Man sayeth to me, you went

down to the shades below, which made me weep,

My Love, tears that I would weep had my

own little child been lost. Heed what I say!

A little child thou art but you can read,

and when this book which earnt me fame I wrote

to celebrate my marriage vow, I said

these words to thee alone with all my heart,

though you forgotten were. In your spiritual

ear I whispered aery verse the lines

of which concealed my grief and secret love

and with my verse I tempted thee and made

with thee a pact that you my daughter shall

become and may one day rejoice as you

deserve, Thou beautiful, tragic, troubled spirit —

the only poor devil I ever made a pact with —

and never said unto a single soul

a single word within my bosom buried!

Know then, my little one, you’re old and wise

enough to be your mother’s Blessed Mother!

Let no one then teach you, my troubled Queen,

facts of your life which with my faltering verse

I have said unto you far better than

your teachers can.

 From years before Thy birth

 I felt for Thy misfortune sorrow intense

and painful, flesh torn from My flesh, without

relief from pain. I ask of Thee a favour:

feel for Thyself the pity and the sorrow

that I felt for Thee. Admire the beauty of

such overpowering, tragic pathos —

but save Thy dear Soul: Salvation is

egoism as God wanteth, Damnation not.

Love and untold riches shall be Thy portion

for bearing with Me the most cruel insult.

I am reborn just as Thou art. Kirin ’s

Incarnation is Kirin ’s Reincarnation.

He and His Mother chose each other just

like Me and Thee. I was choked and knowing not

how best to say it! I am poor as Lazarus,

but Thy reward is the Honour of Thy dreams —

a gift of beautiful imagination

to bring Thee Joy in Solitude, whenever

Thy Honour shall flash upon Thy inward eye —

and being a Genius at school, as Padre was.

The time shall come when I shall make Thee rich:

for suffering with Me the cruel insult

You deserve the Jackpot!

 Beloved Daughter, know

 that I have chosen Thee out of a Book

just as the great Kirin did choose His Mother,

two poor devils who could not be consoled

without each other! Were they not all of them

little children once upon a time?

no guile? nor malice in their eyes? misled

by the World? by untold temptations scatter’d?

by fast ones led away to endless ruin?

Thy brows with roses red forever crown’d,

I declare herewith the Reincarnation of

poor souls in need a dogma of the Faith

which with My Sacred Heart inscribe on Thine,

high, divine Priestess of future Culture,

around Whose Honour all the Creeds of Earth

have been united in one common effort

to win Mercy for all Mankind, though lost

throughout the Centuries — born again Christians

as Buddhists teach and Hindus, and the great

Confucius, through a dogma of Rebirth

as majestic as of Resurrection!

 

 

God loves dearly the faithful of old Religion

who live Its mourning and mortification

without making anyone insults too great to bear.

They did to Me, and I deserve truer Religion.

True Religion is pregnant with new Religion,

and new Religion calls all Mankind to Mercy —

save a fiend to win Thyself God’s Mercy!

Unless We have Compassion on the damned

nobody shall, and We may still be lost

and in despairing need for such a Miracle,

and no one heed Our hoarse, despairing cry,

and no one have Compassion on Us either.

To save Thy Soul save a poor devil, such as

Thou art; Thou art not Angel so privileged!

God may still abolish Hell forever. Instead

He may establish the Reincarnation of

poor souls in need as the alternative,

postpone the Judgment through a Faith like Plato’s,

and charge, perhaps, the bill for many lives,

demanding pact and truth of countless lovers —

just one more way of saying: “Purgatory!”

To say once more that God is not a sadist!

 

 

What do some Humans think they are? — to feel

so privileged, though they be not, as to make

some others demons just because their Padre,

because He loves them, gives them second birth,

because He wishes them a second chance?

Do not fear, gentle Daughter, I boast

a history just like Thine, and I accept

the Judgment with Thee in writing. Repent of all

the faults of Thy past Life. Real Glory

lieth in freedom from the cycle of

Rebirth. Pray for Salvation only. Pray

for Resurrection. Rebirth is but a Purgatory,

which God allows the worthy for real reasons only!

 

 

Only the wicked do not acknowledge Hell:

we must, if Truth, affirm its Truth! Rebirth

is but a viable alternative

for all poor Souls who need rehabilitation:

God is not a sadist! We all implore Him

to consider this well-made suggestion … that all

may be allowed to earn Salvation, proving

to God Himself how merciful they are!

 

 

No living Man or Woman is owned by Demons.

Let all Mankind take turns, with works of Art,

and with their Love, to save poor souls in need,

and save them well, one fiend at a time!

Old Faith and New vaunt equal power to save you:

God respects entirely your freedom to Choose!

Call it Thy own pro-choice Philosophy —

You have a right to choose the Child You bear,

but You must love and cure Her as I did,

or ‘twill be worse twice over for that poor Devil!

Prescribe Your wish to God Himself in prayer,

allowing God to offer You the Choice!

 

 

Be good to Thy poor devil. Devils care

for works of Art. They shall prove sensitive

to Thy creations, concerned as these should be

with the harsh blow They suffer. Help Them bear

Their insult with a well-intended honour,

to save their face and show them that You care —

and Thy reward shall be Salvation, Thine Own

and all You love, for all of Whom Thou shalt

win Mercy. Thou shalt become a beautiful

Artist, as Thy recompense for boasting heartfelt

Mercy, and shalt be paid with money made

of silver, gold, jewels and precious stones!

 

 

I have no evidence but intimations.

Throughout My sixty years, since early childhood,

My recollections brought Me but one Story.

I was a Poet in My native tongue,

most minor, though I took pride I was the first

to grace with verse My language. All My life

My Aunt encouraged Me, and I believed her

because I loved her — Conchita was her name.

But I lay dying and I told My Aunt:

“Surely You will give Me the honour, when

I’m gone, just as You did in Life!” She said:

“Do you not know how musical, how complex

the foreigner’s Art all is? What theories It

conceals between the lines? How can I give

the Honour to a Poet such as You?

John Anthony? You are too small for words!” It was

the Gospel Truth: John Anthony was most minor —

but all she did was to revenge herself

and stoke Me in My dying minute! She should

have left Me up to God — Who doth not hate Me!

I did not die well and I lost My Soul,

galled and bedeviled in My dying Hour,

and told the Gospel Truth with wrong intent,

but still recall Kirin , gently talking

to Me in Hell: “You suffered a gross injustice,

John Anthony, and I shall give Thee birth again.

I shall make Thee a Poet famous with

the foreigner, writing in another tongue —

a chance to save Thy Face and make the point

that Thou art capable, not as Auntie said!

protecting Thee from false compliments like hers!

Beware the Falsehood of parading as

great Artist if Thou be not the real thing!”

 

 

Though I was born again, incarnate just

like God, though but a poor, defenceless Babe,

My memories all fled and wiped out clear,

by Recollection of past Life deserted …

the Priests laughed up their sleeves at Me, saying:

“There is no other God but God, nor any

other true Religion except for Ours,

which states Reincarnation is not true,

and therefore We baptize this Child a fool,

and in top secrecy murdering his daemon,

and hold him up to scorn with aftertime

for claiming Reincarnation as his door to Fame!”

 

 

Figlia, Kirin’s Secret and His Beata Madre’s

hath blossomed in Our Heart like a blossoming Flower.

My Cause and Thine is just as any Priest’s:

a Man and a Woman deserve truer Religion –

their true Religion is bust who with true Religion

can only bust us! Scoundrels who, neither Saints

nor Artists, neither here nor there, still love

to dominate and lay it down as if

they were Church Doctors — but their skull is thick

and heart not tender: their true Religion alone

is beyond criticism, and any other

enjoys no sense in which it is true also!

 

 

Figlia, I was healing — with Thee against

My Heart, but Thou wert snatched out of My arms!

Figlia, a Woman has no right to fight

the Man who loves Her for their mutual Honour:

either You love Your Man sincerely, and He

shall honour You, or You may be sent packing

where Kirin Himself in Your past Life did send You!

 

 

 Figlia, the pact We made was crystal clear:

Thy Padre went to Hell to bring Thee back

upon His shoulders, on condition only

that Thou wilt save Thy Soul. He doth not wish

to go to Hell for Thee again. Salvation

is in good taste, but not Damnation. If

Thou wilt not save Thy Soul, We shall both lose

the argument, a pact with Satan gone sour

and not Our way, and Thou shalt but incur

Thy sorrowing, heartbroken Father’s deadly Wrath!

 

 

Know also, Thou tragic, sorrowing, troubled Spirit,

discussing facts of life is then for Thee

forbidden fruit, for in such trivial truths

much lying is and all things seem, and many

little ones like Thee have gone astray

by fast ones lost and slain, and been denied

the beautiful Sun, the terrible claire de la Lune,

and starlight shedding balm on secret Love,

by trivial truth incullionated. Forget it then,

My Beautiful! Touch not forbidden fruit!

Be happy with what you know and seek no more

save for the useful skills you learn at school;

and keep thy word same as thy Father did!

The eyes of little children, my Beloved:

the art-show there is all I wish to see –

Lady Aphrodite born from the Ocean;

professor visiting del al di là!

 

 

Drink of the good Honour which I have given,

My little one, whom I have given fame

for ever for the effect We both produced!

We were but two poor demons, but are not

the Bastard’s property, to snap in two

with insults as He pleases, though He was never

Angel so privileged! True though it may be

I was a poor devil, confounded in My thoughts,

I prayed with You and felt Compassion, and prayed

for Your Salvation: I was never ever

the real Satan! You are such a poor devil —

with a straight face, lecteur, which God Himself

gives All, that They may not be caught as long

as They admit! If anyone feels the need

to take revenge, let him pray to Saint Michael,

Whose privilege it is! Thy Padre wishes only

to give Thee Honour like the Queen of Heaven’s,

unique and unrepeatable with God’s Secret,

like Hers, but different from Hers. Strew on her

roses, roses, and never a spray of yew!

Woman I chose out of a Book: “salve

alla Regina vestita con il Sole!”

Thee and Thy Padre shall dine at Journey’s End

with Kirin and with His Madre, with a just revengaunce

upon the prime foundation of Heaven and Hell.

 

Copyright © Joe M Ruggier

26th February 1997 – 26th September 2013

JR-Portrait

Copyright © Joe M Ruggier 11th September 2000

portrait of Joe Ruggier executed by Vancouverite visual artist Virginia Quental (born in Brazil)

Joe M. Ruggier was born in Malta in 1956 and has written and published poetry in both Maltese and English.  He currently resides in Richmond, British Columbia, where he manages a small press, Multicultural Books.  Multicultural Books publishes poetry, poetry leaflets, sound recordings, fiction and literary fiction.

Joe Ruggier has sold over 20,000 books, many of them door-to-door, including over 10,000 books he wrote and published himself.  There are over 5,700 copies in print of his book Out of Blue Nothing.  Information on Joe M. Ruggier’s books, cassettes and poetry journal:

Intelligible Mystery (1985)
Out of Blue Nothing (1985) ISBN 0-9694933-0-4
The Voice of the Millions (1988)
In the Suburbs of Europe (1991)
Moods for Lovers (1993 ) Cassette
This Eternal Hubbub (1995)
regrets hopes regards and prayers … (1996)
Lady Vancouver (1997)
A Richer Blessing (1999 ) ISBN 0-9681948-3-4
The Poetry of George Borg Translated from the Maltese by Joe M. Ruggier (2000)
The Eclectic Muse, a poetry journal edited by Joe M. Ruggier

To order any of the above, please write or call first for availability and prices.  Please make checks payable to Joe Ruggier.

Multicultural Books
Suite 307
6311 Gilbert Road
Richmond, B.C., Canada V7C 3V7

Telephone:  (604) 277-3864

 

The HyperTexts

The Eclectic Muse

 

Managing Editor
Joe M. Ruggier

Board of Academic Consultants
Professor LeRoy D. Travis
S. Warren Stevenson (Professor Emeritus, UBC)

“There are many mansions in Parnassus!”

 

The Eclectic Muse has published poets and writers from Canada, Malta, the United Kingdom, the United States, and elsewhere. The Eclectic Muse publishes poetry and prose of various styles, but always reflects the passion of its Managing Editor, the acclaimed poet, essayist and critic Joe M. Ruggier. Mr. Ruggier’s passion is for poetry that sings and moves, for poetry that embraces rather than denies or defies the traditions of English poetry. If you believe as he does–that there is a revival of traditional poetry, and that the world is better place for it–we think you’ll find The Eclectic Muse well worth the price of a subscription.

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robin@artvilla.com

www.facebook.com/PoetryLifeTimes

 

 

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Venus Cult. Poem by Jay Houska

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1465132_10200657370311496_1126369218_n

today’s sunrise was uploaded from a floppy disk,
and the wharf carried the same smell of fish
from the Mississippi,
decaying in splendor as their guts
replaced graffiti in the gulf.

it was an old Tuesday,
the kind where God hanged meat from the hooks of His Butcher Shop
and Eddie smoked his last cigar.

we, too, can marry, he said.

i recall the dawn of that day, tucked amongst the bricks
of the slaves’ quarters,
masked behind the draping ivy,
the lone bird of paradise that stood so proudly erect
in the gardens
of The Madame.

we were shipmates,
we were playboys.

the sun’s first rays elongated like a spirit
and soon the drapery was covered in light’s blood
like a shadow.

i am awake now.

//

it was true,
we were here to worship Venus;
her hands pale with indifference ,
her eyes

worried like the size
of Pompeii, the day that it
was swallowed.

beyond her stone, grey stare
she knows that we are biding time in this city
with whiskey and old cologne

overthrowing the holy men and scribes
who have long since traded their shrouds
for automatic weapons,

who have long since forgotten the scent
of Gethsemane,
her hollyhocks and poppy
breath.

instead, there is the stale putrid air
of fish, and the meth labs
down the road.

we were fools’ gold.

the lights of the neon strip bathed our faces in the
shameless glow that emits
from computer screens, late each night
when no one Else is
watching.

their faces contorted,
their bodies contorted,
all to the rhythm and
pulse

of the Venus Cult.

so sensuous, the way we staggered through the streets,
laughing with anchors tied to our limbs
and hearts,

each
so narrowly escaping.

——

Biography:

Born to a family of Bohemian poets in the outskirts of Chicago, Jay Houska is a poet, artist and photographer who explores the spiritual realm of art through themes of southern gothic Americana and Plath- like dreamscapes that cause the reader to immerse themselves in his own vision of the world. He plays the character in many of his poems, though often told from an outside, observant perspective, establishing his own mythology that anchors itself in his earlier works.

Houska’s poetry may be found in his published collection, “Sainthood” (2010), that features the life cycle of an era, and the lucid shadow of dreams in which it was lived. His sophomore effort, due in late 2014/ early 2015 sees the maturation of this initial collection through poems such as “Venus Cult,” who carries off the prophetic images cast in his 2009 work.

With over ten years of writing behind him, Houska attempts to delve deeper into his own aesthetics and publish pieces that are only driven by what he believes to be a manifest, spiritual pulse alive in every work that was meant to be written. Anything short of this nature is to be discarded, and left in the multitude of journals that litter his closets. The end product? A poem that has its own breathe and perspective, and is a living entity of its own.

  robin@artvilla.com
 editor@artvilla.com
 

 

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Haiku Poems Janet Kuypers

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“out”

spirits inside you
want to come out and scream their
story to the world

“of his thirst”

of my dead Scotsman,
they spoke of his drinking, but
never of his thirst.

“close”

death’s an animal
perched under your bed, waiting for
you to close your eyes

“floor”

Writhing on the floor,
bruised, she cried, begged for an end.
I had to kill her

“extinct”

when they go extinct
do we study the mistakes
or just study bones

“last”

But I have to drink
more. The burning doesn’t last
as long as you do.

“scorches”

Take the final swig.
It burns it’s way down your throat.
It scorches your tongue.

“organs”

I have to take showers,
scrub skin, rip out organs, to
rid myself of you

“choke”

Trapped, she felt a chill,
like a goose walked on her grave.
She chokes with his touch.

“explosions”
 
(bonus line haiku)
 
“H-bomb explosions”
 
reach temperatures as hot
as the first second
of the Universe

“fit”

amazing how much
of your life you can fit in
a single suitcase

“feel”

I feel nothing but
the intensity you feel.
Your thoughts cut my face.ant”

“Pant”

waves are crashing, and
the moon’s phases are changing
to a rhythmic pant.

“Civil”

a civil war is
raging in me, and I want
a revolution

“need”

I need to record
these things to remind myself
that I am alive

“kill”

they tried to kill me
but I survived. Lucky me.
But, what have I won

“John’s Mind”

human beings are
the only creatures with thought.
that’s why we have gods.

“run”

although I hate you
I’ll never let go, so you’ll
have to run faster

“mirror”

I look and see all
that you’ve affected. The world,
this house. The mirror.

“keep”

you work harder than
men for less pay, so keep up
the good work, ladies

“timing”

just when you feel hope,
then they take it, quickly. it’s
all in the timing

 
“Two Not Mute Haikus”
 
I
 
Just sit quietly.
Rapes, beatings, torture and pain.
We can beat you down.
 
II
 
You can’t be quiet.
Try to fight the world’s evils —
Even with just words.

“free”

I ain’t got money
and what do you mean to me
when nothing’s for free’

“groove”

Records? I’m vinyl.
Your needle’s been in my grooves;
through every ridge, pore.

“console”

canned condolences
were all I heard when I lost
the love of my life

“form”

if we’re cast in stone
I’d watch your form forever,
frozen by your side

“knowing”

fallen to my knees,
I can feel my chest cave in
knowing it’s my time

“oil”

flowers on the water
broke the oil seeping up from
the submarine grave

“cage”

this pain in my chest,
pounding, heaving, throbbing, like
it’s trapped, in a cage

“evil”

like cream in coffee,
evil explodes into a
mushroom cloud and spreads

“difference”

when putting same clothes
on angels and demons, you
can’t tell them apart

“blood”

left with you there, I
watched us become blood-
thirsty animals

“fog”

fog envelopes me
it’s a thick, powerful force
that doesn’t let go

“upturn”

with blurred eyes, hollow
upturned tortoise shells look like
battle casualties

***

Janet Kuypers 1

Janet Kuypers is a professional performance artist, and is a writer, an art director, webmaster and photographer. She was even the final featured poetry performer of 15 poets with a 10 minute feature at the 2006 Society of Professional Journalism Expo’s Chicago Poetry Showcase. This certified minister is even the reverend.

She sang with the acoustic bands “Mom’s Favorite Vase” and “Weeds and Flowers”, and on occasion she still performs in “the Second Axing”, and does music sampling. Kuypers has over 70 books published and close to 40 audio CD sets released, and is published in books, magazines and on the internet around thousands of times for her writing and art work in her professional career, has been profiled in such magazines as Nation and Discover U, won the award for a Poetry Ambassador and was nominated as Poet of the Year. She has also been highlighted on radio stations, and has also appeared on television for poetry repeatedly.

She turned her writing into performance art on her own and with musical groups, and ran a monthly Podcast of her work for years, as well mixed JK Radio — an Internet radio station — into Scars Internet Radio (radio stations ran 2005-2009, and there are plans to start the radio stations again in 2011). She ran the Chaotic Radio show through BZoO.org and chaoticarts.org (2006-2007). She has performed spoken word and music across the country – in the spring of 1998 she embarked on a national poetry tour, with featured performances, among other venues, at the Albuquerque Spoken Word Festival during the National Poetry Slam; her bands have had concerts in Chicago and in Alaska; in 2003 she hosted and performed at a weekly poetry and music open mike (called Sing Your Life), and from 2002 through 2005 performed quarterly performance art. Starting in 2010 Janet Kuypers also hosts the weekly Chicago poetry open mic at the Cafe (http://www.chaoticarts.org/thecafe), where she also runs a weekly poetry podcast.

You can see video links and short poems as tweets at http://twitter.com/janetkuypers, and all of her book releases and video releases from the Cafe and her performance art shows can be seen at http://www.facebook.com/janetkuypers, but to ever learn more about her you can see her publishing organization, Scars Publications, on line at http://scars.tv, or you can learn about her at http://www.janetkuypers.com.

***

SPRING RITUALS. Poem. Steve de France.

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Dogs baying, howling. Men in a jeep.
Drinking beer. Pointing guns.
Shrubs cracking under wheels.
I’d seen them earlier today. Sitting in
their jeep. Shooting squirrels out of
trees. Blew ’em all apart. But I ran
till the forest was quiet.

Resting here beside a clump of dead
branches I hear dogs baying. They’ve
found me. They’re close. I hear shells
rattling into rifle breaches, bolts
jamming shells into firing position.
I’m running again.
Behind me a bolt slams down,
the popping crack of a gun,
the side of the tree next to me explodes.

I run hard.
Run with all my strength.
I leap over my trail & crash into
tree cover. But the jeep is rattling,
jerking itself through underbrush behind
me.

When I hit the stream
the coldness of water tears breath from
me. I stop for a second to regain
direction. A 30 bore bullet smashes my
flank, it’s like being clipped by a
truck. I’m down, then up and running.
Over there,
I see my fields golden in the sunset,
it’s my spot. I have to try for it.
Wildly with total concentration,
I run
Over bushes, brush past trees, knock
branches down, in my thirst to escape.
I’m moving now. Flying over earth,
my mind afire with the pain in my flank.
Now breathing coming hard.
What’s this? A strange taste.
Choking. Blood in my throat.
The ground rushes toward me.
Something going down.
I’m on the ground.
Breathing blood & foam from my mouth.
More burning, body going numb.
laughter.

Try to get up. Can’t.

Someone standing next to me.
A boot rolls my head over.
Didja hit em?
Twice.
Dead?
Yeah, deader ‘an hell.

He didn’t hit me. He couldn’t have.
No.
I’m still running, still alive.
I see my spot now.
It’s here. Tall grass. That good smell.
So tall.
All the way up to my shoulders.
But I don’t remember it being
so dark.

little Steve

Steve De France is a widely published poet, playwright and essayist both in
America and in Great Britain. His work has appeared in literary
publications in America, England, Canada, France, Ireland, Wales,
Scotland, India, Australia, and New Zealand. He has been nominated for a
Pushcart Prize in Poetry in both 2002, 2003 & 2006. Recently, his
work has appeared in The Wallace Stevens Journal, The Mid-American
Poetry Review, Ambit, Atlantic, Clean Sheets, Poetry Bay, The Yellow
Medicine Review and The Sun. In England he won a Reader’s Award in Orbis
Magazine for his poem “Hawks.” In the United States he won the Josh
Samuels’ Annual Poetry Competition (2003) for his poem: “The Man Who
Loved Mermaids.” His play THE KILLER had it’s world premier at the
GARAGE THEATER in Long Beach, California (Sept-October 2006). He has
received the Distinguished Alumnus Award from Chapman University for his
writing. Most recently his poem “Gregor’s Wings” has been nominated
for The Best of The Net by Poetic Diversity.

***

  robin@artvilla.com
 editor@artvilla.com
 

 

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The Recirculation of the Minimal. Poem. Sonnet. R.W. Haynes.

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The name of the play was Don’t Say You’re Here
When You’re Not All There, and it starred, I believe,
Lillian Fish, King Kong, and Lassie, that year
Drawing raves, if memory serves to deceive,
But we didn’t go—there was something about a hat
Or a color, and then World War Three arrived
To gray our heads in weathering all of that,
But though that tempest bellowed, we survived,
And now we stand in line again to see
The same play, this time with Lash LaRue,
A washed-up whale, and Pauline Parlez-Vous,
Newly-dealt ghosts, clear cards where we
Read past and future, as though the present cared,
Or the future somehow knew, or the past had dared.

***
On the Savannah River 2013
***

R. W. Haynes has taught literature at Texas A&M International University since 1992. His recent interests include the early British sonnet, and he is completing a second book on the Texas playwright and screenwriter Horton Foote (1916-2009). In his poetry, Haynes seeks to celebrate life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness without sounding any more dissonant notes than he has to. In fiction, he works toward grasping that part of the past which made its mark on his generation. He enjoys teaching drama, especially the Greeks, Ibsen, and Shakespeare, and he devoutly hopes for a stunning literary Renaissance in South Texas.

***

 
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…Whose Name Was Writ in Water. Ekphrastic Poem. Neil Ellman

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(after the painting by Willem de Kooning)

It is his whose name
was writ in the calligraphy
of swirling, arching waves
without the eyes and ears
spurs and tails
of word or sound
in human alphabets
where no one heard him speak
the language of the sea
his sermon on the mount
of turbulence
whose name is lost—
he proclaimed dominion
over tide and time
then sank alone into a sea
of disregard.

Whose Name was Writ on Water

Biography: Nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, Neil Ellman writes from New Jersey. More than 850 of his poems, many of which are ekphrastic and written in response to works of modern and contemporary art, appear in print and online journals, anthologies and chapbooks throughout the world. His first full-length collection is Parallels: Selected Ekphrastic Poetry, 2009-2012 (Omphaloskeptic Press).

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Mongolian Limericks. Vera Rich & Marie Marshall

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mongolia

Five years or so ago, the late Vera Rich, poet and translator, let slip some ‘Mongolian’ Limericks just for fun. I replied in kind and tickled her. Here’s an exchange or two between us.

Vera:

A Mongolian dealer in koumiss
Told his daughter: “I’m angry with you, Miss!
Last night’s supper was spoiled,
For the tea was not boiled,
And the dumplings were sticky as glue, Miss!”

Me:

His daughter’s voice came from the yurt:
“To say the least, you’re very curt!
No need to be cocky –
Those dumplings were gnocchi,
Green tea is drunk tepid – I’m hurt!”

Apparently Vera wrote a whole series of these as a divertissement at a Mongolian Studies Conference in the 1980s – a far cry from her serious work translating Ukrainian and Belorussian poetry. Here’s some more.

Vera:

Said a PR man in Ulan Bataar,
“I really don’t know what’s the mataar!
But that cursed foreign press
Writes of us less and less,
Saying it has too much else on its plataar!”

Me:

The cleaner (whilst shoving her Huva)
Said, “No Mongol is the prime muva
Of things international.
Anonymity’s rational…
It could be worse – this could be Tuva!”

It does you good to let your hair down once in a while. Vera is very much missed by those of us who knew her and worked with her.

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Vera Rich(1936-2009)

Educated at St Hilda’s College, Oxford and at Bedford College, London, Vera Rich, a respected science journalist and a tireless campaigner for human rights, was a fine poet. Her wits were quick, her memory prodigious and she had a wonderful sense of humour.

During the 1960’s she had three books of her own poems published, and founded the poetry magazine, Manifold. This ran with some success for 28 issues before publication was suspended in 1968, when Vera became Eastern European correspondent for the science magazine, Nature.

Once asked to translate some Ukrainian poems, she learned the language to do so. For the next three decades, she travelled extensively in eastern Europe, becoming the foremost translator of both Ukrainian and Belarusian poetry into English. She reported on the activities of dissident Soviet scientists, the Chernobyl disaster, psychiatric abuse and AIDS in the Soviet Union. Her anthology of Belarusian poetry, Like Water, Like Fire, published by UNESCO, was subsequently withdrawn under pressure from the Soviet Union.

Manifold, which she revived in 1998, regularly published foreign-language poetry with parallel text in Engtlish and, occasionally. foreign poetry untranslated. In 2006 Vera travelled to the Ukraine to receive the Ivan Franko Award for her 40 years service to the translation of Ukrainian poetry. While on a visit to the Ivan Franko Homestead she gave an emotional reading of Shevchenko’s poem “Testament”. On her next visit in 2007, she wore her medal, the Order of Princess Olha, which had been presented to her at the Ukrainian Embassy in London. Vera could fairly be described as a Ukrainian patriot, an unusual distinction for an Englishwoman.

In 2006 Vera underwent treatment for breast cancer. But she always insisted her illness was an inconvenient obstacle to her work. On 18 December 2009, her doctor advised her to go into hospital, but even then Vera gave priority to her translations. On 20 December, 2009, she died peacefully in her bed. She will be greatly missed, not least for her kindness and the support she gave to so many. Alan Flowers (UK)

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Marie Marshall (1957 — ) is an Anglo-Scottish author, poet and editor. Her first collection of poems, Naked in the Sea, was published in 2010 and reviewed in Sonnetto Poesia that same year, and her second collection, I am not a fish, in 2013. Since 2005 she has published over two hundred poems, mainly in magazines and anthologies, but the most extraordinary places in which a poem of hers has appeared include on the wall of a café in Wales, and etched into an African drum at the New Orleans Museum of Art. Her first novel, Lupa, was published in 2012. She is well-known in Scotland for her macabre short stories. Her web site can be found at mairibheag.com. Of writing poetry and sonnets she says, “I did not start writing until 2004, so I am very much a twenty-first century writer. I write anything, any kind of poetry that I feel the urge to tackle ― sonnets included.”

 
http://mairibheag.com/2014/03/18/mongolian-limericks
 
 

The Song Bird. Video.Audio.Poem.Randal. A.Burd.Jr.

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Randal Snapshot 2

Randal A. Burd, Jr. is a teacher, freelance writer, poet, and family historian. He teaches English to grades 7-12 in a juvenile residential facility in Southeast Missouri. He previously taught Dual-Credit English through MSU and Freshman English for two years and spent four years at an alternative high school teaching English and Art while mentoring at-risk students. In 2012, he was elected Secretary of the Department of Missouri, Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War. Randal was President of the Ozark Patriots Chapter of Sons of the American Revolution from 2011-2012 and is Camp Commander of Sigel Camp #614 of SUVCW. He was commissioned a Kentucky Colonel in April 2013.

Randal published his first poetry chapbook, “Leaving Home,” in 2008. He received his BA in English cum laude with minors in Art, Psychology, and Writing from the Missouri University of Science and Technology and his Master’s Degree in Curriculum and Instruction from the University of Missouri. While enrolled at Missouri S&T, Randal was Editor-in-Chief of The Missouri Miner, the campus newspaper, from 2000-2002, and Editor-in-Chief of Southwinds Magazine, “Missouri S&T’s Only Literary Magazine,” from 1997-2001.

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