devil's paperwork

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

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

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

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

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

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

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)