Archive for June, 2009
Tuesday, June 30th, 2009
“DANCING AT THE DEVIL’S PARTY: ESSAYS ON POETRY, POLITICS, AND THE EROTIC” by Alicia Suskin Ostriker
Review by Moira Richards
DANCING AT THE DEVIL’S PARTY: ESSAYS ON POETRY, POLITICS, AND THE EROTIC
by Alicia Suskin Ostriker
University of Michigan Press
839 Greene Street
Ann Arbor, MI 48104-3209
ISBN 978-0-472-09696-1
2000, 136 pp., $14.95
http://www.press.umich.edu
I devour books like this. I live across the world from Alicia Ostriker and my education barely touched on poets in the USA–even less on [...]
1 Comment » - Posted in E-Reviews by Megan
Monday, June 29th, 2009
“Not Everything I Do Is Magic” by David M. DeLeon
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
David M. deLeon
NOT EVERYTHING I DO IS MAGIC
Consider, Sally: the way the sun shines laterally
below stormclouds. And the clipped exuberance of green.
And there’s everything that passes by in a single
still moment, there’s the messy kanji of branches,
the superscript of birds. There’s that warmth that someone
you don’t mind sitting there [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Audio, Poems by Tim
Sunday, June 28th, 2009
“Breaking Babies” by Christine Gelineau
Christine Gelineau
BREAKING BABIES
Nobody breaks ranch stock the old way now,
leaving those youngsters wild till two or three
then snub ’em down, cinch ’em up, and pow,
spring to the saddle and set ’em free.
They’d sunfish, crow-hop, leap and roll, frantic
to lose the catamount hooked to their back.
The cowboy had to ride out the antics,
a feather in the [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Poems, Tributes by Tim
Saturday, June 27th, 2009
“Cottonwood Blues” by Thea Gavin
Thea Gavin
COTTONWOOD BLUES
Somewhere along Highway 395
In the pasture over west—
when cottonwood shimmer fills the air
the lizard in me wants to rest
up on a silvered fence rail; there,
twitchless between red dirt and sky,
I’d blend into the wind-carved wood,
let the dark birds circle, try
not to blink until the hood
of stretching shadow catches [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Poems, Tributes by Tim
Friday, June 26th, 2009
“Mahler in New York” by Joseph Fasano
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
Joseph Fasano
MAHLER IN NEW YORK
Now when I go out, the wind pulls me
into the grave. I go out
to part the hair of a child I left behind,
and he pushes his face into my cuffs, to smell the wind.
If I carry my father with me, it is the way
a horse [...]
3 Comments » - Posted in Audio, Awards, Poems by Tim
Thursday, June 25th, 2009
FEAR by Pamela Garvey
Review by Rebecca Ellis
FEAR
by Pamela Garvey
Finishing Line Press
Post Office Box 1626
Georgetown, KY 40324
ISBN 978-1-59924-236-1
2008, 27 pp., $12.00
www.amazon.com
If only I could’ve pinned the angel down.
But the angel is winds
sweeping through fingers like sand,
each grain gliding coldly up the arms
into the frantic heart,
then the seed tumbled through my body. Released,
I turned suddenly, as if the angel had [...]
No Comments » - Posted in E-Reviews by Megan
Wednesday, June 24th, 2009
“Dark Coats” by Trent Busch
Trent Busch
DARK COATS
Bright as a red dress on
a drab street to the eye
I was once to the stopped
moment when she, as I,
saw others in a mist
of dark coats going
to and from work or at
Christmas time in and out
of shops alone trying
to find right presents in
a world that was not right,
someone lost or gone.
Now I, as [...]
No Comments » - Posted in Poems by Tim
Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009
“Expiration Dates” by James Best
James Best
EXPIRATION DATES
There was a peeling little grocery on the corner of Rice Lake
where my brother worked between fifteen and seventeen.
A nothing much happens place in a town too big to know anyone.
Robbed once, and solved and nothing even close to scandal.
Sometimes the owner’s son would smoke pot behind the dumpster,
and sometimes they could just [...]
1 Comment » - Posted in Poems by Tim
Monday, June 22nd, 2009
“At a Party on Ellis Island, Watching Fireworks” by Traci Brimhall
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
Traci Brimhall
AT A PARTY ON ELLIS ISLAND
WATCHING FIREWORKS
The man next to me sings God Bless America even though
he knows the Statue of Liberty is unsafe to enter. He sings
my home, sweet home, and I bless fireworks breaking
over our heads. Bless three islands held apart
by tunneled water. Bless bridges, lights [...]
2 Comments » - Posted in Audio, Poems by Tim
Sunday, June 21st, 2009
“Farrier” by Cal Freeman
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]
Cal Freeman
FARRIER
A barn cat’s complaint set to the pitch of curdled milk,
the poem for Bill is no good. Bill, it gets no better:
a stone so useless it refuses to skip or sail or barter
against the wind’s heft.
Your words sprayed like gravel across the moat and landed
somewhere in the poverty [...]
