The Bedside Book of Bending Down

We will remain ambivalent
about animals and animal
control.

We will shield our eyes.

We will choose between secret and sacred
passwords.

We will fondle the dirt
in the garden,

wash our hands and pile salami
onto a slice of bread.

We will listen as the Violent Femmes
scream for their runaway
train to let them off.

We must figure out how to ask.

Something that fast.

And then it hits the wall.

We are listening.
We have been listening all along

to their harried song,
their hair-brained scheme
to escape from it.

We don’t want to live this way.
We will straighten up and fly
right

into the wild blue.

 

Glen Armstrong, From Issue 1
 

Canvas

My words create shawls—
they cloak the crazies
on empty nights
like this.
So I pick up a pencil
and press it to my palm—
rendering my thoughts clichéd.
But being welcomed back
will never really be clichéd
as long as my return to the village
is kept to
myself.
I sense the weight now
of Euterpe
gnidnib ym no gnitirw;
pins and needles at a party
unwrapping my fingertips
like a Kolossus.
I suppose this would be
a nice place to
Stop.
But the six-month-old curse
needs pushing from my pitiless tongue.
I’ll spit air into streaks of lead.

Jessica Bell, from Issue 1