January 2016 | poetry
Has Death asked me to step out on the floor? For a tango,
long and difficult? Will I need attitude, strength
to learn new steps?
I don’t expect a polka. With luck a waltz, a whirl
of warm music in which I’ll get lost rising
and sinking in my partner’s arms.
If the evening is long, I’d like breaks. Catch breath
on a chair pushed back from foxtrotters. Fade
with wallflowers.
But it might be a marathon that ends with collapse,
then the rat-a-tat-tat of his tap dance
for which I have no shoes.
by Catherine Gonick
Catherine Gonick’s work has appeared or is forthcoming in Boston Review, Caveat Lector, Crack the Spine, decomP, DIAGRAM, Front Porch Review, Ginosko, Amarillo Bay, Word Riot, Soul-Lit, Sukoon, Forge, Jet Fuel Review, Notre Dame Review, and Jewish Women’s Literary Annual. Her poetry has also appeared in the Crack the Spine Winter 2015 Anthology. She was awarded the Ina Coolbrith Memorial Prize for Poetry.
January 2016 | poetry
Blood Clot
Through pink tinted lamp light,
I tilt in the chair,
hair sliding off my shoulders
until my countenance is black
with Japanese heritage
Last night, I woke myself up laughing
Your eyes, ivory with silver shimmer, fell on me
I cradled them until they busted
like a blood clot being bitten
You said “I can see you always.”
“Quit staring.” I moaned in response
“I feel ugly all the time.”
If I let my weight bring me to my knees
and my cheek scrape against the carpet,
I think I will feel pitiful in a sensuous way
Muscle Dust
I tilt against the lace curtain,
pale with exhaustion, half singing,
half moaning
The scarecrow argues
that I am dying and need a friend
to take care of me
Of course, he is just hay and rotten garments
He does not understand I am a muscle that absorbs
negativity and dust and
that I do not care if there is an infection
inside of me, or if I am too quiet to realize
I am alive
by Ashlie Allen
Ashlie Allen writes fiction and poetry. Her favorite book is “The Vampire Lestat” by Anne Rice.
January 2016 | poetry
A hooker with the 13th chapter of 1st Corinthians tattooed on her side.
Four hundred thirty six Crown Royal bags.
How much I hate stuffed olives.
Not dating Jane Fonda.
Ted Bundy’s last meal.
Arguing from design using a cockroach.
God being ambidextrous.
The never ending generosity of drinkers trying to pick up women in a bar.
A billboard: “My gastric sleeve changed my life.”
George Sanders’ suicide note, beginning “Dear World” and ending “Good Luck!”
The girl I fucked in High School who became a mortician.
Hubie Houston USN (Ret.)–the first man to fire a rocket from a plane.
Contracting food poisoning from bad manna.
The serpent’s side of the story.
Using a fly swatter as a swizzle stick.
On the plus side:
never throwing gum in a urinal.
Visiting Hollywood Forever Cemetery: Peter Lorre in a sliding drawer.
A man at the Salvation Army swimming pool telling me this is the best day of his life.
Screwing my wife and having her say: “Just finish your business.”
Passing out in the Seat of Scoffers.
Memory being an identikit.
Remembering too much.
Not forgetting enough.
Getting off with a warning.
by G. Geis
D.G. Geis divides his time between Houston and the Hill Country of Central Texas. He has an undergraduate degree in English Literature from the University of Houston and a graduate degree in philosophy from California State University. His poetry has appeared in 491 Magazine, Lost Coast, Blue Bonnet Review and is forthcoming in the November/December issue of The Broadkill Review.
