Monthly Archives: February 2010

February 28, 2010 · 7:56 pm

The Imaginary Cock Poems

The Reoccurring Imaginary Cock Dream

I keep my mouth full of imaginary cocks, small and large ones. Around them my tongue curls and flips. I force them out in spit. I swallow cocks. Cocks lodge themselves in my throat along my tonsils. Sometimes I stare deep into my esophagus and see cocks embedded in the roof or clinging to the epiglottis. Inside the crevices of my teeth are more cocks. Now and then I want to put someone’s eye out with a cock or hurtle a cock through a pane of glass. I build walls with cocks. I build bridges. I fashion myself a tower to live in, made stable with cocks. Today I want to give my cock to another, to hold it between our hands and feel the thrum. According to science cocks are not alive and yet they’re not not alive. A cock is forever. Under any force it’s still a cock. It won’t disappear. It is true some cocks change person to person and over time they weather. But if you close your eyes and open your mouth, I’ll pass this cock over to you.

© 2010 Laura Madeline Wiseman

What My Imaginary Cock Used on Our Anniversary

socks, shirt
& a hoodie

warmers, a hat
& gloves

umbrella, slickers
& a yellow raincoat

straight jacket, rubber
& a bulletproof vest

© 2010 Laura Madeline Wiseman

My Imaginary Cock and the Bad Halloween


How do we seem to you? Do you find us beautiful, magical?
Our white skin, our fierce eyes? Drink you ask me, do you
have any idea of the thing you will become?
~Louis

 Outside a line of neighbors lift torches and bare teeth.
Thunder claps. Lightening lights the graves of coffins.
My imaginary cock whispers, I think I’m a vampire,
and bends into the mirror beside the door. It’s night.
I exit to the kitchen in search of thick wooden stakes
and descend cellar steps for a bulbous string of garlic.

Around my neck I drape the heavy bulbs of garlic.
I climb the steps and lick the points of my eyeteeth.
They’re dull. I check for my reflection in a steak
knife. I’m there. I open the cupboards, but coffins
I’m fresh out of. I fear I’ll be drinking heavy tonight.
I wonder, who lead my cock into vampiredom?

Candles gutter. Wind whips the eaves. My vampiric
cock still moons in the mirror. I stroke my garlic
and tuck it under my red robe. I say, Nightie-night.
and dash upstairs. I don’t bother to brush my teeth.
Wait! calls my cock and chases me into the coffin
dark of the room. Did I mention, I’m out of stakes?

Did someone bite you? I stand by the bed and stake
out the room for objects to impale a cock vampire:
a coffin ship in a bottle, a coffin plate, a coffin
stool, and a coffin nail. I light a fag (I’m garlicky).
My cock’s head contorts, Do you see any teeth
holes? I see that the alarm clock blinks midnight.

No holes, only a zit. I say. I’ll stay up on night
watch, lookout for the undead who’ve staked
a claim on you. I thumb my blunt white teeth.
My cock whispers, Vampires are bats. Vampires
lack shadows. Vampires avoid crosses, garlic,
and sunlight. Vampires sleep in dirt filled coffins.

Yes, I nod. I fold down the bedspread and coffin
the candlelight. I step to the open window. Night
walkers wield pitchforks and brandish ropes of garlic.
I’ve no reflection, my cock cries, My life’s at stake!
My cock moans and whimpers, It’s a vampiretrap!
I hush my bloodless cock and unclenched my teeth.

Out with a light, I murmur, garlic on tongue, teeth,
and breath. My coffin cock freezes. My little vampire,
goodnight! I thrust a sharp pencil, my imaginary stake.

© 2010 Laura Madeline Wiseman

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February 25, 2010 · 4:53 pm

Happy Birthday, Baby

Half a dozen servers gathered around Vince’s table and sang a jazzed-up version of Happy Birthday to him. There was a lot of hand clapping and stomping of feet. He shot his wife an I-thought-we-agreed-to-not-do-this-kind-of-crap look, but smiled at the singers. He politely said, “Thank you,” when they finished.
One of them reminded him of his secretary, Alfreda. Al as she preferred to be called. She might have liked a masculine name, but she was all woman, something Vince discovered a month after she came to work for him. Since their first time two years ago, they managed to meet with each other at least once a week. She was a fantastic lover—nothing even close to what Gloria had ever been.
Alfreda was only twenty-four years old, which meant she was born just two years before Vince and Gloria were married. Tonight Vince was celebrating his “big-five-0″ as many of his friends called it. He had never been into huge birthday parties, and this one was even more reason not to throw a big bash. He didn’t figure anyone liked to be reminded they had lived for half a century. In the past, Gloria always wanted to do something really special for his birthday, even when he protested. He was elated, and rather amazed, when Gloria agreed to a simple evening—a nice dinner and a movie. “The Bucket List” was playing, and he really liked Jack Nickelson and Morgan Freeman as actors. He felt with those two in the film, it had to be good.
He was also happy because he had finalized a plan to get rid of Gloria. When the two of them married, her father had insisted on a pre-nup that would ruin him financially if they got divorced. Her family had money, and her daddy didn’t want him marrying her for the wrong reasons. At the time, nothing could have been further from the truth.
He had run through a hundred scenarios during the past year, but this one would end his problem once and for all. After tonight, he would be free to be with Al all the time. He started putting his plan into motion a couple of days ago, as soon as Gloria agreed to a simple birthday for him. On his way home from the office, he stopped at a large discount store and bought a pair of work boots that were three sizes too big.
On his birthday, he left the office early knowing Gloria was at the beauty shop. He pulled his car by the side of the house that was blocked from outside view by tall hedges. He put on the large boots and walked through a flower bed to a basement window. He made certain he left plenty of tracks. He broke the glass, unlocked it with a gloved hand, and made sure it opened. That’s how the police would determine the burglar got into the house. He then drove to a business district on the other side of town from his office and tossed the boots in a dumpster.
When they returned to the house later that evening, they would interrupt the robber. He would stab Gloria while making his get-a-way. At least that’s what his story would be to the police. It was a simple plan. It would not only get him Gloria’s money, but money from her life insurance. He and Al would be able to spend the rest of their lives on some island in the South Pacific.
As they were finishing their small dish of complimentary cake and ice cream, Gloria suddenly dropped her spoon and put her hands to her temples. “What’s wrong?” Vince asked.
She closed her eyes tightly. “Oh, crap! I’m getting a migraine!”
Vince stared at her. Well, this is different. We’re not even at home where she thinks I might try and talk her into having sex. “You gonna be ok?” he asked.
“No, I’m sorry. I don’t want to ruin your birthday, but I think you better take me home.”
While driving back to their house, Vince mentally reviewed his plan. He could feel his hunting knife and sheath strapped to his leg. His finger prints were on it, but that wouldn’t matter. It was his, and he had used it many times. It was just something the burglar stole. I’ll tell the police she opened the door, turned, said “Happy Birthday, Baby,” gave me a kiss, and then collapsed in my arms. I saw someone run by me in the dark, but I was too concerned about her to go after them. I immediately called 911.
“The porch light’s not on,” Gloria said as they pulled in the driveway.
“Huh. Guess I forgot to do that.”
Vince fumbled with his keys at the front door. “You still got the house key with the little flashlight on it?”
She took her set from her purse and pushed past him, just as he figured she would do. He glanced around to make sure none of his neighbors were out walking their dogs or doing something else where they might see him. As she put the key in the lock, he slid the weapon into his hand. The door opened, and he plunged the knife into her back. She fell forward, and he heard her make a small gurgling noise.
A second later, most of the lights in his living room came on and twenty-seven of his neighbors and friends jumped up and yelled, “Surprise!”


© 2010 Gary R. Hoffman

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February 22, 2010 · 4:25 pm

To the Tree that I Followed for a Year

You are a stalk too high to climb or cut.
Your branches hold basins of petrified ink
which tell me nothing. I rely

on the way you shift your bark
in the wind, I rely on what I
carve into you, whether it heals

or not, whether you grow
or not. You do not make
it easy for me to turn you into

mulch like all of my
other lovers, who I’ve spread
in my garden. What a trash,

the time I’ve watered on
you. With your idle leaves
and your idol placement.

What are you but a nose stuck
in my doorway like a
hungry pet. Your roots

not so invested in the dirt
but rather in my spine.
You overcrowd my vertebrae.

There is much energy in
your billowing gloom. You
are a tree

which Fall does not harm. Never
naked, never vulnerable unlike I,
attached to your great tap root.

© 2010 Geoffrey Billetter

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February 18, 2010 · 4:45 pm

anniversary

the interesting arm of the olive tree
leans an elbow on the garden wall

it’s a happy symbiosis

the tree in its leaning has made an arch
over the stone entrance to the garden

the branch leans on the wall on either side
squirrels use it as a bridge over the gate

with flourish of hand the branch
spreads fingers of green olive leaves in welcome

the wall familiar solid serene tolerant accepting
the olive with its beautiful scars distinctive turning

were married in this garden

he the open wall enhanced
and I the olive lean entranced

to make a graceful closure

© 2010 Kath Abela Wilson

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February 15, 2010 · 6:00 am

Party

Sunny backyard of the not unpleasant upper working class one-story brick house. Scott’s tree house rotting and black, we’re barely able to walk on it. I’m there alone looking down on the party. Scott has turned four and some clouds are passing over the sun. From Scott’s tree house, I can see my house, old wreck, and the beatings and tears inside do not disturb me. I’m squatting down in the corner of the tree house and a spider moves up the wooden beams but I do not move. I’m defecating very slowly as the party sings Happy Birthday to Scott. I’m Scott’s best friend but no one has so much as called out my name. The word Luke or Lucas does not cross the lips of a single person in the joyful yard, with its little rock garden and plastic menagerie of typical large birds. This back yard is trying too hard to be something it’s not. Scott’s last name is Anderson. He is a Jew, I hear one of the grown ups say, as he brings the punch to his lips, I have no idea what a Jew is, in my little child’s mind. I’m defecating in my pants; it is wonderful, so very peaceful, powerful!

I can almost hear the screaming from my father’s house, he is beating mother again, or the refrigerator and stove. Perhaps mother is beating father again and smashing out the windows again. It is all the same to me, my pants fill up with pure shit, it is pure Joy, it is like the Holy Ghost they speak of in Catechism, being re-born in the Father and the Son, then there are footsteps on the ladder to the tree house, it is Scott. He says, Come and see my uncle, so I stare at the shit that is dripping down my leg and who knows what kind of misery this will bring to the party and I climb down the ladder with Scott and we walk over to the uncle who is sitting between two old women in lawn chairs. The chairs send me into a whorl of class-born misery; they are ugly, so manufactured. The uncle smiles at me, the uncle has no fingers, only palms, hands of sorts without fingers. Is he a Jew too? He says something about a war, the uncle is embarrassed, for Scott and I are looking down hard at the man’s hands, empty of all fingers; he mutters something to the two women who remain as still as trees and he gets up from the chair and goes away, goes inside, where he will undoubtedly weep out of shame. Scott and I have ruined the party even though I’m only four and have no conscience to speak of; I cry because everyone can smell me, I know they can, the whole party has gone silent, the missing fingers, the shit, the smell—

Poor working class people, I didn’t mean to do this to you.

1974

© 2010 Louis Bourgeois

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February 11, 2010 · 4:21 pm

The Problem with Words

My first ex is angry with the second ex,
and I am no longer in the middle,
having stepped away from both sides,
the second one having decided
that I have been judged
and found wanting.
It is the second ex’s birthday,
and it is a big one,
a day that should be celebrated,
excesses of food and laughter,
of joy in not just daily survival.
This should be a milestone and monument.
The first ex wants to go to the beach,
build a fire in the barbecue,
put succulent meats on the grill,
crack out the digital camera,
invite friends to pose under a sign with the words emblazoned,
Happy 50th Birthday.
Then a quick e-mail with the caption:
Look what you missed.

There are things that we can’t say.
We can say birthday, but none of us can say the word we are thinking.

© 2010 Lucile Barker

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February 8, 2010 · 4:26 pm

In the Post Office

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority it’s time to pause and reflect. That’s what the man with the milky mustache said to me that day in the sultry heat of the post office.

It was early. Maybe 9:00 a.m. and already the flies were limping along in a drained glass of too much summer. The man whose name was Sam or Sal, I can’t recall exactly, was standing in front of me at the Old Town Temecula post office.

His yellowed teeth reminded me of the piano keys on the old upright in my grandmother’s parlor: needle point cushions ripe with the smell of mothballs, slumped on aching velvet couches in a shade of blood orange. The piano keys – waiting to be played, stroked – lay silent under the lace curtains blowing in the parlor windows.

The man frothy with meaning tapped me on the shoulder. I stepped back and tried to remain a neutral participant in this unplanned encounter. Okay then, I said. Thanks for the advice.

Between him and the front of the line were babies trapped in strollers, legs and arms wriggling desperately to be free; knobby kneed ladies with sagging stockings.

Lady, it ain’t just advice. It’s the truth. Wilted words I thought to myself as his eyes burrowed into my skull.

Garlic coated each word wafting from his mouth. I took another step back, looking behind me hoping not step on any little bird feet in the snake line quickly stretching outside the doors.

By the way, these are the words of Mark Twain, he said reaching into his pocket. Blind obedience to authority is a cause for concern. Pointing a finger at me he tells me to be careful and think. It is the single biggest thing I can do.

Don’t let him in I whisper to myself.

© 2010 Camerone Thorson

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· 4:26 pm

Making it through the holidays

is something like plodding up a flight of broken
stairs, the metal underpinnings exposed.
It’s useless to try and push time.

Out of breath you stop
for a moment
recalling the litany of excuses why Sammy got sick
at your Christmas party.
Damn, he has the flu and now you have to call the parents of all the kids
to let them know to be on the lookout.
Shit.
Shit and more shit.

You reach the top of the 150 foot vertical climb and
your heel gets stuck in the rusted lip of the step.
Fuck is the only word that comes to mind.
It’s the reason for the holidays, you tell yourself.
It’s not really but shit, when the holidays
are really nothing more than a series of black and white reruns
then what makes for a celebration if not a fuckfest?
Hell, let’s make everyday a holiday…

© 2010 Camerone Thorson

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February 4, 2010 · 4:23 pm

The Pretenders

The Christmas tree looked as green as the day we put it up. It always would. Every year we pulled the box from the rafters and matched the color-coded branches to their correct positions on the metal trunk. Leftover tinsel from previous years only made our job easier. I was eight that year, so it must have been our original tree, the one that looked more like a pile of pipe cleaners than a blue spruce. A few years later, my dad would go from staff accountant to chief financial officer and we’d pull together the money for a more real looking fake tree, its perfect symmetry and lack of aroma the only giveaways. Still, I knew I was missing out. Each year, my classmates would brag about pine scented living rooms, and I would nod along uncomfortably like the only one who doesn’t get a joke.
That morning, my sister and I sat next to the pipe cleaner tree in matching all-in-one pajamas with the plastic feet cut out – my mom was terrified of athlete’s foot. We bounced up and down in anticipation. After weeks of staring at the boxes trying to resist a good shaking, we had memorized the entire layout and knew exactly where each person’s gifts belonged. But now there were new things, big things – Santa had obviously made his visit, and the new boxes were wrapped in beautiful gold and green shiny paper not our own thin, dull blue paper with sleds on it. I crossed my fingers hoping for a ghetto blaster so my friends and I could listen to tapes of Madonna instead of my parents’ Beatles records. When my dad finally woke up, my sister and I could hardly contain our excitement, but as this man we hardly knew and mostly feared came down the hall, we quieted down, stopped bouncing, and got serious about the morning’s promise.
“Let’s do this right,” he said as he knelt down by the fireplace and turned the key to start the fire. “There’s something special for you under the tree this year.”
Could he know what was under the shiny gold and green wrapping paper? I was dying to find out and had to fight the urge to run over to the present. He reached behind the tree and pulled out a present covered in sleds. It was about as big as a bread box. I didn’t know what a bread box was, but I knew its size from playing 20 questions with my friends at slumber parties where we sipped hot chocolate, the real kind (not sugarless) next to real trees, smelly trees.
“It’s from your Grandpa William,” said my dad as he handed me the box. Grandpa William was my dad’s father. For reasons unbeknownst to me, I met him for the first time only a few months before.
I quickly forgot about Santa, thrilled to have something from my new grandpa. I ripped open the paper as my dad sat ready with his finger on the Polaroid camera. I tore the wrapping to shreds instead of folding it like my mom would in order to save it for next year. I finally uncovered a Flower Patch Kid. Not a Cabbage Patch Kid, which was what everyone wanted that year, but a Flower Patch kid. I gasped with joy and held it up to the camera.
Later, sometime after my college graduation, my mom and I were looking through her albums and came across that shot. “Yikes, I look like Vanna White,” I told my mom, assuming I hadn’t fooled her even then. No kid could have been that happy about a Flower Patch Kid.
“You sure loved that doll,” she said. “You carried it around everywhere you went.”
I still remember smiling maniacally as if it were the best present on earth. I knew my dad would send the picture to my grandpa, and I wanted him to know how much I loved him and how happy I was to know him now. He had been so much fun when we went to visit him in Tucson. He showed us his favorite restaurant, the Double L, his trailer in the desert outside of town, and his favorite spot in Sabino Canyon. We all went to the Saint Xavier mission and he bought me an Indian necklace with brown stones. I would have rather had the turquoise necklace, but I pretended to love the brown stones, of course.
I was so happy that I never wondered why I hadn’t met him earlier and didn’t notice the coincidence of timing when he dropped dead at the Double L a few months later. I didn’t yet know that my dad had barely spoken with his own father since he was in elementary school and the child support payments stopped coming.
“You know, your dad actually bought that doll for you,” my mom said turning the photo over to check the date.
It made sense. I doubt my grandpa could have afforded even a knock-off toy. I could have been disappointed – the great guy I shared a few shimmering memories with in third grade hadn’t actually thought to send me a gift. But instead of losing a grandpa, I found a father who beneath his frugal and stoic façade, was forgiving, sacrificing, and more loving than I had ever known.

© 2010 Tiffany Hawk

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February 1, 2010 · 4:32 pm

ON A 40TH BIRTHDAY and ANNIVERSARY

ON A 40TH BIRTHDAY

You remember presents piled high and tipping
on the living room rug, noisemakers shooting perfect
arrows of sound into the dining room
where the table was wreathed by balloons,
the cake enthroned in readiness,
frosting so soft you could burrow
your finger straight in,

the day when everyone took notice, as if you
wore a tiara of flashing light,
teachers and classmates, uncles
and aunts, even your big sister
who almost always hated you–
she smiled upon you then,

you who would one year turn 40, on a day
when the sky spit a heedless
chill rain, and your two best friends
were out of town, on a day when the babysitter
called in sick, and your daughter wouldn’t lie down
for her nap, for she was bubbling, chattering
about something—mama’s birthday—her mama
who waited in another room, one hour
folding evenly into another.

© 2010 Andrea Potos


ANNIVERSARY

We didn’t mention it today, Mother–
all the things I wondered
about that wedding forty years ago
on this day in summer’s marrow.
I didn’t ask if you saw Lake Michigan
knife-blue as it was today,
if you heard the waves’ thunder,
whitecaps reaching out to you like arms on that morning
your father drove you to the church,
where the breath of incense, the deep well
of the cantor’s voice lulled you into believing
words and ritual
could change a man.
I didn’t ask
if after you passed through the gilt doors, the rice still spilling
through your auburn hair, if the trees were on fire
with this same green–pierced through with too much light
for the eyes to hold for long.

© 2010 Andrea Potos

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