Never Mind the Beasts

Website of surreal-absurd writer Marcus Silcock

  • one month intense TESOL course. Two more weeks. Then I can think again. Got a gig for 10 weeks at a small college in Feb-April teaching students from Senegal and India. Yeah. New book coming soon from Harry’s Arthur Shilling Press. Poetry from 2008. Part Dante in London. Lots of areas in London covered. YEAH!!!!

  • Karavan Amigos

    I’m crouching with the march of the penguins in a oversized parka
    a world not yet dead
    I am not the erection of a eunuch
    the buts and the knaves
    I’m dialing in and i don’t wanna say it
    humba womba
    dry coughs from the radiator
    are you feeling fitty?
    how this then methinks
    somebody’s drunk my milk
    I am not yet the harmony of submerged large birds
    I am not yet the preamble of a leering mustache
    I am not yet the baby-boom of sociopathetic innocence
    it’s raining in London yeah big surprise
    I wanna walk the parks with a brown bag and twenty rums
    harder is a part of speech
    here’s a dime now show me how to dance
    I have an Oyster and i know how to use it

  • Karavan Amigos

    I’m crouching with the march of the penguins
    in a oversized parka
    a world not dead
    but sometimes the erection
    of a eunuch
    as a wet tablecloth
    as a community
    you deserve better prigs
    deep down beneath the maniacal weather
    above the buts and the knaves
    i’m dialing in and i don’t want to say it
    dry coughs from the radiator
    how this then rethinks me
    there is this and there is that
    vice will continue
    harder is a part of speech
    somebody’s drunk my milk

  • 18th Dec 2010
    (return to London)

    given what we have seen
    Ryanair equals sardines
    my bag is in number 29
    and I am in number 3
    they are playing Mozart
    the elf a stewardess
    wrapped in tinsel
    selling everything
    “your captain invites you
    to read the card in front of you”
    i’m over my usual weight
    i didn’t do much with Italy
    why couldn’t i have been Joyce
    in Trieste
    I keep forgetting it is almost Christmas
    you’ll drive yourself nuts trying
    to get what you want
    JINGLES
    they fuck you up

  • WOOD GREEN. NORTH LONDON.

    the footpath buckles
    these are the markers

    who steps on my steps
    we’re tailor made

    what’s in yr food chain?

    murals of an albatross
    broken shoulders

    as a community

    you deserve
    better pigs

    and also stilt

    is it lazy to be placed
    with the rats?

    oh this life
    this life

    we are all
    mostly all

    the erection
    of a Eunuch

  • 19th December 2010
    (London)

    I can’t quite tell you where
    I have been

    what’s left to

    I can’t quite tell

    I left my finger
    on the start button

    and the washer wouldn’t
    start

    we have you in the asylum

    in the anthems
    of the serious

    objects are closer than they appear

    fry my loose ends
    these words are a landscape for my friends

  • 7th October 2010

    I am a lucid lucy
    a listless chill in the gloaming
    with a thickening of birds

    I am the slap of the line
    the buzzing of mopheads
    I am that short espresso
    the shaking of tails
    the yoke yellow walls
    spread out the window

    I am a cough a sniffle
    an old man’s head
    a young woman’s eyes

    I am the hairy tale of the past
    waving or tucking between
    the legs sometimes
    a lick of the snout or a low grumble
    from the belly

    I was baited into a new tango
    I was a temporary gathering
    I was beast of another butter

    it is the end of the month and this is not far from Venice not far from the thick eyes of Joyce with his twelve lectures on Shakespeare the Self Taught Man has a nosebleed
    and alienation imagines a man with the tongue of a caterpillar

    we can’t rip it out we can’t be ourselves alone
    this is not a landscape
    this is not the beast of a heart
    the dark flame of old Europe

    these are not moving pictures

    we have left nothing
    poets painters musicians
    nothing stays still
    in the churches of Rome
    or Naples
    with the misheard angels
    we are getting back the ghost

  • 1.5 hours till i leave for the airport. here we go. london . . . .

  • 15 December 2010

    under the salty moon
    full on pizza
    with salty dough
    people commin
    outta train station
    with wheels
    sunday returns
    gone thicker
    gone thinner
    gone itchy
    with winter
    and doghairs
    yr sentiments
    are nice but not surprising
    ideas are sand
    in my bathing trunks
    which i don’t own
    i was due to return
    to Turkey but here
    I am planning for London
    i am that
    perky little pug
    barking at shadows
    i am here
    and have no proxy
    hungry angry
    winter blues
    for fools
    p is for press
    cocky breeze
    spikes my nipples
    because changes
    into something else
    a supreme bark
    nuthin always left
    but everything
    going up
    going down
    which floor
    which paino
    non parka Italiano
    I’ll tell you stories
    of suspended animation
    blues and cheap shampoo
    awoke from dreams
    take notes under headings

    Turkish homophonics

    gunay ik su jack . . . su jack larda . . . ye mes sek es del lay
    jay hitch yamma yok
    chok chu sick lay
    cha shamba gun day
    a vet var

  • 6th December 2010
    Via di Roiano, Trieste

    I am a tense cannibal
    think deeper
    above the fury
    hop flop into hope
    30X30
    illusionary surfaces
    we have many minutes
    we have you surrounded
    keep swallowing your dog hair

    12th December 2010
    Trieste train station park

    Novo Hotel Impero
    (left shoulder)

    stairs to tunnel
    (right shoulder)

    bench
    (ass)

    kebab ali baba
    (eyes)

    30th November 2010
    Trieste Train Station Park

    fake easternness
    coming thru the camel
    below the humps
    scream or at least spit
    instead just stood there
    hands dried out
    pigeons pigeons
    I have a wrong pen in bad light
    this bora waters my eyes
    to rattle your cage
    to lick another
    dog’s bowl
    perhaps you would prefer to make other arrangements
    oh I say it rank
    stop feeding the messengers
    the elements deride
    I awoke on the roadside

    25th November 2010
    Trieste Doggie Park

    is that you in front
    of me
    coming back
    for exactly the same?
    I have a name
    I have been given a name
    more than once
    tried to change
    IT
    I’m learning to talk
    DIRTY

    WALK TO THE SEA
    WALK TO THE SEA

    these beasts
    are good
    to think with
    though i seem
    tame
    i speak for my name
    in name only

    CAUGHT MY SLOPPY
    COPYIST

    acid reflux
    sun
    on grass blades
    lady in brown boots
    and pram
    with worn out
    curls
    a thick matted
    dog
    sniffs my shoe
    there is a tree
    born crooked
    never got straight
    made promises
    never meant to keep
    good morning
    yoga

    24th November 2010
    Trieste, Doggie Park

    I’m yr father’s mother
    lick my nipples
    I’m growing
    up strangly
    plus scroungely
    we’re all here
    giant little monsters
    to feed
    if i am lost it’s only
    for a little while
    all past efforts
    buried
    in our stomachs
    sneezing out the seasonings
    noli me tangelo
    POMP ROAST
    earnest driven
    been down here
    day after day
    this template
    is not my heart
    piggy toenail
    has split again
    change my changling
    darling
    i’m a quick wet
    with street-wide eyes
    calling for you
    everywhere
    I’m not a fat house
    cat
    i’m not a poisoned
    rat
    butterchrist mouth
    all told
    i have no after-
    taste
    in head shape voiceskin
    this is my kin
    in their very own
    private BORA
    give me a beat
    make mock
    of neither beast
    nor foul
    praise the winter
    plum
    no trinkets
    no poems
    mistakes tread their own
    grace
    in this valley of fish
    eyes
    feast on nooks
    my veined one


  • 16th December 2010

    a little love
    feast
    banging

    on invisible
    headboards

    the tired grunts
    of a golden
    retriever

    this goes
    very slowly

    there are so many
    molecules

    I shd be satisfied
    at some point

    i am kicked
    in some stupid places

    let me think
    without

    bliss

    is a simple thing

    i take up
    loving

    the golden ones smells
    a bit better

    from a name brand
    galaxy

    into the wild blue yonder

    muffled voices on the
    cranked winds

    teethed to dying
    meat

    i am en-
    joined

    to morph
    back into human form

    we believed we
    were

    somehow back
    on earth

    pre-
    historic
    again

    and this is what it
    looks like

  • Trendy Club
    (Elblag, Poland)

    put a hole in your skull
    says Roger
    the lid
    is open
    but where are my eyes
    my balcony opens
    delicious flavours
    what wonderful timing
    don’t let them
    keep you here
    i am giving you
    a ride home
    I have not adapted
    I envy my neighbours
    their incredible skill

  • TEXT

    mighty fine band . .. pics remind me of my days in Poland . . . .

  • Cardinal Sundowns

    tell me of the shadows
    hither in St. Nicholas
    late in the evening
    in the gibber and gabber
    with domino Roger
    late in the evening
    baba baba
    in the bean poles
    in the beetroots
    late in the evening
    with the squawk and squeek
    of plastic
    knees on palms
    twins of my bosoms
    tittering and skithering
    jimmied into shiny skin
    zim tim
    microclusters
    in yonder elms
    dark hawks
    hear us

  • Danzig-Gdansk

    an umbrella in my hand
    a mirror in my eyes
    covered in
    smog this city
    changes hands
    play kiss me
    watch all the indie
    kids in t-shirts
    for months I could
    not save
    my blue lips
    my language lacked
    a future
    a smite will keep
    for a while
    me and my lightning
    flashes
    me and a toy cow
    you can ride
    half drunk
    with a mouldy old ghost
    in the house
    of 100 beers

  • Language consists of five basic sounds produced by the vocal cords. They are the vowels a, e, i, o, u. The other sounds are consonants produced by air pressure: s, f, g, and so forth. Do you believe some combination of such basic sounds could ever explain who you are, or the ultimate purpose of the universe, or even what a tree or stone is in its depth?

  • 21st November 2010

    Pancakes provide solidity. Syrup is my get-up. Rain drips from the light swinging from a wire in the centre of the street. The bora is returning. My bum is cold please close
    the window.

    Hello world hello
    i’ve tried to re-up
    my realities
    are short lived
    i’ve not lived
    a story

    Mew is playing on my broken headphones. Have you met someone have you touched
    the bottom? My stomach is regaining its flora and fauna. This is November 21. It’s time to switch the station. Often I am permitted to return to a made place that is mine enfolded in all thought wherefore fall all hosts. A disturbance of words within words whose secret we see often. I can’t believe your hands are so cold. I can’t believe you’re still playing this game.

    Hello home
    hello
    you are being
    oh so very
    esoteric

    swimming to the sound of clouds my partner does headstands in the front room with
    a golden retriever. she is listening to something on her headphones. last night I dreamt of a snake. I had to enter the basement of a building to find my lost clothes. The basement was flooded. My clothes were on the other side of the river. A snake coiled into a U
    covered both sides of the river. This is my ego. I dove in without clothes and the snake squeezed me. I sank. I awoke.

    hello
    tiny bird brain

  • 25th November 2010
    Trieste Doggie Park

    a gooey ganglia
    lived in creepy inns
    no guts for creeds
    I threw away
    the plastic
    that housed my szynka
    haven’t brushed my teeth
    but I’m on my feet
    a dumb shine
    for the haughty
    is that you in front
    of me
    coming back
    for exactly the same?
    I have a name
    I have been given a name
    more than once
    tried to change
    IT
    I’m learning to talk
    DIRTY

    WALK TO THE SEA
    WALK TO THE SEA

    these beasts
    are good
    to think with
    though i seem
    tame
    i speak for my name
    in name only

    CAUGHT MY SLOPPY
    COPYIST

    acid reflux
    sun
    on grass blades
    lady in brown boots
    and pram
    with worn out
    curls
    a thick matted
    dog
    sniffs my shoe
    there is a tree
    born crooked
    never got straight
    made promises
    never meant to keep
    good morning
    yoga

    30th November 2010
    Trieste Train Station Park

    fake easternness
    coming thru the camel
    below the humps
    scream or at least spit
    instead just stood there
    in an expensive necktie
    and shoes
    hands dried out
    pigeons pigeons
    wrong pen in bad light
    bora waters my eyes
    to rattle your cage
    to lick another
    dog’s bowl
    perhaps you would prefer to make other arrangements
    oh I say it rank
    stop feeding the messengers
    the elements decide
    lower level beauty
    I awoke on the roadside

  • Whatever Buzzes the Brain
    Sopot, Poland (August 17th 2009)
    for Magda Bethge

    this is the fish
    this is the beer
    this is the wooden table
    these are the rollerblades
    I snapped you
    one-legged near
    the lopsided house
    this is the beach
    feet dig deep
    into sand
    we used to meet
    in a communist hotel
    we bowled
    we spirited
    my hand is on your shoulder
    my hand is in the frame
    the wine on your birthday
    the snow out the window
    bus stops
    and a warm fuzz
    in the tummy
    don’t think of age
    the temporary tick tock
    the blood or whatever
    buzzes the brain
    or heart
    or hormones
    I misread my trains
    soon the light will go
    where are you oh
    travel mates

  • Danzig-Gdansk

    good morning gates
    wet wet stones
    mouldy old ghost
    a toy cow
    you can ride
    the weight of
    a post office
    after the show
    play kiss me
    wandering through gates
    and side streets
    long way to city
    limits
    sluggin a sack
    covered in doghair
    we reach
    the house of 100 beers

  • September 2009. Elblag, Poland.

    Cardinal Sundowns

    thank you for coming
    I wanted to say something
    about the shadows
    of St. Nicholas
    that Roger spotted
    while swallowing beats
    from the beat machine
    late in the evening
    all the older women
    in the grocery store
    staring at phone credit
    I have no idea why
    I am happening
    at the dinner party
    I ate Polish Indian curry
    my knees were reacquainted
    with my palms
    new waves came
    with vulcan bird nuts
    at the bread festival
    I took a video
    I found myself looking
    for shiny skin
    I am noxious
    I am Specjal
    let’s play tosser
    with the oops in yon skirt

  • 15-11-2010

    Trieste Train Station

    signs:

    MAXIMILLIAN RESIDENCE
    JOLLY CAVOUR
    ROMA
    ALLA POSTA

    Elisabetta statue
    supplicants and muses
    she has a perfect
    rump
    plus two plucked breasts
    bearded man beside her
    in old age
    but still sporting
    a six pac
    this is halfway
    to December
    and the light
    fuck it
    who cares about the light

    ———————————————–

    these are collapsible sticks
    booooooooooooooooooooooooo
    ———————————————–

    where in the world
    to watch
    it go
    it’s not so bad
    to feel my vision
    slippin
    out of focus
    it’s hard enough to live
    slinging rocks
    at the riptides
    i offer you survival
    shut up
    if you’re not nervous anymore
    gonna take it down
    to the wire
    it ain’t hard to hold
    it’s not so bad
    ———————————————–

    flash memory:

    we were love
    boning
    in yr parked car
    near a delicatessen
    not far
    from the Irish pub
    without an inside
    toilet

    ————————————————-
    i’ve lost my zapikanka

    24-11-10

    Trieste, Doggie Park

    I’m yr father’s mother
    lick my nipples
    I’m growing
    up strangly
    plus scroungely
    we’re all here
    giant little monsters
    to feed
    if i am lost it’s only
    for a little while
    all past efforts
    buried
    in our stomachs
    sneezing out the seasonings
    noli me tangelo
    POMP ROAST
    earnest driven
    been down here
    day after day
    this template
    is not my heart
    piggy toenail
    has split again
    change my changling
    darling
    i’m a quick wet
    with street-wide eyes
    calling for you
    everywhere
    I’m not a fat house
    cat
    i’m not a poisoned
    rat
    butterchrist mouth
    all told
    i have no after-
    taste
    in head shape voiceskin
    this is my kin
    in their very own
    private BORA
    give me a beat
    make mock
    of neither beast
    nor foul
    praise the winter
    plum
    no trinkets
    no poems
    mistakes tread their own
    grace
    in this valley of fish
    eyes
    feast on nooks
    my veined one

  • as a rule my other
    half-life
    ex everything
    in the era of hairspray
    the situation
    lies
    on both sides
    ashing
    into paper cups
    contemplating
    the windows
    America
    my Dairy Queen

  • how good it feels
    to stuff
    the cabbage
    I’ve tattooed
    a squint
    of humour
    below yr nipple

    watch this space
    :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
    my fingers
    touch celestial
    juice
    ———————————————————–
    Concrete Pier (Trieste, Italy)

    across from the Piazza Unita
    sitting
    on a metal mushroom
    sculpture
    teenagers in shaggy
    clothing
    sit on a concrete
    pier
    looking out over
    light and ripples
    bora gone quiet
    a circle of blue lights from steady traffic
    i write with neon
    green pen
    ipod shuffle spinning in my ear
    this is dog heaven
    my mouth is dry
    I’ve no Italian
    no major meltdowns
    have metamorphosis
    habit bad
    11/11/2010
    I’ve forgotten the date
    for thanks-
    giving
    mornings serve nerves
    this is the history
    of punking poems into existence
    ready to blow
    you
    into the empty spill
    if you go ahead
    and ask

    ——————————————————
    cut moon, silvered
    sick uhl
    moon
    you’re all
    I’ve got
    ————————————————————–
    Dog Park (Trieste, Italy)

    lattice work all
    around
    I keep a lighter
    in my pocket
    my bowels full
    on coffee and water
    ipod still spinning
    I’m ignoring yr doggy heaven
    ——————————————————————
    I’ve skipped a page
    the leaves are mulching
    I can see my breath
    heaven to Betsy
    the voices you know
    wouldn’t say yes
    wouldn’t say no
    whatcha wanna do with
    this wheel of history
    I’m a night sniffer
    a light sleeper
    the voices
    you know
    ———————————————————————-
    commune di Trieste
    come on
    Trieste
    I’m still shooting
    my wads
    all my kind
    they come
    and go
    come and go
    ———————————————————————–

  • Great time in Prague. What a city!!! Picked up some fab books and met some super cool folks. Louis Armand and David Vichnar, Holly Tavel, Jason Mashak, Richard Tippen, Ondrej Pilny, Joshua Mensch and others . . . .

    good readings . . . some interesting film screenings . . . great walks around the city with Richard Tippen . . . he does some interesting work with found signs and removing one letter . . .among other things . . . talking of love . . . love lost . . . young love . . . and others . . .

    the first issue of Vlak magazine is stellar!!!! Some good cross cultural and cross genre work . . . def work checkin out . . . Louis Armand is a man of many hands . . .

    good community of writers, poets, and artists at the festival . . . yeah . . . super psyched to get down to reading new books and writing.

    reading now:

    Kye by Lukas Tomin (this Czech surrealist novel is seriously seriously joyfully sadly amazing)

    also still working on Primitive Pianos, my nomadic surrealist poetry from Turkey and Italy. The Turkish section in reshifting.

    so yeah again . . . community packs a good punch . . . needed the Prague Microfest . . . energy surges coming . . .

     

     

    kye tomin.jpg

  • 14 October 2010

    all the mornings of the world
    I’m saved
    socks are holy
    bee stings are not

    my tongue has drunk
    the lust of yr race

    ———————————————–
    supreme lucidity: when the lights
    die down

    a camel ravishes
    a goat

    and in the encyclopedia of
    yr brown eyes

    I find

    a no-moss mind
    —————————————————
    this is my Italian translation:

    Easter is married
    to Hades

    but

    I do love
    down
    your cheeks
    ——————————————————

    I sit in the Piazza Unita
    open to the sea
    near
    the fountains of four continents
    an Italian rock
    band
    grinds out tunes
    to the wind
    ——————————————————

    I’m not frightened
    I’m not frightened
    of your lovebones
    sweet hun luv etc.

    bling bling
    my margins
    have shifted

    don’t get ______

    this is the occult
    caves of your music
    ————————————————
    I slept late &
    late again
    with an army
    of insecurities

    ——————————————————–

    yr notorious allure cannot be threatened
    by the queen of the onion shrubs
    all dogs dance
    such intimacies
    such imtimacies
    my friends
    of the trade winds

    ——————————————————–

    in the bliss
    of a new dawn
    we are yoked

    and a number
    we are doing a new
    number

    tapping out lines
    reflecting

    900 exhibits
    of the mind

    in heaven
    there is television

    ——————————————————–

    I’m forever blowing
    bubbles bubbles
    senora senora
    I’m hung up on
    yr love
    and love I’m there
    in a thin white
    towel
    what if getting old means
    no one ever finds you
    I’m always in the tunnel
    not older
    not younger
    I’m tired of this
    poem but want
    to give you
    everything
    senorita senorita
    ——————————————————–

  • friends made a nice wee chapbook of selected work called Primitive Pianos :-) flying from venice. staying 2 min from the old town in Prague. 6 nights of poetry. Prague here i come!!!

  • The 2010 Prague Microfestival features readings, music and film screenings, with performances by Irish-American poet Marcus Slease, Berlin poets Donna Stonecipher & Alistair Noon, and Prague writers Hana Androniková, Holly Tavel, Thor Garcia, Ken Nash, Laura Conway, Louis Armand, Joshua Mensch, Stephan Delbos, Sara Quiroga Navarro… Films by Stephanie Barber, Bill Mousoulis, Abigail Child, Henry Hills… and more!

    PROGRAMME (work-in-progress)
    Saturday, 16 October, 19:00
    Marcus Slease, Laura Conway, Alistair Noon, Sylva Fischerova
    Shakespeare & Sons
    U Lužického semináře 10

    Sunday, 17 October, 19:00
    Hana Androniková, Joshua Mensch
    Café Sladkovsky
    Sevastopolská 17

    Monday, 18 October, 19:00
    Marcus Slease, Sara Quiroga Navarro
    Globe Bookstore
    Pštrossova 6

    Tuesday, 19 October, 19:00
    Donna Stonecipher, Stephan Delbos
    Shakespeare & Sons
    U Lužického semináře 10

    Wednesday, 20 October, 19:00
    Holly Tavel, Louis Armand, Ken Nash, Travis Jeppesen
    Films by Stephanie Barber, Abigail Child, Bill Mousoulis & Henry Hills
    Utopia Club
    Bělehradská 45

    Thursday, 21 October, 19:00
    Marcus Slease, Thor Garcia
    Anglo-American University Library
    Letenská 1

    All events are free and open to the public. Everyone welcome!

    Supported by the Centre for Irish Studies at Charles University and the Irish Ministry of Forgeign Affairs, and VLAK Magazine (www.vlakmagazine.com).

    *[For details and highlights of last year’s Microfestival, go to http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=58293651305&ref=ts%5D

  • Trieste

    when Joyce left here his Dublin
    was complete

    occult bread on a platter
    spasms
    in the inlet

    I let out a yawl in 23 accents
    and my past lives left me

    what gets in
    the eyes:

    a saucer of light
    ink smudge on the Victorian walls

    my pigeons oh my pigeons
    we hover over lost points
    else hoover up the antics

    we live
    in an experimental theatre
    for nerve fibres

    good morning, mr marzipan, good morning
    please wheeze me out
    into the dogstar
    with your nightslippers
    with your lovebones

    ————————————————-

    some dog yelps in the scooby doo cafe
    and there is a smoking fiesta of housewives
    a green and white sign advertises PAM
    which rhymes with HAM
    or SPAM
    and this is where my Trieste
    began
    with proscuitto
    and old aged cheese
    and Pax
    and Tata
    and E
    oh my electric beard
    I’ve fingered yr lords
    Oi
    I’m still fingering yr lords
    oi

    ——————————————–

    a newspaper soaked in blood
    or oil
    or glued
    to a balloon
    or fished
    in vinegar

    a hot water
    bottle placed
    under backs for a cold
    Irish night

    she got fired up
    we got fed
    he got listless chills
    in the gloaming with
    a thickening of birds and the slap
    of the line
    the buzz of motor-
    bikes and the short espresso
    the snaking of tails
    the yoke yellow walls
    spread
    out the window
    Tata with a cough and a sniffle
    a rat a tat tat
    on the footpath
    Pax with old man’s head
    and young woman’s eyes
    the past is a hairy tale
    waving
    or tucking between
    the legs
    sometimes a lick of the snout
    or a low grumble
    from the belly
    it is the end of the month
    and this is not far
    from Venice
    not far from the thick eyes
    of Joyce with his twelve lectures
    on Shakespeare
    Sartre’s Self Taught Man
    has a nosebleed
    alienation
    imagines a man
    with the tongue
    of a caterpillar
    we can’t rip it out
    we can’t be
    ourselves
    E is a soft vowel
    has taken me
    from the winding stairs
    from the babel
    of another heaven
    what was drunk
    or popped
    or sung twelve times
    in the mirror
    with missing teeth
    this is not a landscape
    a shaggy blond
    beast of a heart
    or the dark flame
    of old Europe
    there are pictures crushed
    under boots
    in the soggy fields
    of Sunday morning
    football
    we have left nothing
    poets painters musicians
    Ireland is a twilight
    I cannot cross

    forlorn i was baited into a tango of taut phantoms
    through the praxis of frightwork

    coagulating

    forlorn i was a temporary
    gathering
    the beast
    of another
    butter
    the hymn of another
    longing

    coagulating

    nothing stays
    still
    the voices the voices
    of Ulster
    or the fiddles
    of North Carolina
    the HUSH the HUSH
    puppies
    deep fried
    corn
    meal
    in the churches of Rome
    or Naples
    with the misheard
    angels
    with the ballet
    of my fingers
    i’m getting back
    the ghost
    for god’s sake
    listen

    —————————————————————

    Hamburger and beer near
    the piazza
    unita
    street musicians playing
    guitar and didgeridoo
    green bicycles and jumpers. Bora wind. Sail-
    boats in the Trieste harbor. Beer is
    sharp to the tongue. Italian or German
    women in black leather jackets.

    They call this a mad city.

    I’m in the old town. Venetian. A city
    of small dogs. I awoke
    with a wind chill in my head. Stinging
    red eyes. I’ve lost
    track of the days and hours. The bora
    comes from all directions.
    Heart speeds up without warning
    while walking.
    Nerves are quiet.
    The hamburger has settled.
    I’ve no stomach for a strict career.

    Do you think there is something
    to see you haven’t seen?

    Do you think this is a new
    mental space?

    Howls in the streets. Bora bora bora.
    Graffiti about the past marks
    the Venitian walls. I’ve no
    ear for history. There are lines
    gathering on my forehead.
    My sister has already or will
    give birth to a boy named Joshua.
    This didgeridoo goes well
    with the bora.

    O.K. conversation is a lubricant
    O.K. I still have the inner accents

    ashes are blowing on the plastic plate
    the plastic plate is on the yellow tablecloth
    the signs are in German and Italian
    the hamburger has settled but the beer is kinder

    scab scab
    italian gals hug
    in the bora
    cupping hands
    around fags
    black emblems
    only love
    only love
    here comes a man
    with blinking trinkets
    and stuffed monkeys

    what do you expect
    whom are you expecting
    whose phone is chiming
    whose formaggio are you eating
    where is the carpaccio dunked in lemon
    who hoovers the hairs
    who ascends the stairs
    what smiles in the narrow alleys
    how doth thine eyes move amongst the ruins
    ahhhh whose skirt is lifting
    what are you skirting

    sir do you see
    me
    sir
    con con
    something
    something

    can i please have
    my bill
    —————————————————————

    momentarily disordered
    into an unknown cycle
    you’ve forgotten to take
    down your flags
    the world tosses
    through the window
    there are balconies
    to throw away
    the names we are given
    there is no green shade
    in this parade
    into the drizzle
    of a Trieste sunset
    dark matter
    holds the news
    with a whistle
    and the rattle
    of an exhaust
    pipe
    passing between
    primitive pianos
    and the bora
    blows blows
    across the living
    and the dead

    —————————————————————

  • heading to Prague to read some of my new work. check it:

    Prague Microfest

  • a newspaper soaked in blood
    or oil
    or glued
    to a balloon
    or fished
    in vinegar

    she got fired up
    we got fed
    he got listless chills
    from the magnum opus

    there is proof in the half note in the not quite
    magic of another spoof

  • living in Trieste Italia . . . James Joyce statue and bridge . . . white castle. . . . Rilke . . . prosciutto . . . strong short coffee . . real pizza . . . cheese that knocks off your _____, kickin it in another land!!!

  • DREAMS INSIDE A CUCUMBER

    i nay say i took
    and so we all must

    on this pre-dawn
    marriage bed

    in a trembling
    Turkish noon

  • my new chapbook Nerve Fibre: London has printed . . . yippie . . . hurrah . . .a bit of Dante . . . a bit of purgatory . . . poems written around tube stops while i lived in London . . . with some great old pictures of London transportation . . . handmade and so on . . . ahhhh so grateful . . . thank you Harry . . .soon available at:

    Arthur Shilling Press

  • 1. Eski Yeni

    Their bodies were made from a slice of toast, the kind you put under roast piegeons (Sartre, Nausea)

    I’m writing to you
    in this weather
    among buckets
    of bumble bees

    I’m with slow tongue
    these leopard skins
    are not my people

    children squatters
    & shoe shinners
    sinners oh my sinners
    the little twirps
    sing
    A NAY A NAY

    I’m with slow tongue
    a granny upstairs
    coughs up
    stones
    before breakfast
    before I head out
    to ACTIVE ENGLISH!

    I’m with slow tongue
    sweating off
    Turkish tummy!

    it’s balmy
    with terrific Turkish
    POP!

    I’m with slow tongue
    and persist in rising
    there is dust in my nose
    and dust in my toes
    and dust in my keyboard

    I’m with slow tongue
    lookey here
    I’m a traveler
    I’ve got to keep
    from going under
    bunkered
    near Ataturk’s
    tomb
    yep him
    the icon of icons

    I’m with slow tongue
    juiced out
    on teaching
    the past simple!

    Pascal says
    why am I here & not
    there

    2. DREAMS INSIDE A CUCUMBER

    MESSAGE FROM DREAMWORLD:
    the slaugherhouse is on the move

    A man was cleaning a mess by the river, blue buckets and sponges, he rubbed oilves
    between his palms.

    It was sticky. There was a soft light against a red sky. Near the river a lace curtain opened and a woman above spat stones.

    Then there was Aaron running up and down the hall in Milton Keynes, two years old, slightly bald, slightly blond, head, smiling, running from one wall to the next.

    On the bedroom door, on the glass, the smoked glass, there was a sticker, a sticker
    of the Turkish all-seeing EYE.

    *************************
    we took you to the river and drowned you
    we left open the curtains to bring back the dead
    we’ve clouded yr eyes & scrapped yr tongue
    we’ve come in waves but leave in particles
    we stripped down yr body but want more
    tick goes the tock
    *******************************
    a dot in the night is the bey that sells you
    freshly squeezed
    orange juice
    bones in the embassy
    of light
    bones, bones
    as a mind lowers
    it’s ticker tape
    where is there precisely
    not
    to have
    your chin not yet gimpy
    there are silent helicopters in this missing
    landscape
    there is a stuffed tiger
    on your bed
    how life passes over
    beautiful and boring
    what faces you
    in this house
    there is nothing to make out
    nothing
    so much glass
    give me time
    America
    blood is a place
    soon leaked out

    *************************
    we took you to the river and drowned you
    we left open the curtains to bring back the dead
    we’ve clouded yr eyes & scrapped yr tongue
    we’ve come in waves but leave in particles
    we stripped down yr body but want more
    tick goes the tock
    *******************************

    3. I JUST CAN’T GET ENOUGH

    making—–making it———machinations (Paul Celan)

    . . . carry their existence into language, racked by reality and in search of it (Paul Celan)

    what evades you
    or what are you evading
    the poet continues
    DOPEY
    washing hangs on the line
    radical furniture designs
    I find YOU digusting
    who is used
    who uses
    what is used
    I’m setting out a mind egonomics
    from here
    yes you can
    yes you can
    read a new line
    twitters, twitters
    I have you secrets crammed
    into
    my tiny box
    there is no way outta
    here
    lungs in bat’s juice
    my face in yr pansies
    spritz up spritz up
    i just can’t get enough

  • Three weeks of not writing. No. perhaps four. And wondering if I can still write. That’s worst time. between projects. Just working long hours at a language school. now moving into friend’s house for a while until my paperwork is sorted out with the state university in Ankara. might not have internet for a week or so. re-assess. re-see. pen and paper.

    after not writing for so long it gets harder to write because of fear of being banal. but here. this is banal. not deep. My hands are sweating on the keyboard. 35 degrees. palms sticking to the powerbook. smudges. packed six plastic bags, two backpacks, and one suitcase. gonna order a taxi soon. in about 5 min. attachment is also an issue. or anticipation. or waiting. but there is nothing to wait for cause everything is already happening. always. in this eternal present.

    off we go into the wild blue yonder.

    that was one of the first songs i heard when i immigrated to America. Las Vegas. And Iron Eagle and Top Gun and the cold war. And K-mart hamburgers and 7-eleven slurpies and now-and-laters and trying to do the helicopter on a piece of cardboard and an American girl named Candy who loved Duran Duran and wanted to take me to an abandoned house in the vegas desert to show me something called French kissing but I told her I loved Jesus and I can’t do that kind of thing. yeah . . .. . life happens!

  • Hamam

    oh Cemal
    there are no
    candles
    on a navel stone
    a man grew me
    frightened
    in the manner
    of chips
    I was fried
    and I became
    the method
    of sandpaper
    and I didn’t expect
    this
    from my face
    sloppy seconds
    from buckets
    of water
    an idiom
    of red spots
    aspirations
    of presence
    in this way
    I was wiped
    clean

  • KARAMAN (Anatolia)

    the city is under construction. the newly planted trees provide no shade. students pack every morning into the dolmus with peasants and workers. In the centre new buildings go up and look old before they are finished. nothing matches.

    we sit at a table with Turkish tea. glass cups. redish tint. a gypsy girl calls us sir and madam from the road. we eat our cheese gozleme. talk of interracial couples as the dust blows around us and a man with a hose sprays down the footpath.

    women collect water near the mosque. build 1292. almond eyes in the desert. the sun scorches. we drink ayran.

    crowds crack seeds in their mouth and spit empty shells on the street. there is music. blood and geography. constant beeps from the old yellow dolmus. mules. wedding drums and mopeds. negotiations on the fly.

    this is a dusty town. men with slicked hair and tight jeans. covered women. old men with sticks. modern gals with bright lips and blond hair. Turks return for the summer buying up cartons of cigarettes and purchasing mobilya to ship back to Holland or Germany.

    yesterday a ship captain fed us popcorn, green melon with honey, and white cheese.

  • AMASRA

    the dijinns are relative
    this is affecting a lot of people
    near you
    a good wonderful
    kismet
    toss yr hair
    squeeze me
    off
    check that fish
    with lungs

    *****************************************

    i met your moods
    out to lunch
    spices of the black sea
    fish with coca cola
    a tinkling of knives
    that mountain
    made pregnant
    with Zeusfog

    *****************************************
    you were an armful
    slipping out the balcony
    the flies won’t
    leave me alone
    i’ve an inkling
    to become
    a beach bum

    *****************************************
    I’m accessible but
    difficult
    pardon
    yon
    girl sd
    and took
    my green
    lighter

    *****************************************
    the girl behind her has a hiccup laugh
    sucking out to blow in
    or the other way
    around
    and ah kuh
    she says
    out of nowhere
    “true blue”
    and her friend says
    “higher”
    and then its sayumbabayakma
    or something like
    suzzie got magic
    this is Turkish
    homophonics
    Kolay gelsin

  • Adam is a mighty fine poet and translator . His translations of Grzegorz Wroblewski, A Marzipan Factory, were just published by Otoliths. He has the touch with Wroblewski’s translations into English. I dig it. No doubt, if read, many more will dig it!!! Tender elliptical Kafkaesque dramatic situations spun oh so well!!! witty, charming, slender, funny, surrreal, awe-filled, animals, the quotidian reframed and reframed again and again, space age, earth age, ghosts, narrative threads, elliptical strip teasing (did i already say that), razor sharp observations of the natural human world, birds, old age, fucking, not fucking, haunting, hunting, beyond the barbarian/classical divide, ahead of the time cause it’s bloody smack dab OF the time not 10, 20, 30 years behind like majority of poetry and art, and so on . . . .

    Marjorie Perloff claims it is the best book of poetry she has read in years!!!!

    And Grzegorz is also a painter/visual artist. Version 1, one of his paintings, is the cover!!!

    Check it:

    A Marzipan Factory

    Adam has some of his own poems in Cleaves (among many other places):

    Adam Zdrodowski CLEAVES

    And check out this interview with Adam and some of his poetry for 3AM magazine:

    Adam Zdrodowski interview

    Adam Zdrodowski poetry

  • miss this fine fella in North Carolina!!!

    B. Howe’s Wax Wroth

  • I have often had a discussion with non-poets and their feelings after attending an innovative event (reading or festival) and they reported a feeling of perplexity. Not because they didn’t enjoy the work. Some hated poetry, or at least disliked it, but often really enjoyed the variety of work at an innovative poetry event. No . . . they were asked if they too were a poet and when the said “no, but I enjoy the work” the conversation ended and they felt outed.

    It is a silly question but . . . . . . can non-poets attend innovative/experimental poetry events????

    Some of these same folks have also mentioned the word “hobby.” And I say no way. it is not a hobby. It is a whole way of life. POETRY is not a hobby damn it. Or maybe being a “language artist” is better than the word poet?

    If poetry events become a closed club of self congratulation maybe it resembles a hobby.

    or perhaps it is a religion.

    We need more candour. We need more connections to the other arts. As quite a few folks have mentioned, innovative poetry could have a much larger audience. Say . . . the audience for innovative jazz, indie music, theatre, and so on.

    And haven’t some critiques been written about that whole dichotomy between art and entertainment!!!

    While I may not agree with everything written about Soundeye (if I attended this year), it is a step in the right direction.

    The Openned community in London gives me hope as well!!!

    REPORT FROM SOUNDEYE

  • in response to a review of Tom Raworth in which the reviewer argues that so-called difficult poetry is anti-capitalist and difficult “modernist’ poetry carries more political weight than the movement/mainstream poetry in the UK with its easily summarised themes and conversational speech and so on . . ..the old language school argument . . . and of course modernism consists of more than so called high modernism . . . i don’t want to choose between difficult or accessible . . . . there are many kinds of interesting art . . . nice response from Barry

    either “accessible” nor “difficult” is a quality with inherent aesthetic value–that is, to state what I hope is obvious, there are good and bad “accessible” works just as there are good and bad “difficult” works (though there might be pleasures that are specific to difficult works that are unobtainable through accessible ones and vice versa). So to speak of accessibility or difficulty as either in themselves laudable or not is really barking up the wrong tree, like having an argument about whether marble sculptures are better than steel, or sonatas in minor keys are better than those in major keys, or landscape paintings are better than still lifes. It’s taking a descriptive quality that only takes on aesthetic significance within the total complex of a given work as if it had some absolute value in itself.

  • Mugla
    (Turkish wedding)

    born for the void
    dry dolls fall
    around me
    there are ikons
    there are ikons more
    horrible than
    angels mangled
    in the trees

    the sperm
    scented
    gardens with goat’s
    cheese

    the groom did the gorilla

    the bride pined
    with money

    the upchoke of sea scents

    the special chimneys

    what passes
    for my mind
    ballistic reports
    as you disappeared
    everything is
    not too ha ha

    melancholy wakings now
    attack the nipples

    this milk turns to fire

    the prophet comes
    into a virtuous lady

    my hymen
    amen

  • here comes the wind
    the blinds clacking

    like stuck penguins
    I’m sleeping with

    a flower vender
    on a moped

    with a bell from hell
    let’s part the hood

    and ride
    our Hegelian brides

    with the wicked smiles of those who jerk
    off and off

    in solid white cloudy tissues
    and the ashes of Irish mermaids, yep, them

    i clog along
    in deer hoofs

    my thursdays
    bleeding
    into your weekends

    silk hair expiring at
    yr ankles with

    a sea map between
    cleavage

    yr voice cracks
    like a piano you keep
    moving we’re long
    gone

    water boils in the clouds
    of the sick

    i run on beams
    a baptismal dish
    when i’m smiling
    my jaw turns to stone
    heft yr own hungry
    ghosts

    dawn’s kingdom
    maketh me

    beside the rancid
    waters

    swift with my
    antlers

    my tawny
    bride

    engorged
    me

    I danced myself
    a tomb

    a goat two goats
    stood on the rocks

    my hand raised
    towards
    THE DAWNS

  • in this Karaman
    desert

    i’m beat beat

    there is a sweatstorm
    in my trousers

    and if you find yourself
    falling apart

    there is a rain of mud
    and a lake of salt

    I’m posed and popping
    like a peacock

    what used to calm
    rips my life to ribbons

    my gut kicks
    map it blind

    i can’t say it’s a sickness
    but a stranger slipping nooses in my den

    yr old man was
    a wishing machine

    a toy chest
    if only we hope

  • what was the fate of the turtle gripping the talons of the eagle?
    do you miss sauerkraut stew?
    do you miss the bubbles of Polish beer?
    before you fall asleep
    chronicles spray against the white walls of
    yon mind
    a pensioner of the void
    broccoli dust on the night sheets
    to be like plums in an icebox
    lazy PUG!
    my family owned peaches and a dog named Lady
    when you add up all the sunday
    roasts I ate many a cow
    what is the convenient truth?
    my liver today requires a fresh bleeding
    copulation:cooperation:community
    we’ve been tricked into saucey action
    lately the booze has been scratching my eyelids
    making tea in my underwear
    something to eat to clear yr mind
    something bad inside went away
    can a vibration alter our ocular visions
    don’t take the voices for silky gods
    a kiss on yr molten eyes
    the lure of mermaids
    they are waiting in the ether to form
    propogate only to die
    and I grant you no wishes my pretty son
    tell me what you wanna become
    a union of mammals
    a mammal republic
    milk giving fiends

    —————————————–

    Lato lato swansea swansea
    step o step o the music
    blok switchey o na me
    lato lato
    switchey ah na nanny
    swan che say
    moze
    alle tato lato
    NO LATO
    switchey ah na me
    na namey
    Swansea Saaaaayyyyyy

    —————————————–

    do you have the urge to speak
    of mud and marrow
    my wallet is on the fire
    summer esconced
    a red deer sleeps
    in yr marrow
    water and rust between
    the antlers
    look for me
    the cracked shells
    of turtles provide
    a pattern
    plasma clocks &
    metaphysical pain
    humans are
    relationships
    how do you look
    inside me
    eyes cut in deer juice
    gleaming a beat a real
    beat
    because we are
    young
    or old
    and the rose
    is suffering from surprises
    a dazed turtle
    is still a turtle
    before you fall asleep
    switch off the remote!

  • breakfast:

    white cheese, tomatoes, fresh bread, orange juice with a drop of wodka

    readings:

    A Marzipan Factory by Grzegorz Wroblewski
    Seoul Bus Poems by Jim Goar
    The Story of England by Tom Beaumont James
    I Too Went to the Hunt of the Deer by Lale Mulder
    Small Gods by Terry Pratchett
    Nausea by Sartre
    Nadja by Andre Breton
    Gangway 40 (expatriations): http://www.gangway.net/40/index.shtml
    Cleaves: http://www.cleavesjournal.com/

  • ANTALYA

    I’m writing to you in this weather
    among buckets of bumble bees

    I am trying to write as if
    something is happening to you

    these leopard skins are not my people

    I do not understand your way of turning

    an animal curls up in silence
    reality cannot be forced

    I bought a jacket
    everyone kept calling us German

    the bar was Russian
    the women were Russian
    the music was Gypsy

    we were both perceiving and it is said
    perceiving is complex

    the gin and tonics
    were expensive but strong

  • some poems from Primitive Pianos (Polish section) in new issue of Gangway:

    Gangway #40 – Expatriations: The expatriat edition

  • And I am always trying to think about how to write. As if starting over again. So that I am using different modes all the time and seem to resist doing what I know how to do, resist using modes I may think I have gotten good at. In some visceral way, my feeling is that everything I have written is unsuccessful, and that now, today, as I write, I might find out how to do it right, in a completely different way. Of course I know I never will. Still, I have that feeling–that writing is essentially inexpressible and mysterious, and one is always trying to figure out how to do it and never quite getting there. That there is something absolutely essential to be expressed but one can’t ever quite express it. So it always feels like finding a new way to write, starting completely over again on a new tack.

    Like probably all poets my writing comes out of reading, and reading may be a form of writing and vice versa. So I am reading something important to me and then at some point in reading I am drawn to writing. It is a nearly physical sensation that I have come to be very sensitive to.

    from Norman Fischer interview with Hank lazer

  • EDA (Istanbul)

    Adana kebab is sizzling
    behind me in Sultanahmet
    a man in an all-white suit
    gets his shoes shinned
    I’m skinned
    he speaks of Kurdish and Armenian
    symbols animals & patterns
    Silk. Wool. Silk & wool. Crosses.
    the azan prayer booms
    from mosque to mosque
    in surround sound
    I move among the crowds
    of Taksim
    I run my hands
    over the Galata tower
    move through tunnels
    move through the songs of gypsies
    EDA is a foreign land
    a foreign tongue say
    ghosts the ghost of
    an idea EDA is not
    a verdict EDA moves
    through 20th century
    Turkish poetry
    a crossing, a bridge,
    pronouns are fungible
    pre-rational pre-Islamic
    a profanity and a purity
    there is no sticky tape

    —————————————————————————————————————–

    I slept on the banks of Bosphorus and woke to a cold breeze. This is a city of crooked teeth.

    Canan is an idea. Canan is the beloved. Canan is pronounced Ja nan. Canan is the lion’s milk the lion’s inferno.

    I learnt the formula for the perfect potato by the banks of the Bosphorus in Ortakoy. The Turkish innovative poet ILHAN BERK:

    “I don’t like the potato. But all the world consumes it; it grows everywhere, / knows no boundaries, belongs to an international family.”

    and

    “The potato has no personality”

    “From the soil it yells: / Hey! The Ground! Hear me?”

    EDA (Istanbul)

    framed by the Hagia Sophia
    framed by mucus
    framed by mounds
    framed by lute players
    framed by mangy cats
    waiting for a ferry
    to the island of Büyükada
    watching
    the Golden Horn

    a birthday cake was presented
    for my middle passage

    crossings & double
    crossings

    bridges &
    balloons

    * Thoughts and ideas of EDA taken from Murat Nemet-Nejat’s amazing anthology EDA: An Anthology of Contemporary Turkish Poetry

  • MIND SORES

    eagles search for turtles to drop and crack upon the rocks
    this is a tangible instant of a pure orgasm
    cracks in the hands of a moviestream
    the body of a cracked door
    sun crackles across this country of mosques
    dirty scientists gather a genesis of light
    cracked armies attack the honeycombs
    how fast the summer passes with drums
    peons with a rainstorm of rugs and flirts and virgin brides
    cracks in the muslim masks
    all the pretty boys just for the hell of it
    yr cracks lay upon my pillow
    the body of a cracked nation
    cracked producer of royal candies
    a voice in a hammock cracks the trees
    a cracked lung for penitence
    you were born and we kept you hungry
    cracked cats lick yr name

  • MIND SORES

    eagles search for turtles to drop and crack upon the rocks
    this is a tangible instant of a pure orgasm
    cracks in the hands of a moviestream
    the body of a cracked door
    sun crackles across this country of mosques
    dirty scientists gather a genesis of light
    cracked armies attack the honeycombs
    how fast the summer passes with drums
    peons with a rainstorm of rugs and flirts and virgin brides
    cracks in this pegan country
    yr cracks lay upon my pillow
    the body of a cracked nation
    cracked producer of royal candies
    yr boat moves upon cracky sounds

  • dawn’s kingdom
    maketh me

    beside the rancid
    waters

    swift with my
    antlers

    my tawny
    bride

    engorge
    me

  • DETOUR
    (Karaman, Turkey)

    here comes the wind
    the blinds are clacking
    like stuck penguins
    in an Anatolian desert

    this plywood mouth
    moves

    the soul ala ala

    the soul in mouldy
    chariots

    and crumbling
    zeus bricks

    superstars
    of the civil wars

  • Celestial Teabags
    (Karaman, Turkey)

    there is a sweatstorm
    in my trousers
    celestial teabags
    officianados
    wise ones
    the sun whose
    subject
    is neurosis
    flames of
    disenchantment
    the blinds are
    rattling
    sexology
    sigh

    it is hard to keep
    track of my buttons

    reality is a sandwich stuck
    between my knuckles

    i’m in fact
    a thing a thing

    in this mountain town
    covered women & more goat cheese

    cross women slapping the cheeks
    of cheeky children

    down on this cracked desert earth
    Rainer Maria Rilke
    I’m putting in my ear-
    rings a phantom paw
    paws me

    cat angels
    everywhere around here

    i’m beat beat

    ANGELS STORM HISTORY
    ARMENIAN GENOCIDE AMERICAN GENOCIDE
    and so on . . .

    I’ve been stabbed by the Baltic
    fleet and live with the Ottoman
    trading company

  • think like this: “May all creatures be happy and safe,
    May they all have happy minds.

    Whatever living things there are –
    whether feeble or strong,
    long or short, whether stout
    or of medium size, whether quick or green,
    whether big or little, whether seen or unseen

    whether those living near or far away,
    or those being born as well as those
    only seeking to be born –
    may all these beings be happy,
    may they all have happy minds.

    Let no being deceive another
    Let none despise others
    nor wish harm, in anger or with hatred,
    upon another.

    Just as a mother protects her only child
    with her entire will and being
    so let us each cultivate a boundless friendliness and love
    toward all living things

    Let each of us radiate limitless love
    toward everything in the world:
    above, below, beside, and across – unhindered
    with no ill will or enmity.”

    Do this whether standing, walking, sitting, or lying down:
    develop this attitude!: this is how to live nobly.
    Let each of us not fall into useless thoughts
    but be virtuous — and be endowed with an insightful heart,
    and discard the lust for satisfaction

    so that we may never again come
    to be born into pain.

    —”Karaniya *Metta Sutta,” or “Sermon [Hymn] on Lovingkindness,” by Siddhatta Gotama, the historical Buddha (translation/compilation by GG, based on original and translations by Thanissaro Bhikkhu, Ñanamoli Thera, the Amaravati Sangha, Piyadassi Thera, and Acharya Buddharakkhita),

    * [“Metta” is a Pali word meaning “lovingkindness.” It is an attitude of mind that can be cultivated through an activity called “metta bhavana.” “Bhavana” stems from the root “bhav” — “to grow” or “to become” — and can be translated as “cultivation.” Metta, according to the teachings of Siddhatta Gotama, the most recent Buddha, is one of the “divine abidings,” one, that is, of the four most supremely satisfying and wholesome states of mind a sentient being can achieve. To cultivate metta, one holds an attitude of friendliness and good will toward all things.

    Metta directed at others or oneself can be felt across time and space.]

  • Grzegorz Wróblewski’s A Marzipan Factory

    A Marzipan Factory is the most original and enticing book of poems I have read in years. It is Kafkaesque and yet tender, cynical and yet warm, elliptical and yet wholly immediate. GRZEGORZ WRÓBLEWSKI can take the most ordinary of phenomena and then give them the twist of a knife: to “spare” the life of a living organism—a “dry” tangerine for instance—is, from another angle, to forget it. The pleasures and terrors of sex, of age, of the fear of death, of the deceptions of our social life, have rarely been so brutally—yet wittily and charmingly—documented as they are in these short, often gnomic poems, surprisingly well rendered in Adam Zdrodowski’s translation. Grzegorz Wróblewski restores one’s faith in the power of lyric poetry to renew itself. – Marjorie Perloff

  • Gluttons (original)

    It is 03.28 on the second day and my fridge is full of Pınar Doğal Yoğurt. There is a haze of lights outside my window. I’m at REAL shopping centre. Prayers crowned the air. I was a translated clam. This is where the world’s nuts are made. I’m waiting for the ruins of a Roman bath. I’m waiting for the temple of Augustus. I’m waiting for the Monument to a Secure Confident Future! Everybody seems hard on the face but soft in the mouthholes.

    It is 06.42. I’ve slept one hour. 15 min till I am supposed to awake. It was a night with my life. Or parts thereof. Snow and microbrews, ping pong beer, erotic nights in hotel rooms. Paper routes and swimming pools. Little boy and big boy. Dusty hands against the window, sweaty trousers and moldy cheese. Hands on the nightstand. Running & running round the tracks. Jesus on the ceiling. Angel light from passing trucks. Tootsie rolls from Mormon missionaries. Las Vegas lakes and rocket ships.

    It is 09.00. It has rained and the red clay of Ankara sicks to my soles. The stones glow at the old gate. This is an ongoing nomadic poetics. I’m drinking Seftali Nektari in the east campus cafeteria. In this garden of dark howls i search for my twin. Cleaners clean around me. When you awake what sticks to your skin? Who colours these keenings? The old has been sold. Culling the senses in this cold wind I have felt the devouring. Praise the whirling dervish. The ecstasy of petals on an empty platter. The non-arousing of hotel erotics. The corona is in the clinic. I’m 90% glutton free.

    AFTER GOOGLE TRANSLATE FROM ENGLISH TO TURKISH BACK TO ENGLISH

    03.28 and second day that my fridge is full of Pinar natural yoghurt. Lights outside my window is a haze. I’m worse than REAL mall. Air crowned prayers. I was translated oysters. Made it the world is nuts. I’m waiting for the remains of a Roman bath. I’m waiting for the temple of Augustus. Monument to a Secure Future Confident I’m waiting! Everyone seems on the face of tough but soft mouthholes.

    It was 06.42. I slept for an hour. If I wake up offense 15 min. Was a night of my life. Or tracks. Snow and microbrews, ping pong, beer, erotic night in the hotel rooms. Paper paths and swimming pools. Small children and older children. Windows, sweaty hands, pants and Dusty against moldy cheese. Hands on the bedside table. Running and running tracks round. Jesus on the ceiling. Angel of light trucks to pass. Mormon missionaries from the Tootsie rolls. Lake Las Vegas and rocket ships.

    It was 9:00. Ankara sicks red clay base and I have it rained. Ancient stones glow at the door. This is a continuing nomadic poetry. I’m drinking peach nectar in the east campus cafeteria. My nation is the dark twin to call it in the garden. Cleaners to clean around me. What sticks to your skin when awake? Who is this keenings colors? The former is sold. Culled in the sense that the cold wind I felt I was devouring. Dervish returned the praise. ecstasy leaves an empty plate. Arousing non EROTICS hotel. Corona has a clinic. I am free 90% gluttonous.

  • Gluttons

    Bu 03,28 ikinci günü ve benim buzdolabı Pınar Doğal Yoğurt doludur. Benim pencere dışında ışıkları bir pus olduğunu. Ben REAL alışveriş merkezi daha kötüyüm. Dualar hava taçlandırdı. Ben tercüme istiridye oldu. Burası dünyanın fındık yapılmış olmasıdır. Ben bir Roma hamamı kalıntıları bekliyorum. Ben Augustus tapınağı bekliyorum. Ben Secure Confident Geleceğe Anıt bekliyorum! Herkes sert yüzünde görünüyor ama mouthholes yumuşak.

    O 06,42 olduğunu. Ben bir saat uyuyorsun. 15 dk uyanıyorum suçsa kadar. Hayatımın bir geceydi. Ya da parçaları. Kar ve microbrews, ping pong bira, otel odalarında erotik gece. Kağıt yolları ve yüzme havuzları. Küçük çocuk ve büyük çocuk. pencere, terli pantolon ve küflü peynir karşı Dusty eller. komodinin üzerinde Hands. Koşu ve koşma yuvarlak izler. İsa tavanda. kamyon geçmesini Angel ışık. Mormon misyonerler dan Tootsie yuvarlanıyor. Las Vegas göl ve roket gemi.

    O 09.00 olduğunu. Ve benim tabanı Ankara sicks kırmızı kil yağmur yağdı vardır. Eski kapıda taşları kızdırma. Bu devam eden bir göçebe şiir olduğunu. Ben doğu kampüs kafeteryada Seftali Nektari içiyorum. karanlık uluyor benim ikiz aramak bu bahçesinde. Temizleyiciler çevremdeki temizleyin. Ne zaman uyanık ne cildinize yapışır? Kim bu keenings renkler? Eski satıldı. Bu soğuk rüzgarda duyular itlaf ben yiyip bitiren hissettim. Hamd dönen derviş. boş bir tabakta yaprakları ecstasy. Olmayan otel erotics uyandırarak. Corona kliniği bulunmaktadır. Ben% 90 obur özgürüm.

  • Hamam
    (Ulus, Ankara)

    the upchoke of black crumbs these
    melancholy wakings now
    attack the nipples
    in the Hamam a man
    slapped me
    with soap bubbles
    and scrubbed my face with sandpaper
    red dots spot my back
    what is raki without rhyme
    what is lion’s milk
    what are bluejays without Hermes
    my hymen
    amen
    the people
    are still moving
    unassailed
    they
    are free in their
    pussies
    and crocks
    free to love
    in this red clay of Ankara

  • REALLY LOVE THE POEMS IN HERE!!

    PAPER BAG

  • Flying Bird Teahouse (Insadong)

    the sun on my
    finches the feathers
    in my cup

    less plumbers
    many electricians

    an evening performance
    of fruit sellers


    Utopia Spa

    cold pools
    skating shakes
    heated floor
    wooden pillows
    straws
    leather lumps
    unsheathed
    pale drainage
    never stop
    winking

  • Itaewon

    searching for nan and Russians
    pot-bellied smart and tart
    Zen Blud lust dhar ma top-
    ped rice cake orange fish eggs
    & salmon slices oh boy

    as regards this meathole
    tonked up testy & smiling

    mind finds a home on the ground
    a beard between me & my mouth

    cramping at the knee

    swamp grass
    yogi-YO!

    the allegory breaks
    in the mouth

    the old wood
    sticks out
    from the newer
    handle

    the neighbouring dust
    will have its way

  • Q. And have you any belief as to the purpose which the authors had in mind in writing the Ern Malley poems?

    A. They claimed to be hoaxing the members of a modernistic culturism.

    Q. Don’t you believe that Ern Malley’s poems were never intended to be serious work at all?

    A. I have no opinion on their intentions, I only worry about their content as poems.

    Q. And you say that it doesn’t matter if the significance is accidental or otherwise.

    A. I don’t know if the significance is accidental, I am concerned with the significance.

    Q. A great number of people would regard the poems in Angry Penguins as being rubbish.

    A. It all depends on what people regarded them, on the person.

    Q. The majority of people in Australia would regard the poems as nothing but rubbish.

    A. Yes, and Shakespeare.

  • ahhhh now this is what it is about. community!!! Miss this poetry community. Openned was an amazing resource for innovative British poetry. A bit like the Poetry Project in New York City. But alas someone rich bought the space and there was no more art space. No more Foundry. Here are some video clips from the glory days of 21st century British poetry:

     

    video clips from reading and East London’s The Foundry

  • MOVEMENT AND MOTION

    to get from the ship to the wave is a motion

    the movement is what happens

    my lover is movement

    what is a motion of a lover if not an apology for death?

    I has many notions

    movements take place inside the coalshed

    else inside a coal cooker

    a coalhead

    the paint is wet dry

    it may happen the I is wonky

    it may happen we fickle ourselves sick

    therefore the I must keep moving

    conceptions are not contraceptions

  • PETER ORLOVSKY

    <a href="http://tomclarkblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/peter-orlovsky-namaste.html
    “>PETER ORLOVSKY 2

    This is how I wanna go at the end . . . . . alas of course . . . we don’t have really have a choice . . . a life lived!!!

  • YOU KILL YOURSELF TO RAISE THE DEAD

    ——————————————————————
    the animals on a very bright day offer professions of good will. one month ago, near the shores of the Bosphorus, i slept on a park bench then ate a potato. the Bosphorus is not an empty background. this gut kicks or rather there is a stranger at the door and the stranger is a strangler. i found grieving in the grass and constantly stain the curtains. i found a pervert in my throat. What is attached to a dignified demeanor? If you are too comfortable with a voice do not employ it. The ships are not the waves and vice versa.
    ——————————————————————

    you kill yourself to raise the dead.

    all the people that we’ve _______ and all the people that we’ve_______

    you kill yourself to raise the dead.

    the years flash.

    what goes thin goes sure.

    you kill yourself to raise the dead.

    freckles on the shoreline.

    my phone refuses to sing.

    ——————————————————————

    well, then, for my part, a lover distinguishes movement from motion. but i ask you what is the motion of a lover if not an apology for death. do you think me sheep? very well then. i am sheep. my nose tweaks inside every description. i’ve been pressed into a slow cooker. this grass is not dry and therefore i must keep moving. yes, indeed, you may even say i fickle myself sick. conceptions are not contraceptions.

  • PLAYING DRESS UP

    this gut kicks. this is a stranger and a strangler. i stain these curtains.
    ——————————————————————
    i found grieving in the grass. I found a pervert in my throat. Don’t mistake the ships for the waves. If you suspect a voice do not employ it. the animals on a very bright day offer professions of good will. one month ago, near the shores of the Bosphorus, I slept on a park bench then ate a potato. this forest is not an empty background.
    ——————————————————————

    you kill yourself to raise the dead.

    all the people that we’ve _______ and all the people that we’ve_______

    you kill yourself to raise the dead.

    the years flash.

    what goes thin goes sure.

    you kill yourself to raise the dead.

    freckles on the shoreline.

    my phone refuses to sing.

    ——————————————————————

  • PLAYING DRESS UP

    this gut kicks. this is a stranger and a strangler. i stain these curtains.

    a wave of ships.
    ——————————————————————
    i found grieving in the grass.

    don’t you swallow.
    ——————————————————————

    you kill yourself to raise the dead.

    all the people that we’ve _______ and all the people that we’ve_______

    you kill yourself to raise the dead.

    the years flash.

    what goes thin goes sure.

    you kill yourself to raise the dead.

    freckles on the shoreline.

    my phone refuses to sing.

  • PLAYING DRESS UP

    this gut kicks. this is a stranger and a strangler. i stain these curtains.

    a wave of ships.

    i found grieving in the grass.

    don’t you swallow.

    all the people that we’ve _______ and all the people that we’ve_______

    you kill yourself to raise the dead.

    the years flash.

    what goes thin goes sure.

    freckles on the shoreline.

    my phone refuses to sing.

  • Modernism continues all over the world (Turkish Second New, NY School poetics, Flarf, conceptual poetics, Gnostic Poetics etc.) All is possible