23 SKIDOO ~

CLARICE LISPECTOR ~

R E A D      M E

New Directions

2019

translated from the Portuguese by

Johnny Lorenz

HEAVEN LAKE ( 33 ) ~

Girl In The Middle

It was all in her eyes

and something about the two ragamuffins

sitting with no food at the table in the corner

watching her — my lover and I have come into

the diner from the back door, place about empty

her eyes said — square on us both — I’m ready for you

we smiled, said hello then ordered two salads

with grilled chicken

and one large Coke

plus a large fries

and if she would

please serve the fries

the way they look in the photograph

on the wall behind her

her eyes darted, very cat

she purred, “oh wouldn’t it be

something if we could be served

food the way it looked in the pictures.”

now I really liked her

the two ragamuffins seemed to be listening

I liked her because she reminded me of my

lover who is capable of saying the very same thing

and because of that solvency it all worked out splendidly

she went and served up the fries precisely as they

looked in the picture and I told her she has

now proven it can be done

she may have curtsied

in one of those stupid uniforms

looking on fire 

while the rest of the staff, I’m sorry

looked-on like dopes

we were midway done with our meal

out in the truck cab

when she left with the two ragamuffins 

4 o’clock shift over

big truck

loud truck

two guys and this girl in the middle

big snowplow lifted driving fast

Stone Over Stone

to bal

ance

the

stone

takes

eye

&

hand

& for

get

ting

thought

All

There is 

nothing 

greater 

than a 

greatness 

that 

comes 

not at 

all

________________________

Bob Arnold

Heaven Lake

Longhouse 2018

ELIZABETH WARREN ~

JAZZ CASUAL ~

DEVIN JOHNSTON ~

Along the Little Piney



Fingers impatient

with the buttons of a shirt,

desperate to shed

accustomed constraints,

you strip down

as if aflame,

then pause demurely

to hang your clothes

on a crown

of upturned roots.



How is it? Cold!

wading through

foam and twigs,

caught between

desire and lassitude,

having kept

apart too long.

A current wrinkles 

around your legs

and the river lifts

above itself

as fog.




_________________

Devin Johnston
Mosses and Lichens
Farrar, Straus, Giroux
2019

EDOUARD LOUIS ~

R E A D     M E

New Directions

2019

JOHN LEVY ~

Placing





I look at myself in the mirror

through the wrong end of the binoculars.



I'd like to get further away, as in a movie

when you see someone fairly close



then retreat until you're looking at

miles of earth and further out the earth



as the round marble in space.

Down there in many beds



people are holding each other and

saying Yes Yes or My God or



Touch me here as they take a hand

and guide it, I want to think, gently, with



love and tenderness and hope and joy, that's

the earth I want to return to from space.





______________________

John Levy
On Its Edge, Tilted
Otata's Bookshelf
2018

"JIMMY" (THE YOUNG GODS) ~

MUSIC FOR AIRPORTS (BRIAN ENO) ~

SOME TOM RAWORTH ~

NOT A STEP DO I STIR UNTIL THAT CAT'S
BACK TO ITS COLOUR




civilization was pushing around aging molecules saying

"lovely . . . a new patch of lung" and  "aching  doesn't thank"

when a sunbeam hit my son, throwing his tiny full colour reflection

onto the centre of the flickering black and white screen









CAP




pattern outside my head

speak to me

signaller of the word-commune



i was not aware

one lonely word outside

could call itself 'snap'





.






every question you ask presupposes

an alternative universe










FROM TIME TO TIME IN THE PAST




tree lets me hear the wind

over there where it is

i won't believe this is all there is

(the interest on eternity)



'it is' squeaks my voice





.






you have to learn

you can not teach







.







i can not prove a second ago

to my own satisfaction





.






speak my language

dog






.







a turtle

a fine line

a turtle






.




if they do

what you think

it's as boring

as you thought






.







i put it

there

and it's still

there





.





moon breathe




.




slowly

through the

snow they

go






.






slavery

what

we

have

words

for







.







remember

no time

when i wasn't










SLEEP, PERCH




each clearing of the brain

needs nothing to be clear again



i don't want to listen to the same

i don't get it better twice



starve the nation

out of stagnation



wandering the earth

a civil war ahead of the traffic







______________________

Tom Raworth
Tottering State
selected and new poems 1963-1983
The Figures, 1984

BILL WITHERUP ~

__________________________

I found this letter in a recent pick-up of Poetry

magazine, free, a fistful, from 2006-7

and I read each issue cover to cover

and the best I found in the issues

wasn't the poetry (Bill is correct)

although a fine essay on translating 

by Michael Hofmann was there

 and this letter by Bill 

who is now gone but not

to those who knew him.

HEAVEN LAKE ( 32 ) ~

photo ~ Jerome Delay

Sick Days

Middle of winter

I knock a bug to the carpet —

what is a bug doing here at

my lamp this time of year?

for the longest time

I have been watching it slow-

ly upright itself on the

heavy weave of carpet as

if it were me —

I can’t stop watching

A Moment In The West

Fairly pretty

In a pale violet

Long skirt, white

Blouse, black hair

Sells me one very blue

Iris from a thick

Bunch in a plastic

Pail, wraps it with paper

And blue string

Then smiles at

Susan who I

Hand it to —

Who takes me

Out and shows

Me more of

Santa Barbara

Our Life

You

&

me

&

then

some

You

The woodpile I stacked in the woods

Is precisely as I left it one month ago

Where I dropped the cherry tree

Bucked it up, split it, stacked it

It was left to the sun, rain, gloom

Harmless showers, longer nights

And if I’m a nice guy

I’ll cover the woodpile

Before it snows

It’s all up to me

___________________

Bob Arnold

Heaven Lake

Longhouse 2018

YELLOW MAGIC ORCHESTRA ~

PRINCE, MOTHERLESS ~

SHANE McCRAE ~

Everything I Know
About Blackness I Learned
From Donald Trump


"Frederick Douglass is an example of somebody who's done an
amazing job and is being recognized more and more, I notice."
                            
                                  — DONALD TRUMP






America I was driving when I heard you

Had died I swerved into a ditch and wept

In the dream I dreamed unconscious in the ditch



America      I dreamed you climbed from the ditch

You must believe your body is and any

Body and stood beside the ditch for eight years



Thinking       except you didn't stand you right

Away lay down on your pale belly

And tried to claw your way back to the ditch



You right away began to wail       and weep

And gnash your teeth       my tears met yours in the ditch

America       they carry me downstream



A slave on the run from you       as Egyptian queen

And even in my dreams I'm in your dreams





_________________________

Shane McCrae
The Gilded Auction Block
Farrar, Straus & Giroux
2019