Young American Poets | A poetry blog and online journal

point

2012-01-13T13:11:00.002-02:00

Always write poetry that gets to the point
point.
Never write poetry that misses the point
point.
Only include details to connect to the point
point.
Don't waste words that don't relate to the point
point.
Always write poetry that gets to the point
point.

Hey, is that a squirrel?

henry kellogg (Boston, MA, 1990)

fairy tale

2012-01-12T18:25:00.004-02:00

Dedicated to all who wish for nothing more
than to marry the one they love

The white picket dream,
I share it too.
But mine contains two dresses
with two bouquets,
and a flower boy.

Our images differ,
But keep the same outcome.
To be forever
hand in hand,
with the one you promised
forever to
in a white dress.

tiffany r. ragsdale (Mt. Vernon, MO, 1988)

throw him a curveball

2012-01-11T20:09:00.000-02:00

Late at night
when streetlights silhouette inebriated youth
I sit alone in my living room
under my favorite blanket
riding cotton waves with flattened palms
like grease traversing a rose petal.

Sure, sometimes it’s lonely
sometimes it’s sickening
and sometimes it’s just another night alone.

But every now and then
I hurl the blanket to the floor
pop open a bottle of wine
and hunch over a legal pad
clutching a pen that secretes blood.

Blood as black as ink.

cliff weber (Santa Monica, CA, 1986)

coming to terms with suburbia

2011-12-26T14:21:00.002-02:00

I cupped my hand, inched
you, forgotten friend,
closer. We caught

up over coffee
at one of your Star-
bucks. You offered

to pay, typical
you. “Everything’s on
the house,” you said,

“This venti cup, these
rich mahogany
chairs, those million

passing cars, a blank
check for property.”
When you left, I

closed my eyes for a
second and lost you
among the cars,

moving from one place
to another like the formal nomad
who never understood “lost.”

zachary heine (Sherman, TX, 1991)

A word or two with... Jessie Carty

2011-12-20T18:42:00.008-02:00

Young American Poets is proud to introduce the first installment in a series of interviews which we have dubbed A word or two with... This new section will offer insights into the work and life of our contributors and intends to become a medium for further discussion of poetry in our site. Also, it sort of celebrates our first three years online.

Jessie Carty (Portsmouth, VA, 1975) defines herself as poet, blogger, wife, teacher and herder of cats. She is the author of five poetry collections, including the upcoming chapbook An Amateur Marriage (Finishing Line, 2012) and the award-winning Paper House (Folded Word, 2010). Her writing has appeared in publications such as MARGIE, decomP and Connotation Press. She teaches at RCCC in Concord, NC, and is the founding editor of Referential Magazine.

early memories
I remember making up “songs” on the long bus ride home when I was about 5. They largely involved dandelions.

on influences
As a child I was fascinated with Robert Louis Stevenson, Dr. Seuss – the usual. As a teen I loved William Blake. As an adult I am constantly finding new poets to love. I think I loved Stevenson and Dr. Seuss for the way they painted images with words. Blake was a fascination because of the symbolism he used. I don't even try to do much with symbolism now, but I loved how he tried to build this whole world around himself. I guess, as a writer, I've always been looking for a “home”.

what's in a name?
When I am around other writers I tend to call myself a poet but with my students I lean towards the word writer. I think just calling yourself a poet can distance you from some people. They see poetry as some odd sort of thing. And, in all honesty, I have published in other genres and continue to write in them (just not as much as poetry) so why not call myself a writer?

❝ I think just calling yourself a poet
can distance you from some people.
They see poetry as some odd sort of thing ❞

day jobs
I worked for nine years as an auto insurance claims adjuster before I went back to graduate school and switched over to teaching. I did the adjunct and freelance thing before starting full time English instructing at a community college in the Fall of 2011.

on the writing process
These days all of my poems start in a notebook I carry with me. I draft them by hand, not really revising in the notebook much at all. Within the same week (usually) I then type up the poems, making edits as I go along. I keep the poem in a New/Revise document in Google docs so I can access it everywhere. I keep making edits until it “feels” complete. I don't really have a particular time of day although I tend to write in the notebook at night while I tend to type items up in the morning or afternoon in between classes and other responsibilities.

on submissions
I save all of my writing in a Ready2Sub document and then I go through a list of possible places to submit and select where I would like to send my work. I tend to submit once a week if I have anything ready to send out. I make my submit list yearly (but I do add as I learn about new places) after reviewing CRWOPPS, Poets Market, Poets & Writers, and the suggestions of others. I've learned with acceptance and rejection that the piece you often think is the “best” or “worst” usually isn't the same to an editor so don't take any of that personally. It is a very subjective process in many ways. Just keep writing and looking for the words that are best for you. If you are submitting for the first time I'd say: do your homework. Read articles about how to submit and research the markets you are considering sending your work to.

❝ I've learned with acceptance and rejection that the piece you often think is the “best” or “worst” usually isn't the same to an editor so don't take any of that personally ❞

chapbooks, books
Three of my chapbooks are currently in print and I have a fourth one coming out in March of 2012. Each of mine have been have been released by a different publisher so I didn't produce my own. I also have a full length collection of poems that was published in 2010 by Folded Word Press. I had set up Folded Word back in 2008 but I transferred ownership of it as I moved on to other projects. The new editor later asked me to submit a book for consideration. I had that same book circulating to contests and such, but it was great to work with an editor who really pushed me to make the book a cohesive unit.

the MFA experience
I attended the low-residency program at Queens University of Charlotte. I loved my experience there. I originally attended because I had thoughts of teaching, but mostly because I wanted to write in a community of writers. I found that. I also thought that I would complete my degree while working full time (thus not worrying about the cost so much), but an MFA changes you. I ended up quitting my job six months into the program.

the poetry scene
I keep in touch with poets in person and online. I love both communities! Charlotte, NC, has quite a few reading series and open mics. Our state as a whole has a wonderful selection of poets and poetry events to attend. I trade books with a lot of my poetry friends which keeps me up on contemporary American poetry. I see a lot of terrific work coming out. We are all learning, but isn't that part of the poetic journey?

now reading
I'm currently reading Lessons in Forgetting by Malaika King Albrecht and it is the first book of poems I can think of in a long time that brought me to tears. Just amazing.

found on YAP
Going back at names I know and love I have to bull Bryan Borland out. We've had such a great online relationship over the last few years. His poems show so much of what I love about contemporary poetry because they take a bit of pop culture and weave it into the timeless.

* * *

Bibliography

At the A & P Meridiem (Pudding House, 2009), The Wait of Atom (Folded Word, 2009), Paper House (Folded Word, 2010), Fat Girl (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2011)

Further reading:

Jessie Carty's poetry on YAP

Jessie Carty's website: jessiecarty.com

closeness

2011-11-25T11:52:00.001-02:00

i want to drive a steak-knife into
that feeling
to keep it from changing
or
scurrying away

andrew egerton (Towson, MD, 1989)

here is reality

2011-11-24T11:39:00.002-02:00

a yell toward the wetlands will echo
through the trees and back toward the
voice which freed it. it will do nothing

to change the time it takes the sun
to rise. the birds, startled, will sing
in a way that is both peaceful and

haunting, and the light will slink up
the trees, then through the bedroom
window where a restless heart will

admit that the sunrise heals no better
than a sleepless evening spent
waiting.

alexandra cannon (Pittsburgh, PA, 1988)

sal

2011-11-23T13:48:00.003-02:00

Sal's shirt smelling like garlic and sweat
or just garlic sweat
and whatever else is brewing
behind those swinging back doors
where Manny carries out meatball subs

Sal's life slices
through days of counting
the same three combinations of change
no bills over 20 cousin
and spring or summer fall or winter
that oven will make you
sweat

And today it's raining
dis bullshit weatha
and Sal sits silently behind his moat
of six different pies, calzones and zeppoles
crunching on memories of a place that is not this
new nor this old to him

It's empty and
Sal's eyes widen as lightning hits somewhere there
and something grows in the air around him
a second of clarity through pepperonis
and Sal is not here
and his jaw droops slowly
the only smell watery air
and 33 years of everything
flash like the lightning and the door -
whaddo I get you boss?

tristan franz (Brooklyn, NY, 1987)

eulogy for a clock

2011-11-22T14:29:00.002-02:00

A clock, a near perfect mechanical invention,
a device that can measure all of time,
accurate, to seemingly godly perfection,
a creation that's greatness borders sublime.

Cogs, seemingly endless, populate its space,
pushing each other, like a tide,
each knows their function, and where is their place.
Seeing this all, I was mystified.

But there was one flaw, a hesitation
in the clock; a single error.
I tried to fix it, to achieve perfection;
but plunged the clock into despair.

The perfect creation has been destroyed,
the cogs, ruined, never to turn again.
It was great, until I interfered;
with my meddling, I've ended their world.

jeremy lockhart (Port Orchard, WA, 1992)

Calling all Young Poets across America:last days for 2011 poetry submissions

2011-11-22T14:17:00.005-02:00

Yes, it's that time of the year again: our reading period is coming to an end. Deadline for 2011 submissions is December 15th. Materials sent after this date will not be considered until we resume poetry reviews on February 1st, 2012.

Want to submit? Then hurry up, but don't forget to read our guidelines here.

The Young American Poets team

keep it simple

2011-11-21T11:57:00.002-02:00

"Don't be fooled by the moonshine. The night is young and the night is ours. I can see you are wary. I can see the goosebumps beginning to crawl down your arms. They trickle past your elbow like Plinko chips and I watch with disco ball eyes as if a $10,000 slot sits above your middle knuckle. Don't be scared. Trust me when I say I will protect you. Trust me when I say I love you. Don't be fooled by the moonshine. Don't ever give up on a night like this."

cliff weber (Santa Monica, CA, 1986)

third floor view

2011-11-18T09:20:00.001-02:00

The garage in my backyard
has a hole in the roof.
Leaves and rain
fall in September.

ronald steiner (Butler, PA, 1976)

upon close inspection

2011-11-18T09:18:00.001-02:00

Tree rings reveal
good wet years,
dry cold droughts,
and fires, and births, and death.

ronald steiner (Butler, PA, 1976)

a love affair

2011-11-17T17:22:00.006-02:00

"The poem is a love-affair between the poet and his subject, and readers come in only a long time later, as witnesses at the wedding. But what would the ideal witnesses—the ideal public—be? What would an ideal public do? Mainly, essentially, it would just read the poet; read him with a certain willingness and interest; read him imaginatively and perceptively. It needs him, even if it doesn’t know that; he needs it, even if he doesn’t know that. It and he are like people in one army, one prison, one world; their interests are great and common; and deserve a kind of declaration of dependence"

randall jarrell (Nashville, TN, 1914-Chapel Hill, NC, 1965), excerpt from the lecture Poets, Critics, and Readers, delivered at the start of his second year as Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress —currently Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry—, October 1957, as quoted in 'Randall Jarrell in Washington', an article by Peter Montgomery published in the Beltway Poetry Quarterly, Volume 10.4, Fall 2009

premeditations on separation

2011-11-16T14:03:00.003-02:00

"The Tulips have had their moments"
Margaret Atwood

Neither of us
knew if we were doing it right,
setting fire to each other
becoming a stirred pile of ash.
Your brain inside of mine.
Your brain wanting to multiply
mine trying to divide
back to base.

I’ve been thinking in numbers.
50 percent of unions break in ugly yelps
So in 30 years,
I am half likely
to be her.
Going through her attic
reading letters on mold and time.
Letters you wrote to me--
that is, if you were to start writing me letters.

I would have been a mess--your mess
Now a clean mess--
and leaving a wounded spool of hills.
I will be done killing you—too many times to count
You’ll be tired of dying.

Neither of us
know if we’re doing it right.

morgan eklund (Iowa City, IA, 1989)

dog behind bars

2011-11-15T17:11:00.003-02:00

dog behind bars
doing time
gathering sympathy
from passers-by
black, young, strong
confused
sad
a patio is his prison
a patio where another dog lies
quiet, tired, numb
been there longer
knows better than that
but knows as well what he is
what he has become

the black, young one
longing for freedom
gathers sympathy from a girl, street lads
a smile brings light
a pat brings joy
silence brings everything back
as I, the poet writing this verses
get a glimpse from afar
riding the bus on an empty stomach
fiddling with issues from long and behind
an instant captive
riddled by the moral of the story
setting my problems aside
wondering who the dog is
who is actually in prison
what the odds are
of living in fantasy of freedom
or knowing better, lying stiff and numb
a dog minus the sympathy
another dog behind bars

james pendleton (Bordentown City, NJ, 1979)

levine on upbeat poems

2011-11-11T12:33:00.005-02:00

"I can’t believe this guy Barr is a poet, because I don’t think a real poet would think in that way. When a poem comes to you, you’re not going to say, 'Oh, no, this goddamned poem is just too mean-spirited.' You’re going to run with it."

philip levine (Detroit, MI, 1928), answering the question "I wonder if you agree with John Barr, the president of the Poetry Foundation, who, with the help of a $200 million endowment, has been trying to popularize poetry by encouraging poets to write more upbeat poems" in an interview published in The New York Times Sunday Magazine with the headline Philip Levine Still Knows How to Make Trouble, November 6, 2011

painting elephant

2011-10-24T11:49:00.001-02:00

The face on the canvas
begins to breathe,
like an animal
staring out of a cage.

The elephant holds a tiny brush
in his wrinkled trunk,
paint blotches dried
to his ivory tusks.

He stands, like a small grey house,
mixing colors in his studio.

He’s at his easel all day
and late into the night,
concentrating on a face
across the pillow of his imagination.

Details return to him,
burned into the mainframe of his memory.
He can feel her lips again
kissing his forehead.

craig shay (Bay Shore, NY, 1982)

birdfeed

2011-10-21T12:54:00.002-02:00

Sometimes mine is a broken wing,
and I haven't the heart to sing.
Trapped in my own rib cage
I see bars on everything.
But every disease has a cure
and every lock comes with a key,
and love rains from high above,
sweetening the salty sea.
I am a dove in times of clashes;
an eagle when I want to be;
I am a phoenix, baptized in ashes,
feeling the wind wash over me.

fatima elkabti (La Mirada, CA, 1988)

the heavy musk of masochism

2011-10-20T14:22:00.002-02:00

I busted my ass for $20 a week squeezing cellophane dreams out of jugular veins. Flowers hung from sad, limp stems in the raspy hallway of my apartment. My life felt like a screaming frenzy of nothingness. I began panicking, deteriorating, gnashing my teeth late into the night. And then one Sunday morning, as the churning sun beat down on my ingrown toenail, the antidote appeared wearing a silk suit.

The lion no longer chews upon my heart.

cliff weber (Santa Monica, CA, 1986)

the atoms of lust

2011-10-19T13:40:00.003-02:00

Acid Rain
Radioactive
Thumb
Free Time
is an illusion
She said
to a classroom
of one.

ronald steiner (Butler, PA, 1976)

the transition

2011-10-19T13:00:00.000-02:00

I am the
Student
I ask questions.
I am
the master
I am the
answer to
all questions.

ronald steiner (Butler, PA, 1976)

Bruce Lee, the poet

2011-10-18T21:38:00.008-02:00

"Bruce Lee was an accomplished poet who not only wrote his own work but translated the work of others. He was a man who took poetry so seriously that he even wrote an entire movie script (with the aid of Stirling Silliphant, the screenwriter of the Oscar winning In the Heat of the Night) based off of a poem that he composed. This poem, "The Silent Flute", was even written into the titular script, set to be delivered as a final monologue for the hero."

dave landsberger, excerpt from 'Poetry Kung Fu or: Breaking Boards With Your Head is Dumb, Write Poems Instead', a Rumpus Original published in the The Rumpus, October 4, 2011

cynara cardunculus

2011-10-13T17:21:00.003-02:00

Between you and me, a jade earth-flower, upturned
bud with petals, sharp-tipped, alien fruit. You tug
a leaf from its vertical stalk, and dip sweet curve
into even sweeter silk-butter, your liquid eyes smiling
greenly through long lashes. Here, with you, my spirit
glides on velvet currents. As you dip your heart
in honey-lush bowl and raise it to my lips, I open—
October wind sighs outside as I whisper, “Don’t stop,”
for the curve of your hand fits my cheek, of your body
fits mine. Outside, gold leaves break loose in the wind,
and against snow-heavy clouds the blackbirds fly.

lucien darjeun meadows (Virginia Beach, VA, 1987)

despite the darkness

2011-10-12T16:54:00.001-02:00

the bean plants lived
despite the darkness
of my closet

I didn't think
they'd grow

but they did

into these
spindly white things,
these seedlings,
translucent but tall
and twisting every which
way, almost alien,
almost frightening,
but beautiful, even
unconscious breath-holding:

how unexpected
to be alive

marit rogne (Ann Arbor, MI, 1987)

American Poems Every Student Should Know

2011-10-11T13:34:00.003-02:00

Emma Taylor, a writer for Accredited Online Colleges, sent us the link to a recent post featured on her site's blog, an article titled 20 American Poems Every Student Should Know. From Edgar Allan Poe to Saul Williams, and including names such as Emily Dickinson, William Carlos Williams and Charles Bukowski, this selection is witty, diverse and fun to read, and of course carries a disclaimer: "the entirety of the American poetry scene can’t be distilled into only 20 works", stating also that "this happens to be one writer’s opinion of a few worth exploring".

Read the complete list of poems here:

20 American Poems Every Student Should Know (accreditedonlinecolleges.com)

Nobel in Literature awarded toSwedish Poet Tomas Tranströmer

2011-10-10T17:56:00.006-02:00

The Nobel Prize in Literature 2011 was awarded to Tomas Tranströmer (Stockholm, Sweden, 1931), author of more than 15 collections of poetry and regarded as one of Sweden's most important poets.

Tranströmer's most famous works include 17 Poems (17 dikter, 1954), Windows and Stones (Klanger och spår, 1966) and Baltics (Östersjöar, 1974). His poetry has been translated into more than 50 languages.

In a story published by The New York Times, John Freeman, editor of the literary magazine Granta, said about him: "He is to Sweden what Robert Frost was to America."

The Swedish Academy's citation states the prize, endowed with 10 million kronor ($ 1.5 million), was awarded to Tranströmer "because, through his condensed, translucent images, he gives us fresh access to reality."

Further reading:

The Official Website of the Nobel Prize (Nobelprize.org)

The Official Website of Tomas Tranströmer (The Lion Publishing Group)

Poetry Defeats Politics (The Wall Street Journal)

The Academy of American Poets

brothel

2011-09-02T12:22:00.001-03:00

I knew her before she came here.
Her heart like a dug-up ditch, was before as firm as a trunk.
But adze-gashed in youth:
What was heart was ever after raw material.
(We see how the dark piles up:
The wrecked ruins of a once-white temple;
The ashes from a fire, long-ago-lapsed.)
This is where the prostitutes line up like pigeons
Sitting on a wire. Bird-thin and grim.
Drugged-numb as to stitch up guarded wounds.
Her eyes sag like drip-dirty rags, misused and polluted
With a dazed glaze draped thick over her pale-grown pupils:
She’s seen so much that now she refuses her own sight.
I think of her still: Whole nights (most nights) her legs up-tucked,
Fetus-like, wishing for reunion with wombly warmth.
She hides her eyes and chin from me in guilt.
Her hair whips in the wind
like a white handkerchief waving goodbye.

c. dylan bassett (Las Vegas, NV, 1987)

devil's paperwork

2011-08-26T18:49:00.003-03:00

I am told to sign documents I can read
But I don't understand
I am told to sign one, two, three times
I get a nod when I do the one
I get more nods with two and three
My signature is crooked and ugly
But they are happy with it anyway
And I am now getting a handshake, a pat on the soulder

I am told a new life is waiting for me
I am not sure how it will look like
But it will be new
I am not scared for it's just paperwork
And it will all work out ok, I know
Or at least I try to remind myself everytime
It will all work out ok
One way or another
As I see them walk away

An easy transaction
I now deeply resent
As I regret it all -- my blood as ink,
The shoulder pats, the stupid confidence
The sorrow I can't feel
Because I sold it, and I sold it cheap

But I seem happy anyway

hollis temple (Raleigh, NC, 1975)

paint over a black sky

2011-08-24T01:47:00.002-03:00

I took my woman to the river bank
South by Jefferson
we were nude and everywhere
she moved like a fish out of water
we were past the city lights
and that night
she tried to move the moon
with one hand but couldn't
we kissed

her lips were bitter like lemons
this was the first time she saw the stars
untangled
carelessly thrown like paint over the black sky
and she saw the sun
stick its head out over the distant hills
and it was as bright as a thousand headlights
coming over the Van Wyck
that morning

drew degennaro (Baldwin, NY, 1985)

red-hood

2011-08-23T03:54:00.002-03:00

Whisper through woods,
travel quick under brush,
There are Dark Things lurking.
Black eyes to watch you pass
Big teeth you have,
could swallow poor Granny

Beware the tail, don’t let him
Fool you
Meat is sweet and
he doesn’t mind the fresh taste
of Innocence.
Your cloak Red from travel, Red
from fear, his teeth Red from
You.

julia bodwell (Newton, NJ, 1989)

you become anything

2011-08-22T04:45:00.001-03:00

Your callnotes can strike the empty
fairgrounds after the rodeo trucks home.
You can rip the frail tin from rooftops
and fling it over backyard gardens.
You can throb through the freckles
on a cute girl’s face, wait for the highest
wave to rise and bullet through the blue.
You can knot the nosehairs of old folks
as they nap, unsheathe the half invisible
prophecy, stare through isinglass, screech
at bluejays, trap rubies of sap from pines.
You can open a restaurant, serve only
Rocky Mountain Oysters and Budweiser,
shoot at the full moon with a scattergun,
and drive a Monster Truck, or you can
come back to life and squeeze our hands.

christopher lee miles (LeRoy, MN, 1982)

and lo!, a sad asian girl's memory card is full

2011-08-19T05:00:00.001-03:00

The 8gb memory card.
The 10.1 mega-pixel camera.
The Asian girl is not a
Stereotype worth generalizing about.
Her Giga pet died years ago,
As Japan’s economy was crashing,
As China’s Great Wall was being
Repaired, this time for tourists,
The Mongolians no longer care to cross,
Though Koreans on either side will be
Shot if they do.
Busy massaging the world,
The Thai are not at home, while
Tibetans are, but feel as though they are not
As bad off as the Vietnamese, who
Are better off than the Burmese, who
Are not as well off as the Japanese.

And just when we fear that the world is
Spinning too fast, that time is rushing like
An elderly addict rushing to the casino,
Somewhere, almost everywhere,
Is an unassuming girl ready to
Record and share it all in spite
Of generalizations not worth
Stereotyping about.

luke armstrong (Kalispell, MT, 1985)

spousal anatomy

2011-08-18T04:00:00.001-03:00

My three-year-old brother
points to my father
reading naked
on the leather couch
and asks,
Are those brains?
My mother
without looking up
from muddled folds
of laundry
answers,
Yes.

mallory keeton bass (Jackson, MS, 1988)

piece of sunset

2011-08-17T18:16:00.001-03:00

She’s so
Trippin’
I’d love to see her head spin
As her lips touch the clouds of that piece
Of sky she bought on the street corner in the dark.

Her eyes run glassy to marmalade spheres, lightyears gone and
Falling like an angel from the upper east side
Of a church façade.

Her orange n’ cream glass eyes starin’ and glarin’ and
Freewarin’ into your own as she stops
and shatters.

She’s so trippin’ and her body’s rockin’ in you hands
As that expensive, poisonous sky comes closer
and closer.

She simply fell off the edge of a gargoyle, skeetered
Past its fangs, and tripped into the clouds.

Lucy in the sky, my girl with the ice cream eyes.

nadya agrawal (Houston, TX, 1991)

the gift of language and the wounded ugly boy

2011-08-17T17:39:00.007-03:00

“Poetry shouldn’t tell us what we already know, though of course it can revive what we think we know. A durable poet, the rarest of all birds, has a unique point of view and the gift of language to express it. The unique point of view can often come from a mental or physical deformity. Deep within us, but also on the surface, is the wounded ugly boy who has never caught an acceptable angle of himself in the mirror.”

jim harrison (Grayling, MI, 1937), excerpt from 'King of Pain', a review of The Pleasures of the Damned: Poems, 1951-1993 (Ecco/Harper Collins, 2007), by Charles Bukowski, published in the Sunday Book Review, The New York Times, November 25, 2007

Further reading

Pleasures of the Hard-Worn Life: An Interview With Jim Harrison (The New York Times)

Food for the Soul (The New York Times)

Indoors With a Poet of the Outdoors (The Wall Street Journal)

Jim Harrison at the Academy of American Poets, The Poetry Foundation, The New Yorker and The Paris Review

wiki-what?

2011-08-16T11:27:00.003-03:00

At happy hour, two weeks ago,
I began talking with a guy who
(as my interest waned) boasted,
that he was in Wikipedia.

Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia
of people.

I shrugged like it was nothing.

He wanted more admiration than this,
explained that
not everyone can be listed in there.
Apparently, there is a “process”.

And now, I’m obsessed with it.

I want to be able to Wikipedia myself.
If some schmuck in a bar did,
why can’t I?

I think about my life so far.
I’m not sure that religiously giving
spare change to the homeless will be enough.

I can twirl a baton and sometimes catch it,
but unless I learn to do it while
balanced on the nose of a seal
who is balanced on a ball,
it’s a forgettable gift and not
“Wikipedia” quality.

I could probably get in there
if I schmoozed my way
through social circles,
I could become the
blah blah blah to a yada yada yada.
But I have a knack for
befriending starving artists,
half of whom can’t even afford
their Internet access bill-
I’d end up only schmoozing my way to an open mic night.

jennifer donnell (San Clemente, CA, 1979)

the good life

2011-08-15T04:15:00.001-03:00

We've lived like squatters
For a couple days
At her friends' house
While they are away on vacation
And the bed squeaks
And the blinds keep the afternoon
Looking as young
As 6 a.m.

"You need to stop talking
about money,"

She tells me.

"We don't have it...
We want it.
And someday,
With a little luck,
We'll have it.
But until we do,
We don't need to sit around
And talk about
How we still don't have it."

I smile,
And wrap my arm around her
In another couple's bed
As the rain and frost mix and slop
All over main street
And I debate this poem
Between each strand
Of auburn hair.

ryan torres (Lebanon, PA, 1987)

poetry on the refrigerator

2011-08-12T17:02:00.001-03:00

It's the first of the month
The last day for excuses
The first day of
A lot of stuff I just won't figure out
For a few weeks or maybe months to come

Nothing in this room belongs to me anymore
Except this machine where I type
But it's so out of place now
Much like I am

My possessions reside
At a new address
Almost an hour from here
And what doesn't rest there
Is thrown into my car
Much like I have been for the last two weeks

In the morning
I don't know where I am
The new house?
My parents'?
My roommate's apartment?
My generous friends' home?

The dirt in the new house
Didn't originate with me
It came from the bottoms of the shoes
Of some nice people I only met once
{And their very hairy dog}

I'm not sure what to do with myself
So far from my new abode
So disconnected from any of these
New responsibilities that have suddenly become mine
Afraid to leave this house again
For fear I will no longer have protection
{I know that's not true}

So
I sit in my parents' house
In this room that is no longer mine
Feeling oddly placed
Waiting to be permanently imprinted someplace
Just like poetry on the refrigerator

abigail m. aycardi (Two Rivers, WI, 1985)

Philip Levine appointed U.S. Poet Laureate

2011-08-10T18:30:00.007-03:00

Philip Levine (Detroit, MI, 1928) was named today as the Library of Congress' 18th Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry for 2011-2012, and will take up his duties on Monday, October 17th, during the annual literary season.

Levine succeeds W.S. Merwin as Poet Laureate and joins a long line of poets who have served in the position, including Kay Ryan, Charles Simic, Donald Hall, Ted Kooser, Louise Glück, Billy Collins, Stanley Kunitz and Robert Pinsky.

Levine is the author of 20 collections of poems, including News of the World, What Work Is, Ashes: Poems New and Old, and The Simple Truth, for which he was awarded the 1995 Pulitzer Prize.

Further reading:

Librarian of Congress Appoints Philip Levine Poet Laureate (Library of Congress)

More About Philip Levine - Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry (Library of Congress)

About the Position of Poet Laureate (Library of Congress)

Voice of the Workingman to Be Poet Laureate (The New York Times)

Profile of Philip Levine, poet laureate (The Washington Post)

Philip Levine interviews at The Cortland Review (1999, 2009, 2011 video interview), The Paris Review, The Atlantic

Philip Levine at the Poetry Foundation, Poets.org, The English Department at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, PBS.org and The New Yorker

anesthesia

2011-06-17T20:09:00.004-03:00

We met the usual way strangers meet
By nefarious chance
Awkward coincidence
In perfect timing
For disaster

Add some casual chatter
Sprinkled by impromptu social-network cross-research
An unnecessary fourth round of spirits
Early summer weather
And there you had us – helpless

Double entrées
Triple distillation
The Kronos Quartet
A five-pointed star tattoo – WTF???
Six bucks in my pocket at the end of the night

And there we go, all over again:
This season's first shooting star
Fleeting, elusive, flamboyant
Lots of things in my life at the moment
Feel very temporary

So it must be two or three in the morning now
It must be time for me to go
That said in poor taste, in sour regret
While silently walking away at frantic speed – without reasons
Just like trying to write a poem under anesthesia

nik anastasiadis (Sacramento, CA, 1984)

Kay Ryan, 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry

2011-04-20T11:43:00.004-03:00

Kay Ryan (San Jose, CA, 1945), former U.S. poet laureate, recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship, the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, and author of several collections of poetry, won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for The Best of It: New and Selected Poems, published by Grove Press.

The Pulitzer citation calls the book "a body of work spanning 45 years, witty, rebellious and yet tender, a treasure trove of an iconoclastic and joyful mind."

Finalists in the poetry category also included The Common Man, by Maurice Manning (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) and Break the Glass, by Jean Valentine (Copper Canyon Press).

Further reading:

The 2011 Pulitzer Prize Winners. Poetry (Pulitzer.org)

Kay Ryan, The Art of Poetry No. 94 (The Paris Review)

Kay Ryan, Outsider With Sly Style, Named Poet Laureate (The New York Times)

Stealthy Insights Amid Short Phrases (The New York Times)

Poet Kay Ryan On Words, Writing (NPR)

Poems that turn ordinary things grand (SFGate)

Catching Up with Kay Ryan, Poet Laureate, at the National Book Festival (The Washington Post)

Kay Ryan at the Poetry Foundation, Poets.org, The New Yorker, The New York Times and The Library of Congress

young poests wanted

2011-04-14T16:00:00.005-03:00

YAP welcomes submissions by poets born on or after july 20, 1972, from all 50 states, the district of columbia, puerto rico and all territories of the united states of america. send two to six unpublished poems written in English, bound in the e-mail body or as an attached document. our reading period for 2011 extends through december 15.

read our guidelines here!

Young American Poets
A blog and online journal devoted to
New American Poetry by America's New Poets

on the historical accuracy of your biopic

2011-04-12T00:23:00.004-03:00

As much as you try to forget me
Burning letters, pictures,
Turning the common ground of our memories
Into scorched earth

You just can't erase me from your past
Have no doubt, princess
I'll be the stain you can't get rid of
Researchers, historians -- they will find me

I may not become a paragraph
Maybe not even a line
But at the very least
I'll be a footnote in your biography

Then it will be a question of time

Just let some lame script writer
In need of flesh, drama
For your otherwise uneventful biopic
And there you have me, handsome as ever

Haunting you on the screen
Seducing you
Being the most good-looking
And biggest mistake you ever made

jonathan rothko (St. Louis, MO, 1975)

sushi

2011-04-11T01:26:00.001-03:00

Here is John, right after sushi class
The second in a series of three lessons
For beginners

He is walking down the street, happy as ever,
Carrying a plastic plate filled with sushi rolls he has just fixed himself
It's 9:36 PM

Here is John, happy as ever, carelessly crossing the almost empty street
His eyes fixed in the fresh sushi, wondering
How to tell apart the vegetarian rolls he specially made for his girlfriend
Not noticing the speeding car about to thrust him and the plastic plate
High in the air

He is gracefully elevated from the ground
He is bruised, bitten and pushed by the cold metal
Maki rolls fly without loosing a grain of rice
Which is of course a clear sign of John's fast acquired ability

He hits the ground

The car is gone, the street is again silent
One of John's sushi rolls lands gently on the lap
Of a homeless man sitting on a bench nearby
Reading an old newspaper
He looks at the well-crafted salmon piece with suspicion
And tries it, chewing slowly
His face turns into a big eeewww
He spits all over the place, cursing God in colorful manner

Meanwhile, John is laying on the street
Still figuring out how to tell apart the vegetarian rolls
He specially made for his girlfriend, and he smiles
He has two, three convulsions
And dies

cindy ortemann (New York, NY, 1979)

Boston Review's Annual Poetry Contest

2011-04-09T15:00:00.002-03:00

The Fourteenth Annual Poetry Contest organized by the Boston Review is now accepting online and mail submissions through June 1, 2011, of up to five unpublished poems and no more than ten pages total. Any poet writing in English is eligible, except current and former students, relatives, or close personal friends of the judge, Slovenian poet Tomaž Šalamun. The winner will be announced no later than November 1, 2011, on the Boston Review web site. Read the full competition rules here.

Postmark deadline: June 1, 2011

Entry fee: $20.00

Prize: $1,500, work published in the November/December 2011 issue of Boston Review

Further reading:

Poetry at the Boston Review

unravelings

2011-04-08T01:34:00.005-03:00

A navel veil,

             A grave Nile,

A vile vale unveils.

             "Unravels

Unreal

             Unnerving,"

Leaving gangs rave.

              Engrave alive

A gun avails.

Evils lie,

               Giving leave

Singing,

                  "Sang

                                Sung,

                  "Sang

                                Sung."

Level silver,

           Leaving leas,

Salvia vessels revel

           Grieving selves.

max brodsky (Denver, CO, 1989)

nos saves the world

2011-04-07T14:25:00.000-03:00

Nos
obsessed with Frank Black
passing around his Hellraiser
puzzle box
neglecting to tell us
he's superglued it
shut

mercyrain (Mystic, CT, 1975)

abscess

2011-04-06T02:58:00.008-03:00

Be here, listen to me now:
Joe slept in, Joe's locked out; moss
Rocks gather it whether rolling or not
Don't need to be a goddamn Dane prince
To know something smells like shit in here
Fishy

Weekend escapades for the few chosen ones
Bargains for a weakened, glossy heart
Lawyers and accountants on RVs filled
With champagne, pills, 16 year-olds
Playing the GFE, fighting the gag reflex
Cruising cross country, they analyze
Pros and cons of the self-sufficient holiday
In Lake SOB, Fucker Valley and a thousand destinations
For the enthusiastic policy maker who enjoys some time off
Out in the wild, having fun in the rip-opened ass of America

So yeah, let's have our very own TED Talk
Let's discuss double penetrations
strap-on gang bangs
and 200+ gay bukkakes
What are you waiting for?

Let's discuss asphyxia, double standards
Stained moral values and a million dollars in twenties
Because a CEO position at an NGO does pay, My Deareast
And all of us should have listened to mom
(All of us should have listened to mom, or have we?)

Don't just take every word they say for reals
'Bout the Wall Street crooks who ruined this country
You may experiment, throughout this process
And while effects last
Awkward feelings of happiness, euphoria

Real is what is not
Then, you shovel us for good
Make do without a name
Make do without a home
Be content and calm
Resting assure there will be no such thing as a revolution
Resting assure there will be no end
No pure forgiveness
No hugs

Never, ever forget
The lost triumphs
And gorgeous wounds

The ghostly memories
And vicious road
Ahead

erik ivan clayton (Oklahoma City, OK, 1976)

heart in a foxhole

2011-04-04T05:59:00.000-03:00

there are times when I can't
feel my heart beating inside my chest.
it seems that the blood in my veins
backs up like a city-wide traffic jam
filled with blaring horns and red-faced
motorists in a rush to get
nowhere.

I listen, but there is no sound of the
constant thump thump.
it's one thing to lose your keys.
not even a reason to panic when you
lose your mind.
you can go on perfectly content being crazy.
but this dead feeling between my ribs
sends me searching.
I pull myself apart like a Cronenberg
scene spilling a cluttered mess of me
to the floor.

I have a lot more guts than I thought.
but where the hell is that fickle,
bastard heart of mine?
maybe it is my mind I've lost.
I start rummaging through the inside of
my whiskey-coated shell until finally,
tucked away between the aching
bones of my spine, I find that
barely beating mass of muscle.
hiding like a chicken-shit from the
battlefields of
everything.

but it's about time it started pulling
its weight around here.
my liver has handled sorrow for too long
and my dick is tired of dealing with love.
so I pull its cowardly, beating ass from
the foxhole of my spine and
throw him to the front-line.
face the blitzkrieg.
take a few bullets and
shards of shrapnel.
collect scars.
lose fights.
women.
lose it all and
die bleeding with a smile on
your face knowing you lived.

dale wilsey jr. (Tunkhannock, PA, 1984)

all poets are failed poets

2011-04-03T20:08:00.002-03:00

"As a young editor, Robert Giroux once asked T. S. Eliot whether all editors were not failed poets. "All poets are failed poets," said Eliot. And he was Eliot. To have your work published is nice, of course, but in my experience it takes more than a story or poem to make a nobody feel like a somebody. The world is full of published writers who suspect they're amateur clowns."

lorin stein (Washington, DC, 1973), excerpt from 'The Murakami Landscape; Your Inner Clown', published in Ask The Paris Review, the Paris Review Daily blog, April 1, 2011

Further reading:

Lorin Stein, the Paris Review’s New Party Boy (The New York Times)

349 Minutes With Lorin Stein (New York Magazine)

The Q&A: Lorin Stein, editor (The Economist's More Intelligent Life)

not the sunday family movie night

2011-04-01T10:35:00.000-03:00

See the red trampoline tongue
Shaggy DA
How many comedies
are made
out of unexpected
transformations?
Except
when there is a pink
thong on a teen boy
who knows he is a girl
who just has too much of
...something
Too absent of...
other
He/she twirls knowing
they will be a lawyer:
Special Victims Unit
or a Vet
for little cats
homely dogs
The unclear sex
of the un-prodded rabbit

jessie carty (Portsmouth, VA, 1975)

detritus

2011-03-29T11:14:00.004-03:00

There are crumbles here and there
Even when you move
Crumbles follow you everywhere
And as I take my chances and make a wild guess
I might as well believe your very own crumbles still rattle
In DC, LA, Portland or somewhere

I've resisted ants, unemployment, my parents' divorce
I'm not gonna worry about you

Special and talented were always other people
And yet it was you all along

Whose story will be told in the aftermath?
Winners only tell lovely lies

I am unhappy
As in confused
Longing for the days we sat together
In the same table
Living in the same rented apartment
Riding on the same buses
Cruising the city in our color matching bicycles
Fighting each other to see who could get there first
And neither of us did

You got it all sorted out
I'm still collecting rusty old pieces
Useless, cracked and fallen pieces
What is usually known as detritus

Our very own

scott guglielmone (Jacksonville, FL, 1981)

it's great to be alive

2011-03-28T01:24:00.002-03:00

I lived with my father
sometimes. A cocaine dealer lived
under us, on the second of three
floors. I met him a million

times but never caught the name.
I heard his stereo
through the floor. His ex
dropped his daughter

off every other weekend.
Tattoos on her clavicle.
She was tan. I walked past a stroller
to the third floor.

When he took a girl home,
I’d hear it
until the morning. It wasn’t his fault
Summer was hot. I left the windows open.

I smoked cigarettes
with him in December.
We were snowed
in often. We have good, loud lungs.

When he had sex
it was so loud, my dresser
shook, my cologne
fell. I’ve been so tired. I’d sleep in
like him

if I could. One night, hot August,
I went out for a smoke. A pretty girl
from my high school
came on the stoop. She hugged.

I smiled. She blushed.
Half Asian half Hispanic, both
or neither,
we talked

for some time. I didn’t realize
what she was doing, where
we were. I was with her. She
walked in to his place. Cologne fell

off my nightstand.
I can still hear
her orgasm,
it echoes

off brick and concrete, off
the hydrant, she flutters
through my window curtains.
I hold my sheets.

dylan tyler forsyth (Lowell, MA, 1988)

forgetting the finale

2011-03-26T21:38:00.000-03:00

tonight,
I looked, found screen windows,
dug trails with pruned semen
and sweat fingertips,
from forehead to chin
smiled coyly, muttered confessions to the moon
"my lovely, lovely lover of molten and sulfur"

paced used bedroom of another,
quilted patterns with rabid teeth, looked wall length mirror in quicksilver eye
filled fluster in spilled V patterns
ignored supposed red pill, blue pill philosophy
catered summer leaves to form mask
rain scrubbed
the thousand portal dusty bubble hail screen clean
beer with a hand attached not so much
a vice
as a

matthew wedlock (Taunton, MA, 1984)

the stowaways

2011-03-23T08:52:00.002-03:00

come stow away with me
forget about the money
think instead of the Odyssey
and how different it would be
to read Homer while at sea

let's go so far from home
we won't have to pay
our student loans

two sailors we shall be!
you can whittle
while I wrestle
with antiquated verse
I'll learn to write

with ample time
to contemplate rhyme
we'll solve the riddle

we've made our life
like smashed up clay
we just need air and light
we'll take what's left
and mold it how we like

let's leave tonight
we have what it takes
to make it right

marit rogne (Ann Arbor, MI, 1987)

psalm two

2011-03-22T02:16:00.001-03:00

I don't need a chin to rest upon this clenched fist.

I don't need fists to blindly pound the earth, or sky.

I don't need earth to tell where this body has been
or sky to remember where it has not.

john sibley williams (Wilmington, MA, 1978)

two girls

2011-03-18T19:11:00.000-03:00

Two girls sent to their grandfather's farm
Two girls warned not to speak for fear that they be harmed
Two girls surrounded by Shabab in camouflage and arms
Two girls ordered to speak, standing arm in arm
Two girls called spies, their eyes wide with alarm
Two girls who made it to the evening news but never to the farm

fatima elkabti (La Mirada, CA, 1988)

animal

2011-03-15T13:10:00.001-03:00

His kisses like
A stallion's breath on my neck
I shiver and my eyelids fall

His fingers like
A spider's step on my back
I shiver and swallow a chill

His gaze not piercing but
Pleading
A boy that begs to bond
Not bite

But the bites
On my breast
Show the nature
Of the beast

His crooked smile
Like a cub in trouble
Hides the lion
That roars inside

claire audrey gallagher (Fresno, CA, 1991)

residuals

2011-03-14T10:00:00.000-03:00

So often
the setting is the home of my childhood.
The garage, full of multiplying and subtracting cats,
the yellow-and-orange-streaked linoleum of the kitchen, the lava
of my boyhood games,
the windowless den. When I picture that room,
it is only lit by the shaky glow of the television.
It is a museum alive
with memories that breathe and laugh softly,
of items and objects
long ago lost or left behind,
of things just of out sight or
off the edges of old photographs.
The characters
are so often out of place,
think Holden Caulfield
in fair Verona
or Huck Finn in Revolutionary France.
It is as if a passenger train on a time-lined track
had its cars rearranged at random,
the giants of my life, strangers to each other,
introduced and allowed
to mingle.
My lover stands with me at the cool glass of the front door,
his arms around a former version of myself.
I can smell the Windex
my mother cleaned with,
can smell the Christmas trees
from those young Decembers.
We look, together, at the neighborhood he never knew
as he holds this cloudy-eyed boy
who thinks nothing
of a lifetime condensed, strained,
the things most loved,
remaining.

bryan borland (Little Rock, AR, 1979)

three more haikus

2011-03-10T13:50:00.002-02:00

crushed between pages of a book
flat, dead
a mosquito

* * *

you coming to my doorsteps
knock, smile, spring
seems rather unlikely

* * *

at Whole Foods today,
sad and lonely,
organic tomatoes cry

felicity johnson-clark (Silver Spring, MD, 1982)

love as a dead horse

2011-03-07T10:00:00.001-02:00

A Three Act Romance in Reverse

ACT THREE,
In which he plays an asshole, and she plays a cunt,
and they both say "I love you."

In the months after she leaves,
he drags their bed into the mountains,
Where it finally dies.
He sleeps on the ground next to it
And dreams of her laughing on a cold beach.
When he wakes up he is cradling a ghost,
With no idea where he is.
He sees the bed and remembers,
Lays back in the leaves.
The mice have moved into the cobwebbed space between his ribs,
And he lays there,
Sprawled on the ground,
Listening to them root around in the unfixable darkness.
He can feel his heart,
Even from so far away,
Crashing and pounding in her bedside drawer.

She barely eats.
Wakes up crying and doesn’t know whether it is for herself, or for him.
She tries to think only of the bad times.
Buys an expensive vase so she will have something to smash when the time comes.
She gets drunk,
Sits in the cellar and looks at the unplugged phone the way a killer looks at beauty.
She feels awful.
Thinks to herself, “This is the worst death I have ever died.”
He was loving even as she stuck the knife in,
Kind even as she broke off the blade.
He kissed her face even as she reached for the salt.

ACT TWO,
In which he plays a wounded dog, and she plays a brick wall.

Their bed has become a landlocked ship shorn of its bones for firewood.
Their bed has become a broken-hearted tree left last in a clearcut graveyard.
Their bed has become a blue whale with a broken back.

When night comes in like a bruise,
They board the bed like a gallows,
Brush lips as a politeness,
And make their backs into mirrors until morning.

That their feet form a bridge between their bodies is the sole evidence of the old tenderness.

God sits watching in the corner, saying nothing.

ACT ONE,
In which he plays sunlight and she plays strawberries.

Their first conversation takes place on the rim of a wineglass,
In a patch of sunflowers the size of streetlamps.
His jokes are stupid.
Her laughter is enchanting.
Under the microscope, it has all the building blocks of proper chemistry.
The bird has already been carved into her forearm with the razor blade,
And his wreckage has already washed up on too many shores.
But their old wounds are not enough to keep them from risking new ones.

When they undress each other for the first time,
It is a holy fire.
There is chest-catching grace
In their act of laying themselves bare;
In their offering of what they have;
In the simple fearlessness of choosing to love,
Despite the knowledge that sorrow, and grief, and terror
also exist.
They revel in the powerful joy of their naked alchemy
In reducing the world to a room, a word, a touch.

Their bed is a smiling horse.
Their bed is a full belly.
Their bed is a kingdom, lacking nothing,
More than worth all that is to come.

shimmy boyle (San Francisco, CA, 1983)

showers

2011-03-04T12:03:00.001-02:00

It rained night we met.
Long walks parks.
Sparked, jokes.
Life story
and how your father,
mother,
sister.
Troubles.
Characteristics, personalities admired.
Realization wanted life intermingle.
For long time, maybe
until couldn't stand anymore.
So time move usually does.
Introduced to loved ones.
Your lady.
I happy.
Somehow I felt you were leaving out important details.
I shrugged it off because our conversations were always full.
Demanded attention and time.
Hickies when I went away.
Trips couldn't keep apart,
bills sky high,
wait planes land,
in your arms again.
Arms felt like bed.
Bed felt like home.
You laid me on your shoulder and told me to get comfortable because
I'd be here for a while.
Despite my fear you assured me that arms were bed,
And bed was home.

rebekah wilson (Jamaica, NY, 1988)

dive

2011-03-01T20:16:00.004-02:00

I stood behind Melissa Maroon,
stared at her budding curves,
bright pink bathing suit,
sun-kissed legs that climbed
step by step to the top of the dive.
She smiled at her giggling girlfriends,
pinched her nose, made little splash.
Even while flopping into water,
surfacing with damp hair,
she made me blush.

When my turn came, my teeth chattered,
my weak heart sunk.
Melissa shouted, Go, Bri Go!
How did she know my name?

My dive had to be just right,
a perfect splash, high fives from the guys.
Then maybe she’d see beyond
my chicken arms, chicken legs,
zits dotting my nose,
bony hips barely holding my bathing suit.

I clenched my fists, closed my eyes,
bounced once, jumped off.
Water stung my belly, burned my eyes.
I pushed my body out of the pool,
collapsed next to Melissa’s giggling girlfriends.
She glared at them, walked over to me, and said,
That was the best belly flop I’ve ever seen!

I gave my towel back to her,
strutted to the ladder for another chance.
I forgot about my bony hips,
bony arms, bony legs.
This time I performed a dive perfect enough
to earn a peck on the cheek from Melissa,
a high-five from all the guys.

brian fanelli (Scranton, PA, 1984)

Young American Poets: now open for submissions!

2011-02-23T14:03:00.003-02:00

ok, we admit it: our winter break stretched way beyond our plans. but hey, we've said before we consider slackerism as one of the fine arts! Anyway, YAP is back, again. This marks the beginning of our fourth year online and we'd like to thank once again our readers, the poets who have contributed to our site, fellow bloggers and editors, friends and families who support us and make this project happen.

and we do promise the huge pile of unread e-mails in our inbox will be sorted out asap. thank you for your patience!

Read our guidelines!

Read our poetry!

The Young American Poets team

winter ramblings -- part iii

2010-12-20T13:01:00.007-02:00

Movers and shakers all hooked on Paxil
And the rest of us left to our own devices
Anything but the truth was not enough
A burden over strained shoulders

There's no such thing as an easy winter
Here in the Northern Plains
Weather Channel tuned the clock around
Noodles, bagels and franks
Noodles, bagels and franks
20 inches of snow

And she said:
For the soul is an empty auditorium
filled with ancient echoes
and ragged velvet seats

And the TV said:
How does one define a Utopian world
And Utopian experiences?
Well, you get to witness, enjoy and take bliss
Of the Utopian universe here

And the Internet said:
The sexiest escort walking
Hand in hand with you at your command
You can have her with you
For a splashy massage
A fragrant shower
Or even for physical entertainment

And I said:
Everything I've lent is lost now

g.r. butler (Des Moines, IA, 1977)

last days for 2010 poetry submissions

2010-12-19T03:29:00.001-02:00

Yes, it's that time of the year again: our reading period is coming to an end. Deadline for 2010 is December 21st. Materials sent after this date will not be considered. The Young American Poets staff will resume poetry reviews on January 15th, 2011.

Want to submit? Then hurry up, but don't forget to read our guidelines here.

The Young American Poets team

jest after midnight

2010-12-18T02:57:00.003-02:00

Desperate times call for drastic measures:

Drop the boredom bomb for good,
End the cool kid wars and fuck the blues

Crop your Facebook profile picture
Trimming out and weighing in

Props are fake like plastic trees
Troops, though, are dead indeed

Wrap me around your heart
Make it feel like crap

Shout out the Lost numbers to your neighbors
In the middle of the night -- Let them all wonder

Pet an illusion
Bet on a horse

4!
8!
15!
16!
23!
42!

Kick that nail biting habit
Easy to make it go, easy to get it right back

Set the rules and break them
One by one; like monkeys

(This works wonders when I'm sober,
Should do the trick for you)

Now, to a lesser extent
I wish I was viral
I wish I was viril

I really wish I was

matt sambarino (Dallas, TX, 1986)

a poet overcome by enthusiasm isn’t a poet

2010-12-17T02:23:00.007-02:00

"Too much of anything gets you nowhere. Even logicians warn that someone who tries to prove too much ends up proving nothing at all. We see excess everywhere in life. Excessive or profuse sensation turns to numbness. It produces indolence, inaction, a culture of sluggishness among individuals and whole populations. A poet overcome by enthusiasm, passion, etc., isn’t a poet—I mean he isn’t able to make poetry. Confronted with nature, his mind is swamped imagining the infinite, ideas swarm in his head and he’s unable to separate, select, or grasp any of them; he’s completely incapacitated, in other words; he can’t harvest the fruit of his sensations—he can’t conceptualize and formulate, can’t apply himself and write, can’t theorize or practice."

giacomo leopardi (Recanati, 1798-Naples, 1837), excerpt from an article originally published in the November 2010 issue of Poetry. Translated from the Italian by W.S. Di Piero.

Further reading:

The poetry of pessimism: Giacomo Leopardi (Rice University)

The Solitary Life (The New York Times)

Leopardi: Selected Poems. Translated by Eamon Grennan (Princeton University Press)

Giacomo Leopardi (Wikipedia)

i want to dance barefoot on the grave of history

2010-12-13T01:43:00.002-02:00

At the Alamo at the tourist hour, I don't mind the heat as much as I do the screaming children; maybe I should have paid for the audio tour to drown out the people. This was a church, it was holy, then it saw war, an unholy one. The plaques call this a shrine. More glorified war, more valorized shame, more hatred historicized incorrectly. The signs that instruct me to not touch the walls make me want to read them as if they were braille. The rooms have been retrofitted for air conditioning, the stones must feel refreshing, I want them against my skin. I want the nerve endings in my soles to absorb the chill and store it for when I walk back to the hotel in the middle of the day. I want to take off my shoes and let the past creep up through the base of my body.

allyson whipple (Cleveland, OH, 1984)

thirty years to the day

2010-12-10T13:40:00.001-02:00

on my thirteenth birthday, elaine told me
now that i was grown, she would not be attending
anymore hockey games

when the tornado upended eighth avenue and logan
the four of us gathered at the streets of london pub in north capitol,
the pints were pricey and the band talked too much

i was the black sheep that ate the flock
i opened my box of letters
the three of you did not even know mom took up pottery

lawrence gladeview (Longmont, CO, 1983)

bring it on

2010-12-07T09:57:00.001-02:00

I want to smash apart my computer and snort it up.
I want to melt my cellular phone and shoot it into my veins.

Let us all drink tumbling towers
and piss in our neighbor's yard

Spring comes in a can now.
Can I take pill for that?

Studies have shown lions are roaming our streets.
There are some side effects of course

Never trust a man with a mouth.

garrett west (Detroit, MI, 1984)

lorelei café

2010-12-06T22:22:00.002-02:00

i lounged at the kaffeehaus–
identical to that fake german
café from epcot, if the huge
manmade lake was the rhine

i dunked a stale berliner in
my cappuccino and flipped
through the pages of my
fresh faced german diary,
purchased in a gift shop
for impulsive americans.

i traced the phrase
"übung macht den meister"*
etched along the binding
in flawless cursive script

the pastry crumbled and
oozed on a blank page.

three years later,
it remains, a lone
journal entry

stephanie gustafson (St. Paul, MN, 1988)

* Editor's note: "practice makes the master"

riddle

2010-11-16T16:37:00.002-02:00

if a fly is a fly
why isn't a man a walk?
or a die?

ava grünberg (New York, NY, 1971)

to a poet a thousand miles away

2010-11-12T00:38:00.007-02:00

for Laura Eglin

She's the one who started it all
By calling water by its name
Speaking in that soft sweet voice
Yet with a deadpan stare

Showed up unannounced and nesting
Her warm child under her armpit
I was intrigued and still
Happened to had just split

Since then name of water
And name of expatriate poet
Became familiar, longed for and aired
All poets, sooner or later,
become something of the sort (that is, expats, smoke or lonely bears)

My first guess was a mistake
Feelings grew not within but around
Early stories and skipped classes
Her bright joyful eyes behind her glasses

It's never virtual when she's typing:
Your story is my story
Rather hours ahead in hidden beds
Water sliding and pages seeming wet

Bringin on, miles away from home,
That same fresh air we endure through
The darkest winter and breathe
In January when it's hot here
And it's hotter there

My only hope is she knocks my door
With older children, a big hug,
Her smiling cat and healing wounds
For we both know sooner or later

Poets are meant to meet halfway
Across the page, through the borders, against the odds
Where miles turn stepping stones, the desert blinks
And proper names become oceans

bardo thomas (Jacksonville, FL, 1978)

The Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival

2010-10-06T10:00:00.001-02:00

Four days of peace and poetry is one slogan that could suit pretty well for The Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival, dubbed "Wordstock" by The New York Times. Based in Newark, New Jersey, and arriving this year to its 13th edition, the biennial event is North America's largest poetry festival. Sharon Olds, Martín Espada, Kay Ryan and Bob Hicok are only a few names from the long list of poets taking part in the evening programs, which are the centerpiece of the Festival. If you're nearby, don't miss it!

The Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival
October 7-10, 2010
NJPAC and Newark's Downtown Arts District

Further reading:

Festival 2010

Festival Poets

Scheduled Readings

little red riding hood feels the tingle

2010-10-05T12:05:00.009-02:00

"I want to be notorious,
infamous, androgynous,
barely innocent,
vaguely inconsistent"
Giovanni Anderson (1742-1801)

Behold, a nightmare!
a porn star, a turtleneck, and no poet
So much energy towards a useless revolution,
Mother said -- What a waste of time!

And the higher the buildings rose the deeper we were drowning
Into recession, anxiety and Civil War, which was anything but Civil
The Rat Race was over, the triumph of Evil inevitable,
The smell of your panties, unforgettable

[PLACE COMMERCIAL HERE]

The story of Little Red Riding Hood, everybody knows -Or should know-
Is not about a girl shuttling a piece of cake for her grandmother, no
It is about the innate curiosity of the young
About the dawn of sexual arousal

So when The Wolf living in the dingle
Makes Little Red Riding Hood feel the tingle
From his signature swinging schlong
You can't help but remembering Anderson's words:
barely innocent, vaguely inconsistent

Because both Wolf and the red hooded girl are hungry
And she may not be as strong as him, but you know she has the instinct
To devour the black animal using teeth and nails
Were it needed -- and you can comfort yourself saying:

Poor little thing!
Just a little girl!
Good heavens!
Dear Lord!

The higher the buildings rose, the bigger our despair
Just like when you came back home -- just like
Only to grab your belongings
And walked out the door without saying goodbye.

richard krauss (Missoula, MT, 1975)

roadkill

2010-10-02T23:37:00.002-03:00

I washed the Honda Odyssey
just yesterday-and now
the bumper’s splattered.
I dread the clean-up process.

Surveying the wreckage, I try to
recall the last time I witnessed
any expression on your pyrite face.
The trail of tears was absent
at your mother’s burial,
so why is your salt spilling
on the tabby's mangled body?

Fascinated, I study the feline's
anatomy: crushed skull bone,
intestines strewn across the
steaming pavement.

I wonder: should I be touched,
or annoyed by the tears that
dampen your graying beard?

I wrap the tabby in a
flowered picnic blanket
that hides the matted fur.
And from the right angle,
she looks peaceful.

stephanie gustafson (St. Paul, MN, 1988)

scotch, lipstick, and alone

2010-09-28T14:09:00.002-03:00

donaldina relocated to
steamboat springs twelve
years ago, she's originally
from scotland

donaldina has girlfriends, but
not friends, and on friday nights
she never has a date

how could
this be?

she is a respected bagpiper,
two handicap golfer, and
a champion curler.

lawrence gladeview (Longmont, CO, 1983)

wine in my throat, pen in my hand, you in my vengeance

2010-09-27T12:26:00.002-03:00

If that was love, I rather go loveless
And well, yes, I am putting this into verse
After reading my metaphoric Monday paper

Where it is printed that I was so not
The kind of guy you expected
Or ever wanted as a significant other

It is all so lame:
Me and you, the metaphores,
Stating the obvious, not being able to see the evident

Your all new look
Favoring the clothes you once said
Were reserved for desperate wannabes

Your sudden new life
I can't compare
Friends all drawn from the liberal arts

Your new boyfriend
I can't compete
His clothes are so much better than mine

Tell me if it will ever stop hurting
Tell me if I will ever forget you
Tell me if this poem will do

carson newman (Boston, MA, 1987)

they call me hispanic

2010-09-21T12:06:00.003-03:00

they call me hispanic, latino, brown
what do they know?

they call me wetback, chicano, tex-mex
they build a wall

they say we're good fo'nuthin', yet use our tax dollars
for pumping petrol in their border patrol

they call me hispanic, latino, brown
mandatory labelling, profiling frenzy

they knock our doors in the middle of the night
asking for josé, for hernán and rita

they won't let our children speak spanglish
and yet they order undocumented fajitas

they send me to eat in the kitchen when company comes,
but I laugh, and eat well, and grow strong

they call me hispanic, latino, brown
they build a wall

silvia arroyo (El Paso, TX, 1972)

summer work

2010-09-17T18:21:00.003-03:00

subdued in the raw smell of office supplies
and paper bags with the tops rolled over,
you'll take down in your messagebooks
how they stapled you to a rolling chair,
made you dance for a man you don't know
and for a phone that does not want to ring
and does for anyone but you.

so you answer in a name that isn't your own,
pray at an arbitrary wooden desk
to not be there long enough to see
your name engraved on a rectangle paper card.

samantha zimbler (Staten Island, NY, 1991)

The Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize 2010

2010-09-14T00:49:00.004-03:00

The Waywiser Press is now accepting submissions of poetry manuscripts for the fifth annual Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize. Entrants must be at least 18 years of age and may not have published more than one previous collection of poems. Manuscripts must be written in English. There is an entry fee of $25 for residents of the USA and £15 for entrants in the rest of the world. Read the full guidelines here.

Prizes:

The winner receives $ 3,000 or £ 1,750 and publication of the winning manuscript by Waywiser Press, both in the United States and in the United Kingdom.

Postmark deadline: December 1st, 2010.

about this poem

2010-09-13T11:47:00.004-03:00

this poem has no first person singular
it is not about you either
and while it definitely has no nutrition value
it may contain genetically modified products

this poem was not written but produced
in a facility that also processes nuts, wheat and eggs
vacuum sealed for extended freshness
please see reverse for expiry date

this poem was enriched with sodium, iron and blood,
additives and preservatives approved by the FDA
no significant amount of metaphores or poetic license to be found
other rights may apply, such rights vary from state to state

this poem was not tested on humans
but it was indeed tested on rabbits, mice and a 16-year-old chimpanzee
they all seemed to enjoy it, except for the monkey
who scratched his head in sheer disbelief

[Poem parts made in India, Malaysia and Thailand. Assembled in China]

lex fairchild (Phoenix, AZ, 1982)

fuck you, i’m from kansas

2010-09-10T19:07:00.004-03:00

Two inches of snow in Norwich and this city shuts down.
“There just isn’t enough grit!”
Fuck you, I’m from Kansas
Where grit comes from the inside
Where blizzards bury children in as little as eight minutes
And you just deal with it.
Socialized health care?
Fuck you, I’m from Kansas
If you get cut, you die. Simple as that.
Sure, we’ll pray for ya’ll, but that’s about it.
We buried pa in a field by the Kaw River after the rustlers came,
And ma died while trying to birth that calf, kicked in the head to death,
Little sister was bitten fifty-two times by a rattlesnake before she managed to bite off it’s head, and we couldn’t afford the antidote cause the cattle died of blight.
The poison still courses through her veins today. Makes her mean.
And when the well ran dry, fifteen kids tripped and fell into it
Cute little blonde-haired blue-eyed kids,
Like the kind you save in movies
Movies that are never set in Kansas
And as they fell to their tiny deaths
We just watched.
Health and safety?
Fuck you, I’m from Kansas
I went to school in a class of four hundred
Only eight of us are still alive
We couldn’t find Billy Ray after that twister got him.
He’s probably somewhere in Missouri
Or Ohio
Or maybe Iowa.
Or maybe bits of him in all three.
Did we miss him, yup,
But fuck you, I’m from Kansas
It’s just part of God’s plan
We just got color in ’94, before that, everything was black and white
Except the people, they were just white.
I’m not racist, fuck you, I’m from Kansas.
Nineteen of my friends died of dysentery,
Cholera got the other six
My Facebook page reads like the book of the dead
The dead of Kansas.
I cried once, when I was two, and pa punched me in the face
Fuck you, son. We don’t cry. Not in Kansas.
Nothing tastes better in Kansas than pain.
We like our women to have teeth
But it doesn’t always work out that way
You don’t always get what you want in Kansas.
If you don’t drink a case and a half of Pabst Blue Ribbon a day
Fuck you, get out of Kansas.
If you don’t stop at the titty bar along the highway
Fuck you, get out of Kansas.
Our capital, Topeka, is built of sticks and mud.
We added a brick once, and the whole thing fell over.
Forty thousand people died.
So we just started again.
Fuck you, I’m from Kansas.
I graduated at the top of my class in Kansas because I went to the library and read the book.//
Now I’m governor. Governor of fucking Kansas.
So when the snow comes next, and ya’ll English are trying to push your faggoty French cars out your ever-so-slightly frosted over roads, don’t come whining to me.//
I’ve seen it all. On the cold, cold prairie.
Fuck you, I’m from Kansas.

will averill (Lawrence, KS, 1974)

what i see

2010-09-07T11:58:00.003-03:00

what I see is dead umbrellas
skeletons lying on the streets
no traces of the fabric that once stood
between rain and being

the sky is plumber gray
roads are empty
looted malls in a take-it-all spree
by spirits riding cinnamon buses

what I see is the outcome of a plague
a deadly virus, heavy weather
and Miley Cirus, half naked
a storm of epic proportions

the ultimate open-zipper policy
vague notions of a nation's
leftovers, cranks and cramps,
marauding bodies seeking prey

eleanor day (Tacoma, WA, 1979)

you say explode

2010-08-11T02:10:00.004-03:00

the red wine was a pouring in a whirlwind binge
soy sprouts and foul mouthed outbursts,
icicle! popsicle! bicycle! rats!

the tension building upon the tension in a fringe
must be the poetry of lonesome short skirts,
tonsils! advil! Brazil! maps!

you say explode
the way you say things when you matter-of-factly mean it
google! goggles! giggles! fuck.

it all goes kaboom when the summer's in bloom
your ass no longer mine, now Zagat rated
you say explode

the way you say things when in your please-all mode
the mode you say things when it doesn't go your way
still, I rather go to a bring-your-own-beer kind of venue

you say explode, I say yeah!
it all goes down the drain; banal expectations of a normal life
anal perspiration when hostile cruelty is rife

not uncommon, by the way, building up to 7200 degrees
you say explode, sucker
and when that happens, sadly, it all goes stale

norbert norris (New Haven, CT, 1977)

maturity

2010-08-09T13:41:00.002-03:00

i recently
took up
fashioning
a beard

        for what
        duration
        do i let
        this thicket
        germinate?

        what is
        the jugular
        etiquette?
        barber every
        two days?

on second
thought

i am
not ready
for this.

lawrence gladeview (Longmont, CO, 1983)

snakes and ladders

2010-08-05T10:32:00.005-03:00

hierarchy

prevalence

ambition

escalade

intercourse

solitude

vacuum

descent

hunger

anger

fear

aggression

bad credit loans

submission

hell breaks loose

game instructions:
snake bites pull you down
and you tremble in cold sweat
ladder accidents pull you down
breaking your legs and your morale

go up and down at will
if you can

talbot dillinger (Rome, GA, 1973)

misconceptions of a novice copy editor

2010-07-26T15:03:00.007-03:00

I am fact-checking a piece on a new German luxury sedan
And I easily recognize in the cover picture
Of the digital brochure where the technical specs are
The Chicago skyline in all its grandiosity

I am suddenly distracted from my job
Thrown in a burst to a time past long ago
That one time we walked down Michigan Avenue
Is this accurate?: "Hand in hand"

I smell the iron coming from The Loop
I savor the deep dish pizza
I remember I was then, still young
I descend slowly, like in a panoramic elevator

* * *

The thousand miles in Greyhounds
And frequent flyer loopholes
I squeezed through just to get there
Speed up before me and before the tinted window

The wind in your hair, the woolen cap I gave you
Those endless phone calls in the middle of the night
Your friends and, why not, that other girl I dismissed
Because of you, turnstiles, plenty of turnstiles,
Ticket booths, phone booths and obstacles.

All in all, it's a misconception
And I get back to my work:
Yes, the horse power is right
And I am tight, sweating, sitting in my desk
A deadline away from an empty home

talco fischer (Monona, WI, 1976)

poetry of rock

2010-07-22T02:12:00.004-03:00

A rock is king of its own salt -- washed again and trembling
Malaise, early bird bonds, frustration and raspberries kept
The mineral still for thirty three thousand years
Oh, how it hurts!

Has seen infants turn into old men and women
Been climbed time and time again, defied
Was unable to help the boy who wanted to impress a girl
When he skidded, hit his back and fell flat to the ground

With a thousand legs like ghost limbs -- so real
Just trying to keep a balance and a distance
Disappointed because skin turns into sand little by little by little
Yet the soul remains a stone forever

Wet and cozy refuge for furry lichen -- clothes you might be afraid of
Becoming bread as pebbles and twisting with ice hot frenzy
Has a skeleton indeed but not a single eye
Unable to feel what time feels like but for the painstaking erosion:

A rock is queen of its own grief...

And that's about it

arthur grobb (Decatur, IL, 1991)

high 90s

2010-07-21T03:33:00.004-03:00

lip balm grease innuendo
good times please Nintendo
calm, seduced, stupendous
bill my room, follow through
embittered

there's friction in a fraction nanosecond
air is gone and sweat is prone
I'm on, he's in,
joy, pride, rubber souvenirs
tease it and squeeze it so it flows in rivers,
tonguewise

soggy
undressed but by my training socks
let them go too
please let them crawl out
it's you and me making Wii
surfing the crazy heat wave
feeling full circle for the first time
feeding empty random thoughts of sorts:
Magellan's friends just called him Nando

audrey villisac (Indianapolis, IN, 1988)

accidents waiting to happen

2010-07-20T01:07:00.005-03:00

should you walk away empty handed
remember the ants, the skills and the black paint
remain professional at all times
be righteous, courteous and gorgeous
no milk spill can make you lose temper

like a loose skateboard in the dark
plugs plugging plugs plugging more plugs
in a wire jungle coming out of that one single outlet
ill-conceived at the sudden blow,
sputtering home, sweet anger

help yourself
help others
sound the alarm
be calm, locate the exits (should they exist)
smile

it could have been me, it could have been you
walking out of the building in flames
accidents waiting to happen
fighting fire with gasoline
lacking courage for in our chests pounded shrinking hearts

kind of we deserved the smoke and all

the blurry vision
the ugly aftermath

ruth labandera (Santa Fe, NM, 1974)

does color matter?

2010-06-09T03:12:00.001-03:00

The outside of a black hole
is equally as black as
the inside of a black hole
When discussing black holes
our conversation should
never move passed the color
black
Unless of course we consider
white to be a color
And ask If a black hole is the absence
of matter and white is the
absence of color why isn’t a
black hole white?
I suppose the absence of matter
has nothing to do with
the absence of color

Similarly (though not)
The outside of a person
is equally as colorless as
the inside of that person

john kropa (Redbank, NJ, 1990)

heavy

2010-06-04T03:27:00.001-03:00

Clench jaw
heavy lid
misses the breeze
misses the sun

clench jaw
heavy lid
misses the ease
misses the fun

grit teeth
red eyes
knows not the strength
knows not the will

grit teeth
red eyes
knows only the length
knows only the hill

frown mouth
drooping brow
once had the heart
once had the light

frown mouth
drooping brow
has lost the art
has lost the fight

claire audrey gallagher (Fresno, CA, 1991)

a thought or not

2010-06-03T22:01:00.002-03:00

The prices of things have changed
and that is very hard to believe.
Our minds stay the same and I still know
which side the groceries are on.
That is something that is taking space in my head,
which can only hold so much.
Perhaps a memory was knocked out so I could remember this fact.
I am guessing it goes something like this:
I am standing the center of the food court wondering
if I should take a horse or a taxi.
It looks like rain and burning buildings,
and I must prepare for this party.
I forget.

garrett west (Detroit, MI, 1984)

ink received from the editor's pen

2010-06-02T02:57:00.000-03:00

The trend now is to take song lyrics
and replace one word in the chorus
with a contemporary word
like tweet,
so, for example,
you keep on tweeting my love into the borderline
or
I would tweet anything for love but I won’t tweet that.
It's not plagiarism because we've replaced a verb.
The trend now is to avoid entire elements of language.
This is what I recommend.
Replace any adverb with the name of a television show.
It's something our readers will recognize.
She went down the stairs dancing with the stars™.
Readers will feel their living rooms.
And forget iambic.
It's been done to death.
The hot thing now is to correlate a poem with the speech pattern of
the actress who adopted all those children from Africa.
Pop culture and supporting a cause!
The trend now is to write a haiku
and delete every third word.
It saves us time and space
for ad revenue.
This is what it sounds like
when doves tweet.

bryan borland (Little Rock, AR, 1979)

daughter of a fisherman

2010-06-01T00:42:00.002-03:00

I remember two things

November late afternoon sunlight
exclamatory sparkles of dust
upon lashes a fence to blue eyes
the dull scent of cat litter and coffee grinds
&
pacing a guttural song against the glued down tiles
counting pills from green tubes
white miniature cupcake molds, catch,
then dispose down toothless gaps
a sacrament with red ink confessing

walking and watching
a curious peer around corner
lingering waiting strangers in my home
why you here

matthew wedlock (Taunton, MA, 1984)

zombie girl tries sitting at the back of the bus

2010-05-28T00:59:00.001-03:00

For some reason, that day, she decided to play
Truth or Dare. She dared.

She leaned over to kiss the blondish boy
and she did encounter

soft, like she thought she would but there wasn’t
any movement as she expected.

She opened her eyes onto her first real penis.
The other kids had had

to prop the boy against the back of the seat
so the zombie girl would be properly

aimed at his crotch. Did she think of crying?
Of throwing up?

What she did was crawl under the seat, swerving
to her right to reach the aisle

before she stood up and walked, without looking back,
to her normal seat at the front of the bus.

jessie carty (Portsmouth, VA, 1975)

distrust

2010-05-27T02:42:00.008-03:00

I distrust foundations, think tanks, non-profits, NGOs, the church
-- in all the wild and colorful forms it has adopted in this scornful nation of faith//
I distrust the Federal Government, its multiple agencies like tentacles, the police state we live in and the Library of Congress//
I distrust the media, televised singing contests, public transportation and the notion of a collective us, happily marketed as one nation under God, indivisible, the unfulfilled promise of liberty and justice for all//
I distrust the Internet as a means of better understanding and better communication, corporate slogans, retirement homes, hedge funds and Wall Street//
I distrust pop music, big-hair heavy metal and alt-country, Monday Night Football, discount coupons and free popsicles//
I distrust digital photography, fashion magazines, smartphones, iPhones, iPods and iPads//
I distrust my neighbors, their born-again christianity, their new car and beautiful kids, their financial struggle and capability to project themselves into a future of neverending debt but still happy they'll manage to send their offspring to college, just like their parents, and their grandparents who actually didn't go to college and were in so many ways blissed by ignorance//
I distrust the easy way out, no future nihilism, I distrust those who, upon questioning, can only say they sold out to the man//
I distrust the paranoid conspiracy theories abounding, about how it's all said and done, the notion of this world as theatre, people as puppets, and some string-pulling entity above all//
I distrust the convenience of convenience stores, hot water bottles and people who dress up in super hero costumes for comic conventions//
I distrust the power of the mind, the hope for a better tomorrow and, as I type,
I distrust to nausea my very own verses

dan kraut (Cincinnati, OH, 1981)