Two Poems by Laurie Koensgen

Corporeal

I know that is the moon

and not your lambent absence

but you’re everywhere tonight.

You’re reclining in this room.

You’re the loom on which my senses

weave their synesthesia.

You’re a figment of my body.

You enfold me like a sun-

spun shawl that no one sees.

They only feel the warmth

that radiates, from you,

through me.

Laurie Koensgen’s poems have appeared in Literary Review of Canada, Arc Poetry Magazine, In/Words, Barren Magazine, Juniper: A Poetry Journal, Ottawater, Burning House Press, Kissing Dynamite, and elsewhere. She was shortlisted for The Malahat Review’s Far Horizons Award for Poetry 2018 and received the Honourable Mention in Arc’s 2018 Diana Brebner Prize. Laurie is a founding member of Ottawa’s Ruby Tuesdays poetry collective.  

Two Poems by Andrew Reiff

The Boom

Everything I say is true.

I sit in front or in the back pew

among the heavy smokers and their beer carts.

My feet hurt but it has all happened as said, not imagined,

where the back of the hair is parted,

 And locks change color among the forgiveness.

 Large people, flowers, people with headaches,

aspirins for a rough week, volumes of Hopkins speak,

there will be eight, there will be light.

Passion stands up for thanksgiving.

Its name notwithstanding well known.

 Take a picture today, but it is not my name I came to sing.

 Trees grow in the window glass.

 Silence grows too. Collections are quiet.

 Nobody wears a coat

I get in trouble sitting at the back with the smokers’

fantasies of life lived happily after nosebleeds

when people hold hands.

Andrew Reiff is involved in the likeness of the native and the captive, one of the early degrees of surfactant hydrocarbon reduction. He has published “Angel Standing in the Sun” in Penny’s Poetry Blog.

Two Poems by Michael Lee Rattigan

Standing

Rock-scraping closeness    to miracle    carried from home   

unlettered blessing    in faith's    slow-breathing current

that breaks     through unplugable breach    new beginning’s      

mortal descent    not fallen away    from arms   

sonic boom's silent force    helped by hope-labouring

breath broken    by water's force   

welcome    from no verbal root    explodes   

through every nerve    on musical string    of suns   

backward glance    unstayed by compassion

torn knees lightened    by final entry   

swooping beside bank    to counterpointed breath's   

exact leading    blurred sight's legible joy    given

promise to granted thanks    chance-unfailing algorithm

longing ache    deep mouth-counting holes

in undiminished wait    sun’s cordial scent

non-physically determined departure    taken owl-instructed

steps    call of unfurled blossom    seen   

before as tree    growing by growth   

with untrimmed grief    gifted only to all   

in confirmation     of neutral difference    ripples   

born from overpowering urge    stand by   

hidden support    on day's crushing conception

exceeding strength to bear    alpine blossom

inheres to sight    what it is   

dropped now    from each age    between the shoeless      

remembered    through all we are    unfathomable effort   

to catch air    fidelity to life    unseen. 

Tailing

Answering likeness of welcome                                                       

withdrawing from loss

comforted in fear   

           

a storm's deeper tone        

holding out peace                            

unknown in birth

taken step    

bidding goodbye in advance             

to scent of self       

                            

immediate sign

accepting the here of hereafter                      

a hundred times   

the yellow rose's early bloom                                                            

spanning a day made known                                              

to other eyes

all that is given away                                                                                                                                  

entwined   

within the self  

   

into the heart

a hoped-for repetition      

footing the sky at dusk.

Michael Lee Rattigan is a poet and translator based in Caterham, Surrey (UK). He has translated the complete collection of Fernando Pessoa's Alberto Caeiro poems (Rufus Books, 2007). His poetry collection Liminal was published in 2012 (Rufus Books). His latest collection Hiraeth was published alongside its French translation in 2016 (Black Herald Press). 

To Be Born Everyday: In Conversation with Rus Khomutoff

Radia

DCW: Your latest chapbook, Radia, was released earlier this year, in June; I am hoping you could break down portions of the book, for a prospective reader. What has the reception been like?

RK: It has been a delight!....Placing the emphasis on the elusive, tangential and abstract, the poems in Radia came from a place mystic Osho called the ‘no mind’, a kaleidoscopic collage so to speak. Most of the poems in Radia were written at night-they are seeped in nocturnal stillness. The earliest poem in the book was written in January, it was the dedication to Scott Weiland. I even thought about another project centered on this poem with Kristopher Biernatsky of Dink Press. Undertow was another early poem that set the tone of Radia. I posted it to my blog at Authors database, and it got a healthy reaction. At the time I was reading a lot of experimental writing, and one day I discovered Louis Armand’s Menudo, this book breathed new life into me-especially the fragmentary nature of its narrative. I dedicated a poem to Armand! Jackson Pollock was a huge influence in writing Radia, my words are applied in the same way Pollock painted. Another poem I am really proud of is Imminent connoisseur of heaven & abysses. It is dedicated to French filmmaker Jean Luc Godard, whose latest film Image Book startled me! Another special poem for me is my collaboration with the late Felino A. Soriano, who you also knew.  The influence of poets like Ric Carfagna, Jukka- Pekka Kervinen and Peter Ganick on me is immeasurable. The book has been very well received by people. I have people who live in France and Australia who have bought Radia

DCW: What brings you to poetry?

RK: It’s been quite a journey really! I only started thinking about poetry in 2015. I had a near death experience earlier that year, it was when I returned home from the hospital a voice urged me to write!

DCW: So far, you’ve released 2 books of poetry in as many years. What do you do to stay motivated, to keep writing, to keep working? What inspires you these days?

RK: I’ve been blessed….I never expected to be an author! Immaculate Days was first published as an ebook on Smashwords. I discovered Alien Buddha Press from Felino A. Soriano! Radia was a tad easier. I published several poems in Void Front Press’s zine Explaining death to children, after that James Harris the head of Void Front Press asked if I was interested in putting together a chapbook, naturally I said yes. Many things inspire me: Art, music, news, a beautiful concoction of everything. I draw inspiration from the askew, occult and paranormal- a kind of unauthorized reality

DCW: Do you believe in the muse? What are your ideas of the muse?

RK: Strongly!

Oftentimes there’s a charge propelling my words that’s hard to explain. That’s when the writing is raw and palpable. I love this Osho quote:

The really creative person is not interested in dominating anybody. He is so utterly rejoicing in life — he wants to create, he wants to participate with God. Creativity is prayer. And whenever you create something, in those moments you are with God, you walk with God, you live in God. The more creative you are the more divine you are. To me, creativity is religion. Art is just the entrance to the temple of religion.

I have a line in one of my poems “I forced myself to be born everyday.” This is basically my motto.

Rus Khomutoff is an experimental language poet based in Brooklyn, NY. Poetry has appeared in San Francisco Review of Books, Proprose Magazine, Mojave Heart Review and Hypnopomp. In 2018, Immaculate Days (Alien Buddha Press) was published. In 2019, Radia was published by Void Front Press.

Empire of the Fireflies by Lauren Scharhag

Spring now:

the great pulse and push,

bulbs thrusting upwards

at their earthen ceilings,

stalks raw and cut-looking,

gasping at the sky.

Buds burst forth,

painfully wet and green

as exposed nerve endings,

still clenching secrets,

like modesty,

of petal and leaf.

Thawed pond, where koi

shy away, in the throes

of hibernation hangover,

from the hand that

scatters the feed pellets.

Songbirds screech,

all insistence,

quickening tempo,

soaring rush, all haste

toward their mate and

blind, pink children

quivering in a nest

of shell and reeds,

needy maws.

Want begets want.

Wanderlust surges

like sap, overflowing,

seeping from bark,

a sticky tide that sweeps

thoughts away

from the mundane

and onto the lilac paths,

airborne, where dog-star nights

and trenchant heat await.

Sloe-colored dusk. Fireflies.

Like eyelids, like empires,

they fall and rise

and fall again.

Lauren Scharhag is the author of eleven books, including West Side Girl & Other Poems and Requiem for a Robot Dog (Cajun Mutt Press). Her work has appeared in over 100 literary venues around the world. She is the recipient of the Door is a Jar Award and the Gerard Manley Hopkins Award for poetry, as well as a fellowship from Rockhurst University for fiction. She lives in Kansas City, MO. To learn more about her work, visit: www.laurenscharhag.blogspot.com.