2021

 

 

APRIL CONTRIBUTORS

 

 

Melanie Branton, Luigi Coppola, Seth Crook, Melanie Hyo-In Han, Nels Hanson,

Tom Kelly, Ibe Liebenberg, DA Maolalai, Megan McDermott, John Middlebrook,

Lynn Pattison, Paul Waring.

 

 

 

 

 

 

MELANIE BRANTON

 

Why I Kneel Before The Altar Of My Kitchen Table

I’m instructed to wash thoroughly before use,
a baptism in three changes of water. The rockabye baby
cradle of the pan nurses all food I weigh in the scales. I celebrate
the order of each task in its allotted turn, chopping vegetables even,
cleaving to half-moons or cubes or sticks. Stirring, the feeling
radiates up my arm, the ritual of muscle and tradition. My body imposes
its own calm, finds peace in what it’s done many times before.
I do my washing up as I go, keep myself clean, keep my surfaces clean,
drying on the inside and the outside, like my Nana taught me,
then stowing away, in the places I can find with my eyes shut
and my mind on autopilot, bowls and plates I remember from my childhood.
Their gentle curves ease back together, as they comfort each other
when I shut them into their own darkness.

 

Now, It’s Time for Ice Cream!

A taffeta curtain on an automated track
like the one at the crematorium
whirred back. Snug in their plush armchairs,
they were manacled to their neighbours
and bolted to the floor. The films:
movies, motion pictures, frat house comedies,

shoulder-holstered cops from the precinct,
moms with brown paper bags of groceries
from the store - hand-me-downs
from an older cousin that didn’t quite fit.
They didn’t get some of the jokes,
but laughed, anyway. We sold them America

in a finger roll, with onions and ketchup.
The popcorn machine in the foyer
a light box, a butterscotch glow
they could warm their hands on,
and they never noticed the oil and salt
clotted like scurf at the bottom.

My job was to carry a torch,
help them navigate the darkness.

 

Melanie Branton lives in North Somerset and has two collections: Can You See Where I'm Coming From? (Burning Eye, 2018) and My Cloth-Eared Heart (Oversteps, 2017). Her work has been published in journals including Ink, Sweat & Tears, The Honest Ulsterman, Marble and The Lake. melaniebranton.wordpress.com

 

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LUIGI COPPOLA

 

Filleting Fish with my Father in the Family’s Fish & Chip Shop

 

The cod would come in halves – well, less than halves: no head, tail, guts

just two iced cuts: white meat exposed on one side, grey skin on the other.

 

My father would sharpen his knife against a waiting whetstone that once

was a perfect block, now worn to a dip from grounded down years.

 

The ceremony begins: he holds the blade, hands over handle into my hand:

a warm hand, dry and shaking from anticipation and concern for precision.

 

He had taught me and now it was my turn to go it alone, half a fish

on pearl stone slab: a flattened fish, still, silent and ready for the edge.

 

I pivot the tail’s tailless end down with my middle finger’s nail, find

the moist gap between dead skin and dead meat until it yields.

 

I glide the knife as it chews along white string and elastic fibres

that once bonded with a beating pulse but now rip along the seam.

 

I go for it, all the way to the end: one hand pulls at the skin, the other

takes one long swipe out and away with a knife that grates to be free.

 

Skin in bin, the half is slivered of its fat, a brown and red-tinged jelly,

then I turn it around to carve out the embedded spine, extracted

 

while still clinging on; it is now just a waved spike of opal thrown

onto the waste with one hand while the other cuts, trims, measures

 

and weighs to small/medium/large/extra-large portions: the pinned-in

white price on the black-holed board the award for this boy’s butchering.

 

I lump lumps of its siblings, clump and cobble together if needs be.

All this before the master filleter checks: his age arranges, expert eye

 

catches, declares a yes to fry the prize… or (as it is this time) a no.

I dismantle the routed beast, lay out the now twice-spliced parts and

 

start over – an ah and a sigh linger on my cold, wet, splitting knuckles.

 

Luigi Coppola is a teacher, poet, first generation immigrant and avid rum and coke drinker. Shortlisted for Bridport Prizes, longlisted for the Ledbury and National Poetry Competitions, publications include Worple Press’ anthology The Tree Line, Acumen, Ink, Sweat and Tears, Iota, Magma, Rattle and Rialto. www.LuigiCoppolaPoetry.blogspot.co.uk

 

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SETH CROOK

 

Kant Sleep

The world divides into those who,
like the old philosopher,
spend hours wondering,
Is there a Synthetic Apriori?

and the rest, my goddess,
who do not care at all,
who ask me to whisper
the history of philosophy

in their ear, late at night,
because it helps them get to sleep.
Who are always snoring
by the time of David Hume.

Seth Crook lives on Mull and is transitioning into a seal. His poems have appeared in such places as The Rialto, Magma, Envoi, Northwords Now, Poetry Scotland, The Lake. And in recent anthologies such as The SHOp: An Anthology (Liffey Press), Declarations (Scotland Street), The Centenary Collection (Speculative Books), Places of Poetry (One World).

 

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MELANIE HYO-IN HAN

 

and you told me

 

that i spoke good english - ! that it was surprising i didn’t have an accent - ! that i was eloquent, considering i had grown up in a “third world country” - ! that i was well read - ! whitman, eliot, plath, cummings - !

and you told me

that i should be grateful that your country stepped in - ! that my culture would’ve died out - ! that without your soldiers, my homeland would’ve been decimated - !

and you told me

that i should thank you - ! maybe do you a favor - !

and you told me

to stop playing hard to get - ! but that you did like a good hunt - ! that you were a lion, a leopard, a cheetah - ! that i wouldn’t be able to get away - !

 

but i told you

 

that you may be a lion, a leopard, a cheetah - !

but I am a Crowned Eagle,

Raptor of Africa,

Most Powerful of Birds,

Largest of Eagles,

Seer of All Things 

I fly high above you with outstretched wings,

and before you even know it,

I will descend upon you at 160 km/hour.

I will tear your jugular open with my 7 cm talons - !

 

Born in Korea and raised in East Africa, Melanie Hyo-In Han currently lives in Boston where she’s a poet and a teacher. She has received awards from “Boston in 100 Words” and The Lyric Magazine, and earned her M.F.A. in Poetry and Translation from Emerson College. Learn more about her at melaniehan.com.

 

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NELS HANSON

 

After a Hard Year

 

I remember snow falls more slowly

than the rain and hail like slanting

arrows harder than rain. Yesterday

a full lemon moon wore a halo, aura

blue, turquoise, yellow, red-orange

for a portal. Is it time to take the dirt

road by plum trees throwing shadow

on a pond’s quiet waters, wood duck

drifting, bill in soft down? Last night

in a dream everyone was alive, from

the forest we never knew all the tan

deer stepped past us without bending

to the green blades and we followed

the hundredth fawn Jesus says we’re

supposed to find toward the gateless

city and its single tower foretelling

each shade of weather. Soon the ice

melts, it’s rain again after virus, fire

and drought but today I’m too tired

to count the heavens’ scattered trove,

the endless silver coins and in racing

puddles their brief dissolving rings

like sudden wishes for resurrection.

 

 

The Voice Inside the Shell

 

At dusk from harbors of Greece

each fisherman sets out in a slender

boat with lantern and bronze shade

to attract the fish as true night falls,

black sky, sea are one and one light

and another gets lost in the stars.

 

Sometime lift closed eyes to the sun,

watch the two turquoise dots, now

a slash on the orange field, sudden

brushstroke a secret Chinese word

for grace disappearing in yellow.

 

Battered, partially submerged, left

to drift flotsam and jetsam, our

shipwrecked desires return years

later with a tide, polished spindrift

on this morning’s cleanest sand.

 

White scallop or mussel’s indigo,

yours or someone else’s? Choose

any shell to hear a voice a captain

heard when the lovely Sirens’ song

ended and sailors still with tallow

in their ears untied the tarry ropes

binding him to the sturdy mast.

 

Nels Hanson grew up on a small farm in the San Joaquin Valley of California and has worked as a farmer, teacher and contract writer/editor. His fiction received the San Francisco Foundation’s James D. Phelan Award and Pushcart nominations in 2010, 2012, 2014 and 2016, and poems received a 2014 Pushcart nomination, Sharkpack Review’s 2014 Prospero Prize, and 2015 and 2016 Best of the Net nominations.

 

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TOM KELLY

 

Go To The Co-Op Undertakers, Jarrow

 

they make coffins on High Street. 

I am standing at the door.

A life-time later I am watching

the boy I was,

wanting a bag of sawdust for me rabbits.

Listen to the high-pitched yell,

a man concentrates,

gimlet eyes lost in dust.

I am seven and holding an empty sack,

having it filled for my rabbits to piss and leave

small cannon balls of shit.

 

 

Digging
 

Me dad wants me to turn over the soil in the back garden.

Me dad wants me to turn over the soil in the back garden.

I write that twice as a way of saying

it was a veritable chant,

growing more annoying.

I am slicing the soil, lifting and breaking it up

at a steady pace.

Half the garden is covered in an hour or so,

sweat pouches stick to my arm pits.

Dad is standing watching my progress.

A Foreman of sorts.

I begin to slow as he proffers a cup of water,

we didn’t deal in glasses.

I have to go somewhere, anywhere, try to escape,

trapped as my mother peers from the kitchen window.

I believe then and now I am digging forever,

see myself at fifteen with Irish navvies

in Kilburn, working for the Water Board,

digging up high streets, watching this England go by.

Dad starts working behind me, turning over the soil,

his attention to detail an annoyance I try to ignore

as my spade slurps into earth.

Like the boys in Kilburn, sometime in their future

mam and dad slowly disappear as the boys force their flat caps

into coat pockets, talk of a pint or few,

work for the day over, taking a look of satisfaction

from the Foreman at a job well done.

 

Tom Kelly is a north-east of England poet, short story writer and playwright. He has had eleven books of poetry, short stories and a play published in as many years. His new collection This Small Patch has been recently published and re-printed by Red Squirrel Press. https://www.redsquirrelpress.com/product-page/this-small-patch-tom-kelly

 

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IBE LIEBENBERG

 

Anthesis

 

My definition of sadness: Imagine I am smiling.

The only photo of my dad was washed in laundry.

Found his obituary online, read it like a stranger.

A resume of people who loved him.

I feel through wet clothes to find the pieces, of course

cry, but love is a flower that does not care

who watches him bloom.

 

Ibe Liebenberg is a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation. He is currently enrolled in the MFA program at the Institute of American Indian Arts. He has been published in The Journal of Chickasaw History and Culture, Chico State Universities Multicultural Echoes Literary Magazine, and The ThreePenny Review.

 

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DS MAOLALAI  

 

Home

 

so sick of dublin.  

the way it curls up  

under sunrise; 

a flower with petals 

of business park. and I want 

more than anything 

to travel again,  

though there's no 

destination I trust now.  

I've left here before 

and the world is a circle –  

wherever you go 

you are on your way 

home. and you go 

again. try again. escape, escape 

escape. see things  

you haven't seen before,  

and impress people 

with your accent. new york  

was good. paris. I even liked  

toronto. now the dog 

scratches doors  

of our third floor apartment, 

wanting a piss  

in the courtyard. 

I let her out 

to the hall, move 

down two floors 

on the elevator. 

let her out, watch her.  

let her in. 

 

DS Maolalai has been nominated eight times for Best of the Net and five times for the Pushcart Prize. His poetry has been released in two collections, Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden (Encircle Press, 2016) and Sad Havoc Among the Birds (Turas Press, 2019)

 

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MEGAN MCDERMOTT

 

Cosmic Latte  

 

is the term for the average color 

of the universe, 

 

I learn from a light installation 

meant to capture it, at an art museum 

I go to alone. 

 

I am not typically concerned with averages. 

 

An average of colors sounds reductive. 

 

Like it might zap color  

from color. 

 

Like it stands against the meaning 

of color - something which fills, 

distinguishes. 

 

But the “cosmic latte” lights don’t feel empty, 

but warm. Like a more sophisticated version 

of a college girl stringing twinkly lights 

in a dorm room. And I like the picture 

I take below them. The smile 

emanating from my eyes as my mouth 

hides under a mask. So much has been  

covered for months and months,  

only allowed revelation in solitude. 

Underneath the cosmic latte lights, 

maybe I am not alone, caught instead  

in compilation, constellation, me  

and all the universe’s colors drawn 

together in one soft hue.

Megan McDermott is a poet and Episcopal priest living in Massachusetts. In 2018, she graduated from Yale Divinity School. Her first chapbook, Prayer Book for Contemporary Dating, will be out later this year from Ethel Zine and Micro-Press. Connect with her at www.meganmcdermottpoet.com

 

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JOHN MIDDLEBROOK

 

Probing Phenomena                                             

 

Waiting for dinner, kids watch TV.  

A man on the screen—flanked by flags— 

repeats his words and waves and grins                                   

until his audience claps.   

The kids’ ears flinch; their wide eyes blink,           

and they wonder what he meant.            

                                                                  

Peering out the window, the oldest asks,                                 

When trees sway and leaves sail

why can’t I see

the wind that moves them? 

And where does wind go

when everything’s still, 

and it no longer brushes my skin?                       

                                                          

Mom replies, Well…

the wind is like the world

all around us                              

and the many people in it.                

They can be reckoned best                                                

by grappling with our senses                     

as you just did.

                                                                                               

The child retorts, So…                                      

if my mind gets stuck                            

like that key on our old piano        

or when things that matter

seem missing,  

should I press down harder

with more questions?           

                                             

Mom nods yes,

and scans a blank swatch of dusk.         

She clears the plates and sighs, knowing        

their search must cut through the haze      

of our earth-bound lamps                                   

           to find the stars awake in the dark.                  

 

John Middlebrook lives in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, where he manages a consulting firm focused on non-profit organizations. He has been writing since he was a graduate student at the University of Chicago, where he also served on the staff of Chicago Review. His work has been published by Cleaver Magazine, Wilderness House Literature Review, and Synchronized Chaos, among others. John's home on the web is https://johnmiddlebrookpoet.com

 

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LYNN PATTISON

 

It’s not that memory

 

doesn’t serve, it just doesn’t always offer

filet mignon. Dishes up links of wormy sausage

stuffed with gristled betrayals and ground with bits

 

of cheating foul as dirt, snout, fur. Too much fat

in the mix: the sticky lard of saying “yes” instead

of “I don’t want to”, and, “I know that” when I mean maybe

 

I knew once, then forgot. String of misshapen links

with a stink that means there’s not enough spice to mask

the taint. Tamped near to bursting in thin casings, trusting gut

 

strength to hold. Sometimes Memory, wearing a chef’s

toque, carries the past to the table with a flourish: piled head

cheese, tripe, brain. Offal tricked out with French oil and truffles.

 

Grilled pig’s ear, sweetbreads—a term that proves the art

of euphemism’s at least as old as the culinary. Tasting the stuff

again, I’m ashamed to find myself savoring certain bits. He uses butter

 

and cream the way I used winding rationales to make

the past palatable: I didn’t know the rules, I was the real victim.

Hadn’t broken any vows I’d made. The best cooks use everything,

 

few scraps go into the bin—wasting what’s at hand leads

to its own regrets. Best to swallow what you’ve got, haul out

the grinder, the salt. Then pour the wine. Slit the casing. Dig in.

 

Lynn Pattison’s work has appeared in Ruminate, The Notre Dame Review, Smartish Pace and Moon City Review. She is the author of the book, Light That Sounds Like Breaking (Mayapple Press). And three chapbooks: tesla's daughter (March St. Press); Walking Back the Cat (Bright Hill Press) and Matryoshka Houses (Kelsay Press, July 2020).

 

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PAUL WARING

 

Shedbound

 

Weekends he escaped to a world away

from ours, crazy-paved corner of garden,

dad-only den; shed air incense of solder,

sawn cedar or pine, heady, glue-thick,

cigarette smoke haze punctured by metal

or wood notes from orchestra of tools.

I see him, stick-thin, still hunched

over thoughts, long after day downs

last dregs of light, intent to crack code

of a repair, design some new gadget

or eavesdrop police channel chatter

on radio scanner. I wanted to be him:

drill with dental precision, perform surgery

on circuit boards - but could only watch,

fetch cuppas and brush up. Wanted to be

his hands, hold them steady in later years,

be his eyes that lost focus, now there

in my reflection; growing reminders of him,

another world that awaits.

 

 

Night Swimming On Windermere

 

Lake inked edge to edge

under orchard stars

          I bowl arm over arm

 

a blink away from bug eyes

and wiper hum on the A590

          weight of day left waterside

 

my speck afloat

in this fathomless well

          ley lines pulling perch, trout and char

         

flanked by long-necked firs

and bulbous oaks

          of Great Knott Wood

         

home to unseen owl

bat and fox

          sharpening dark adapted eyes

         

tuned into nothing

but night music –

          wind strings

 

and rain

softbrush percussion

          on lake skin

         

heart locked inside

somewhere

          keeping perfect time

 

Paul Waring’s poetry is published in Prole, Atrium, Obsessed With Pipework, Ink, Sweat & Tears, London Grip and elsewhere. Awarded second place in the 2019 Yaffle Prize, highly commended in the 2019 Welshpool Poetry Competition and 2020 Wirral Poetry Competition. Debut pamphlet Quotidian (Yaffle Press, 2019). ‘Shedbound’ was previously published in The High Window, 2018.  www.waringwords.blog Twitter: @drpaulwaring

 

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