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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ (the poetry) WORM ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 5
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eating pheasant
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we were eating pheasant
the night you told me
id cooked it as a surprise
for our anniversary
seen it hanging
in the butchers window
the colours caught my eye
the butcher said
the meat was rich and dark
perfect for a special occasion
candlelight and red wine
and you had a surprise for me
said you felt we were just drifting
not communicating anymore
it was time for a change
you were leaving me
but what you really meant was
youd found someone new
with fresher face
firmer skin
more tender flesh
and brighter colours
© Adrian Tissier
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Evidences
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"At Sappeden, Sir, that succulent valley
of spruces, her thighs well greased to slip about
the scales of Lucifer, old witch Demdike did
a congress make with greyhound Ball which after
became Old Nick. This Sir, I swear, is true.
And under Blackhow Sir, in fields, there chanting
the dark fell's ancient mischief, did old Chattox
on a new-cut broomstick skoyl past Pendle top
until she gained the Malkin Tower. This Sir,
I swear, is true. Then near to Kearahow,
a place that little song-thrushes do spelter
among the sunface stones like metals heated
in hottest fire, under the fell's leer, Demdike
from her witchmarks did the brown dog Dandy feed
and draw awry a man's head. This Sir, I swear,
is true. Some later coven at Whalley Nab
where wood spins into grass along the river,
among the graves, in holy Churchyard after,
Chattox, legs wide apart, her font uplifted,
did yield herself with lewd and grossest groanings
to Lucifer in a boy's form. This, I swear,
is true. Close Gysburn where fast water splutters
and rattles among rocks, old Demdike did from
a horned and hairy creature receive and spit
upon the bread and wine at Maundy. This Sir,
I swear, is true. In Haegham on the unclothed,
mown flanks of Pendle, under the fell's clenched fist,
Chattox did meet a hare, demanding the bread
and wine, that vanished at the cross. Sir, I swear
that this is true. My name is Jennet Device
and I am nine years old. This Court's Magistrates
affirm that the truth will set me free, that none
will torture or break me. All I swear is true..."
© Keith Howden
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Collage
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For the record:
there is simply no telling
if you remember how
insinuations flew from your lips
like so many sparrows
black on blue wing. How
I crouched in snow to relieve
myself, big of belly, all about
smelling of blue on cold,
of cigarettes, of white on bone,
of red on blood. Of fear. If
you remember. There is no telling.
How often my teeth cast green
from grass curbing hunger, how
chewy newspaper gets, how
in the oubliette of my mind
my skin never let loose
for you. There is no telling.
Even as I fell from the sun.
If you remember. Now who will I
love. Now who will love me.
Now who will scream
down my throat. There is simply
no telling.
© Maryann Hazen-Stearns
first appeared in Gulley's Wall, Online Literary Journal
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174517
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"I can find no solution to this riddle." - Primo Levi, 1987
Dinner at Leverkusen with executives from an important
German chemical company of some description.
It is summer and the men have short sleeved shirts on.
One executive notices a tattoo on the arm of
One of their Italian guests. "What's that stand for?"
He asks, realising too late that he does not want to know.
"That was my number in Auschwitz," replies the small man,
With no discomfort obvious behind or within his quiet eyes.
There is the slight clink of spoons through thick soup
And not another word is said on either side until the meal is over
.*
Thirty four years later the quiet chemist falls or dives
Or jumps or slips into the stairwell of the house
Where he has always lived except for twenty two months,
December 1943 to October 1945.
© afharrold
from the collection Private Language Argument
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"Comet Keeps its Date with Death"
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The Guardian, Monday 18th July 1994
16th July 1994
I heard the world might end on my wedding day,
began my own countdown,
in yards of silk and lace,
and champagne roses (seven).
Five hundred billion miles away
a comet fractured into twelve,
spiralled towards a planet
drawn closer - still closer.
Telescopes waited, spacecraft
hung beyond the atmosphere.
I iced a cake, stitched a hem,
slept in curlers.
At three o'clock we met as strangers,
stood separate, side by side, then touched.
The twelve became twenty.
Eighty voices sang Jerusalem.
In the garden I became the hub of the universe;
people circled, brushed against me,
dusted me with kisses, wishes.
I clutched a silver plastic horseshoe.
The sun in its July nearness
shone for me; unblocked by clouds
it stirred the air, warmed my skin,
the pavement. The roses wilted.
Later, taking refuge from the throng,
the stultifying heat of a blinded room,
I sat on a roadside bench, waited
for a fireball on the dark side of Jupiter.
Saw nothing.
Took it as auspicious.
© Helen Clare
first appeared in First Pressings, Faber & Faber
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here, there, and everywhere
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here
the demented shrieks of starling fruit
plump the barren branches
hedgerows sunk in mercury
bind the grit amalgam
there
sun mutates in dog-fox stink
behind the coiling cloud
high notes strike the carcass grin
of lichen riddled stone
everywhere
the shreds of old ejecta
poke like petals through the eyeball
drape the day with bright festoons
of gaily branded trash
© John Carley
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Keys
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There was this film about a piano
on the beach
I loved that image,
knew exactly how it felt
an outsider, standing silent
while the waves taunted,
their voices fiddling small,
stones percussive, breeze a cool bassoon,
while the lone keyboard ached,
passionately mute.
Ive loitered on that shoreline half my life
waiting for someone to play me.
© J.M.Harvey
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boomerang rhapsody
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they came from the outer limits
..of calderized space: klee-ful (dig it)
.experimental static plastic loops warped
around einstein's relatively kinematic theories
.(our lives dangled in the balance)
of simple form and function: e=mc2;
child's play suspended overhead
hung on a thin taut line ... like WOW!
..those were boomerang days < humdingers!
..when hip ologies mobilized in-retro
rocketing toward far flung dimensions
danced free from primitive ids (crazy!)
....modern thought laminated to cool
.abstract image slung on the i.e.,
..symbolic table ( acute cuvilinear
.noguchiisms> genre: 1950 metamorphic
..quasi-kinetic wingdingers ) def:
..(1)atomicized mutant life forms
..(2)protoplasmic petri dish cultural movements
(3)loonytoon moonrunes & noodle doodles
..(4)flex-0-matic thing-a-ma-jig whatchamacallits
(5)bop baby zoomerangs = id quids (trend benders)
..(6)parbolic lingoid jazzbirds ("boingo-boingo")
(7)vaporized martian vowelett sets
.(8)universal freudian slips & slightly altered egos
.(9)futuristic daliwatchpalettes (10)atomic kidnoid quirkettes
.
(11)signs of the times & the shape of things to come
like way out, man; and time curved back on itself - beat
into randomly ordered existence.
© Debra Woolard Bender
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Ssssss
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slickly
the sanguine
savagery
of the scimitar
sang softly
as it sliced
the skin
from his
skeleton
© Martin Peacock
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Joanna
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frail husk
of a tall girl
woman
and a six year old child
legs wrapped around her hips
arm around her neck
sleeping
thumb-sucking
and the acrid smell
of stale urine
on a warm August morning
six a.m.
at the Gateway Clinic.
"I can feel
I'm loosing it
slipping away
these men just fuck me
bring me the stuff
look, lost so much weight
vomiting all the time."
I looked at her thin body
where the skin creased
at the sharp bones and
the sheer shocking electric love
mother and daughter
clinging, soldered
somnambulists
in the final month
of her life.
© Christina Fletcher
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Compiling Editor: John Carley
Associate Editors: Sally James, Joe Warner
Editorial Support: Terrie Relf
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We gratefully acknowledge the support of:
North West Arts Board & Mid Pennine Arts
Celebrating Year of the Artist
June 2000 ~ May 2001
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