Tuesday poem #521 : Jon Cone : OVERHEARD IN EASTSIDE LAUNDROMAT

 

 

They invented solace to coincide with advances
made in various tureens of measurement. Yup.

You don’t understand. One thing leads to another.
The cool night air brings a trace of wood smoke.

I keep a diary. I have done so since I was twelve.
I complete one diary then immediately start another.

Gosh the world is swell or maybe it isn’t, maybe
I keep saying only what I’m told: the world is swell.

They perverted solace to coincide with advances
made in varying internments of atonement. Yelp.

You can’t understand. One thing pleads to another.
The cool night hair brings a brace of weed berm.

I seek an aviary. I have done so since I was twelve.
I find one aviary then immediately go toward another.

Harsh the world is swill or maybe it isn’t, maybe
I keep braying only what I’m told: the world is swill.  

 

 

Jon Cone is a Canadian poet, editor, and writer who lives in Iowa City.  He has an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. His recent works include New Year Begun: Selected Poems (Subpress Editions: Brooklyn, NY, 2022); Liminal: Shadow Agent, pts 1 and 2 (Greying Ghost, Salem, MA, 2022); An Ice Cream Truck Stalled at the Bottom of the World: a collection of plays/written with Rauan Klassnik (Plays Inverse, Pittsburgh, PA 2020); Cold House (espresso, Toronto, ON, 2017).

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

Tuesday poem #520 : Guy Elston : A Personal Journey

 

                 “You either go to heaven or hell.
                   I’m going in a first class seat to heaven.”
                                         - Jason Derulo

Not saying anyone deserves what we get
or to be damned, not telling you not to identify.
But. Something else embarrassing is how much I love
the CN Tower, its high-60s Thunderbirds retro-futurism.
Similarly, here I am chilling on the 522^nd floor
of Frank Lloyd Wright’s ‘Mile-High Miracle’ in Chicago,
the personal flyers below as twinkly distant as the emissions
harvesting nets above, drinking a velvety cup
of cool serotonin to celebrate my 150^th birthday, and.
There’s a fly headbutting the pane. Personal space
is quite important to you isn’t it smiled my most successful
and sober friend; apocalyptic visions come naturally
and thrive in the future perfect, always will have done;
many people consider relapse a sign of complete failure
and long periods of abstinence a sign of complete success;
nothing’s so simple. Except. On a dated rocket
heading sunward (International Rescue grounded
due to smog and/or endangered goose flight) I know you know
we’ll go together, JD, on pre-paid economy tickets,
my knee knocking your fold-out table, our personal
hells touching on the armrest we, I’m sorry to insist, share.

 

 

 

 

Guy Elston is British and lives in Toronto. His poems have included by The Moth, The Honest Ulsterman, Anthropocene, Untethered and other journals. His debut chapbook Automatic Sleep Mode was recently published by Anstruther Press.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

Tuesday poem #519 : Miranda Mellis : Detective Nothing

 

 

nothing is the unsigned confession
inside the unopened envelope

nothing is the evidence
which was never found

nothing is the weapon
neither artifact nor clue

nothing is the foil
who fakes her own death

to solve the mystery of nothing
by becoming no one

pretending to be alive
she fools detective nothing

melting into the crowd
where no one is ever missed

without getting up
from her empty chair

 

Miranda Mellis is the author of Crocosmia (forthcoming, Nightboat Books); The Revolutionary (Albion Books, 2022); Demystifications (Solid Objects, 2021); The Instead, a book-length dialogue with Emily Abendroth (Carville Annex, 2016); The Quarry (Trafficker Press, 2013); The Spokes (Solid Objects, 2012); None of This Is Real (Sidebrow Press, 2012); Materialisms (Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs, 2009); and The Revisionist (Calamari Press, 2007).  She teaches at The Evergreen State College. mirandamellis.com

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

Tuesday poem #518 : Brad Aaron Modlin : To the Astronaut Who Hopes Life on Another Planet Will Be More Bearable

 

 

As in, if the people there like everyone, even
the ones they are not related to, if they like
strangers and budding plants, like to hum the songs
in each other’s heads, like food
too much to chew it, and too much not
to share, if they like to be alive
more than to bomb or be bombed, like
visitors, like thirst, like letting it last
ten extra minutes to boost the thrill of water,
brush their mouths with baking soda
so their next drink tastes sweet, if their games
do not name winners and losers, if no
one must deadbolt a door behind them in fear,
if no child or adult hears, I did not invite you
to my party, if people do not exchange
paper and say, This paper is worth
so many’s unhappiness, if no
night outlasts a day, if no
one oversleeps for sadness, or if
they do, someone—it’s a network
better than any antiquated phone tree—         
lies atop the quilt beside the sleeper and waits,
matching their inhales and exhales,
            and no one wakes alone.   

So far away and so down
here, we’re all rooting for you,
astronaut. We squint toward your ship,
which must be—must be—
traveling somewhere overhead.
We rise from these creaky beds
in our empty rooms
and stretch the curtains wide.

 

 

 

 

Brad Aaron Modlin’s poetry has been the text for orchestral scores; the springboard for an NYC art exhibition; and the focus of both an episode of The Slowdown with U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón and the premier episode of Poetry Unbound from public radio’s On Being Studios. Brad’s book Everyone at This Party Has Two Names won The Cowles Poetry Prize and features the poem “What You Missed That Day You Were Absent from Fourth Grade.”

“To the Astronaut Who Hopes Life on Another Planet Will Be More Bearable,” was a finalist in the CBC Poetry Prize (cbc.ca) and is part of his next manuscript. Brad has participated in residencies with the Banff Centre, Artscape Toronto Island, and Biophilium in Gatineau. He wrote/read/sang a poem for a concert with Symphony Nova Scotia and stayed on key. A creative writing professor, he teaches/learns with undergraduate and graduate students. BradAaronModlin.com

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan