Faith. A Poem by Despy Boutris

 
 
I knew the dying was coming—
knew her heart struck twelve
because I couldn’t sleep,
 
could only gaze out at the hallway,
past my door as it creaked
on its hinges, the wind outside
 
the open window running
its hands over everything in sight.
If I closed my eyes, I could pretend
 
it was my grandmother, running
her fingers through my hair.
I knew my father would call soon,
 
stranded at the hospital with her,
not wanting me
or my brother to see death so young.
 
I knew the lawyer would stop by,
present us with her
will. I didn’t know she’d leave
 
my brother her rocking chair,
and me: my favorite breakfast—
her recipe for buttered biscuits.
 
Didn’t know my father’s face
could glisten with tears or how hard
I’d sob, or how my mother’s palm
 
would smooth back my hair
me as we watched the coffin descend
into the ground, my grandmother
 
making her way into eternal life,
as the priest promised.
I wish I believed in eternal life.
 
It’s too much work to try
to imagine a realm without darkness,
no croaking
 
toads, nothing with claws.
It’s too hard to believe in her
cheering for me up above.
 
But how tempting it is to have faith
in her floating like pollen above us,
the clouds blurring her angles,
 
her body all tangled up with God’s.

 
 

(first published in Prairie Schooner)

 
 
 
 

Processed with VSCO with a6 preset
 
 
BIO:
Despy Boutris is published or forthcoming in American Poetry Review, Copper Nickel, Colorado Review, The Adroit Journal, Prairie Schooner, Palette Poetry, Third Coast, Raleigh Review, Diode, The Indianapolis Review, and elsewhere. Currently, she teaches at the University of Houston and serves as Assistant Poetry Editor for Gulf Coast.
 
 
 
 

You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

Share

Strange Fruit. Audio Textual Poem by Robin Ouzman Hislop


 

Robin Ouzman Hislop is on line Editor at Poetry Life & Times at Artvilla.com. His numerous appearances include Cold Mountain Review (Appalachian University, N.Carolina), The Honest Ulsterman, Cratera No 3 and Aquillrelle’s Best. His publications are collected poems All the Babble of the Souk, Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals & Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems. A translation from Spanish of poems by Guadalupe Grande Key of Mist and Carmen Crespo Tesserae, the award winning (X111 Premio César Simón De Poesía), in November 2017 these works were presented in a live performance at The International Writer’s Conference hosted by the University of Leeds. UK. A forthcoming publication of collected poems Off the Menu is expected in 2020

You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

Share

Virus on the Brain Poem

I got virus on my hands
virus on my clothes
virus on my feet
virus on my toes

Did I touch that doorknob
did I get too close
I can’t touch my face
I can’t scratch my nose

Oh baby my baby
close the door and come in
we’ve been quarantined
by Covid nineteen.

Oh I went to the sink and put the virus on the handle as I turned on the water on the water with the virus on my hands. So I lathered up the hands and I lathered up the handle. I lathered up the doorknob and I
lathered up my n o s e. Oops.
Cause

I got virus on my hands
virus on my clothes
virus on my feet
virus on my toes

Oh it’s no use in runnin’
We can’t take the train
We’re all stuck at home
with virus on the brain.

 

david michael jackson

Share

Pressure Wash my World

 

Pressure wash my world
Make it clean
like the snow used to be,
like the water used to run down the mountains
and into the valleys.
Wash the corners where the crowded animals hide.
Wash the barns where the pigs stand mouth to tail.
Clean the barns where the chickens lay sick eggs
between crooked feet in the cage.
Pressure wash the bats in the market of death
and in the bags of the poachers.
Pressure wash the ones who cut those trees,
clean them,
bleach them.
Turn the stream around on those
who use water jets
pressure washing the natives
until the land is stripped
and the demons are released
to get their
revenge.

Pressure Washing Poem by David Michael Jackson

First Published at Artvilla

—————————————————————–

For the pressure washing in Clarksville go here

Share

No Place Like. An Audio Textual Poem by Robin Ouzman Hislop

Robin Ouzman Hislop is on line Editor at Poetry Life & Times at Artvilla.com. His numerous appearances include Cold Mountain Review (Appalachian University, N.Carolina), The Honest Ulsterman, Cratera No 3 and Aquillrelle’s Best. His publications are collected poems All the Babble of the Souk, Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals & Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems. A translation from Spanish of poems by Guadalupe Grande Key of Mist and Carmen Crespo Tesserae, the award winning (X111 Premio César Simón De Poesía), in November 2017 these works were presented in a live performance at The International Writer’s Conference hosted by the University of Leeds. UK. A forthcoming publication of collected poems Off the Menu is expected in 2020

You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

Share

The Fear Factor and Covid19. Video Poem by Debashish Haar.

Debashish is a machine learning scientist, who has been published in literary magazines severaltimes across the globe, including Poetry Life & Times, where he was interviewed twice. He is currently contending with a severe writer’s block spanning a decade, when he has hardly produced any publishable content. He is also losing emotional connection with his own work gradually, and spends more time to edit / tighten his old poems than creating any new content.

 

Editor’s Note: Debashish Haar was interviewed twice in the old Poetry Life and Times, once by Sarah Russell then Editor & later by myself as a new Editor before it folded in 2008. The New Poetry Life & Times restarted in 2013 at Artvilla.com site, Admin David Jackson.

Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

Share

The Spirit of Corona Times. An Audio Textual Poem by Debashish Haar

 

This moment is a metaphor, 

        the metaphor is a war,

               the war for the survival of mankind.


Its victims are those who sold weapon

     its victims are those who bought the weapons,

          its victims are those on whom incendiary explosives were and are being fired.


Its victims are those who armtwisted national regimes, 

     its victims are the benighted nations,

          its victims are rich, its victims are poor.

           
Its victims are those who stockpile nuclear arsenal, 

     but have scant PPEs and Ventilators,

             its victims are the stereotyped minorities.


Its victims are the old who have lived their lives,

     its victims are millennials in callow youth having starry dreams, 

          its victims are infants and even new borns.


Its victims are those who are living lives in house arrest 
     
      fending an invisible nano scale enemy threatening to reduce the world

           in a nuclear winter without any bombs being dropped.


This moment is an allegory,

       which nobody knows, no one understands,

             it stammers and rattles, and speaks everything at once!

 

Debashish is a machine learning scientist, who has been published in literary magazines 
severaltimes across the globe, including Poetry Life & Times, where he was interviewed 
twice.

He is currently contending with a severe writer's block spanning a decade, when he has 
hardly produced any publishable content. He is also losing emotional connection with his 
own work gradually,  and spends more time to edit / tighten his old poems than creating 
any new content.

 

Editor's Note: Debashish Haar was interviewed twice in the old Poetry Life and Times, 
once by Sarah Russell then Editor & later by myself as a new Editor before it folded in 
2008. 

The New Poetry Life & Times restarted in 2013 at Artvilla.com site, Admin David Jackson. 

Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. 
See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)
Share

In Perfection. A Poem by Antonio Martínez Arboleda

                        Nothing is in

                                               perfect,

                         Isn´t it?

Everyone counts

no Body is dispensable

                     Energy in

                     Energy out

The Equation holds

                    -The Fort-

until the End

                                              Nothing is in

                                                                       perfect,

                                              Isn´t it?

                                              Except for this bastard Universe

                                    In its self-fulfilling Logic

                         of cruel Creation

                        and cruel destruction

             following its Own

            beautiful blueprint

 

 

 

Antonio Martínez Arboleda:
Antonio (Tony Martin-Woods) started to write poetry for the public in 2012, at the age of 43, driven by his political indignation. That same year he also set in motion Poesía Indignada, an online publication of political poetry. He runs the poetry evening Transforming with Poetry at Inkwell, in Leeds, and collaborates with 100 Thousands Poets for Change 100tpc.org/. Tony is also known in the UK for his work as an academic and educator under his real-life name, Antonio Martínez Arboleda at the University of Leeds. His project of digitisation of poetry, Ártemis, compiles more than 100 high quality videos of Spanish poets and other Open Educational Resources. http://www.artemispoesia.com/ .

He is the delegate in the UK of Crátera Revista de Crítica y Poesía Contemporánea , where he also publishes his work as translator from English into Spanish. He published his first volume of poetry in Spanish, Los viajes de Diosa (The Travels of Goddess), in 2015, as a response to the Great Recession, particularly in Spain. His second book, Goddess Summons the Nation PaperbackGoddess Summons the Nation Kindle Edition , is a critique of the ideas of nation and capitalism, mainly in the British Brexit context. It incorporates voices of culprits, victims and heroes with mordacity and rhythm. It consists of 21 poems, 18 of which are originally written in English, available in print

and kindle in Amazon and other platforms.

Editor’s note: further information bio & academic activities can be found at this link: https://ahc.leeds.ac.uk/languages/staff/91/antonio-martinez-arboleda

 

 

 

 

 

Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

 

 

 

 

 

Share
Share