https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Si20d96WmWU
flicker-of-smoldering-embers-lay-in-ashes-by-shuttershock
Beneath the bedded ash the ember curls and dies
Its memories drift towards the sky, reaching grey fingers
Up the blackened grate towards the early morning stars
Within the silent room the ghost of whisky lingers
Its breath testament to those who drank there earlier
Sharp warmth waiting to greet the breakfast comers
Searching out fresh fat to chew,
Crackling beneath the griddle.
What memories fold and steel towards those stars?
Whispered over tumblers in the late hour of the night.
Our minds’ stained glass distorting light behind our eyes,
Colouring opinion, casting motes of floating
Dust adrift upon the ebb and flow of our remembered history.
Between those whispered words, hushed tones,
Cracks of lightning laughter quick to smite,
Comes the ticking of the clock
Measuring out both time and truth,
Illusive in the midnight hush:
No longer rights or wrongs but
Wicked witches casting spells
Against which we pitch ourselves
the heroine.
No longer simple kindnesses bestowed
But kingdoms and vast fortunes gifted
Whilst ungrateful greedy hands would
Snatch from us our mercy, offering only
Empty embers’ ashes in return
Our youth no longer ordinary but
Fraught with Hogarth’s excesses
Of hedonistic, narcissistic, nihilistic
Indulgent pleasures
First kisses love stories, first cuts a battlefield
Bled out over a lifetime, mingled with gin and
Absinthe, as absent hearts refused to return
And those that did grew fat and unforgiving
Ah! Such heady thoughts of heady days.
Conversation, like the fire, soaked up fuel
Grew higher.
Spat a little, blushed red hot
Smoked, smoldered and raged
Before dying.
Topics exhausted and sapped to ash
Colourful opinions drained to grey
As the bottle emptied
And the clinker built
As the dawn broke
And nought more
There was to stoke
From the gaping
Drooling
Drooping
Jaws of two tired friends.
To bed, then.
Let the last breath of whisky haunt the hearth.
Let the stars claim their stories from the grate.
Let a hundred more stories await us
For the telling.
Marion Grace Woolley studied at the British Record Industry Trust
(BRIT) School of Performing Arts, Croydon. After obtaining an MA in
Language & Communication Research from the University of Cardiff, she
declared that she’d had enough of academia and decided to run away to
Africa.
Balancing her creative impulses with a career in International
Development, she worked and travelled across Africa, Australia,
Armenia, and a few other places beginning with ‘A’. In 2009, Marion
helped to oversee the publication of the first Dictionary of Amarenga
y’Ikinyarwanda (Sign Language) in Rwanda, where she currently lives.
The same year, Marion was shortlisted for the Luke Bitmead Bursary for
New Writers. She is an associate member of the Society of Authors. Her
latest release, Those Rosy Hours at Mazandaran, is due out with
Ghostwoods Books in February 2015.
Marion Grace Woolley, Literary Vagrant
www.authormgw.co.uk / @AuthorMGW
Blog: www.deckledged.blogspot.co.uk
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http://www.amazon.com. All the Babble of the Souk. Robin Ouzman Hislop
www.lulu.com. All the Babble of the Souk. Robin Ouzman Hislop
https://www.amazon.com/author/robinouzmanhislop
http://www.innerchildpress.com/robin-ouzman-hislop.All the Babble of the Souk
Poets
Poverty’s Army. A Poem by RC de Winter
i remember the bodies
filthy
unwashed
everything accruing to them in layers of rags
beaten brown bags sagging with defeat
sometimes an empty bottle as still life decoration
completing the sad tableaux
i remember stepping over them
around them
as i hurried through grand central
on my way to an expensive entertainment
heart heavy with pity but also with fear
wondering how in the land of milk and honey
so many could be disenfranchised
they cleaned out the station
eventually
no more reminders of what can befall
the best of us
the worst of us
I don’t know where they exiled them
but next trip they were gone
the wheel has turned as it always does
no longer society’s ghosts
the once-invisible army
has returned with a vengeance
too many conscripted
too many to hide
we know these people
destitution is an equal opportunity recruiter
no longer satisfied with broken men
the ranks swell with women and children
with the corporate cast-offs
of a world burdened with too many drones
not the ones that kill
but the ones who would work if work could be found
and now i
once a card-carrying member of the comfortable
walk the knife-edge of poverty
around every corner i turn
waits a death’s-head recruiter
with a paper bag a shopping cart a dumpster
how long before i too wear the uniform of the lost?
© 2014 RC deWinter ~ All Rights Reserved poverty’s army
RC deWinter is a writer, digital artist, photographer and musician currently living and working in Connecticut. Her art and poetry have appeared in print, notably in the New York Times, Uno: A Poetry Anthology, Pink Panther Magazine, Arts Creation Magazine, The Sun Magazine, The 2River View and The American Muse as well as in numerous online literary publications. Five artworks were licensed to ABC-TV for use as set decor for “Desperate Housewives”. Ms. deWinter is honored to be the first digital artist invited to exhibit her work at a four-week October 2011 solo show at the Arts of Tolland Gallery in Tolland, Connecticut.
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I think it will be winter when he comes. Poem by Dufflyn Lammers
I think it will be winter when he comes,
not that anyone can feel it in Los Angeles.
It will be winter and I will know this
because there will be less traffic
and everyone wears pants.
He will come from a long way off
but I will know him
by his shoulders, by his chin
by his shimmering.
He will smile when he sees me
the smile I knew so well once
that I inspired so many times
stretching across the years like a bandage.
We will open our arms
without thinking about what we have carried
for so long and it will drop from us. Spinning
like clouds into each other, we will make
something new.
Lammers co-edited the spoken word anthology CHORUS with Saul Williams, from Simon & Schuster (Sept., 2012). She writes for www.thefix.com, the world’s leading website for addiction and recovery. And she also has a blog for actors in Los Angeles: www.thelaactorsblog.com Her poetry has been published in journals as varied as Iowa Woman and The Museletter of the National Association for Poetry Therapy. Lammers is anthologized in SLAM: The Competitive Art of Performance Poetry, 2000, Manic D Press. Recently, she wrote, produced, and starred in the short film RAVEN co-starring Deezer D (ER). RAVEN won best experimental picture at the Los Angeles International Underground Film Festival, 2011. Lammers appeared on “Russell Simmons Def Poetry Jam on HBO”, in “Criminal Minds,” “Entourage,” and in the films BELLY and PROUD AMERICAN, among others. She has also toured Universities from Smith College to UC Irvine with my spoken word poetry show and competed in the National Poetry Slam for five years running.
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Methuselah Speaks. A Poem by Joan McNerney
Living in shadows I scarcely stir.
Each motion brings pain with fear
of falling, breaking brittle bones
or bruising my spider web skin.
I see so little. Sunlight blinds my
rheumy eyes. Night dims my world
leaving just vague outlines.
Food is stale, bitter. Thirst savage.
No liquids quench me. My bodily
functions often fail befouling me.
All these years weigh down my soul.
Hearing faded, everything in whispers.
My breath is raspy, without strength.
My mind dull with defeat. I count only
my losses and remember nothing
but the dead. My memory is pain.
I cannot celebrate births. My great
grandchildren died so long ago.
Why must I always wait here?
God, have you forgotten me?
Joan McNerney’s poetry has been included in numerous literary magazines such as Seven Circle Press, Dinner with the Muse, Blueline, Spectrum, three Bright Spring Press Anthologies and several Kind of A Hurricane Publications. She has been nominated three times for Best of the Net. Poet and Geek recognized her work as their best poem of 2013. Four of her books have been published by fine small literary presses and she has three e-book titles.
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MI CORAZON ROMPA. A Poem by Robin Marchesi.
My eyes have eaten the Morna Valley in a feast of sight.
The sweet pine and thyme scented airs fresh from the seas
have reached my nicotine stained lungs.
I have stood privileged to hear flocks of birds chattering in shrubbery
or to watch a falcon riding the swirls of wind before diving,
like a panther, for its prey.
I have witnessed the vast skies of night that dwarf humanity with constellations,
solar systems, planets, moons and universes.
I have sensed shadows stalking my footsteps; felt the pull of lunar tides,
on my own tides, as fascinated; I’ve watched its penumbras and changes,
its cycles, in our petty breaths.
I have held cloud-induced commentaries with God and in the vast silences of my daily time;
I have spoken to the dead, lulled by their camaraderie, comforted by their presence.
No doubt, peaky and press-ganged, at some future date,
wandering down Ladbroke Grove in London, I might remember this intelligence,
amongst my city-influenced companions.
My heart breaks
‘Mi corazon rompa’
For you,
Ibiza,
The nearest place I found
To home…
Robin Marchesi, born in 1951, began writing in his teens, much to the consternation of his mother, the sister of Eric Hobsbawm, the historian.
In 1992 Cosmic Books published his first book entitled “A B C Quest”.
In 1996 March Hare Press published “Kyoto Garden” and in 1999 “My Heart is As…”
ClockTowerBooks published his Poetic Novella, “A Small Journal of Heroin Addiction”, digitally, in 2000.
Charta Books published his latest work entitled “Poet of the Building Site”, about his time working with Barry Flanagan the Sculptor of Hares, in association with the Irish Museum of Modern Art.
He is presently working on an upcoming novel entitled “A Story Made of Stone.”
http://www.amazon.com/A-Small-Journal-Heroin-Addiction/product-reviews/0743300521
http://www.illywords.com/2011/09/down-the-rabbit-hole-a-glimpse-into-the-wonderland-of-barry-flanagan/
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in an odd state of melancholic un-belonging. A poem by Richard Lloyd Cederberg
So it was for them,
and for countless others,
as they grew and struggled
in a soulless-system, seeking-out
their identities, their paths, their purpose,
their successes, as captivating circumstance cajoled
(each) with a fool’s panacea. People much like cold calderas,
once bold and forceful, now, sadly subject to
the chronicles of yawning indifference.
~
A cop’s wife beat
down {oppressed}
seeks retribution in her world
of make-believe.
A sister’s husband beats her; it
rewires her heart and mind; cursed,
he dies soused in a head-on,
leaving her and an
(only) son alone
unloved.
Years go by…
EVER deprived of model,
the son loses his bearings, angry,
arrogant, aggravated, he curls inward,
embraces his wounds, weed, alcohol, pills,
ends up wayward, darkened, lessened, a miscreant
seeking refuge in a Wiccan’s ramshackle garage
where he drinks and smokes himself numb,
and lines the framing with hundreds
of empty bottles he pretends are medals
~
These accounts
proliferate like weeds,
in every city and township
the wounded (financially solvent
or in straitened circumstances) exist in
an odd state of melancholic un-belonging,
souls seeking freedom, wings, peace,
meaning, as opposing forces
relentlessly push back
with impudent vigor
ugly converting
influences
staunch
unbending
unwavering
deceptive assuredness
vomiting multiple sides of
similar theories simultaneously
caught betwixt shadows of indifference
as side by side miseries annihilate
meaningful purpose
~
And they persist,
like wildflowers and weeds, a
pandemic of fraught souls struggling,
(employed or destitute)
surviving alone,
unloved in a soulless system,
scorned, segregated, separated,
alone dreamers dreaming dreams of
beautiful things that remain [for them] unrealized …
richard lloyd cederberg
___________________________________________________________
A new hard-fought adventure/thriller, BETWEEN THE CRACKS, was completed March 2014 and will be available summer 2014. August 2007 Richard was nominated for a 2008 PUSHCART PRIZE by the Mississippi Crow Magazine. Richard was awarded 2007 BEST NEW FICTION at CST for his first three novels and also 2006 WRITER OF THE YEAR @thewritingforum.net …
Richards work has been featured on Poetry Life and Times, Artvilla, The Taj Majal Review, Hardy Alpha 1, ChristianStoryTeller, The Mississippi Crow Magazine The Path Magazine, and in varied anthologies, compendiums, and e-zines. Richard’s literary work is currently in over 35,000 data bases and outlets. Richard’s other novels include: A Monumental Journey… In Search of the First Tribe… The Underground River… Beyond Understanding. All four are in the Monumental Journey Series.
Richard has been privileged to travel extensively throughout the USA, the provinces of British Columbia, Manitoba, Alberta, and Saskatchewan in Canada, the Yukon Territories, Kodiak Island, Ketchikan, Juneau, Skagway, Sitka, Petersburg, and Glacier Bay, in Alaska, the Azorean Archipelagoes, and throughout Germany, Switzerland, Spain, and Holland… Richard and his wife, Michele, have been avid adventurers and, when time permits, still enjoy exploring the Laguna Mountains, the Cuyamaca Mountains, the High Deserts in Southern California, the Eastern Sierra’s, the Dixie National Forest, the Northern California and Southern Oregon coastlines, and the “Four Corners” region of the United States.
Richard designed, constructed, and operated a MIDI Digital Recording Studio – TAYLOR and GRACE – from 1995 – 2002. For seven years he diligently fulfilled his own musical visions and those of others. Richard personally composed, and multi-track recorded, over 500 compositions during this time and has two completed CD’s to his personal credit: WHAT LOVE HAS DONE and THE PATH. Both albums were mixed and mastered by Steve Wetherbee, founder of Golden Track Studios in San Diego, California. Richard retired from music after performing professionally for fifteen years and seven years of recording studio explorations. He works, now, at one of San Diego’s premier historical sites, as a Superintendent. Richard is also a carpenter and a collector of classic books, and books long out of print.
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Speed. A Poem by Steve de France
One cloudy day in 1945,
I played alone in a vacant lot
across from the Central Hotel.
Digging roads for my fire
engine. It was small, red,
and made of cast metal.
Suddenly, I saw my mother
standing next to a man
in uniform. She called to me.
We were living in a cheap hotel
in Redondo Beach.
The Central Hotel.
Built in the twenties or so.
Wooden fire escapes.
Transoms.
Bathroom down the hall.
Filled with smoke,
whiskey voices,
coughing.
Men and women fighting.
Doors banging.
People coming & going all hours…
I stood & shaded my eyes
from the sun glare. They walked across
the street to me.
“This is your father.”
He had medals on his chest.
I stared at him,
not comprehending.
He grabbed me up like a bag of potatoes.
Whiskers scraped my cheek.
Beer breath frightened me.
He toted me
into the Central Hotel.
The war was over.
I remember the smells.
People cooking on hot plates.
Fish, cans of hash, eggs, stew,
potatoes, onions, cabbage, coffee,
anything & everything cheap.
And then, there was the
hotel manager patrolling the halls.
Looking for overdue rents.
Maybe an open door to stare in.
He smoked big cheap cigars.
Chewed them till they were wet
then, he’d hock & spit.
Usually he’d miss the open door
hitting the floor instead,
the was followed by a
“God Damn” or two.
But
more powerful than all these odours
was the stench of the mouldering
hallway carpet. That grease-stained,
puke-beige carpet. It’s miasma
hung fog like in the halls.
This night
For reasons I didn’t understand
I was forced to sleep alone
in our hallway leading to the bathroom.
Here in the shadows, car headlights
seeped through diaphanous curtains
from Diamond Street, and threw
huge fantastic shapes of black
and ghostly white on aged wallpaper.
I cried.
Until he came in a flood of light;
and spanked me till my butt burned.
And then for the rest of the night,
I breathed the stench of dead carpet
and listened to each night sound
walk by my hall window.
I fell asleep, planning immortal revenge.
Not long after this, my father,
Speed disappeared forever.
His memory still hangs like a fog in my mind.
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.
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editor@artvilla.com
maiden grass. A poem by E. Darcy Trie.
look
mother
i have your hands
the thin ridge of toes
shang-hai at the east heel
the mole of hunan beneath
the hangnail
even the barley of your laugh
grows along this throat
but you say
something in my field
cannot
that i have lost the taste
for your gods
your gardens
your gracious arsenal
of acquiescence
you accuse like a brick
whose powers are to
bash and be broken
that i am a woman
of the west bridge
the brown bells of my body
clang at a different hour
that i find lust is a fist
not knees of lilies
that i need
while you knead
but it is not the
same
that my shame
will last for generations
all because
she ate the edge of things
and i
only
the centers
she cuts
like a metal salad
still good for you
even as it rips at the belly
i am too tender
unable to carry
such sacred bitter water
this daughter
will leave the table cold
it will empty chairs
rattle rugs
and fail to catch
those christ nails
that somehow
show how strong
she is
even while
lying down
it is too late
to apologize
though the words swell
against her hills and dale
but i will not
for i know
sorry
is just a
word
yet
she will forgive me
when i return
push past paladin plains
ghost over geometric gates
my feet damp
across maiden grass
and the short stride
to her door
it will open
her face
will startle
like a flock of birds
doused in sunlight
before wheeling back
to the nest
___________________
Darcy was born in Taipei, Taiwan in 1975, E. Darcy Trie is a Scorpio, Rabbit and matriculated in Little Rock, Arkansas at the age of two. She graduated at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville with a B.A. in Psychology along with Minors in Drama and Asian Studies. Sensing that achieving her Masters would drive her to drink, she wisely opted to tour Asia in her early twenties (thanks to a grant provided by Bank Of Daddy), and in the year 2000, found herself in the heart of Beijing, China where she began writing due to the fact that crocheting was far too complicated and because the voices in her head would not shut up.
By 2004, she had completed two romances, one historical and one modern, and after viewing all nine seasons of the X-Files and three seasons of C.S.I, finished the first two series of the Snow novels and is currently writing the third installment. During this time, she has also had several pieces of her poetry published in various online poetry magazines.
Her passions and hobbies includes writing, reading (anything put out by Neil Gaiman), Disney movies, all divination tools such as Tarot, I-Ching, Runes and is an enthusiastic, although albeit amateur, astrologist/paranormal investigator. She is 5’10, weighs whatever she wrote on her driver’s license, owns a lot of black hoodies and is addicted to It’s A Grind’s Passion Fruit tea.
She is fluent in English, Mandarin Chinese, some French and once took a Zero Hour in Greek in high school. She hates mornings, coconuts, wire bras, and sincerely hopes that this is bio is long enough to fill up an entire page (doubled-space of course).
Ms. Trie currently lives in Las Vegas, NV because she adores $2.99 buffets, Paigow Poker, and that lovely 116 degree August weather. She dreams of writing best-selling novels that will delight and thrill her future fans and because she is tired of being a productive citizen and wants to go back to being a mooching hermit.
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