vomiting chunks into the
river, while
hanging over the bridge
railing as
my drinking buddy, an
ex ski bum pot-smoking
hippy, waits
patiently, through the
up rush and
gush, as
all my sickness
and self-disgust over
what I had become--
what I was--
came to the surface.
“In 762, Li Po’s wandering ends south of the Yangtze River, at someone else’s house, when he falls into a river and drowns trying to embrace the moon.”
—David Hinton, The Selected Poems of Li Po
The moon is that which does not come and go.
The moon always agrees with water.
She hides, she is my eye moving as the earth turns.
She stands as light, my true mother to my father.
Moon holds, reflects him, where he shines—
in the clouded eyes of crones,
and boys and young girls,
moon changes with the time. Many moons
mirage in puddles during rainstorms.
Moons feed artists and madmen at night.
And my lover wonders why I write
about a Chinese poet with the sight who’s drowned
himself, her hunger a yawn for lunatic stories
lapping on Li Po’s dock.
So, such ripples of night’s white apple convict.
This moment of peace. The green shallows
fill lungs with water and with smiles—
I sleep soundlessly. I am a mere piece of fruit-fall
for beautiful mirrors and rivers of charity,
these—inviting bone-whites, fingers speak
sweetly, every syllable a clarity
to strum a song that I would die for,
to flock with fish
beneath the stream.
Manny Grimaldi is a Kentucky writer and editor at Yearling Poetry Journal with two
books Riding Shotgun with the Mothman and Ex Libris Ioannes Cerva. His third book,
slated for the near future is with Whiskey City Press on the subject of how to royally
fuck up every single relationship you’ve ever had. Without exception. He lives
with two stupid feathery bipeds and the dishes are never done.
Sunken through its face
this concrete skeleton's teeth makes light
pick out exaggerated cars on its skinny highway,
swallowing souls whose birthdays pack today like a sardine tin
controlled by so many wheels I wonder where they could possibly go
to escape the judgements of the bone-tinted light,
appearing from the mouths of buildings,
and the skull-shaped concrete
perched behind broccoli trees
wobbling a worried wind that tries to wobble broccoli trees back
and everyone assumes
it's a language of vision and silence that poems magically fall from
Driving through New England,
I notice small towns
all have a cemetery
crowded with tombstones,
weathered and leaning
into each other
like old friends.
How many dead people
are buried there?
I hear my father’s voice
ask years ago—
All of them, he’d say,
then laugh at his own joke.
The dead don’t mind,
having sailed away
like widows and warriors
taken by surprise
when the night sky
sinks into a fishbowl,
and the stars blink
out one by one.
a pounding headache
with any luck you'll
be dead by the morning
the woman of your dreams
is off fucking her true lover
and if you ever want to let
the young poets know
that is the reality
that awaits them
dancing with the devil
is reserved for a higher
class of degenerate
get used to the sewers
to the cheap booze
to women as lost
as you truly are
she swore she could
shit out rainbows if
given enough drugs
would you rather eat
or be entertained
she said she knows
a guy a few blocks
away that sells some
good shit
old enough to know now
that is never a good sign
J.J. Campbell (1976 - ?) is old enough to know better. He's been widely published over the years, most recently at Synchronized Chaos, Disturb the Universe Magazine, The Beatnik Cowboy, Lothlorien Poetry Journal and Black Coffee Review. You can find him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (https://evildelights.
I visited the Pagan fest yesterday.
Not that I’m a practicing or non-practicing Pagan.
I was curious and wanted to see what it was all about.
Old school mythology has always been an interest
Since I was a kid – Norse, Roman. Greek, Egyptian.
Those stories always held more interest to me
Than those told in Sunday school.
The fest was kind of a bust. No human sacrifices.
No half naked women dancing around,
Chanting at the moon
At least not when I was there, just after lunch.
No goats, no black cats, no toads,
Nothing resembling a witch’s familiar,
Other than some annoying, toad-looking kids.
Not even a single broomstick in sight.
Just a lot of incense, homemade soap, fake fairy wings,
Tea samples, rodent bones, Tarot decks,
Folk art with chickens, cows, and tornadoes,
And people who wanted to chat.
I asked about the ceremony
Involving a sacrifice and orgy afterwards.
Did entrance to that cost extra?
Would condoms be provided?
Or wipes to clean off the blood?
The festival goers who previously wanted to chat
Suddenly lost all interest.
God damn close-minded pagans.
Brian Rosenberger lives in a cellar in Marietta, GA and writes by the light of captured fireflies. He is the author of As the Worm Turns and three poetry collections - Poems That Go Splat, And For My Next Trick..., and Scream for Me.
vomiting chunks into the river, while hanging over the bridge railing as my drinking buddy, an ex ski bum pot-smoking hippy, waits patientl...
