Tuesday, March 26, 2019

Tuesday poem #312 : Conyer Clayton : Irrigation Techniques


I thought

earth was tainted
with lead

and the plot
was sad.

I shovelled
countless worms

for years,
heavy with doubt.

No — it wasn't
the soil but how

it was used.
How it was

treated; the chemical
nature of upbringing.

Lead is a choice
sometimes

or at least
if you let yourself

be poisoned by it.


Conyer Clayton is an Ottawa based artist who aims to live with compassion, gratitude, and awe. Her most recent chapbooks are: Trust Only the Beasts in the Water (forthcoming with above/ground press, 2019), Undergrowth (bird, buried press), Mitosis (In/Words Magazine and Press), and For the Birds. For the Humans. (battleaxe press). She released a collaborative album with Nathanael Larochette, If the river stood still, in August 2018. Her work appears in ARC, Prairie Fire, The Fiddlehead, The Maynard, Puddles of Sky Press, TRAIN, post ghost press, and others. She won Arc's 2017 Diana Brebner Prize, 3rd place in Prairie Fire's 2017 Poetry Contest, honourable mention in The Fiddlehead's 2018 poetry prize, and was long-listed for Vallum's 2018 Poem of the Year. She is a member of the sound poetry ensemble Quatuor Gualuor, and writes reviews for Canthius. Her debut full length collection of poetry is forthcoming in Spring 2020. Check out conyerclayton.com for updates on her endeavours.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan


Tuesday, March 19, 2019

Tuesday poem #311 : Evan Gray : from WRETCH POETICS




beneath fence wire

some investigators. some broken

.22 magnum scope some

murder weapon. some

 pieces found inside the victim’s
door. some local hardware

store that sold it to him.



[VICTIM], 25; Christmas-tree farm
on Jan. 24, 2008 & killed

[VICTIM], 73;
his son, [VICTIM], 44;

& a farm employee.


mr. firewood salesmen
shot all three. how deadly could you be


I would leave my kids
with you. I trust your

eyes. your frail hair is 12 lb.
test & you are old
your age is a blacksnake
& I thought I knew


you. so  


how could you on the bridge
the bridge I go fishing
near. fuck you for killing
those boys. you bastard. I think

 of you all the time. not
because of your duty & plea


barging but because of this

bridge. my bridge & those boys.
how selfish of you to do this
to me. how selfish of me

to think you ruined
my place. my river. the head
of two others. the firearms


used in the crimes missing

disposed of. I wish

                       
that man would’ve just
killed himself or drowned




+++



just a mile
down
a thorn bush
behind hog pins
strung in
the starkness of new
telephone wire

the holler
a blister
might as well be
my flannel shirt
coated in briars

the beehives again
a half-dollar
Dad gave me
buy gas
take a mouthful of snuff
hide in the house
J comes over drunk

pick
scabs on
the porch
light
find something

to hold
on to in the perch
window
stains
you leave
the doors locked
you remember
the mountains
ridges
BBQ chip bags
that night on the bridge
the mountain
the car
almost drove off
origins
like a shoebox
hand-me-down
sweaters 

a murky
pond
hayfields
hissing
in wind
cattails
tall people
the cold
alter
now fenced-in
field my self-
portrait
backdrops
blackberries
along
the parkway

rough
work
words
taxidermy
plastered
deer hide
mason jars
filled with
kerosene
postcards
furnaces
black smoke
the road
silver
pine
riddles
fast food joints
maybe
a blacksnake
six goats
four hens
diabetes toes
in unison
dancing
seven nails
my cerebral cortex
his liver
failures


tractor bucket
here is
a sacrifice
now God
a stuck hog
or lamb or
another
blacksnake

keep
we
ours
yours truly
the mice
out of the barn
most of all
bottom
feeders

bent glass
shards flat
picking
breaks
a melody
a birth
a cesspool

no
new
eyes

here
rain
clouded
ecosystems
white
chalky
connections
or dust
my dashboard

readiness
certain
eyes

call
things
specific

before
the corn
comes




Evan Gray is from Jefferson, North Carolina and is the author of the chapbooks Blindspot (the Rest (Garden-Door Press, 2018), BODY BIRTH (above/ground press, 2019) and Dusk Melody (Shirt Pocket Press, 2019). His essays and poems have been featured in DIAGRAM, Tarpaulin Sky, Yalobusha Review, Word For / Word, and others. He currently lives and teaches in Pittsburgh, PA.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan



Tuesday, March 12, 2019

Tuesday poem #310 : Tanis MacDonald : Hawks and Handlers



At the Medieval Faire we watch
two women in leather jerkins
cinched with wide brown belts and 

tethered to their wrists a peregrine
hawk with its dark head and slate wings
and a barn owl with a face like

a Venn diagram and the hawk handler says
They don’t like being with us so we can’t
pet them and they won’t fly to glove

for food because the hawk will ball
its claws up and punch its prey to break
its neck before eating it

but we keep these big birds fed and
protected so they are getting all their
needs met and aren’t looking for another

relationship and all the couples and maybe
some singles in the crowd laugh and
the hawk handler blushes. She didn’t

mean it that way not at all and I look
at you with your camera to your eye
twisting the lens for a close-up of the owl’s

white face floating in the dim tent and know
the cat will spring at our ankles when
we walk in the door she will bare

her teeth and pounce preparing for the day she’ll
take us down with matching thuds and eat us
beginning with our eyes

and know we were getting all our needs met


Tanis MacDonald is the author of five books of poetry and essays, including Out of Line: Daring to Be an Artist Outside the Big City, and the editor of two collections. Her next poetry book, Mobile, will be out with Book*hug in Fall 2019. Recent work has appeared in Atlantis, Understorey, Prairie Fire, and Lemon Hound. She lives in Waterloo, Ontario.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan