Spondylotic Lines
stand face to face
keeping their eyes and hearts open
as if
they intent to intersect one another
touching
the epi-center of their pain and gain
assuming
the Sun and the other ancillaries are still
happy to be blind.
Alas!
Why the other Lines are not visible?
Why the equi-lines are repulsive?
The dreadful disease
keeps all the individual Lines
in turning mode
enabling them to watch only
the ever-hanging tongues
of their own flexible pencils.
Biography — Pijush Kanti Deb is an Indian poet more than 30with0 published poems published in more than 100 potry magazines and journals world -wide. Beneath the Shadow of a White Pigeon is his only poetry collection. He is an Associate Professor in Economics in Nagaland (India).
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Online Blog Poetics
Olympic National Park: Nature’s Drama. A Poem by Sterling Warner
Drinking ice tea in the
Bogachiel Rain Forest,
relaxing in retirement,
observing the Salmon
run along the Skokomish,
bald & golden eagles soar
high above, wait for harbor
seals to capture fresh fish,
climb aboard wooden rafts,
& steal the slippery bright
pink prey for themselves or
possibly feed hungry eaglets.
Large driftwood logs
float down the river’s throat,
anchoring themselves
along the Hood Canal’s
warm salt water shoreline;
mosquitoes breed abundantly
while skittish bullfrogs
stridently soldier vociferous
appetites in concrete storm
drains—conduits emptying
into the sound—shielding them
from sharp-eyed predators
scouring sand & stone for food.
Sterling Warner’s Brief Biography
An author, poet, educator, Pushcart nominee, Sterling Warner’s poems have appeared in many journals and anthologies, including Poetry Life and Times Artvilla.com, The Flatbush Review, Literary Yard, The Fib Review, Street Lit: Representing the Urban Landscape and The Atherton Review. Warner has published five collections of poetry: Without Wheels, ShadowCat, Rags and Feathers, Edges, and Memento Mori: A Chapbook Redux. Also, in August 2020, he launched, Masques: Flash Fiction & Short Stories, his first collection of fiction.
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Crackhouses of Venice. A Poem by Richard L Weissman
And in memorizing this dream while still dreaming it,
so that upon instant of awakening
none of its texture shall be lost
of bringing her to contractual climax
and warm cloaking in her vulnerability
as the love songs turn
mid this sea of teen
that await their plastic straw turn
to coat
long back of their throats
with the numbing drip. drip
of the Mayan rock goddess cocaina
who lays in state
atop this fragmented mirror of truth
till the blue coats rush in
scattering old cabals to four corners
and one ends lost
in crack housed Venice
lumbering down danger streets
searching for Santa Monica Boulevard
and faintest hopes of home.
Bio:
Richard L Weissman has written fiction since 1987.
In 2000, his theatrical play, “The Healing” was selected by Abdingdon Theatre for a staged reading Off-Broadway.
Richard is the author of two Wiley Trading titles. His second book, Trade Like a Casino was selected as a Finalist for the 2012 Technical Analyst Book of the Year Award.
In 2016, Mr. Weissman completed his historical novel in the tradition of magical realism, “Generations”.
In 2020 his poem, “Mountain Bird and Loquat” was selected as the grand prize winner of the Florida Loquat Literary Festival.
In addition to hosting, “In Our Craft or Sullen Art” – a biweekly poetry radio talk show, Richard participates in live spoken word events throughout the U.S.
https://richard-weissman.com/
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Autumn Fascination/ Fascinación de otoño Video Poems English/Spanish by Antonio Martínez Arboleda
Editor’s note: check the icons on the YouTube Videos to read texts
Green under siege
efficient blowing that pushed me to an end
of simultaneous lips
of seasons of perfected assonance
Now around a hiding sun
A brown agony
Scaffolding
made of arteries
transporting gravity to the top
The fall of the Roman Empire
Or the British
was harsher
but not neater.
When you try through your rustling
to talk to me about the time
that I set to you with my steps,
I find it very sweet and useless.
Why does your voice follow me,
but you stay behind stranded?
How can a loop be so straight?
What are you, but a new form of life
a sign
that defeat in the Natural World is always relative?
Today, you are masking the ground
where I keep dragging my roots
in contempt for the fallen.
And
despite the appearances
I still live
in a constant state of fascination
Fascinación de otoño
Un cerco fijado en torno al verdor,
efectivo soplo que me empuja a un fin
de labios simultáneos,
de estaciones que corrigen asonancia
Agonía marrón
Arterias como andamios
que transportan
la gravedad a lo alto
Más dura fue
la Caída del Imperio Romano
o del británico,
pero no más limpia.
Cuando intentas con tus chasquidos
hablarme tú
del tiempo que yo te marco
con mis pisadas,
me parece todo tan dulce e inútil.
Dime por qué me sigue tu voz
si tú te vas quedando atrás.
¿Cómo puede un bucle ser tan recto?
¿Qué eres,
sino una nueva forma de vida,
una señal
de que la derrota en el Mundo Natural
es siempre,
siempre, relativa?
En días como este,
enmascaras la tierra
por la que arrastro
con orgullo
mis raíces.
En fin,
a pesar de las apariencias,
continúo viviendo
en un estado constante de fascinación.
Antonio Martínez Arboleda:
Antonio (Tony Martin-Woods) started to write poetry for the public in 2012, at the age of 43, driven by his political indignation. That same year he also set in motion Poesía Indignada, an online publication of political poetry. He runs the poetry evening Transforming with Poetry at Inkwell, in Leeds, and collaborates with 100 Thousands Poets for Change 100tpc.org/. Tony is also known in the UK for his work as an academic and educator under his real-life name, Antonio Martínez Arboleda at the University of Leeds. His project of digitisation of poetry, Ártemis, compiles more than 100 high quality videos of Spanish poets and other Open Educational Resources. http://www.artemispoesia.com/ .
He is the delegate in the UK of Crátera Revista de Crítica y Poesía Contemporánea , where he also publishes his work as translator from English into Spanish. He published his first volume of poetry in Spanish, Los viajes de Diosa (The Travels of Goddess), in 2015, as a response to the Great Recession, particularly in Spain. His second book, Goddess Summons the Nation Paperback , Goddess Summons the Nation Kindle Edition , is a critique of the ideas of nation and capitalism, mainly in the British Brexit context. It incorporates voices of culprits, victims and heroes with mordacity and rhythm. It consists of 21 poems, 18 of which are originally written in English, available in print and kindle in Amazon and other platforms. Editor’s note: further information bio & academic activities can be found at this link: https://ahc.leeds.ac.uk/languages/staff/91/antonio-martinez-arboleda
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Learning Curve. 3 Poems by Gary Beck
‘Learning Curve’ is an unpublished collection concerned with the decline of Western civilization: Gary Beck
(i.)
Urban Reaches
Alone in a great city
strangers pass,
intent on jobs, crime,
shopping, terror.
I know not what.
They all look remote,
don’t say ‘good morning’,
don’t meet my gaze,
except the hostiles,
when I quickly look away.
I cannot tell
who is good, kind, normal,
smart enough to build a future.
Temporarily marooned
in a vast enclosure
I do not know what to do
to establish an identity.
(ii.)
Homeless VIII
They robbed my cans
for the second time
in a week.
I hustled my ass off
getting those cans
and got nothing for it.
At least they didn’t beat me.
Maybe I’ll get me a knife
and cut them good
if they try to rob me again.
(iii.)
Conflict
Armies march in many lands.
Rebels attack in many lands.
Conflicts simmer across the globe,
boil over,
erupt
in deadly violence,
destroying lives,
property,
eradicating
aspirations for stability,
disallowing
normal pursuits,
education,
home building,
raising children,
hoping
tomorrow will be better
than the savagery today.
Gary Beck has spent most of his adult life as a theater director and worked as an art dealer when he couldn’t earn a living in the theater. He has also been a tennis pro, a ditch digger and a salvage diver. His original plays and translations of Moliere, Aristophanes and Sophocles have been produced Off Broadway. His poetry, fiction and essays have appeared in hundreds of literary magazines and his published books include 26 poetry collections, 10 novels, 3 short story collections, 1 collection of essays and 1 collection of one-act plays. Published poetry books include: Dawn in Cities, Assault on Nature, Songs of a Clerk, Civilized Ways, Displays, Perceptions, Fault Lines, Tremors, Perturbations, Rude Awakenings, The Remission of Order, Contusions and Desperate Seeker (Winter Goose Publishing. Forthcoming: Learning Curve and Ignition Point). Earth Links, Too Harsh For Pastels, Severance, Redemption Value and Fractional Disorder (Cyberwit Publishing). His novels include a series ‘Stand to Arms, Marines’: Call to Valor, Crumbling Ramparts and Raise High the Walls (Gnome on Pig Productions) and Extreme Change (Winter Goose Publishing). Wavelength (Cyberwit Publishing). His short story collections include: A Glimpse of Youth (Sweatshoppe Publications). Now I Accuse and other stories (Winter Goose Publishing) and Dogs Don’t Send Flowers and other stories (Wordcatcher Publishing). The Republic of Dreams and other essays (Gnome on Pig Productions). The Big Match and other one act plays (Wordcatcher Publishing). Collected Plays of Gary Beck Volume 1 (Cyberwit Publishing. Forthcoming: Plays of Aristophanes translated, then directed by Gary Beck). Gary lives in New York City. https://www.facebook.com/AuthorGaryBeck
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
The Color of a Snuffed Flame & Poems by Ryan J. Davidson
(i.)
Freedom of Fences
Dear _____, I lust her—though
she cannot know. It’s a painful thing—
a tightness of the chest. I keep having to stop
myself from ending each email
with “love, R”. But appearances
being what they are—I end with “best”,
but I know what I mean—so there’s that.
(ii.)
Fountain Statue
When it was still years ago—
before I saw that girl
with a flower in her ear; before
that flower grew—
I missed a summer day.
My broken English stands better
than my unwhistling lips and tonight
I meet a German poet
I’ve never heard. He’s a park
statue I can touch and feel the shoulder curve of his
bronze rather than the fountain statues whose jagged edges—
or if they’re soft it’s only the mollification
of time and distance—I can only feel
with my eyes. The ones I walk in circles around
wishing to walk on water. I took a photo of the tin-can moon
electrified by lightning
to understand the part of me that’ll go to this meeting
in the name of—it rained in Munich today.
(iii.)
The Color of a Snuffed Flame
Woken by a trumpet sounding.
There are things
we’re meant to make, some
less definite than knots and a box. I watched
a Boeing 747—there was a girl
who taught me to do that—and thought
of the 369 lives in it and those
stories. This is too much; people have their minutes
which added together equal a life
and all the plots and coincidences that live therein.
The butterfly house in Vienna
was beautiful though hot, small
and expensive. Filled with kids
more interested in the fish,
parents who wished their kids
would look at the butterflies,
and one woman taking pictures
of a dead butterfly. Tomorrow I’m
going to a fair to win a stuffed animal.
Bio: Ryan J. Davidson’s first book, Under What Stars, was published in 2009 by Ampersand Books. His second collection, Statues Need Stories, was published in 2019 by CyberWit. He is Assistant Professor of Humanities and Comparative Inquiry at Habib University in Karachi, Pakistan.
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
FOLLOWING THEIR LEAD (i never will) A Poem by Bradford Middleton
The world seems to have turned a corner and suddenly there
Is a glint at the end of this longest tunnel down which life has
Taken a turn. News came today that the stock market is back
Up meaning the rich are back to getting richer and with all the
Headlines here consumed on one bit of news, our PM is now in
ICU, the real story is ignored as figures in general society are
Finally falling.
Right now though no one in our media cares as they all talk of
His fighting bulldog spirit and how he’ll battle on through just
Like they saw him on the rugby fields of Eton more than forty
Years before. He’s super-fit I heard one tory hack-minister claim
Before the interviewer managed to ask about his body-mass
Equating a case of obesity but ‘oh no, he runs, he exercises every
Day and barely drinks’ he claimed.
So now out there people continue to teem around the streets
Carrying on with their lives as if everything is normal and then
There are those who’ve decided they want to do something
About it. David Icke announces the burgeoning 5G masts are
Responsible for all this horror and the next thing we know they
Are being destroyed and whilst I think his theories mad it does
Offer a question.
Where did this come from and why did it happen? Well, in
Years, maybe decades to come, the truth will doubtless come
Out and practically no one will notice as it’ll just be a footnote
In a history book by then but I can guarantee you one thing, it
Weren’t the 5G masts that caused this as to this mind it seems
More like an exercise in control, seeing just how far they could
Push us, telling us what to do and how to live this life that grew
Just a little out of control.
BIOGRAPHY
Bradford Middleton was born in south-east London during the summer of 1971 and won his first poetry prize at the age of nine. He then gave up writing poems for nearly twenty-five years and it wasn’t until he landed in Brighton, knowing no one and having no money, that he began again. Ten years later and he’s been lucky enough to have had a few chapbooks published including a new one from Analog Submission Press entitled ‘Flying through this Life like a Bottle Battling Gravity’, his debut from Crisis Chronicles Press (Ohio, USA) and his second effort for Holy & Intoxicated Press (Hastings, UK). He has read around the UK at various bars, venues and festivals and is always keen to get out and read to new crowds. His poetry has also been or will be published shortly in the Chiron Review, Zygote in my Coffee, Section 8, Razur Cuts, Paper & Ink, Grandma Moses ‘Poet to Notice’, Empty Mirror, Midnight Lane Gallery, Bareback Lit and is a Contributing Poet over at the wonderful Mad Swirl. If you like what you’ve read go send a friend request on facebook to bradfordmiddleton1.
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
“TESTIMONY” A Video Poem by Deborah Sfez
Deborah Sfez is a multidisciplinary Israeli artist, born in 1964, working in Côte-D’Ivoire and
Israel.
She is a recognized Artist in Israel and internationally and has won several photography and
art awards.
Her work can also be found in the archives of several Museums.
Her tools are photography, moving image, filmed performance accompanied by texts and
music and sound composition.
Her path, atypical, begins with studies of literature and languages and then by learning the
trades of Fashion and Theater Costume.
Today her work mainly talks about the ups and downs of human existence, she talks about
the experience of existence, partnership, how to overcome an illness, the fear of life, the
beauty of to be a woman and the impossibility of being perfect.
Photography, for her, means a creative research.
She started her work with a series of hundreds of self-portraits by transforming her
appearance into many different characters using costumes, make-up and wigs. Later, she
began using these various self-portraits in a more complex way creating photographic
installations or in more constructed videos, including texts that she wrote, and soundtracks
composed exclusively for each work.
Coming from a country like Israel, where cohabit multiple cultures, the main objective
would be to find equality for all human beings, regardless of their cultural background,
because we are all born one day and therefore must die, man or a woman.
https://www.deborah-s-artist.com
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)