Monthly Archives: July 2011

THEME FROM NEXT DATE by Keith Higginbotham

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The 26th offering from Ten Pages Press is now available: Theme From Next Date by Keith Higginbotham.

Jigsaw

figurative stitched-on
characters of the
picture plane, moving
the story
recurring a device, a passage
of caustic confessionals.

a head-on car
metaphor for a tortured
relationship in paint drips
and speech bubbles.  a green
hillside gestural embroidery
a resolution for metaphorical
approach.  also

simple:  faceless intimacy at
desks of potted
plants, a hint of glamorous
medieval delirium.

(This poem originally appeared in Liebamour.)

THE PENALTY FOR TRYING by Howie Good

Posted by CS on

The 25th offering from Ten Pages Press is now available: The Penalty for Trying by Howie Good.

MOUNTAIN MUSIC

 

1

Why dance cheek to cheek to Sinatra? We could be prowling the Metro, students of the gypsy pickpockets of Paris, or picking the wild raspberries out back that proclaim the importance of being plump and red and dangly.

 

2

Everything we started together is unfinished, perhaps unfinishable. In unnaturally bright light, I fuss over commas, how objects connect or whether they even should. You stand in the living room and look toward the mountain. They told us when we were kids to keep away from windows in the event of attack.

 

3

You’re left with yourself, scorch marks of extraordinary complexity, after the faceless man from last night’s dream, smiling apologetically, showed up at the door with a garbled message for you, something about the walls of the forest also being in flames.