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I Gut the Fish

Robin Walter

When something
in the dark
begins to shift:
I move into it.

 I gut the fish.
 I split my own wood.

The Tailor of Twitter

Amy Holman

He measured     the pattern     to be cut bias
cherry-coloured     snippets
that will serve one single button hole.

He talked to himself     little twittering tunes     his greatest triumph
but there was no one there
He was vexed     like a cat that expects

cream on the dresser

No more twist!
Throstles and robins sang

His badness     hunted and searched     house to house
and secret trap-doors     without any keys
merry voices an echo

ravelling     that wonderful coat
Never were seen such flowered lappets

And he talked to himself:     do not lose that last penny!
We shall make our fortune     shut out the light

Rhizome Culture

David Bankson

but keep the fingers from severance, from severity of assumption, from a neighborhood of sheer glass in gravel, peeling out pickups like boars roaring and squealing, the crash of running out of antipsychotic healing, pirates reading poetry for the ultimate in democratic experience, an intermezzo existence, a stone’s-throw through a solid state, culture as a surface of water trickling through cracks, one hand in the hound’s mouth

Sonnet with Simile

Jane Huffman

I knew straight away,
like a rabbit darting across traffic
knows the extent of its quickness.

I had wanted to emerge without
emerging. A private debut,
no needling.

What happened, of course,
was threefold, like a Chekhovian
drama. First, I gave in

as some might give birth. Then,
I made the decision. Last, I stayed,
which had the staying power

of an image, a hook-handed man.
A rifle in the umbrella stand.

kitchen window view

Philip Arnold

of the barn-tethered
goat

his joy-besotted molars
cudding

brambles in blossoming
light

the rickety-hinged holler
opens

the
cauliflower

are rife with
it

Licentiam: 9.8

Daniel Y. Harris & Jonathan Mulcahy-King

hissing vessel desperate to be poured, poor little veins,
lava streams engulfing inland valleys, brown blood
flecks, a peaking shrine to blackmail hex on kin, old
straws, busted copper rods to suck, sacrosanct instead
of laundered preempt, sickos willed by the smack of a
papal legate, loyal gene, radical selfcombing, snarled
hair, narrates the rotary gestures, theremin with
vacuum tubes, heterodynes, Fête des Belles Eaux for
six ondes, to crave badly is to take hard the blood-tusk

Quercus alba

Sonja Johanson

mott-gathered, hard
 as hunger

 rock-shelled, soaked soft
 cracked
 open with a maul

 three days
 in a basket, steeped

by the whiskey river
 destitute lobes,
 handful
in the pot, mouthful
in the cup

 one on the sill
 against the storm

Ageratina altissima

Sonja Johanson

 the milk, and the bone –
 sickness and break fever

women in their crinoline
 cages

 round-toothed, scalloped
 feet planted so close
 together

 birthing herb,
snakeroot, richweed, sanicle

 ruptured shade   the febrile wood
 white island
 in a sea of heat

terete-wrap your breeze around
 my aching legs
 and tongue

All That Good Stuff

klipschutz

take the prose of a poem   the teeth of a grin
lost weekend of a savior   heyday of a has-been

golf shoes of a president   a jew’s christmas cheer
a punchline in german   the court eunuch’s leer

warren beatty’s crow’s feet   johnny depp’s address book
the mouth of a mime   the vow of a crook

take a scrivener’s eyes   a blackmailer’s file
straightedge of a schoolmarm   a judge’s denial

the twitch of a surgeon   a divorcée’s glow
repose of a greyhound   a yes man’s hell no

the staple from a centerfold   bouquet of a bride
stand in line for a seat   bite down hard, open wide

take an open house tour   through a boychild’s wet dream
hey diddle diddle   don’t make a scene

take the prose of a poem   and a guilt-wracked scapegoat
hey nonny nonny   death row clears its throat

Guitar by Chuck Prophet

It’s Hard to Get Ahead

Brad Rose

Brainwashed the dishes. Now, I’m looking for money in large amounts and small denominations. Jesus says I’m a very legible person, but Raven says I don’t have enough string to fly a kite. OK, so maybe I am still working out the kinks. This week they called off the weekend, so I’ll just work right on through, at least until those Japanese Martians land. I’ll wear water skis if I have to. I’ve heard hollow chocolate Easter bunnies really can work up an appetite. After all, you are what you eat. Of course, you can’t trust everything they teach you in hairdressing school. To make up the deficit, I practiced my danceable moves in broad daylight. Before I knew what was happening, the cops asked me to leave. That nearly killed me. I love this country like the back of my hand. Can’t count the number of times I’ve tried to set it on fire.

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