I once invented a poetry form. 5 lines. Syllables assigned: 2,80,1,5,22. It didn’t catch on. So I walk the Earth. ~ Rocky Jones
VOLUME ONE :: ISSUE ONE :: FALL 2017 :: FIVE DOLL ARS
T H IS I N AU G U R A L ISSU E IS D ED I C AT ED TO T H E L I F E A N D M EM O RY O F
CHR I S A L B R E C H T (1 9 8 6 - 2 0 1 5 ) Christopher Scott Albrecht, born January 28, 1986 in Maryland. He was raised in both Maryland and later Oregon. Chris died far too soon on March 21, 2015 and is missed by friends, family and collaborators. He was a poet, musician, artist, blogger and a friend to many people in need of compassion. His passing brought messages, tears, sympathy, drawings and anecdotes from all over the world, including a poem to Chris by Saul Williams, one of his favorite Slam poets. Chris read every young, Beat or hip hop poet he could find. He quoted Rumi and Pablo Neruda, as well as Sean Daly and Ramble Jon Krohn. Chris read poetry at coffee houses, bookstores or house parties. He free-styled on street corners and gatherings. He and his friend Josh Coberly, as Leadheart Deadbird released the CD ‘72, and was very proud of his collaborations with fellow artists and coconspirators. Chris had a strong spirit and was kind and generous. To anyone poorer in spirit, he gave his time, his imaginative wit and honest friendship. No one, who knew and loved him, came away empty handed. ~ Colleen Albrecht 1
ILLUSTR ATION BY HANIF WONDIR
PUBLISHER Chris Iatesta chris@texturemag.com
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Cliff Lynn
cliff@texturemag.com
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Hiram Larew hiram@texturemag.com
Joanne Van Wie joanne@texturemag.com
DESIGN DIRECTOR
Chris Iatesta
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SUBMISSIONS: Email to submissions@texturemag.com. TEXTure Magazine is published quarterly. SUBSCRIPTIONS: $30/yr payable in advance. Single copies $7. Back issues if available are $10 (includes shipping and handling). POSTMASTER send address changes to 2 Magazine, P.O. Box 1234, Annapolis, MD 21401. Entire contents © Copyright and Trademark 2017 TEXTure Magazine™ unless TEXTure otherwise noted. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part is strictly prohibited without Publisher permission. PRINTED IN USA
INNARDS
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DEDICATION TO THE LIFE AND MEMORY OF CHRIS ALBRECHT
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MASTHEAD
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DISPATCH FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK - CLIFF LYNN
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STAGE ANNOUNCEMENT - ROCKY JONES
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FIRST WORDS - BETH KONKOSKI
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WEAR A CAP - HIRAM LAREW
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BUT NOT SARDINES - RENEE GHERITY
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APOPTOSIS - STEPHANIE WHITE
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RADHA’S WHISPER - FRANZ RHEINHARDT WISE
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WHO GETS TO TAKE THE PICTURE? - PAM WINTERS
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THE ORIGAMI WOMAN HAS EIGHTEEN FOLDS - SUSAN COHEN
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BEING YOUNG - JANE FITZGERALD
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BURDEN - CHRIS IATESTA
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DECORATE ME - LADI DI
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THEY ALMOST LOOK LIKE US - HENRY CRAWFORD
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TRAIN SONG - CHARLES WILSON JR
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FEATURED POET - JOANNE VAN WIE
• JUST ONCE
• AS IF WE WERE
• NOTE TO SELF
• ANYTHING ELSE?
• THIS EVENING
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WHISKEY - GRACE CAVALIERI
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AFTERNOON AT TRADER JOES - GEORGE MILLER
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GRANDMOTHER, SHEILA MARTEL
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GOING DEEP - JOSEPH THOMAS MINTON
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AFTER THE RAIN - CHRISTINA BORGOYN
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THOUGHTS WHILE SITTING ON THE BEACH - MICHAEL RATCLIFFE
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MARY OF GAITHERSBURG - MAX OCHS
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MINIATURE MIGRATION - SARAH M. FREDERICKS
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IMAGINARIUM - ANN BRACKEN
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THE WOLVES OF DECEMBER - SUSAN MOGER
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CRAZY BOB’S USED CARS RADIO TIPS - RANDOLPH BRIDGEMAN
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DISCUSSING OLYMPUS AT THE CAMELOT HALL NURSING HOME -
ELISAVIETTA RITCHIE 39
THANK YOU TO OUR CONTRIBUTORS
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SPIRIT NEPHEW’S LATEST PLAGIARISM - CHRIS ALBRECHT 3
D ISPAT CH F R O M T H E E D ITOR’S DE S K WESTMINSTER, MARYL AND :: JULY 30, 2017
Welcome to TEXTure Magazine. Sweet Georgia Brown, but we got us some poetry and art up in here! Deadline for submissions is tomorrow, and still nothing from icon and master of her craft Elisavietta Ritchie other than a promise of poetry. Under normal circumstances, I’d be chewing my own beard off right now, but I’m pacified by the fact that the work we have received to date has exhibited a quality of excellence the likes of which would bring all but the most cynical of Greek gods to their enormous Greek-god-knees. I don’t want to brag, so I won’t. Turn the pages, absorb the contents. Marvel. Meanwhile, I’ll just send Ms. Ritchie a gentle reminder and move on. Email sent. This issue of TEXTure is dedicated to Chris Albrecht, a wonderful and talented young man, a mad force of nature in the local arts scene for a way-too-brief period of time. I had the pure pleasure of enjoying his friendship while he graced this realm with a personality too big, too giving for the likes of us. Once, he attended a reading at Ukazoo Books in Towson dressed in a teddy, just to say he done it. I’m not joking. The 21st century took a big hit when he moved on to bigger and better things. But Chris’ rogue spirit lives on and pulses in his writing. His mother Colleen sent TEXTure a pirate’s treasure chockablock with awesome weirdness that we plan to dole out piecemeal to you, dear readers, beginning in this issue with Chris’ Spirit Nephew’s Latest Plagiarism. Master Albrecht, this issue is for you. 4
We plan on dedicating future issues to local poets and artists who have left us. We appreciate your suggestions. TEXTure Magazine will be featuring a poet each issue whom we feel is under-represented in the literary world, that is to say, authors with talent much more remarkable than their publication history might indicate. I’m especially stoked about our featuring of Southern Maryland poet Joanne Van Wie. The decision to ask this quiet phenom to feature in our inaugural issue was a remarkably easy one at which to arrive, as it would have been impossible to choose just one or two from the five small miracles she tendered for our consideration. Since she has agreed to feature, we’re just gonna pump ‘em all in, a mini body of work. Problem solved, and you, dear readers, score a win, in that you are given the opportunity, for the first time ever, to sit quietly and dream with a full quintet of JVW poems. Get comfortable, grab a cup of tea (or a glass of wine, if a cup of tea ain’t your cup of tea), and prepare to bear witness to a star rising. Also, check out Joanne at a reading if you get the opportunity. No disappointment live, she. I’m grateful beyond my ability to describe, other than to say “Thank Thor!” for publisher Chris Iatesta’s decision to share his vision of TEXTure magazine with us all, and to recruit me to act as his Editor-in-Chief. Starting next issue, we will invite a different literary genius as guest editor. Gentleman Hiram Larew, the only poet I know who is so tall he has to duck to enter the ocean, has agreed to helm TEXTure, Issue II (now I’m bragging). Strap yourselves in, dear readers, this is shaping up to be one helluva ride. Cliff Lynn Editor-in-Chief TEXTure Magazine PHOTO BY SHERRI HOSFELD JOSEPH
R O C K Y J O N E S’ STA G E A N N O U N C E ME N T I know this is a mixed crowd. There’s no reason to ruin this evening just because the various factions and caucuses scattered about the audience might oppose each other on any other day. We gather this evening for one reason: We all love devil music. I want the mods and the rockers to get along. Shapeshifters and sanguinarians, remember why you are here. Capulets, Montagues, know that if you share no other positive thing, you share devil music. And if smiling while making eye-contact with each other is too much to ask, keep your eyes to the stage in peace. Do this in honor of devil music. Whether you break your eggs on the larger end or the smaller end, stand, this night, in a crowd that includes people of different creeds, and share the good feeling, the universal feeling of devil music. Whether your belly sports a lovely star, or is left as unadorned as the beautiful open plains of America, wiggle that belly. Put your shoulders into it. We are going to rock the shit out of this place.
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B E T H K O N K OS KI ’S F I R S T W O RDS I still have cells, bits of appendix and lung to match the young girl at ten who perched high on a dresser and stared out a small rectangle of window at snow covering the road that curved out of sight. She was there with pencil in hand, an impulse loose in the world and perhaps meant to strike her much later, when she was old enough to understand. But instead, she scribbled down the snow of Thanksgiving Day as her family made their banging, calling house noises to one another and the smell of turkey rose slowly to her room. To capture it, she sat still and listened for the pulse of glaciers and calm, seeping teabags, the call of tree frogs and afternoon pink. No one had taught her this thinking, a pause uncommon but pure as a crocus. Decades later that single line of words has moved forever across a page to land in the present and remember.
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H IR AM L A R E W WA N TS US TO WEAR A CAP I’ll say three things – First if I were you I wouldn’t worry I’d find some shade to rest in for a while Where nothing much will trouble Where the only concern might be flies on bread The next thing is what I remember From being in town at sunrise – That reddish orange plate glass Was the same way I feel about you The only other thing to keep in mind Is that no one ever doubts a whistler So carry on in the very same way That water does splashing up and down.
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RE N E E G H E R I T Y PRE S E NTS B U T N O T S A R DINES I’d like to live with a Goldberg on my wall with its colors bold in reds and blues and yellows gestured brush strokes lines straight and curved thin and wide I’d like to live with a Goldberg on my wall I need color in my house not to reduce his work to color it’s color that speaks to me if I had one of his paintings I’d walk by it every day and say I’m gonna shoot straight with you meaning me they’re gonna be some curves thrown at you you just have to remember color Goldbergs are more than paintings they’re an era myth like the story behind Sardines when O’hara dropped by Goldberg’s studio there was a sardine in the right hand corner of the painting maybe if O’Hara hadn’t dropped by Goldberg wouldn’t have painted out the sardine in the sense that O’Hara thought about orange wrote twelve poems that turned out not to be about orange at all at least that’s what he said I wouldn’t like to live with Sardines on my wall though not because it reminds me how they smell or how I cut myself once opening the elongated can with oil that spilled on my shirt but because I’d keep looking for the sardine
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S T E P H A N I E W H I TE ’S APOPTOSIS FOR DR. CHERNIAK
Constructions just like East Berlin’s dangerous rat hole bathrooms lead to a busted stairwell in the red brick building with the white columns. You can’t miss it we miss it. You can’t miss it but we miss it Attack dog anatomy is our argument’s travesty filling in the blind spots, pretending there is a tree or a wall or love. We are only human at most and bastards at best so give me your tragedy, give me the silver dyeing technique that reverses our currents and impales the cells that I will promise to carry on my shoulders and in my back.
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F R A N Z R H E I N H A R D T WI S E P RE S E NTS R A D H A’ S W H IS P E R Imagine trembling with waves of pleasure, Ecstasies of fire, aflame with longing. The senses: the same for all, all are pure; Wet kisses, moist caresses, flesh tingling. What wonderful works could be created, With sensuality as raw matter. Fire, light, air, water: all beings tended; Unexplored desires becoming greater. I would be proud to be that new artist. Your flesh would feel the air, the light, the fire; Your soul would embrace the magic, the bliss. Gaze upon the flames and taste the desire. A feeling of sexual excitement. A knowing of the true abandonment. A SONNE T WHISPERED BY R ADHA, A CHAR AC TER IN FR ANZ RHEINHARDT WISE’S SCREENPL AY ADAPTATION OF LUCIO’S CONFESSION BY MÁRIO DE SÁ-C ARNEIRO. IMAGE: EVERY WHEN (2017) BY FR ANZ RHEINHARDT WISE. SIZE: 1024 X 768 PIXELS; MIXED MEDIA. A VIDEO IMAGE OF PAST,
PRESENT, FUTURE (2001; CHARCOAL ON PAPER) L AYERED OVER A STILL IMAGE FROM WISE’S SHORT FILM TR AUM (2008)
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PA M W I N T E R S W ONDE RS W HO G E T S T O TA K E T HE P ICTU RE ?
Whoever’s least important, I guess. Whoever’s not the loved one. Whoever didn’t graduate from Richard Montgomery High School in 1979 or wasn’t a member of the Indigo Girls Internet Fan Group (“closer to fine, ‘cause we’re online”). Whoever’s nearby with steady hands. Whoever looks least likely to turn and run with your iPhone. Someone’s kid. Someone’s husband. Someone’s waitress. Someone who got seated next to the Clagett Family Reunion. Someone who failed to wear the blue-and-white Clagett Family Reunion T-shirt to the Clagett Family Reunion. Someone’s kid who’s “really good with computers,” by which at least 55 percent of the Clagett Family means “really not loved enough to be in the picture.” The one who sees that the only gap in the crowd is next to her ex. The one who hates that the fact that she barely scrapes 5 feet tall means she’s always in the center, like someone’s wedding bouquet, with that much extra pressure to be sweet. The one who knows that no matter where they put her, she’ll look fatter than everyone else, who thinks to be less is to be loved. The one who fears standing next to that one woman because how he really feels might not be a secret anymore, the plane of his face alight. The person who’s planning to up and run. Blow this popsicle stand. Ditch this apple cart full of bad apples. Catch a breeze and fly to a land of better-looking people. Soberer people. Smarter people. People who don’t know that people like these posers even exist. People who know the score. 12
The passerby, wary of her purse—is this all a pickpocket ploy?— who doubts her photo skills, fears she’ll drop the expensive phone, realizes too late that each of them will be leaning out of the group to hand her another phone for another picture, one after the other, with the hope that one of them will accidentally show all of the right people with all of the right faces. The person who’ll get eternal gratitude she’ll never know. The person late for her class, her therapy, her hair appointment, her would-have-been future lover who is sitting at a table in a window downtown, a perfect picture, then rising from the chair.
PHOTO BY CHRIS IATESTA
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SUS A N C O H E N P R E S E NTS TH E O R I G A M I W OMAN H A S E I G H T E E N F OL DS Knees bent to her chest, elbows like wings-she tips her chin to her collarbone. Sitting on a wooden chair, her grandson waits-while an origami crane watches from the windowsill. Ladybugs work their way through rotted window wood and no one notices the slight flutter in the crane’s paper wings. The sleeping origami woman flexes her ankles; as the boy turns to watch a flock of birds through the window he shifts in his chair to count the black-capped birds loses track at eighteen and begins to hum a song. The origami woman dreams she is dancing, feels the sandy beach against her ten creased toes, seeks her flock and lifts her paper beak skyward, her long thin neck supple again. When the boy opens the wobbly window, the ladybugs scuttle into the wooden frame, The origami crane drifts to the ground, and the origami woman spreads her paper-thin wings.
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JAN E F I T Z G E R A L D RE CAL L S B E I N G Y O UN G
once when my Grandmother and I were drying the dinner dishes I told her that I was sorry she was going to die she became very still, an appendage to the dish, and whispered to my Father did he know a secret about her health fluttering hands and darting glances told me I had done something wrong like stolen or lied my Father took me out in the boat to say we didn’t talk about death to someone old he wasn’t mad he seemed sorry I never meant to hurt my Grandmother I had been thinking of how much I would miss her (she even sits on the floor to play jacks) my Father tried, but it really required the seasons, to teach me how to scare away the truth with silence
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C H R I S I AT E S TA’S BURDEN A carried cross built from grimy sweat and tears A badly stubbed big toe forgotten in temporaneous haste The quizzical wonderment of a stolen, moldy shower curtain A fervently chastised booming, baritone voice The undiscovered tic taking up residence in a frightening place The narcissism of repeated enjoyment of success achieved by poorly executed strategies A carbon prisoner an organic warrior a future fertilizer a manifested consciousness Like a leaf trying to control the current not realizing the relentless synergy of reality He forgot the wind waiting patiently soul bleeding warmth in self-sacrifice Forgotten was that there was no language for us That did not dismiss the simple joys of creating one. 16
L A D I D I S AY S D E C O R AT E ME
Golden Glorious Autumn is upon us Oh so happy this sunshiny brisk Morning you chose me ... How lovely. Competition keen, some how it seems I am chosen one, I suit your fancy. My hope is, I make everyone happy when they vision me. Today I will go everywhere you go. I was the last item you dealt with before leaving home Now I am first thing everyone sees When you appear. Oh yes, I thank you, for it is always Gladness to be seen. FOR K ANIKKI J “WRITE LIKE A WOMAN�
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H ENRY C R AW F O R D B E L I E VE S THEY A L M O S T L O O K L IKE U S then you notice the hair tonic curl on a sharp-parted head and the pencil mustache, but mostly it’s that all the men are white with pillbox women arranged in Edith Head poses, chatting and flattering, shushing away an anger none of them can name and sometimes they’ll be in a club with dry martinis and evening wear and a black man will come dancing down the aisle all banjo, banjo, banjo, or a cinemascope Moses will come down from the mountain in a cloud of special effects, like Custer at another last stand and I’ll be here snorting Vicodin off the coffee table with three remotes, just changing channels and waiting between the stations.
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C H A R L E S W I L S ON J R’S TRAIN SONG “Say something,” she said, But his mouth was glued shut From crow and bad promises. She took back her blue heart, Dinged with half-moons and fissures. He gave her a quavering song About a train that left a station. She knew the chorus from a past life: Throttle jammed, blue sparks Jumped the mountain track; Pines got plowed into kindling. He stirred his coffee for answers. “Say something,” she said, But his mouth was wired shut From fables already spoken.
ART BY CHARLES WILSON JR
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n n a o J n a V ie FEA S ’ E ES H AY ZIN Y C. A HON T G N BY A MA TO PHO E R X TU E T T MEE
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P OE D RE
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T H E B O O K O N J OAN N E
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SNIPPE TS OF INTERVIE W WITH JOANNE VAN WIE (ABRIDGED FOR SPACE CONSIDER ATIONS)
“The best place to meet anybody is always where they are at that moment.”
(Q: Who is Joanne Van Wie, really?) “… Carl Jung once said, “The world will ask you who you are. And if you do not know, the world will tell you.” I say, if you do not repeatedly check to see again who you are, you will not know, because we are always different than we were even a week or a day ago. One must not fool themselves to think they are unchanged by even the smallest word to the heart, by even a clear bird call in the window at dawn. “It is so important that we are part of a larger community as writers and poets...The poetry scene always blossoms though wherever we choose to plant our voices. Each of us helps it grow.” “…I actually went for my undergraduate degree in Environmental Design and Architecture to Syracuse University, and was able to realize there, the close connection between all the arts, the overlapping of poetry in architecture, fashion, and music etc. So we all share at least one artistic talent of getting ourselves dressed and reading ourselves to the world as we walk through our day.” “…my favorite poet will always be Margaret Atwood because her poem, This is a Photograph of Me, is the first poem that really wakened me. I had been there, in that lake for so long under the water, or at least I felt it so…” “…I only began to get more serious about poetry in 2002 when I began submitting my work to Connections Magazine at the College of Southern Maryland. I quickly realized how incredible it felt to be able to share what I had written. It is truly life-changing to have someone else there to listen, even if it is only through an open-mic.” Joanne, we’re listening. EXPERIENCE THE ENTIRE INTERVIE W AT TEX TUREMAG.COM
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JO AN N E VA N W I E WI S HE S JUST ONCE Just once I’d like to end this poem about you without the cold of the frozen lake’s edge touching. Just once without the deadened or grayish, or silent reaching out. No longer the loosened as a bite or unspoken as a loss. If only I could avoid bending on the same line as broken, faint on the same line as fallen. If only I could stop this poem altogether that seems to rewrite my heart into all the same pieces, if only I could end this poem.
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JO A N N E VA N W I E PRE S E NTS A S I F W E W ERE If we were, I would be your birdmate, maybe not for more than a season, but with my conical beak angled down to the ground, my white-tipped tail feathers, lifted. I would be waiting for you to swoop overhead for you to arrive at this agreed-upon location. I would be waiting. And it would be a swift copulation of sorts if we were song birds or even raptors. If we were, on the other hand, lions there would be plentiful growling at the cusp of each other’s ears. There would be a purposeful breathing lowered into our deliberate, aching motion. But, as it is, we come quiet as less than a whisper on the drum. Our meeting is not wing-ed or swift, it is hardly audible as trapped air. But in the mind it is unnerving. The way we undress ourselves and find the other just arriving just perfectly open-flamed enough to let it burn into the night, to let it answer our silent throats as if we were.
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J O A N N E VA N WI E ’S N O T E T O S E LF
Self, be someone else any chance you get. Black-skinned girl with cerulean blue eyes. The waterstrider spread over a clear stream. Be geothermal with legs. Be the space left untouched by shrapnel rainstorm. The killing tree that stood silent but took note. Be the fisheye lens looking down over what hurt most. Be distorted vision. Be the little girl who hasn’t yet learned to lie, and become her secret. Be a resurrection biologist at heart. Be a long screw, slowly loosened. You are just left inside. Be the clear memory of wearing sentimental strength, like broken skin. Be wingspan over the Wicomico. Be the sound of a young boy breaking stride in his own darkness. Be blacktop. Be steam. Be rising. Be once-only encountered and be eternal. Bear your own resting weight. Self, be drawn to love as to pain. Be tree limb and overhang the stretch like silver voices. Tell the truth as though a happy ending. When you break against the rocks with sharp fingers for safety, be unapologetic. Be like the dead. Be at the beginning of the river at dawn, and be ready. Be anything that dares to surface, to resurface. Be that blind eye, turning away.
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J O A N N E VA N W I E AS KS A N Y T H I N G E L SE? What was that motion I just felt in our locked gaze? A pulling in— a pushing away that won’t listen to reason. I find myself searching inside your words your hands, your quicksand skin. I need to expand your voice, get you to say those words again, is there anything else you need? because there is this void, this crater of an ocean where I swim without ever floating it is always the sinking and the just reaching the beach before nightfall. It is always the sharks entering the sand and the short burst along an endless edge. There is no moment reclined face up on the white sand. No evening breeze that’s just warm enough. Have you actually seen the blue-eyed horizon you promised? Have you (also) felt the rocking to sleep of that accidental lingering caress? You asked, is there anything else I can do for you? and I looked away from that penetrating glance—from the sand’s moving surface, but I have come back to search again. And I have brought my list this time, I have tattooed it on my forehead torso, my shallow-pooled places you cannot miss. So go ahead and open your voice— dare that catch in my throat one more time and I will meet you mid-ocean. 25
JO A N N E VA N W I E P RE S E NTS THIS EVENING The early-fallen shadow takes away the texture of the skin (if there is one), and the color of the North Star’s rising smooths out the red tone and gives a soft, muted sound to your eyes. Your words are lined as wind-blown cotton, and as careful as the one-by-one white picket fence introducing this moment. Its gate opens a breeze of intentional glances— says something vague about the want of my reflection, my texture, my shadow in the moistening air, and this quiet, this closening, this evening.
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G RA C E C AVA L I E R I OFFE RS US WHISKEY
My Father says I only send PR, press releases, never a letter, and here I thought he wanted me to become successful so I wrote plays and books and operas for him. I even went to grad school. And didn’t I give four grandchildren? Once when I was five he brought home a puppy in a whiskey carton. He’d always wanted one, having been the first child of seven émigré children, but I was terrified by its barking and jumping. I thought I’d done something wrong, and not knowing how to say that, I stood screaming at the top of the stairs until my father packed him up in the box and took him back to the liquor store. My father said he never understood my plays or poetry. Yet I kept writing books for him. All he ever wanted was for me to ask how are you feeling, Are you well, Do you miss me, Can we talk, I‘m glad you have a new dog.
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G E O R G E M I L L E R S PE NDS A N A FT E R N O O N AT T R ADE R JOE S (she, girlfriend) salmon? how much do we need? (me) I said I’d take care of it. (me the next week to the therapist) okay, here’s the problem, we’re in Trader Joes, there’s a pot luck, we need salmon. (she, therapist) let’s get in touch with this, how have you discussed the matter? (she, girlfriend) we’re here, the salmon’s here, what’s to decide? (me) I have a feel for these things, I spent a summer in Alaska, I know my salmon. (she, therapist) did you say what you thought? expression, we’ve discussed that. (she, girlfriend) let’s do the math, four couples, let’s say three ounces apiece, times eight, that’s twenty-four ounces. (me to the therapist) then maybe I said something like, “it’s my party, I think I can handle the salmon.” (she -- I forget which one) there’s a problem here, let’s zero in on it. (she, therapist) I’m not sure I follow you, what were the exact words? (me) I think I know how to buy salmon, this is too much. (she, therapist) that’s good, assert yourself, I like it, expression, raw feelings, the inside. (she, girlfriend) twenty-four ounces is about right, any more and people fill up before the main course, we’re talking appetizer here. (she, therapist) I can’t believe I’m taking the man’s side on this. (she, girlfriend) okay, that’s two twelve-ounce packages. (she, therapist) I hate to interrupt here but we’re out of time. 28
S H E I L A M A RTE L’S GRANDMOTHER First grandbaby arrives. From Florida to Nova Scotia our open hearts and open arms await him. I’m happy he’s here. I’m also happy to have built a life brick by brick by hand with chapters that included bad wolves and sticks and straw and hot air being blown around, sometimes by me. I appreciate being alive in a time where the word grandmother needn’t be cloaked in Norman Rockwell limitation or a prescription to clean up the residue of anyone who came before. I say yes to mystery yes to curiosity yes to unfolding. Every grandchild who blesses my life will be for me a blessing, not a prince nor a projection, nor a princess, but, rather that simplest yet most challenging human: an honest to goodness person.
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JO SE P H T H O M A S M I NTON I S GOING DEEP
After the sub slowed its sharp dive Baby Duck and I one-handed Gathered up the books and food That hadn’t been stowed for sea. We held our noses and breathed out To pop our ears clear of the pressure. It was a night in September. It was a day away from Japan. It was a day that bled into tomorrow.
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CH R I S T I N A B O R G O Y N P RE S E NTS A F T E R T H E RAIN it’s after the rain has finished falling and the air is so thick, you see the steam rising from the asphalt and the mist lingers just a little longer than you want to, the ache to move from the porch chair is strong, muscles that threaten but won’t atrophy for a long time scream as you stand and hobble off the porch towards the mailbox, noticing how slick the pavement is and you have to tread carefully to open the door that sticks just to retrieve water-logged mail.
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M I C H A E L R AT C L I FFE ’S TH O U G H T S W H I L E S ITTIN G ON THE BEACH Is it desire to swim again in uterine seas? Or, vestigial memories of when we were fish? We sit on the beach, facing toward the waves and dream. As much as we seek its warmth, the sun is not our friend. Only the waters embrace and soothe.
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PHOTO BY CHRIS IATESTA
Amongst the waves, I hear mothers cry.
M A X O C H S P R ES E NTS MA RY O F G A I T H E RS BU RG
Mary, the look in our eyes says “engage,” But a weak smile is the only way we dare. It would be good to know who you are, But even if I should approach your cage to flirt, chat, ask your heart’s secret age, stare at your dreams, your eyes and hair; even if I did not feel like a garbage man; and if you, on your own, were willing to see me, though my chin stubble’s gray and your body seems to my eye naive; and though the awful wonder of the everyday world is always lost to me and probably you (almost); and the music which calibrates my inner vibrations to thunder on high is probably different from the music that makes Mary’s soul shiver or fly, but possibly not, it would not matter. All we can do is a lame face dance, caught like leaves in the whirlwind. Our lives are so small and far apart, as we pass in the IBM hallway, it seems a dreadful distance, one we could not ever span.
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SA R A H M . F R E D E R I CK’S M IN I AT U R E M I G RATION
I shake my crystal globe: a swirling winter storm blurs to white the smudged glass. Bewildered, birds topple southward from snowy, green plastic trees: a solstice circumstance! Frantic wings flapping, wild to alight, huddle on electric wires—frozen underneath my topsy, turvy world. Poor shiv’ring swallows! What do you seek? Safe haven? Or a new glass prison? 34
A N N B R A C K E N’S I M A G I N A R IU M
Power shape-shifts one day becomes the father in your dreams. His baritone voice, the solid line of his lips school you in self-control. Meanwhile, fear jumps up and down in your throat groans louder as power stalks your life until you discover the inner alchemy of joy.
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S U S A N M O G E R FE E DS TH E W O LV E S O F D E CE MBE R FOR CHARLOT TE AND WILL
Under a cold sky In the last week of the year Come the wolves of December Long, lean, hump-shouldered, Hungry. They scent sorrow. Red blood on snow. This year I scatter words To call them closer Pull words out of my pockets Hold them on my open palm. I look into yellow wolf eyes Feel warm, wet wolf breath Hear their hearts Singing. Come, memory. We’ll feed each other.
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R A N D O L P H B R I D G E M AN P RE S E NTS CRA ZY B O B ’ S U S E D C A R S RADIO TIP S crazy bobs used cars in my home town had radio commercials that talked about checking your tires for proper air or how to keep your battery posts clean my father listened in every morning and it was the one after all these years on how to winterize your car that i remembered most crazy bob said before you start the car make sure none of the neighbors stray cats are sleeping on the engine block to keep warm because it’s a mess when they get caught in the radiator fan it can traumatize the kids guts and fur on a hot engine stinks and it can take weeks to get that smell out my sister cried inconsolable father and i belly laughed mother yelled to turn the broadcast off but before my father could crazy bob ended with but the most important thing is to get to work on time without these type of inconveniences so come on down to crazy bobs used cars at the corner of first and main streets where this month only we are installing locally approved SPCA cat guards a $25 value with each car purchased shut that goddamn thing off my mother screamed father and i bent over laughing we’re the only ones i know who could get my mother to cuss like that because that’s the way guys love right? 37
ELISAV I E T TA R I T C H I E P RE S E NTS DISCUSSING OLYMPUS AT THE CAMELOT HALL NURSING HOME [the residents speak, if they can]
What anachronistic Grecian gods can help us now? What myths explain away Promethean livers, wounded heels, spent bones, one unpaired eye? Those gods an under-thirty bunch except Poseidon, that old salt. Orpheus was too preoccupied to be debriefed. Athena has abandoned us. Aphrodite is a tawdry joke. Zeus turns to new pursuits. Persephone still breezes past but won’t share one pomegranate seed. Demeter’s on the shelf. Only bovine Io understands indignity of change, incontinence, bellowed helplessness, this pastured lack of grace. Icarus, you were in luck. We’d trade these wheelchairs for your wings, despite the cost. dreams of immortality, hallucinations. We’ve had experience with risk and nosedived plans. We’d like the business done. 38
TH A NK Y O U T O O U R C ONTRI B UTO RS !
SYLVIA DIANNE BEVERLY A native of South East Washington, D.C. and alumni of Anacostia H.S. and The University of District of Columbia, Sylvia is an Internationally acclaimed poet, presenting poetry in London at the Lewisham Theater. As well, she is the proud matriarch of her family. Ladi Di can be contacted at syladydi@comcast.net
CHRISTINA BORGOYN Owns 1 square foot of Hawaii 2, a private, uninhabited island in Maine, thanks to Cards Against Humanity. Graduated UMUC in 2012 with BA in English Literature. Participates in NaNoWriMo and NaPoMo. Active member of AllPoetry. Self-published November Poems. Administrative Specialist II for MDE by day, demi-goddess by night.
ANN BRACKEN Authored two poetry collections, No Barking in the Hallways (2017) and The Altar of Innocence (2015). Her work appears in several anthologies and journals, and two of her poems were nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Ann is the deputy editor for Little Patuxent Review and leads writing workshops for adult education programs.
RANDOLPH BRIDGEMAN Graduate of the College of Southern Maryland, St. Mary’s College of Maryland, recipient of the Edward T. Lewis Poetry Prize, and Lannan Fellow for the Folgers Shakespearian Theater 04-05 poetry reading series. He teaches poetry at Great Mills High School. His fifth book of poetry The Trash Talk Poems is forthcoming in 2017.
GRACE CAVALIERI Her forthcoming book is Other Voices, Other Lives (2017, Alan Squire Publishers.) She’s founder/producer of Public Radio’s The Poet and the Poem now from the Library of Congress, celebrating 40 years on-air; and a CPB silver medalist. 39
SUSAN A. COHEN A professor of English and the coordinator of the Creative Writing Program at Anne Arundel Community College, she has published essays on American literature, environmental issues, the legacy of diethylstilbestrol, and poems inspired by the people she meets on her daily walks.
HENRY CRAWFORD A poet in the Washington, DC area, his work has appeared in several journals and online publications including Boulevard, Copper Nickel and The Offbeat. He was a 2016 Pushcart Prize nominee. His first collection of poetry, American Software, was published in 2017 by CW Books. His website is HenryCrawfordPoetry.com
JANE FITZGERALD Her poetry is written with clarity and insight. She is an enthusiastic poet who feels compelled to write about relationships, nature, emotions, and time. Jane has been writing for thirty years and has self published three books.
SARAH M. FREDERICKS With an honors degree in Studio Art from Montgomery College, Sarah now studies Creative Writing at Anne Arundel Community College. Her work has appeared in Amaranth and Cargoes. She received two Burt Dall Formal Poetry Awards and a National Certificate of Merit from the League of Innovation for short fiction.
RENEE GHERITY Renee lives and writes Maryland. Her work has appeared in Poet Lore, Innisfree Poetry Journal, District Lines, and other journals. She participated in Ekphrasis, an exhibit that paired work of painters from the Corcoran (Washington, DC) and poets from the Writer’s Center (Bethesda, MD). She has been a featured reader in Maryland and Minnesota.
CHRIS IATESTA No relation to the publisher of TEXTure Magazine of the same name. This Chris Iatesta was raised by jackals in the Mumbai Zoo in India. A true believer, Chris has mastered the art of human flight unaided by technology. He has only been published in hieroglyphs, and often howls his angst in a language long ago forsaken by the sane. 40
ROCKY JONES An artist, musician, and multimedia poet, Rocky has performed his poetry at Hard Bargain Farm, Hateful Acres, and Maryland Faerie Festival. His work has appeared in Gargoyle Magazine, Truck, MiPOesias, Poets’ Ink, and the Bay Weekly. His poetry book, My Demo, was self-published in April 2017.
BETH KONKOSKI A writer and high school English teacher, Beth lives in Northern Virginia with her husband and two kids. Her poetry, fiction, and non-fiction have been published in numerous literary journals including The Baltimore Review, New Delta Review and Smokelong Quarterly. Her chapbook Noticing the Splash, was published in 2010 by BoneWorld Press.
HIRAM LAREW Hiram’s work has most recently appeared in Amsterdam Quarterly, Little Patuxtent Review, FORTH, Viator and Every Day Poetry. He is a global food security specialist, lives in Upper Marlboro, MD, and often attends poetry events in Annapolis.
SHEILA MARTEL A poet living in Montgomery County, Sheila is dreamily engaged in composing and creating. Deeply affected by place, she grew up in Nova Scotia and Montreal, and has lived in NYC and Colorado.
GEORGE MILLER Living in southern Anne Arundel County, his recent poem “Wreck of the Toni Marie” was published in the Annapolis magazine Upstart Annapolis in the Fall 2016 issue. Local associations include the Poets Circle of Southern Maryland and the Evil Grin Poetry Series. Publications include a novel and a poetry collection.
JOSEPH THOMAS MINTON Enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1975, serving as a linguist, and commissioned in 1988, he retired in 2004. He earned his BS from Excelsior College in 2012 and an MA in Writing from Coastal Carolina University in December 2016. He resides in Camden, SC. 41
SUSAN MOGER An author, freelance editor, and writing instructor at AACC, she has read her poetry at open-mic events in Annapolis for many years. She always emerges inspired — by powerful poets and attentive audiences. Her YA historical novel Of Better Blood was published by Albert Whitman Company in 2016.
MAX OCHS Max began writing poems as a teenager in 1956. While working at Anne Arundel County’s anti-poverty agency, and the A.A. Conflict Resolution Center, he received a Masters in Humanities from St. John’s College. His book of poems Just Caws is available on Amazon. Max lives in Severna Park with his wife, Suzanne.
MICHAEL RATCLIFFE Geographer and poet. When not writing, Michael can be found bicycling around Central Maryland. He can also be found on-line at michaelratcliffespoetry.wordpress.com.
ELISAVIETTA RITCHIE Harbingers; Reflections: Poems on Paintings, A Poet’s Gallery; Timbot; Babushka’s Beads: A Geography of Genes; Guy Wires; Tiger Upstairs on Connecticut Avenue; Feathers, Or, Love on the Wing; Awaiting Permission to Land; Arc of the Storm; Elegy for the Other Woman; Flying Time: Stories & Half-Stories; In Haste I Write You This Note: Stories & Half-Stories
JOANNE VAN WIE Joanne prides herself on not only creating handspun poetry, but also remembering the names of her seven children AND their birthdays. Her works have frequented Connections magazine, a CSM publication, and though she credits her parents all else, Margaret Atwood’s poetry inspired the birth of her own voice.
STEPHANIE WHITE Currently missing. Please stay tuned for more information should she be found. She has been published in Austin Younger Poets, My Favorite Bullet, Echoes, and Stylus. Stephanie has been located; she’s fine living amongst the honey badgers. 42
CHARLES WILSON Charles is a poet, musician and visual artist from Virginia Beach. He has won multiple prizes in the Poetry Society of Virginia’s annual contest. He has been published in The Blue Hour, The Sow’s Ear Poetry Review, and www.100wordstory.org.
PAMELA MURRAY WINTERS Recipient of a 2017 Maryland State Arts Council grant for her poetry. Her first book, The Unbeckonable Bird, will be published by FutureCycle Press in summer 2018. She is one of the organizers of the Evil Grin Poetry Series in Annapolis, MD.
FRANZ RHEINHARDT WISE Baltimore-born artist and filmmaker, Wise holds a BA in Philosophy from UMBC and a MA in Liberal Arts from St. John’s College in Annapolis. Wise is currently in Seattle painting Elevator Elephant, a mural, and editing Mamallapuram, his film about that Indian seaside town.
“As a poet and a writer we understand it is important to remember that it is the texture of the words that can be felt through the reading and along the tongue, even along the ear canal as the meaning enters us each differently.” - Joanne Van Wie
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CHRIS ALBRECHT PRESENTS SPIRIT NEPHEW’S LATEST PLAGIARISM NOVEMBER 30, 2013
I’m born of Chesapeake pirate’s cove reeds and frog-song, strong by Appalachian air, rocky, remote. I’m bred of long-distance and dreams for the grandchildren, watered of bathtub bootleg booze through prohibition. I’m schooled in ‘everything-with-a-grain-ofsalt’ (our family disclaimer for even our own oldest stories), strong by greatest-remembered grandfather’s alleged immigrant fugitive dive into forbidden New York harbor, undenied, and ready for my work. I’m gypsy-strong, freak-strong, underdog-strong, and ready to do more with less. I’m strong by river-skipped and -smoothed stone medicine, reared in hurricane-aftermath repairs in time for hurricane season following year, grateful for the couple months of something approaching Summer. I’m wise by countless highways and not immune to nostalgia, worldly from where I’ve sat by libraries and schools and losing count. I’m hewn of knuckles, skate-trucks, chains, billy-clubs, belt-buckles. I know family among the leaves, thick as thieves. I’m old by goddess-love and have woven shrines left behind in hearts for towns passed through, homes never mine. I’m worn but yet weary, and ready for my work. I’m strong by millions and enchanted with this land... In love with nothing so much as what’s yet to come.
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PHOTO BY MAGGIE SLIKER