Tuesday poem #34 : Joe Blades : where is tomorrow’s wine?

annapolis valley vines hang

                        heavy

with grapes waiting

            to freeze

before they can be

harvested

all this nor’easter rain

melts chocolates in pockets

turkey and plum pudding

picking crews hang

            christmas with family

wish to be in outside lane

moving slow with fresh

                        ice wine

but weather is not

            cooperating

bottles empty

too warm

            not truly winter

so living is unsettled

with an eye to outside

and anticipated arrival

            of a cold snap

            for their picking

gainful employment

24-hours max

            start to finish

wine pressed onsite

            estate bottled

before next month’s

            pruning begins

Joe Blades lives in Fredericton, NB, Canada. He is a visual artist–writer, educator, producer–host of the award-winning, long-playing Ashes, Paper, & Beans community radio program at CHSR 97.9 FM, founding publisher of Broken Jaw Press Inc., and a Past President of the League of Canadian Poets. The editor of ten collections, and the author of seven poetry books, including Prison Songs and Storefront Poetry (Ekstasis Editions, 2010), Casemate Poems (Collected) (Chaudiere Books, 2011), and three books in translation, his newest book, Iz knjige koja se ne zatvara, is translated by Tatjana Bijelić into Serbian, co-published by Art Print in Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Broken Jaw Press, in Fredericton, NB.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

Tuesday poem #33 : Sarah Mangold : How to Electrify Human Hands

To redeem dreams betrayed by the machine—The devout
mechanist— Mesmerized subjects—Magnetized waters—Priest
and patient—Her reader will understand this compression

Displacements of agency reconstituted through technology—
Each new version of the phrase a small victory in an expected line
of succession—At the same time she advocated—The marks
of desire are various—The spirit body abounds with scenery—
Spiritual nitrogen—Spiritual calcium—Exhale

One way of attaining to be—Boundless and unknowable desire
is a generative grammar—Trinket—Lincoln—The number
“379”—And the image of a small house

A sensitive girl—Her sensitive fingers—Motifs of sea
and separation—We have received hand written instructions—
Breathless wonder and utopian potential—The implied reader
is a qualified reader—An ideal specification should not waiver
from this purpose

Sarah Mangold lives near Seattle, Washington and is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts 2013 Poetry Fellowship. She is the author of the forthcoming Electrical Theories of Femininity (Pavement Saw) and Household Mechanics (New Issues), selected for the New Issue Poetry Prize. Recent chapbooks include Parlor (above/ground press), Cupcake Royale (above/ground press), I Meant To Be Transparent (LRL e/editions), An Antennae Called the Body (Little Red Leaves Textile Editions). www.sarahmangold.com

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

Tuesday poem #32 : Colin Smith : A Small Poem to Help with Something

  (for Sandy Boyko)

“If I put in my hearing aids

all I will be able to catch

is the bugs of $$$ chewing on my doorframe”

“I can hear my dog

’s sbsnc whimpering just fine”

Colin Smith’s latest is a chapbook, Carbonated Bippies!, out in 2012 from Nomados. He lives in Winnipeg.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

Tuesday poem #31 : Robert Swereda : from .:. Flood poems ( Calgary 2013 )

an ignored canvas

justifies your landscape

howling warmth I wouldn`t chose to be

dirt, a historic high anthem for uninhibited

follow the action from a perch

wiring unbraced glimpses

hotbed method come under dispel

surrounding aims for two-prong purpose

wanted sand, different kind of film

gravel: the following year

in your respective hovels shut inside force

plunged into tenor confessions

fell into rebuffed shifts- traditional gatherings

scenarios and ocean neighbours

collect. remind me of being out running into

note pushing pinnacle

long exposure realm of ridicules promises

none of those hands

toward uniformity

where origins gather

Author of re: verbs (Bareback editions) and a chapbook ionlylikeitwhenitrhymes, Robert Swereda is a member of the Filling Station collective. He studied creative writing at Capilano University in Vancouver. Other work has been published by The Puritan, ditch, West Coast Line, The Incongruous Quarterly, steel bananas, The Capilano Review, Enpipe Line and Poetry Is Dead.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

Tuesday poem #30 : Amanda Earl : from Beast Body Epic

a minor goddess of magic, isolated on this island the sun's my father I feed herbs to the lions my nightmare protectors whenever death calls for the bed-ridden days the morphine dripping into my veins if only I'd press the button

spiny solitary covered with coarse hair snouted elongated sharp clawed with tiny searching beady eyes looking for their next meal. I can't run away this time. I'm not strong enough

banshee keening at the death of myself washing the blood from my armour do you like my disguise? at dawn I begin as crone the silver in my hair glittering my eyes dead & brown  sparked by the thought of devouring I leap/turn tigress bound can't be contained I need this a distraction from the pain the flare of the scar like the strike of a match against a fingernail in the dark stings the vulnerable skin

Beast Body Epic is a monstrous long poem. Amanda Earl [photo credit: Charles Earl] is a poet, publisher & pornographer from Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Amanda's most recent chapbooks are Sex First & Then A Sandwich (above/ground press, Canada, 2012) & Me, Medusa (Red Ceilings Press,  UK, 2012). Her poetry has been published most recently in independent &/or student-run online magazines & zines & journals, including theSteelChisel.ca, Nickel95, Ottawater.com, The Peter F. Yacht Club, In/Words Magazine.  Amanda is a small press fanatic & a chapbook addict.
Site: www.amandaearl.com; Twitter: @KikiFolle

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

Tuesday poem #29 : Mark Cochrane : Semi-Permanent Lashes

for Enid

Welts, pinkening.

A modified eternal.

It’s / blinky.

Odysseus sputters in this version.

Dirty old town.

Para-fraudulent.

You cross my mind.

Should the parties / cease to cohabit.

Like lesions.  Life lessons.

Everyday.  Every day.

Blinking, not flirting.

Not flirting but blinking.

Should the parties.

To this modified fraudulent.

Cross town, pinkening.

Sputter eternal.

This dirty version.

Para-life.  (Co-sirens.)  Mind welts.  (Masthead.)

Mark Cochrane lives in Vancouver, BC, practises law, and teaches in the English Department at Kwantlen Polytechnic University. He is the author of Boy Am I (Wolsak & Wynn), Change Room (Talonbooks), and, more recently, a chapbook called Cat. (above/ground press). His poetry, essays, or interviews with contemporary writers have appeared in journals including New American Writing, The Capilano Review, Open Letter, and The Malahat Review; textbooks (Elements of English 11); and anthologies (A Verse Map of Vancouver, White Noise: The Eminem Collection). He has written book reviews, encyclopedia entries, and materials relating to the practice of family law. He has a manuscript-in-progress called Girlfriend of the Time.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan