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Fuck Art, Let's Dance
ISSUE #003 / MAY 2014
"This moment is not worth the hours of television consumed while this Fire burned."
IN THIS ISSUE:
POETRY
- Steve Brightman
- Leigh Cuen
- Dreamer
- Ryan Quinn Flanagan
- Richard King Perkins II
- Michele Seminara
- Adam Tedesco
- Jeremiah Walton
ART
- Carmen Varner
- Leslie Boroczk
- Nick Romeo
- Janne Karlsson
- "Heart Under Bridges", Burlington, VT, Graffiti
PHOTOGRAPHY
- Ryan P. Kinney
- Captain Thornton
- "Motel Rot", a N! photo series
INTERVIEWS
FEATURES
- "Darkness" by Peter Gabriel
N! NEWS
- We're launching a traveling bookstore!
Fuck Art, Let's Dance
by N!
"Poets, come out of your closets,
Open your windows, open your doors,
You have been holed-up too long
in your closed worlds."
Open your windows, open your doors,
You have been holed-up too long
in your closed worlds."
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-Lawrence Ferlinghetti, "Populist Manifesto"
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TWO POEMS - LEIGH CUEN
Leigh Cuen is
a writer from California, currently living beside the Mediterranean
Sea. Her journalism about poetry includes groundbreaking reports about
emerging Syrian, Afghan and Israeli poets. Her creative wrings have been
published by War, Literature & the Arts, the International Museum
of Women and many others.
Q: "Why are you passionate?"
A: "Because I was born this way and got older but never grew up."
A: "Because I was born this way and got older but never grew up."
Apples Before Honey
After the silver twilight
the man from Gaza
came knocking.
He slipped a fat envelope
into my hand.
I begged him with my eyes:
“Go home. Stay safe. Hide under
the kitchen table.
Do whatever it takes. Don’t let them
find you.”
With my mouth I said:
“I can’t take your money.”
He insisted.
“I’ll pay you back after the war,” I whispered.
He smiled.
We vowed
by the taste of his harvest,
by the pies and
slices of white flesh
The red, golden
and green
skins
that might nourish strong sons
and beautiful daughters,
Someday…
It was 1948, the eve
before my wedding,
Before the banquet of scrounged rations
and a borrowed dress.
I was still a juicy virgin,
Almost a bride,
blushing
and a little frantic.
I gave him my word
in return for his trust.
Then the man that smelled of sweet apples
Melted
into the night.
Apples paraded through my dreams.
My stomach cried for the enemy, rumbling
churning.
I had promised the apple farmer
we would see each other again
Someday…
After the war,
I smuggled myself across
the invisible line.
The breeze tasted
dusty, ashes frosted
the ground.
Battle had redrawn the world,
made my home a stranger.
We looked all night,
My new husband and I
Every full moon
We hunted
by starlight.
But we never found the apple farmer.
I could not return
the friendship he left
in my hand.
So I carry
his absence
with me
Wherever I go.
It is the chain around my neck.
the man from Gaza
came knocking.
He slipped a fat envelope
into my hand.
I begged him with my eyes:
“Go home. Stay safe. Hide under
the kitchen table.
Do whatever it takes. Don’t let them
find you.”
With my mouth I said:
“I can’t take your money.”
He insisted.
“I’ll pay you back after the war,” I whispered.
He smiled.
We vowed
by the taste of his harvest,
by the pies and
slices of white flesh
The red, golden
and green
skins
that might nourish strong sons
and beautiful daughters,
Someday…
It was 1948, the eve
before my wedding,
Before the banquet of scrounged rations
and a borrowed dress.
I was still a juicy virgin,
Almost a bride,
blushing
and a little frantic.
I gave him my word
in return for his trust.
Then the man that smelled of sweet apples
Melted
into the night.
Apples paraded through my dreams.
My stomach cried for the enemy, rumbling
churning.
I had promised the apple farmer
we would see each other again
Someday…
After the war,
I smuggled myself across
the invisible line.
The breeze tasted
dusty, ashes frosted
the ground.
Battle had redrawn the world,
made my home a stranger.
We looked all night,
My new husband and I
Every full moon
We hunted
by starlight.
But we never found the apple farmer.
I could not return
the friendship he left
in my hand.
So I carry
his absence
with me
Wherever I go.
It is the chain around my neck.
Eaves dropping on the Whore of Babylon
She pressed her phone against her ear,
veiled in frizzy red hair.
I don’t remember his name.
The lover with the moustache.
She breathed cigarette smoke,
wriggling
gray and wisps of ash.
Blinked her tired eyes.
He said he missed me,
so I gave him a bargain. 15% off fallatio.
A voice from the line snickered
with dry mirth: Generous.
He filled me so good
I thought about being a vegetarian.
But then I had breakfast.
The park was empty after midnight.
Save for the redhead
and her ghosts.
We made love, dangling
from the monkey bars. Very romantic. Whimsical.
She closed her eyes, turned his salty memory
over on her tongue.
Tasting that moment of hope
when her body was suspended
in the wind, pierced and electrified.
weightless in the breeze
Before her feet landed back in the present.
veiled in frizzy red hair.
I don’t remember his name.
The lover with the moustache.
She breathed cigarette smoke,
wriggling
gray and wisps of ash.
Blinked her tired eyes.
He said he missed me,
so I gave him a bargain. 15% off fallatio.
A voice from the line snickered
with dry mirth: Generous.
He filled me so good
I thought about being a vegetarian.
But then I had breakfast.
The park was empty after midnight.
Save for the redhead
and her ghosts.
We made love, dangling
from the monkey bars. Very romantic. Whimsical.
She closed her eyes, turned his salty memory
over on her tongue.
Tasting that moment of hope
when her body was suspended
in the wind, pierced and electrified.
weightless in the breeze
Before her feet landed back in the present.
by Leslie Ann Boroczk
WHAT IS Books & ShovelS?
by Captain Thornton
N! is launching a traveling bookstore [UPDATE: we're off!] that shall traverse the United States throughout 2014 into 2015. We need your help filling our gas tank & successfully taking off, starting at the 2014 N.Y.C. Poetry Festival & heading West.
We are not planning a concrete tour. We are going to bop from city to city, open mic to open mic, street corner to street corner, distributing independent literature alongside classics to promote 21st century writers & artists. All books we distribute are available at a 'pay-what-you-can' rate to avoid denying anyone literature over monetary incentive. This project will provide N! a physical method of distribution that cultivates community 'cross borders & regions, shines light on great poets of our time, & furthers our ability to live up to pushing Passionate Living > Making a Living.
by Leslie Ann Boroczk
TWO POEMS - ADAM TEDESCO
Adam Tedesco has worked as a shipbuilder, a meditation instructor, a telephone technician and cultural critic for the now disbanded Maoist Internationalist Movement. He is a contributing editor to the online literary journal Drunk In A Midnight Choir. His work has appeared in Creative Nonfiction, Pine Hills Review, Similar:Peaks::, dcomP and elsewhere. He tweets at @AdamThomasTed.
Deliliah
Wearing piss soaked pants
Crawling out of a military basement
Into the frozen breath of dawn
Flooded free from their burrow
To dig my own grave
The frosted tongues of lawn shone
Reflecting the haze of the night before
Dusted diamonds smashing at each step
I broke my last dollar on black coffee
I sat and let it burn my tongue
As close to numbness as I could afford
I went outside to wait
I leaned my back against you
And you sang to me
And I could feel your voice
It traveled up and though me
Crossing over in my chest
With my voice
As I sang along with you
In beautiful harmony
You reassured me
Your song was the story
Of me finding you wherever I go
Always singing for me
And I could always sing to you
So I did
I leaned my back against you
Waiting
For anything
Anything at all
Crawling out of a military basement
Into the frozen breath of dawn
Flooded free from their burrow
To dig my own grave
The frosted tongues of lawn shone
Reflecting the haze of the night before
Dusted diamonds smashing at each step
I broke my last dollar on black coffee
I sat and let it burn my tongue
As close to numbness as I could afford
I went outside to wait
I leaned my back against you
And you sang to me
And I could feel your voice
It traveled up and though me
Crossing over in my chest
With my voice
As I sang along with you
In beautiful harmony
You reassured me
Your song was the story
Of me finding you wherever I go
Always singing for me
And I could always sing to you
So I did
I leaned my back against you
Waiting
For anything
Anything at all
You Are the Aura Before My Seizure
I read it in a comic book.
I could make you rich.
You’d smell the gold.
I’d smell all of you.
Make the yage.
Take the yage.
Fill the gourd.
Last night we were in a Bavarian simulacrum.
All the doors locked at two A.M.
We would float over wine streets.
Our faces brushing festival flags
Our hands gripped each other’s sweat skinned backs.
Drunk, laughing, fucking, flying.
Our fluids dripping into revelers’ steins.
We pounded on Inn windows
Looking for a place to land.
This morning I looked for the comic.
Upon finding it, I sat reading in the shed.
Absorbed in bending you over my knee,
Filling you with the gourd,
Filling the gourd,
So you could smell gold like a truffle dog.
I could make you rich
Beyond imagination.
Would our texts lack tension then?
Would I know what you meant
By faith in those you’d someday love?
Would I ever be more?
Would I ever hold you?
Around the time the Seroquel was wearing off
And the Pristiq was kicking in
I realized you didn’t want gold,
Especially if you had to crawl around on all fours to find it.
So tonight and every night after I will lie on my side
Imagining my feet covered in fur as I fall away.
I will take you to the Spanish coast.
I will lay with you in the grass at the tomb of Hafez.
We’ll float through Vondelpark and Storm King.
Every morning I’ll wake
Put my hand to my face
Trying to find your smell,
Remembering the gold,
Remembering the gourd,
Remembering the seizure.
I could make you rich.
You’d smell the gold.
I’d smell all of you.
Make the yage.
Take the yage.
Fill the gourd.
Last night we were in a Bavarian simulacrum.
All the doors locked at two A.M.
We would float over wine streets.
Our faces brushing festival flags
Our hands gripped each other’s sweat skinned backs.
Drunk, laughing, fucking, flying.
Our fluids dripping into revelers’ steins.
We pounded on Inn windows
Looking for a place to land.
This morning I looked for the comic.
Upon finding it, I sat reading in the shed.
Absorbed in bending you over my knee,
Filling you with the gourd,
Filling the gourd,
So you could smell gold like a truffle dog.
I could make you rich
Beyond imagination.
Would our texts lack tension then?
Would I know what you meant
By faith in those you’d someday love?
Would I ever be more?
Would I ever hold you?
Around the time the Seroquel was wearing off
And the Pristiq was kicking in
I realized you didn’t want gold,
Especially if you had to crawl around on all fours to find it.
So tonight and every night after I will lie on my side
Imagining my feet covered in fur as I fall away.
I will take you to the Spanish coast.
I will lay with you in the grass at the tomb of Hafez.
We’ll float through Vondelpark and Storm King.
Every morning I’ll wake
Put my hand to my face
Trying to find your smell,
Remembering the gold,
Remembering the gourd,
Remembering the seizure.
by Carmen Varner
by Carmen Varner
ONE POEM - STEVE BRIGHTMAN
Steve Brightman lives in Kent, OH and firmly believes in two seasons: winter and baseball.
"I am passionate because my blood won't leave me alone."
Green Become
Green Become Blue
Green Become Blue
You can hear the television and I become the dialogue.
I become the words and the music and the nodding head.
I become the time between the remote control falling
from your hand and its diagonal crash upon the carpet.
I become the carbonated breaths and candied eyes.
I become John Dillinger dancing like Fred Astaire.
I become sex.
I become all of the eyes that have ever cried over you.
I become all of the skies that have ever blued over you.
I become a river of violet, a river of violins, a river of violence.
I become green become green become green become blue.
I become poppies and daffodils and lilies and fingers and
legs and elbows and an ill-informed nation of carnations
that listen to too much talk radio and use books as doorstops.
I become sex.
I become thought bubbles and submarines and
screen doors and silver-scented salamanders.
I become Fred Astaire dancing like Salome,
toes digging into the still warm body of John the Baptist.
I become the blinking digital clock and the loudest alarm.
I become the sound of your mother’s voice
when you thought you’ve forgotten it.
I become the words and the music and the nodding head.
I become the time between the remote control falling
from your hand and its diagonal crash upon the carpet.
I become the carbonated breaths and candied eyes.
I become John Dillinger dancing like Fred Astaire.
I become sex.
I become all of the eyes that have ever cried over you.
I become all of the skies that have ever blued over you.
I become a river of violet, a river of violins, a river of violence.
I become green become green become green become blue.
I become poppies and daffodils and lilies and fingers and
legs and elbows and an ill-informed nation of carnations
that listen to too much talk radio and use books as doorstops.
I become sex.
I become thought bubbles and submarines and
screen doors and silver-scented salamanders.
I become Fred Astaire dancing like Salome,
toes digging into the still warm body of John the Baptist.
I become the blinking digital clock and the loudest alarm.
I become the sound of your mother’s voice
when you thought you’ve forgotten it.
ONE POEM - JEREMIAH WALTON
"I'm Jeremiah Walton. I'm 20, from N.H., and run traveling pop-up bookstore Books & Shovels. I founded Nostrovia! in 2011, & co-manage it while on the road, performing at open mics / slams / festivals / & street corners across the country."
TWO POEMS - MICHELE SEMINARA
Michele Seminara lives in Sydney, Australia, with her husband and three children. She has been practising and teaching yoga, Buddhism and meditation for fifteen years. Her writing has been published in many online and print journals, and she was recently nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her passions are emptiness (the Buddhist kind) and poetry. Michele is on twitter @SeminaraMichele.
The Lover
The skin’s sumptuously soft. The body’s
thin,
hairless,
vulnerable. She
doesn’t look
She Touches his
sex, caresses the strange
novelty. He moans, In dreadful love
And the pain is
slowly borne towards pleasure.
thin,
hairless,
vulnerable. She
doesn’t look
She Touches his
sex, caresses the strange
novelty. He moans, In dreadful love
And the pain is
slowly borne towards pleasure.
***a found poem sourced from Marguerite Duras’s "The Lover"
Masque
Ah,
as if abuse was
happiness and I
striking her
were a game,
she raised and dropped against my lap,
gutted on a dagger.
as if abuse was
happiness and I
striking her
were a game,
she raised and dropped against my lap,
gutted on a dagger.
***an erasure poem created from Djuna Barnes’s "Nightwood"
art by Janne Karlsson
Motel ROT
- a N! photo series -
ONE POEM - RICHARD KING PERKINS II
Richard King Perkins II is a state-sponsored advocate for residents in long-term care facilities. He lives in Crystal Lake, IL, with his wife, Vickie, and daughter, Sage. He is a three-time Pushcart nominee and a Best of the Net nominee whose work has appeared in hundreds of publications including The Louisiana Review, Bluestem, Emrys Journal, Sierra Nevada Review, Roanoke Review, The Red Cedar Review, and The William and Mary Review. He has poems forthcoming in Sobotka Literary Magazine, The Alembic, Old Red Kimono and Milkfist. He was a recent finalist in The Rash Awards, Sharkpack Alchemy, Writer’s Digest and Bacopa Literary Review poetry contests.
Divination
It was my brother who first discovered
the body of a hobo who got Macked
by a midnight truck and who found
the bloated little boy face-down
in the community pool.
He was even there when they pulled
twenty-nine diced pieces of rotting
human flesh from a neighborhood
trash can, an event hushed up by
the local papers.
I swear God is always smiling down on
my little brother while I sit at home
reading books which mandate
a thousand deaths per chapter,
waiting for Jesus to grin and die
in front of me and for my brother
to confess it's more than just providence
which guides him.
the body of a hobo who got Macked
by a midnight truck and who found
the bloated little boy face-down
in the community pool.
He was even there when they pulled
twenty-nine diced pieces of rotting
human flesh from a neighborhood
trash can, an event hushed up by
the local papers.
I swear God is always smiling down on
my little brother while I sit at home
reading books which mandate
a thousand deaths per chapter,
waiting for Jesus to grin and die
in front of me and for my brother
to confess it's more than just providence
which guides him.
by Janne Karlsson
ONE POEM - ASHLEE BEALS
Ashlee Beals is 20 year old musician, comic artist, and occasional poet living in Berkeley, California.
"I'm passionate because that's what the world needs- people who are mad to live and do the things they long to do in the world. There are so many people who don't let themselves be passionate about things because they're afraid of failing. I want to reach other human beings and change things, and you can't do that by being half-assed about what you're doing."
Burnt Out
I admit it, tonight I practically crawled down to Oakland to go to a party
just for their free booze. I’m not above this kind of thing,
and now I’m downing plastic cup after plastic cup because I’m not
very good at sipping things slowly, and the faster I go the faster the knot
inside of me will begin to unravel, a spreading warmth taking its place.
One single thread lingering, you at the other end.
Every time I turn around, there you are with it
tied around your wrist, mouthing the words
take care of yourself and call your dad,
it was Father’s day today and there are only
so many more left that he’ll be around.
Tonight I am too many shots and a busted heart.
I’m a land line and an answering machine,
out of place but nobody can quite figure out why.
I’m a ghost town, all boarded up, a vacant sign with half
the letters flicking on and off. A girl sitting on the floor
worrying the worries that circle around her head
each day like those little cartoon bluebirds –
should I stay should I call and what thing
inside me broke and when did it happen
and how did I not notice until now? If you were here
you’d probably say just stop. We’re always
going to be chasing the not enough around,
walking into one bright room
and then out into another.
just for their free booze. I’m not above this kind of thing,
and now I’m downing plastic cup after plastic cup because I’m not
very good at sipping things slowly, and the faster I go the faster the knot
inside of me will begin to unravel, a spreading warmth taking its place.
One single thread lingering, you at the other end.
Every time I turn around, there you are with it
tied around your wrist, mouthing the words
take care of yourself and call your dad,
it was Father’s day today and there are only
so many more left that he’ll be around.
Tonight I am too many shots and a busted heart.
I’m a land line and an answering machine,
out of place but nobody can quite figure out why.
I’m a ghost town, all boarded up, a vacant sign with half
the letters flicking on and off. A girl sitting on the floor
worrying the worries that circle around her head
each day like those little cartoon bluebirds –
should I stay should I call and what thing
inside me broke and when did it happen
and how did I not notice until now? If you were here
you’d probably say just stop. We’re always
going to be chasing the not enough around,
walking into one bright room
and then out into another.
heArt UNDER BRIDGES
***photographed in Burlington, VT
ONE POEM - RYAN QUINN FLANAGAN
Ryan Quinn Flanagan presently resides in Elliot Lake, Ontario Canada under three feet of snow, writing all sorts of things all over all sorts of things because he has a compulsion.
"I think the reason I am passionate about most things is that I don't understand them but want to know such things truly. I'm like an ever-curious child lifting rocks in a summer garden to see what I can find."
Re-gifted
There was that single mother
who left a crying basket
on the doorstep of the orphanage
who then found a loving home
for the child
that didn’t work out
so the child was returned
to the care of the state
who found it another home
that didn’t work out
and then another
and another
until the child was eighteen
and finally old enough
to enter the adult prison
system.
who left a crying basket
on the doorstep of the orphanage
who then found a loving home
for the child
that didn’t work out
so the child was returned
to the care of the state
who found it another home
that didn’t work out
and then another
and another
until the child was eighteen
and finally old enough
to enter the adult prison
system.
by Ryan P. Kinney
w/ love