Poem

Isolations. A Video Poem by Maggie Hall

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Maggie Hall
 
_______________________________________
Completed: Master of Creative Industries, May 3rd, 2020
 
Recipient: Margaret Olley Scholarship, Friends of the University Art Prize, 2019
 
FABLE: The art and heart of storytelling, April 3rd to 28th 2019, Group Exhibition, Writing, Painting & Photography
 
Life in Three Parts: an autobiography, August 8th to September 1st, 2019, Solo Exhibition, Watt Space, Photography, Sound, Painting
 
Lost & Found: Memory, January 5th to 14th 2018, Art Systems Wickham, Solo Exhibition, photographic Installation
 
Gateway: White Mushrooms & Painted Gods, July18th to August 5th, 2018, Solo Exhibition, Photography & Painting, reviewed in the Newcastle Herald, July 19th, 2018
 
https://www.newcastleherald.com.au/story/5532957/the-mona-lisa-adapted-displayed-in-newcastle-photos/
 
Regular contributor, Studio La Primitive Art Online Magazine: Quarterly, March 2017-2021, ongoing
 
I am an artist who can work in any medium, depending on what is required of my ability. The isolation we have been faced with has allowed for transformative and technological connections between individuals and communities, that otherwise would never have been possible. Intuitive connections that have been transformative and healing, challenging and shifting. This is my song; this is my voice.
 
The spoken verse was written over the past 6 months of isolation. The words came through a stream of consciousness. What is seen in the film is a dancer (myself) dressed in a full white body. In the background, a painting I created which in post has replaced the green screen behind my moving body.
 
I recorded myself reading several poems I have written in a layered intuited fashion. All recordings and text are of my own hand and voice. The background recordings were taken during my travels overseas pre-pandemic change.
 
One recording is not my own. It is the constant metronic sound that threads throughout the film. It is the sound of a ‘Singing Comet’ which I have also layered and adjusted in speed. Below is a link.
https://youtu.be/Tyuhh7759V0
 
I have taken a few lines from ‘Frankie Goes to Hollywood’ The Power of Love. It is clear where this is spoken within the layers of each poetic melody.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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)

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Vida. (Life) A Poem by Antonio Arboleda (English & Spanish)

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Image: Calle Santo Domingo, Lorca (Spain), showing the house where Antonio was born and his mother, Lucia, in the balcony of their flat.
 
Life
 
To my father, Antonio Martínez Manzanera, who passed away on 28 March 2021
 
You leave behind a trail of victims.
 
How many voices,
unique children
delivered to your light,
did you end up strangling
with your own hands, Life?
 
You kept up the appearances
deceiving those humans
who believed themselves
boundless,
who felt accepted by the matter
of an uncanny universe
that turns out to be
just a sad arrangement
of rough stones and gases,
a universe that enslaves you,
Life,
as its precarious
exotic whim,
forcing you to leapfrog
through chosen planets,
and drag yourself
in travelling theatres
for your vanity,
and your honour,
Life.
 
My thinking carbon molecules,
the impression of my spirit,
are not members
of any ruthless club
of inert particles,
of empty energies,
of graceless big bangs
with no purpose,
with no story to tell.
 
Life,
if there exists a divine mystery,
sweet and tragic,
mother, parricide,
redeeming saviour,
defying the dark,
clumsy ways of physics
that must be you,
Life,
That must be you.
 
 
 
Vida
 
A mi padre, Antonio Martínez Manzanera, fallecido el 28 de marzo de 2021
 
Dejas a tu paso un reguero de víctimas.
 
¿Cuántas voces únicas,
hijas paridas en tu luz,
terminaste ahogando
con tus propias manos, Vida?
 
Tus apariencias engañaron
a más de uno,
que se creyó sin límites,
aceptado por un universo
que resulta estar hecho
de pedruscos y gases,
por un universo
del que no eres más
que lacaya en precario,
Vida,
capricho excéntrico
que de salto en salto se arrastró
por planetas elegidos,
teatros ambulantes
de tu vanidad,
y de tu honra,
Vida.
 
No es mi carbono pensante
ni el espíritu de mi impronta
miembro de ese club despiadado
de partículas inertes,
de vanas energías,
de big bangs
sin propósito, ni narrativa.
 
Vida,
si existe un misterio
y una divinidad,
dulce y trágica,
madre, parricida,
salvadora y redentora,
desafiando las artes oscuras
ramplonas
de las físicas
y las químicas
esa,
Vida,
eres tú.

 

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)

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Dead Beat Dad & More Poems by Brian Rihlmann

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i.
 
Deadbeat Dad
 
my poems are my children
and I’m their deadbeat dad—
I create them, love them,
nurture them for a little while
a few hours…a day…
sometimes a week
if that’s what it takes
until I feel they’re ready
or I’m just tired of them
then I boot them out
I open the door and say—
you’ve gotten all I have to give
so go on now
you’re free
get out there and live
go see what they’ll make of you
just don’t expect too much
 
sometimes they don’t want to go
they look back at me
from the front steps
they plead with their eyes
and their sad little faces
but I set mine to stone
and shut the door
 
like any parent
of course it pains me to know
they may be mocked
or laughed at
or misunderstood
they may wind up
rotting in dumpsters
or abandoned in dark
and dusty corners
but there’s always the possibility
of being found by someone
who needs them
someone who hears
what they have to say
and that’s the best
a deadbeat dad like me
can hope for
 
ii.
 
One Day Much Too Soon
 
she walks unsteadily as a toddler
and trembles as though terrified
always a nurse by her side
I’ve watched her come and go
from the house next door
diminutive and middle-aged
with pageboy hair and thick glasses
but I haven’t seen her
since the ambulance came that day
and I haven’t heard
the unearthly sound she makes
halfway between a laugh and a cry
I never knew which
maybe she didn’t either
but now as I stand outside, listening…
the absence and the silence
reminds me of all we get used to
and all the strangeness we’ll miss
one day much too soon
 
iii.
 
One Hand On Her Ass
 
If a young man
ever sought my advice
I’d tell him this—
don’t kick yourself too much
not over the times
you stumble and fall
not over the time
you think you’ve wasted
lying there
until you’re able to get
on your feet again
and not over all the people
you believe you’ve let down
because the world
couldn’t possibly go on
without you, right?
don’t kick yourself
for any of it
in fact make a habit
of not kicking yourself—
life’s a cranky old mare
she’ll kick you plenty
stomp you when you’re down
she doesn’t need
any of your help
oh—and if you have to walk
behind her
keep one hand
on her ass
and stay as close
as you possibly can

 
 
 
 

 
 
 
Brian Rihlmann:
 
Brian Rihlmann lives and writes in Reno, Nevada. His poetry has appeared in many magazines, including The Rye Whiskey Review, Fearless, Heroin Love Songs, Chiron Review and The Main Street Rag. His latest collection, “Night At My Throat,” (2020) was published by Pony One Dog Press.
 
 
 
 
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)

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Three Strikes in London A Poem by Megan Denese Mealor

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We spent our thunder in East End stagger,

imbibing jellied eels sharked from shadows

underlying Tower Bridge stained Silver Jubilee.

Irish weavers once spilled their angels on those docks;

Leather Apron boiled fetid fog, tempested theists.

You induced me along gashes of geodesic graffiti

enlivening crooked curry houses, inner city chattel,

fidgety railway bridge partitions retailing

kitschy orchards, botanic rainboots

in the shambolic underpass.

 

In a charismatic kilt and Victorian tourmaline,

I descended brick basement bookshops,

jubilating in the heirloom halo,

thumbprint burning your impassive palm.

Cancan robots, unbaptized bohemian Bentleys

depicted the dilettantish din borderless

throughout enameled back alleys.

Electrified with Rhubarb Sours and feeling alien,

I disoriented your voltage in a biting brasserie

swirling with coriander, chilies, cardamom.

 

The last time you lost me in Shoreditch,

I was procuring bouquets of Harper’s Bazaar,

pocketing hints of old-world Chanel,

lacing Queensbridge Road into my hue.

 

(Originally published in The Ministry of Poetic Affairs, April 2017)
 
 

 
BIO
 
Megan Denese Mealor is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee. She has authored three full-length poetry collections: Bipolar Lexicon (Unsolicited Press), Blatherskite (Clare Songbirds), and A Mourning Dove’s Wishbone. Her writing has appeared worldwide in such publications as Digital Americana, Gone Lawn, The Furious Gazelle, Maudlin House, and Black Dog Review. Diagnosed with bipolar disorder in her teens, Megan’s main mission as a writer is to inspire others feeling stigmatized for their mental health. She lives in Jacksonville, Florida with her husband Tony, son Jesse, who was diagnosed with autism at age three, and their sovereign cats Trigger and Lulu. Megan enjoys astrology, alligator farms, painting, photography, yoga, and volunteering at humane societies and food banks.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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)

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Karol Nielsen’s SHAKESPEARE’S GARDEN & other Poems

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SHAKESPEARE’S GARDEN
 
I sat on a bench, raw logs,
shaved clean almost
in Shakespeare’s Garden.
The magnolias were bursting,
and the cherries,
and Japanese plum.
A photographer
held his lens high to
the pink, white, and purple buds,
snapping, looking,
snapping. Across the
sky, the apartment towers
looked grand,
like church steeples,
graceful, gothic spires.
And I thought of you,
painting this scene,
like we used to do.
 
COWBOY HAT
 
I wore a cowboy hat—
straw—and raw confidence,
as I walked past two men
who turned to look and said,
We’ll never see that girl again.
 
HEADS
 
They turn in summer for
sun-kissed hair, buttery
flesh—exposed, carefree.
They look down, turn away,
after fall brings its dull cast,
and I wonder what is true?
 
THE WRITING LIFE
 
I write a few lines
and feel the calm
of a practiced monk.
But too long away
I am the worst sort of
neurotic—incessant.
 
 

 
 
Karol Nielsen is the author of the memoirs Black Elephants (Bison Books, 2011) and Walking A&P (Mascot Books, 2018) and the chapbooks This Woman I Thought I’d Be (Finishing Line Press, 2012) and Vietnam Made Me Who I Am (Finishing Line Press, 2020). Her first memoir was shortlisted for the William Saroyan International Prize for Writing in nonfiction in 2012. Excerpts were honored as notable essays in The Best American Essays in 2010 and 2005. Her full poetry collection was a finalist for the Colorado Prize for Poetry in 2007. Her work has appeared in Epiphany, Guernica, Lumina, North Dakota Quarterly, Permafrost, RiverSedge, and elsewhere. She has taught writing at New York University and New York Writers Workshop.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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)

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THE REHABILITATION OF A FUSED PARTICIPLE & TRUST IN THE COUNTRY Poems by Colin James

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(i.)

THE REHABILITATION OF A FUSED PARTICIPLE
Upon your giving
the proper direction
we passed the gate without incident.
All the staff heavily bearded
wore vertical striped fare.
They led us down subconscious hallways
adorned with inmate’s art,
some bargains for the closet.
Pausing at a bared window
I matched a landscape with where we were.
They held you in a cordoned courtyard
the trickling light meekly unaware.
A straight jacket unpressed, stained
bits of recent food in your hair.
I signed the drug concession form.
We took the same route back
stopping just once more to inquire if
a previously dropped off appliance
could possibly be repaired.

(ii.)

TRUST IN THE COUNTRY
There is a neat, round hole
cut into the small tree bushes
across the way from
our bathroom window.
Sticking out of this hole
is a thick complex telescope.
I thought it was a tree limb,
passed it many times walking
the dog Jeff who had no opinion.
When I realized what was afoot,
I confronted our voyeuristic neighbor.
He said he had little interest in me
my skin too flaccid on the bone,
thin and thinner, despite absolution.
My wife however is voluptuous.
He often observes her on the toilette,
long legged, ankles turned slightly in.
Piquant and still retaining
much if not all of her original sin.
 
 

 
 
Colin James has a couple of chapbooks of poetry published. Dreams Of The Really Annoying from Writing Knights Press and A Thoroughness Not Deprived of Absurdity from Piski’s Porch Press and a book of poems, Resisting Probability, from Sagging Meniscus Press……
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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)

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Shelter. A Poem by Andrew Scott

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So many hands out
waving affection
though they do not know
who I truly am.
 
I hide the nervousness
and the thoughts
that keep away sleep.
 
Confidence and anxiety
cause the different blend
of the perfect confusion.
Hidden with a calm smile
to the many faces I meet.
 
As I look you in the eye
please remember one thing.
Just because we shake hands
does not mean you may know me.
The only one that truly does
is the person in my shelter.
 
July 12, 2015
© Andrew Scott – Just a Maritime Boy 2015
 

 
 
Andrew Scott is a native of Fredericton, NB. During his time as an active poet, Andrew Scott has taken the time to speak in front of classrooms, judge poetry competitions as well as had over 200 hundred writings published worldwide in such publications as The Art of Being Human, Battered Shadows and The Broken Ones.
 
Andrew Scott has published five poetry books, Snake With A Flower, The Phoenix Has Risen, The Path, The Storm Is Coming and Searching and one book of photography, Through My Eyes. Whispers Of The Calm is his sixth poetry book.
 
To contact Andrew, email …andrewscott.scott@gmail.com
 
http://twitter.com/JustMaritimeBoy
http://andrewmscott.com
http://www.facebook.com/andymscott
http://www.facebook.com/JustaMaritimeBoy
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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)

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3 Poems by Glen Armstrong.Cherry Cola XXXVI,June Bug & Radium

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(i.)
Cherry Cola XXXVI
 
Bottled inks and dyes fill Sister’s dressers,
desks and closets.
Color
 
confuses me when it can be labeled.
Clean bedding shares
space
 
with paper.
 
Yellow makes a case for exclamation
points and plastic.
Red
 
lights a flare.
 
Orange is loved but unexpected, unplanned,
nearly a clearing or sauce.
Purple
 
is nobody’s child.
 
I sign up to conduct an experiment and end
up measuring rainbows,
eulogizing
 
white mice, eating lunch by myself.
 
(ii.)
June Bug
 
One of the letters
of the alphabet has golden wings.
 
I think about ping-pong.
I think about falling.
 
One of the radio stations
has letters that almost spell
a word.
 
I think about calling
in to request
 
“My Blue Heaven.”
 
Whippoorwills and babies
fly around the room.
 
(iii.)
Radium
 
We played in the abandoned clock
factory.
 
We chased each other the way squirrels
chase Russian spies.
 
We smoked Granddad’s pipe
and tried on Mother’s dresses.
 
It was the best
of times and the wurst.
 
We ate liver spread on white bread
with yellow mustard
 
and bested the spies
who worsted the moose.
 
Gardens bloomed
on bedroom walls at night
 
when the rest of the world
stopped glowing.
 
 

 
 
Glen Armstrong holds an MFA in English from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and teaches writing at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan. He edits a poetry journal called Cruel Garters and has three current books of poems: Invisible Histories, The New Vaudeville, and Midsummer. His work has appeared in Poetry Northwest, Conduit, and Cream City Review.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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)

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