Venice Nights
Venice nights
Life’s sweet delights
Spinning carnival lights
Cool jaded moon
Soft golden sand
We walk hand in hand
We walk onto the promise land
Hear the drums
When the time comes
follow the sound
Watch the mystics whirl around
Light our camp fire
snuggle up beneath the moon
Flames dance from the campfire
Young nights spent on the beach
Amongst the stars and your eluding speech
The bongos play
We are birds of prey
We are youth at play
-Savannah B Nolan

THOUGHTS AT THE BEACH AT NIGHT
By Glen Fitch
Can cells sense something’s wrong
when cancer starts?
The body as a whole
is self-contained,
complete,
compatible in all its parts.
Its function, features, fate
are all maintained.
What is this maverick madness,
counter-fate,
a tyrant spirit
rending all awry
to sap and warp,
confound and mutilate,
a manic mayhem
forced to multiply?
What kind of baneful guest
is so engrossed
within the selfish meeting
of his needs
to damn his future,
jeopardize his host?
Now everything that eats
and poops and breeds,
the very stars and waves,
and wind and sand,
must dread our gaze,
the moving of a hand.

MADMAN DRIVING
Sleeping under the snowfall dream of toxins
I’ve laid down, not fallen
Chains on the ceiling
Time on a shelf
Living only to give away one’s self
why?
Does it happen when you die? Or…
take it all & be selfish, have quite the dish
It’s not a permanent stay
It’s taken back anyway
the playgound’s here for play
Higher awareness
The Anti-matter
get to Nirvana, before the Mad Hatter
He’s ahead of you, and he’s in my head
should’ve gone right, but went left instead
he knows the secrets held by the dead
Murders hidden in the text
and detectives perplexed
to solve the riddle of 30 years
taxes pay for incompetent careers
Taboo talks scare you away?
I killed the bully where children play
then shuffled the deck and got away.
They won’t be missed,
couldn’t help but grin
It’s the secret wish
of the innocent
flush him out!, flush him out!
pull the thorn from within
I heard the thoughts cried
a premonition that I’d never confide
a story of the method,
but not where they died
Was it under a tree?
or by the revin?
Was it a place I couldn’t be seen?
I’m not quite sure…officer
are you asking about the he, or the her?
left out some facts from the lie I stir
Such methods of questioning
must of impressed the academy
your truth has holes
and no real clues,
polish your shoes
polish there brass,
and while you’re down there,
kiss my ass!
Recollection you will never find
I swept the footprints of my mind
By the way, mad hatter, have you got the
time?
Arist Niciforos

Guilded
My feet they are a stinkin,
My teeth and fingers stained,
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking
And i think i’ve gone insane.
My hands they are a shakin,
My hair and face are long,
I’ve been doing a lot of drinking
And i feel i can’t go on.
My eyes they are wide open,
My truths and false’s deep,
I’ve been doing a lot of praying,
Because i just can’t fall to sleep.
Yet i stop and wonder,
is it really all just me?
I’ve seen all the destruction,
The air is unsafe to breathe,
My food supply is poisoned,
My waste pollutes the sea,
My protection, the dellusion,
Give back my cherry tree.
– F. Craig Byars,
A barefoot poet

QUESTIONS
By Laura Shepard Townsend
Your questions sting
With their Impatience
But
I must leave them…
For Now
For now, there is no answer
But I promise you, my love
I will whisper them to the sky
And then go about my journey
Knowing This, That
Destiny consents our knowledge
With its loom weavings
Personal to every being
Weaving, busily weaving
Designs swirled with
Threads familiar, variously hued
And also
Threads marvelous in mystery
To a finale
A looming of grand wisdom
But left in the Voids
Until claimed
So I wait
Quietly
Wrapped in a serenity
Until I know
What is to be,
Until I become the I of my I
And until I can tell you
My answer….
You call me mystic
That makes my soul sing
Yes and No,
I am a Woman
With my eyes enchanted
By the eternity of the Eternal
By the infinity of the Infinite
All for the Magic Tricks
We call Life

Job
By Ronald McKinley
I must sell myself lease my body.
Walk the walk talk the talk of a worker.
First I must be purchased hired.
Ask for what I want see what is offered.
The two most likely not meeting.
Hourly, weekly, biweekly
my worth doled to me sometimes
with malice.
Vend my virtues, market my muscles.
The other will try to pay me less.
Make me minus work me
before I work.
I am lost with order
no form or precess is death to me.
I ask to exist to work
to have worth.
In America no job no voice.
Money makes you tangible.
I have skill just not skill at vending.
I fill out the forms.
Write the dates.
Interview, brush, wash, drive, wait,
shake hands.
This process makes crazy
makes me lazy,
hesitant of marketing me.
Work is easy sweat and thought
360 degrees the total existence.
No job, no food, no home, no love.
I raise my hand and hope to be picked.
I am more than a job.
This is my pain.
More than what I do.
I tremble with the worst
my vision tunneled
focused on money not worth.
A high cost to pay.

The Philomenian
By Jim Smith
Here’s to the Philomenian
that delightful, ever-growing,
always exploring, never knowing
kaleidoscope of the imagination.
That temple of the mind
dedicated to all things Philomene.
Her poetry, her books, her smile
and an echo chamber filled with her laughter.
One day we will build this edifice
in the world of atoms and molecules.
It will be based on the Parthenon
but with lights, plumbing and heating.
It will be a true museum
with 10 rooms for the muses,
including Philomene,
to take their leisure.
A popular spot inside
will be the Pegatron.
whose walls and floor and ceiling
are covered with looping films of P.
There will be seminars every day
on topics like, “The influence of
Philomene Long on New Wave Rock,”
And, “Surrealism, green eggs and baby pigeons.”
You’ll be greeted by a life-like robot
in a flowered shirt spouting trivia
about Philomene. Pay him no mind.
But please exit through the gift shop.
And now, the doors are opening
The Muses are arising
Strap in and enjoy
The Philomenian…

North On Robertson
by krista schwimmer
Early evening
driving along Robertson Boulevard
i spot the Dancing Man
stripped down to his waist
his back a hard tan.
i’ve seen him there before,
sometimes on roller skates,
always watching his reflection
in a store front window.
Once, i saw him get into a taxicab right
before nightfall.
i cross Beverly Boulevard
leaving the Dancing Man for another
familiar sight — a seated, gold-leafed Buddha,
12 feet tall, bolted down in a parked, pickup truck.
Today, he is covered with carpets
revealing only his head and topknot.
Why is he still here, i wonder,
held down like a hostage? Does he see
the Dancing Man, just two blocks south?
They could be dharma brothers
neither of them caring so much
for West Hollywood Samsara. i continue north,
turn east onto Melrose Ave,
man and statue no longer visible
in my side mirror. i sink into my body
feel the strength in my ample thighs,
and know that at last, i am happy —
just a simple, earthbound woman
making her way to work.

11:15 Tuesday, July 16th, 2013, Adullam ….. The order, natural,
is to forget. The mind gets clumsy. Battles that were fought
Get blurred. Chronology begins to drift. Below the surface,
plates begin to shift. The history of things historical Will be
replaced. And then will come the fall. The beauty that was savoured
will no more Be lovingly recalled. Who won the war?
The honey-colored voice that used to call Will be hushed beyond
silence. And the wall, Once built as to contain, will feel
the lift Of seismic forces, ’til there’s nothing left. Tsunami will
obliterate the lot. The order, natural, is to forget ….. One last
palindrome sonnet from Roger Houston, to Edna Saint
Vincent-Millay.

LITANY FOR PEGARTY
By Philomene Long
Pegarty, consider the possibility
in the trillion, billion, million
light years since the beginning of
this universe and I don’t know precisely
how long afterwards it was with you
that I was once the same person
the very same person – only you
in this immensity of space
as well as time
I shared a womb
only with you
none other and I knew you
before you took your first breath
Pegarty, and you were the very first to
put your arm around me
in that same womb it was your arm
that consoled me
Pegarty, it was you who heard my first breath
and ever since we breathe together
for this, especially on our birthday
I am grateful, yes
in this expanding universe
of five billion years (is it?) none but you
Pegarty, with whom in this expanse
as well as others unknown to me
I floated timelessly in that womb where
we kicked and slept in the warmth
in the darkness from which I kicked you
out into the world at ten minutes to
ten o’clock on August 17, 1940
St. Vincent’s Hospital I kicked you
out into the blazing light so that your cries
would be the first sounds in the trillion, billion
million to the trillionth, billionth, millionth power
of all sounds ever emitted, yes
so that yours would be
the first sound I would hear as
I emerged from the darkness and
now in my darkest hours it is always
your arm I feel
your voice that I hear
– August 17, 2003

The Pool Hall
My mother spanks me so I
Run off to the Pool Hall.
Fast Eddie puts backspin or english
On the ball as it seems to slumber into
A catatonic stall… smacks into
The other ball, falls into the hole.
Pretzels and stale coke… I’m having a Ball!
– Paul Beethoven

The Void
By Humberto Gómez Sequeira-HuGóS
I am walking
in the void
without the umbilical cord
that interweaved the mind
with the skin of the senses.
Dispossessed
of attribute and desire,
I abstract myself
from the world
in which the form
of pleasure and its meaning
deteriorate.
Impelled
by the need to understand
the truth as it is
perceived by a blind child,
I pluck my eyes
and connect the imaginary roots
of their tears and dreams
to the alternate current of my awareness.

Humanly possible

By Eric Ahlberg

I decided to try to do what was humanly possible.
this seemed the proper way to live,
constantly expanding my consciousness,
as far as my journey will take me.
being alive, taking it all in,
the highest ecstasy and pleasure,
the lowliest pains and sufferings.
There is no avoiding the joy
from when our bellies are first tickled
how we giggle when we play
we chase and fool one another
we caress and open ourselves
to our ecstatic orgasm
together, alone, your love is my love
we root in the earthly pleasure
of recreating ourselves out of everything
stardust and dung.

We come screaming into the world,
armoring ourselves against the pain,
with certainties, platitudes, woo,
half-truths, the lies we need
that wall off the hopelessness
the bitter blind destruction
where our open heart of love
grabs the fetish of control
in the face of annihilation

The Universe throws us at the Sun and misses
Shiva hails us with rocks
we stand before the terrible cosmos
edging into annihilation
fucking our brains out.