Category Archives: short poems

Launch: Potcake Chapbook 7, ‘Murder ! – poems of killings past and present’

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07 Murder!

Potcake Chapbook 7: ‘Murder!’

Murder needs no formality of gats,
violin cases or fedora hats
or any other long-outdated memes.
Murder is merely social discord that’s
taken to interpersonal extremes.

Murder. Here we present victims ranging from the unidentifiably unknown to the rich and powerful, and from the time of the Emperor Constantine to the present day. It appears to be something with which we humans are permanently infected. 

The poems–all formal, of course!–are as usual in a variety of forms. This chapbook contains sonnets, a double dactyl, quatrains, rubaiyat, parody and nonce forms. They were authored by Potcake newcomers A.M. Juster, Marilyn L. Taylor, LindaAnn LoSchiavo and Frank Hubeny, and old-timers Chris O’Carroll, Marcus Bales, Vera Ignatowitsch, Noam D. Plum, Michael R. Burch and myself. And powerfully illustrated, as always, by Alban Low.

For the price of a fancy greeting card you can, through the wonders of PayPal, get this 16-page chapbook online for £2.60 + £1.20 P&P to a UK or European address, or £2.60 + £2.20 P&P to a Worldwide address.

Or you might prefer to browse themes and poets here, and photos and bios here, and choose between poems on travel, or love affairs, or the working life… or relatives, or modern life, or poems to amuse and amaze. Life, after all, is more than just Murder!

Poem: “Time”

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Time takes the young child by the hand
and leads it through a golden land
so timeless it will never note
Time’s other hand is at its throat.

This little poem was just published in Snakeskin, in one of its richest issues ever. I’m glad to have been included, along with several others–Claudia Gary, Tom Vaughan, George Simmers, Marcus Bales–of the formalist poets who appear in the Potcake Chapbooks. And a shout-out to Nikolai Usack, who made me clear up clumsy pronouns in the original draft.

Poem: “Prose and Poetry”

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I long for Prose – but darkly, distantly,
She looks at far-off lands.
It’s Poetry who brings persistently
Small gifts in small white hands.

I confess that I have always wanted to be a novelist rather than a poet… but when, over the years, several novels remain as unpublished manuscripts but the poetry contributes to bubble up and find a home, what can you do? Smile ruefully and accept the gifts you are offered, and be grateful.

This poem was originally published in Lighten Up Online. And my only published novel is The Gospel According to the Romans… self-published, of course. The publishing score so far: Poetry, 300 – Prose, 1. “You can’t always get what you want… but…

How You Can't Always Get What You Want became Donald Trump's ...

you get what you need.”

 

Potcake Poet’s Choice: Rob Stuart, “Bliss”

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Rob Stuart

 

Rob Stuart

 

The Bible offers this advice;
Repent of all your sins. The Lord
Will grant the worthy Paradise
As their reward.

But what kind of incentive’s this?
Who wants to spend eternity
With upright folk? Who’d deem that bliss?
Not bloody me.

When dying, I’ll abjure the priest
And trust St. Peter recommends
Damnation, for in Hell at least
I’ll be with friends.

Rob Stuart writes: “Whatever this poem’s shortcomings may be, it has the rare distinction of having turned out exactly as I had intended, making the journey from concept to page without incurring any significant damage along the way. You can deduce quite a lot about my world view from these twelve short lines, I think, and it’s very much representative of the kind of poem I am always trying to write – short, snappy, and simultaneously humourous and barbed. I showed it to a colleague once and she immediately declared ‘I want that read at my funeral.’ I thought that the best possible endorsement.”

Rob Stuart’s poems and short stories have been published in numerous magazines, newspapers and webzines including Ink Sweat and Tears, Light, Lighten Up Online, M58, Magma, New Statesman, The Oldie, Otoliths, Popshot, The Projectionist’s Playground, Snakeskin, The Spectator and The Washington Post. He lives in Surrey, England with his family.
http://www.robstuart.co.uk/

Potcake Poet’s Choice: David Galef, “Entropy”

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David Galef

All I said I unsay now,
Speaking backwardly,
Raveling webs of words,
Reversing entropy.

But that is not what I meant at all
In order to mean something new,
Trying to re-verb sunrise,
Trying to undo the dew.

Or stirring the coffee slowly.
As if retracing a rune,
Hoping the sugar will undissolve,
Emerging pristine on the spoon.

I’ve always been fascinated by the notion of reversal, from turning back time to building order out of ever-encroaching disorder. On a universal scale, this act is impossible, but on the local level, one can make little inroads: writing a poem, for instance. I started out with just the line “All I say I unsay now.” The rest is fanciful, I admit, but I had fun. The poem appeared originally in Light, when it was edited by its founder, John Mella. He’d rejected a few other poems, but this one he took at once.

David Galef has published over two hundred poems in magazines ranging from Light and Measure to The Yale Review. He’s also published two poetry volumes, Flaws and Kanji Poems, as well as two chapbooks, Lists and Apocalypses. In real life, he directs the creative writing program at Montclair State University.
You can see more of his work at www.davidgalef.com

Epigram: “Obituary”

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“Regarded”, “distinguished”?
Regardless, extinguished.

This is one of two short poems that I have in this month’s Snakeskin.

Poem: “Dark Fedora”

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“You look like a musician-poet in that dark fedora.”
I think of the young Dylan, and it takes away my breath,
And for her easy flattery I all the more adore her…
But she meant Leonard Cohen in the days before his death.

 

 

First published in Light Magazine, Summer/Fall 2017.