Poems By Cameron Gorman

Cameron Gorman is Intern, Wick Poetry Center, Senior Editor, The Burr, Editor-in-chief, Luna Negra, Former Editorial Intern, POZ

conveyor

i’ve been waiting a while

to write this one down,

so i can’t remember

all the things

piled on the side of the check-out line,

strawberry chapstick and candy, gum,

tiny tin bottles of WD-40,

wipes and tissues, maybe cards, and

i am tired-sad, and

my eyes sag under the weight of

the couple beside me,

waiting to buy a maple twist.

ah! I remembered that,

The maple twist, and he said,

i haven’t had one of these in years,

just years,

and i was stuck ahead,

staring at the reese’s and twix bars and

skittles, you don’t say much, and i know it’s

because you know i will cry, or yell,

scream at you and make them grasp away

from the check-out line,

plastic bags to thank

and helium

to hold until you fall.

and now, ah, i remember,

and here we are, yes, i remember,

how the fluorescents bore down, and i

felt your hand in my hand, and i

swallowed poison in my throat, and i

saw the conveyor belt and i

wondered if whoever made it

was happy.

french toast casserole

she hates ruining paper,

hates ruining paper

snow white, once white,

now full of her footprints,

scratchings, the first brush of chapstick,

imprinted with her lips,

and somehow, she wants

her new skin back, her,

standing in the thrumming

hospital blues,

waiting to touch

the only thing she ever had as pure,

not yet olive from the sun,

raw and unbitten,

uncut, unmuddied,

a dream of a dream of a

childhood dream,

it was never that creamy and freckled,

not loved and brushed,

and when her hand

reaches for that skin,

she knows should she touch it,

no, she can’t touch it.

the crying and thrashing,

and she does,

and now

nothing, nothing,

nothing is

there.

to the guidance counselor’s office, 2011

because I don’t think that I should leave her in there,

should I?

shaking like that,

crying and wailing for something to stop.

stop what? what can we do?

“i haven’t slept in days,” she tells me,

“i’m so tired.”

i want to help her, and you know that,

but what can you do except

show her framed photos of the counselor’s sons,

football giants,

a ticking, sterile clock,

and a door covered in the faces of kids from Sandy Hook,

there so he can point them out, and say,

“that’s who you should cry for.”

i don’t want to leave her there,

i watch myself walk by,

and i shouldn’t care, i can’t,

but she’s faded into the timeline of life,

burned into the screen of sleeplessness

like a light bulb’s ghost,

weeping stuck inside itself

on a kirlian day.

fleeting

she’d not dare

bite the peach

sink her teeth into the

flesh of the

moment

if she knew that

the rapture

the sweetness

the euphonic speaking

was

the fuel of the longing

was a blaze only

kindled

by each passing

minute

the sureness of loss

growing more

and more

certain

more painful and

bleeding

sanguineous and

beating

by the halcyon

kingfisher blue

of the present

the sweet, sticky

love of the 

now

Poems By Timmy Mars

This Timmy Mars has grand  intentions on a marginal drive, trying to line up the holes so to trace the trajectory of the spark that first did pierce him so.  Published lately by Zombie, Neologism Poetry Journal, Blue Collar Review.

The Shower Scene

We are one and half of it is bathing.
I hold the soap with my knees
as your voice knifes through the curtain
again and again.
It is not enough to be clean and responsible;
the self-contained play their hand
close to the sudsy chest and risk
leaving their bowels on the tile.
English is a lovely language, not universal,
but can get us to the edge my dear,
tangling fully extended on the sea floor
well beyond protection.



                   Kink in the Flow

The tube is blocked with debris,
hubris, the letter A in amalgam;
lotus blossom must go brown.
"You should never have said that,"
another bound pig over the cyclone fence.


We go about love kicking and pitching,
dynamic motor drive, pneumatic pistons.
Thus I left the girls behind
to chase the white whale
as a salty lap dog to the Captain's fate.


The iron strikes and leaves a mark.
Second honeymoon sun sinks
like a used Aztec heart in a bodega broth.
Old two-stroke could use a valve job,
but we don't give a damn for the smoke.



                         Breakfast with Ducks

Multiple ducks line up for a biscuit.
The white star cluster last night
filled a vessel with cold milk.
Our sun again spreads butter up
the east trees, and the mist
smells of reptiles for the frying.
I turn the day to be over 
and then I turn it back again;
a fever prickles my fingertips.
The ducks have a biscuit habit;
I hear them outside the door
shuffling and quibbling.



                    Barbeque

we burned a shed full of our clothes
heat and smoke across the cracked ground
the stench was the essence of our modernity
we felt strange for several days
then went to shop again
I bought a new green belt to tie off with 
you got some silk to cover your wrists
flaming dogs pull meat from the fires
but eat none of it.

               Lifetime with the Sanhedrin

"Goodbye old head ," they said.
"Goodbye old mission accomplished,
tattered baboon of the mist-
a wretched eye on your summer door.
You may not enter the still purse again,
cheated by your bridges,
poked by sharp rocks everywhere."


I laughed and tumbled down the slope,
cutting several members.  Our union
was an explosion on the horizon.
One dinner of light could be enough, like
red doughnuts and St. Pat's beer in a boneyard.


If I must cross these mountains again,
I'll take an empty birdcage and sing to it,
but it won't matter since already I feel
the degeneration.  I walk floppy,
the sinuses drip blood, and
not frightening but annoying-
it's not mine.



                         Scary Legs

the spider came down oh the spider
came down and sat beside my head
the spider washed out the gutter oh
that thing with the scary legs
and that stinger oh
she whispered in my ear and left a sac
and I am very careful now
the boiling waters rise now
and I am careful with my prizes oh

Rob Quill Two Poems

Rob Quill is a new writer. 

Peelings

 

I strip

away my

life

in awkward

peelings.

 

Beneath,

a clown.

Macbeth.  Whoever.

 

Don’t eat the

chips.  They are full

of worse poisons

than lead.

 

But they

go nicely

in a word salad.

 

Star Horizons

 

I’m a space

traveling mama

who’s really

a man.

 

I go from one

planet, your inner

self, to the next,

your enemy’s garden.

 

I’m everywhere,

nowhere, collecting

evidence to hold the

rest of the universe

 

in celestial contempt.

Five Poems By Sean Tierney

Sean Tierney is a 31 year old poet with OCD and a panic disorder living in South Florida. His poetry often reflects the derealization he experiences at times.He has been involved, both as a contributor and editor, with Ra Press of Vermont and the Adirondack Center for Writing going on eight years now. This year he will be judging the poetry contest for the Poetry Society of South Carolina.

HAVE YOU SEEN ME?

I mean, like staples

in a telephone pole

there is often something

missing

DEMENTIA

drawn / erased

like a moth without

his sunglasses

it made sense

a second ago

just fill the

page, buddy

you'll be OK

IN EVERY CALM RIVER

THE BULL SHARK TURNS

it's just a feeling

you get

while the

buildings

and people

move with

great speed

all around

you

like someone is

hitting the gas

then the brake

over and over

and sometimes

your mind

is like a toilet

flushing

and to keep from

disappearing

completely

you focus

on a single

brick in

the road

and move

towards it

carefully

for the rest

of your life

WARLOCKED

the slow pull of an endless worry

tied to itself like a magician's scarf

INHIBITION AT 20,000 FEET

there you are

blooming

like the cardboard lip

of a milk carton

oh, and there's me

like a bee with

a plate of cookies

I see us

from the airplane

window

in its reflection

as I avoid

you