LIMIT
The woman watching the see is blind. For her, the sea waves are the soul waves.
From now on, the chopped light of the immense water container is what she will see
running deeper and deeper inside herself.
The blind woman and the ship that could never sail are of the same age.
The ship and her last lover have the same farsightedness.
Her last lover was a sailor and a fool. He heard only the melody
coming from the beating stick, turning a deaf to ear to all the island’s playing drums.
The blind woman and her last lover loved the flute sounds at dusk.
He never told her that the sea light had the shape of his destroying love for her.
However, she would willingly pretend that she had understood him.
She feared that he might also go blind if she told him the truth.
HIS WIDOW
His widow will continue to live her earthly years under the shadow of the emperor’s courtyard.
He, the most wonderful tree, left her soul empty with the crowds still conquered by him.
The crowds always look at his widow as a mantel of leaves.
When the blossoms wither, the mantel ceases to exist. At this moment even the crowds stop thinking.
In spring the mantel rejuvenates again. His widow gladdens because of the freshened memory of the citizens who never knew the dictator.
His widow loved the crowd and the leaf.
They both have short memory.
HE
He will not be able walk out of the house where he and the Eagle stay imprisoned.
He is there, and the guitar sounds coming from beyond the window, though tempting,
fail to encourage him.
He and the Eagle love and hate each other infinitely.
She will not pluck his eyes out, for he has given up watching since his childhood.
To both of them, light particles are as strange as colors.
She will not blind him, and he will cry one day, he will cry a lot because of her farewell.
At that moment he will be a child conscious of his loss, while the fir-trees will throw
thick shadows over the sadness of the undiscovered oases.
Alisa Velaj has been shortlisted for the annual international Erbacce-Press Poetry Award in UK in June 2014. Her works have appeared in more than eighty print and online international magazines, including: FourW twentyfive Anthology (Australia), The Journal (UK), The Dallas Review (USA), The Linnet’s Wings (UK) The Seventh Quarry (UK), Envoi Magazine (UK) etc etc. Velaj’s digital chapbook “The Wind Foundations” translated by Ukë Zenel Buçpapaj is published by Zany Zygote Review (USA). Her poems are also translated in Hebrew, Swedish, Romanian, French and Portuguese. Alisa Velaj’s poetry book “With No Sweat At All” (trans by Ukë Zenel Buçpapaj) will be published by Cervena Barva Press in 2019.
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times his publications include All the Babble of the Souk and Cartoon Molecules collected poems and Key of Mist the recently published Tesserae translations from Spanish poets Guadalupe Grande and Carmen Crespo visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds) and his latest Collected Poems Volume at Next-Arrivals
poet
Paid For. A Poem by Mercy Eni Wandera
The way she moves, magnificently strutting with a purpose
No lazy strides in red bottoms
The way she sits her ample behind
as if posing for the Vogue cover
The way her darting tongue swirls from her bright cherry lips
On her straw sipping on her Bloody Mary
The way her aromatic aura wants for attention
Having doused herself in Femme Fatale, her signature lavender fragrance
The way she crosses her curvy legs and her skirt rides up her thighs to reveal grazed knees
Thighs so thick everybody’s uncomfortable
The way the summer breeze caresses her gleaming brown skin
She sits by the pier and pets her fluffy chihuahua with her painted stiletto nails
Her back is worn out, all in a day’s work though
Still her whisky raspy laughter punctuates the laden ocean shore
She removes her Dior sunglasses to reveal the most enchanting pair of eyes
Bewitching windows that tell of ensnared souls unwilling to escape the abyss
The way she gazes into the horizon with a grin and a hooded wink
And sighs with contentment
That she finessed the gullible and the cynics alike
Her happiness has been guaranteed
This queen’s chaff is worth more than other women’s (s)corn
I am a young and upcoming budding writer. My biggest accomplishments in my less than a year worth of active writing have been being published in some of the biggest literary magazines like African Writer, Jalada Africa, Poetry Life & Times, and The Kalahari Review where I have won the Igby Prize for Non-Fiction. I have also been highly favored to start my personal blog (mercyonmeweb.com), which is my canvas that is always being filled with juicy storytelling, poetry and reviews.
Additionally, I am a lover of the arts, travel and pop culture, and an unapologetic feminist.
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times his publications include All the Babble of the Souk and Cartoon Molecules collected poems and Key of Mist the recently published Tesserae translations from Spanish poets Guadalupe Grande and Carmen Crespo visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds) and his latest Collected Poems Volume at Next-Arrivals
A Robin Finnegan Poem. Video Audio Visual.
Adam and Eve – The fall: of a once wallstrait oldparr is retaled early in bed and later on life down through all christian minstrelsy. James Joyce Finnegan’s Wake: thunder in several world languages, including French (tonnerre), Italian (tuono), Ancient Greek (bronte) and Japanese (kaminari) –
(bababadalgharaghtakamminarronnkonnbronntonnerronntuonnthunntrovarrhounawnskawntoohoohoordenenthurnuk!) = 100 letter word. Editor’s Note.
Robin Ouzman Hislop is on line Editor at Poetry Life & Times and Co Editor at Artvilla.com and Motherbird.com. His publications include Voices without Borders Volume 1 (USA), Cold Mountain Review (Appalachian University, N.Carolina), The Poetic Bond Volumes, Phoenix Rising from the Ashes (an international anthology of sonnets) The Honest Ulsterman, Cratera No 3 and Wall Anthology, Aquillrelle.com. His recent works are three volumes of collected poems All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules & Next Arrivals. 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), published through Aquillrelle., in November 2017 these works were presented in a live performance at The International Writer’s Conference hosted by the University of Leeds. UK. Further appearances are in the publications Aquillrelle’s Best, Aquillrelle’s Anthologies Selecting the Best and Aquillrelle’s Published the Best, all available at Amazon.com & main online distributors. He also appears in the recently published free online anthology 1000 Poets for Change. Leeds 2017, accessible now at Artvilla.com & Motherbird.com
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times his publications include All the Babble of the Souk and Cartoon Molecules collected poems and Key of Mist the recently published Tesserae translations from Spanish poets Guadalupe Grande and Carmen Crespo visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds) and his latest Collected Poems Volume at Next-Arrivals
Edge. A Poem by Debashish Haar
It’s 2:30 am, pacing on the terrace:
I see me ricochet against the edge
of an open window on the fourth floor.
I feel a strange numbness: a speck of ash
scatters, the end left to fall:
tumble and swing in mid air.
There’s no spark as the stub hits the ground.
I begin each day at 7:00 am
somewhere near the spot
where the stub hit the ground.
Debashish is a machine learning scientist, who has been published in literary magazines several times 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. Editors 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 his publications include All the Babble of the Souk and Cartoon Molecules collected poems and Key of Mist the recently published Tesserae translations from Spanish poets Guadalupe Grande and Carmen Crespo visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds) and his latest Collected Poems Volume at Next-Arrivals
On the razor’s edge, Iceland. A Poem by Anna Maria Dall’Olio
Islanda sul filo del rasoioSospiro. Spuma sgorga. Ghiacciaio fulminato frana fiume fluente.
Astronomico il debito statale. Soverchi tassi d'interesse. Basso livello medio salariale. Vasti strazi nell'infero profondo. Campi di lava. O grano. Fili d'erba sul filo del rasoio.
("Latte & Limoni", 2014)
On the razor’s edge, Iceland
Something sighed a flowing river is falling foam flows out. Too high is the national debt too high are interest rates too low are median incomes. The toxic torture in the deepest depths. Either lava or corn fields. On the razor’s edge, blades of grass.Anna Maria Dall’Olio
She has been teaching English in Italian high schools since 1987. She devoted herself to fiction, poetry and playwriting. In 2005 she was ranked second in “Hanojo – via Rendevuo“, a Vietnamese cultural competition for the millennial celebration of Hanoj (1010-2010). Moreover, she was ranked first/second/third in lots of literary competitions for her Italian poems (2006-2018).She published a short novel, “Segreti” (“Secrets”, 2018). Besides, she published 5 collections of poems:”Sì shabby chic” (“So shabby chic”, 2018), “L’acqua opprime” (“Water oppresses”, 2016), “Fruttorto sperimentale” (“Experimental Food Forest”, 2016), “Latte & Limoni” (“Milk & Lemons”, 2014), “L’angoscia del pane” (“Bread is anguish”, 2010). Finally, She wrote “Tabelo” (“Table”, 2006), a play in Esperanto dealing with mobbing as a supreme artistic form.
Web site: www.annamariadallolio.it
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times his publications include All the Babble of the Souk and Cartoon Molecules collected poems and Key of Mist the recently published Tesserae translations from Spanish poets Guadalupe Grande and Carmen Crespo visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds) and his latest Collected Poems Volume at Next-Arrivals
Life and Opinions of Doctor BOP the Burnt-Out-Prof. Collected Poems by EM Schorb. Reviewed by Robin Ouzman Hislop
Excerpt from
Life and Opinions of Doctor BOP
A poem is a posit, an assertion, an act,
and in action we forget fear: respite
in creation, the maker takes a stand, in making,
but is it a stand no better than gimmick-makers make?
Well, poetry possesses the virtue of being a record,
at least, and you can date a poem, if you wish,
thus giving it the merit of a worldly fact
contained in a system of time, which, admittedly,
is a system which is perhaps pseudo-fact itself,
or will become so as matter completes its withdrawal
upon itself to revisit its beginnings in a black hole in space;
and yet, until then, something like a fact,
a fact in the sense that Sherlock Holmes is almost real
and lives in Baker Street in a fictional series
in a real world that may exist only in a dream
that is being dreamed elsewhere, perhaps—dare I say—
by Yahweh; and so poetry becomes an actual little stab
and, poets hope, rip in the black sheet
that covers the deserted, haunted mansion.
Reviewed at:
Amazon.co.uk Life and Opinions of Doctor BOP the Burnt-Out-Prof and Other Poems . See also Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk Emanations from the Penumbra Poems EM Schorb See also: Amazon.com
Review of
Life and Opinions of Doctor BOP
by
Robin Ouzman Hislop (Editor of PLT)
Many poets often turn to playwrites, more so than the other way about, and undoubtedly, imo, EM Schorb’s early background in theater has led to his latest theme in poetics “Life and Opinions of Doctor BOP ( the Burnt – Out – Prof and other Poems)”. In fact, it seems to me, the entire text hovers between sketches, vignettes, and biographic autobiographical narration in the first person. As a European, but one who has followed, as well, with keen interest North Amercan academia in poetics. As much as philosophy, related to cosomology and evolutionary concerns in the new sciences. It comes as an edifying experience to be introduced to the home grown frantics of North American Campus life, or insomuch, the affect it has had on our character in question, Doctor BOP. Actually, in the reading of the first part of this three part volume, a practically epic poem consisting of some seventeen pages, I was strangely reminded of the later short story writings of JD Salinger’s depiction of University life as an undergraduate English lecturer. He was in fact, as he describes himself, a rather reclusive English lecturer. And one of his passages springs vividly to mind, as he mentions in a more or less autobiographical narration, how as a now muchly graying and aging professor, he hastily makes himself scarce, the moment a group or anything like of under 40’s looms on his horizon, (on the Campus). A far cry from the days of Catcher in the Rye, perhaps we might encounter our Doctor BOP, as Schorb portrays him, as having travelled a somewhat similar way, perhaps a universal way of all burnt-out-profs. At least for the birth of our Doctor BOP, as he emerges from the Yiddish community, where due to a series of social phenomena peculiar to North American modern history, he finds himself born into the world of academia at midriff with his family’s origin, social background and status. Here Schorb brings his own background knowledge of Yiddish custom and vocabulary into full play in all its richness, in the first part of the central theme to the work. It is but one of the literary treats he devises. The whole text is replete with a classical apotheosis, religious epitomes, literary analogues and philosophical allusions, all of which abound in the head of Doctor BOP, as he makes his final but defiant bow before the world. The poems obviously are tragico/comico, there is satire, irony, bitterness, humour and kindness blended together with eruditeness. The text is littered with phrases in Latin, Greek, Yiddish, Spanish, we even have augenblick (in the blink of an eye, or in the moment) for Hamlet in German, and of course, Orator fit, poeta nascitur, poeta nascitur, non fit. (A speaker is made, a poet is born, not made). According to Doctor BOP, who quotes extensively from bibliographies of writers past and present and salutes us in the final part of the first part with vaya con Dios, my Darlings. Doctor BOP makes a delightful read, which the two latter parts of this small volume only serve to embed, and is well worth the buy, if only to raise the dust from our minds to reminisce over our studious years and the host of miscellenious trivia that is the heritage of our race in all its travail – a poor player who struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more – to coin yet another allusion.
Biography
E. M. Schorb attended New York University, where he fell in with a group of actors and became a professional actor. During this time, he attended several top-ranking drama schools, which led to industrial films and eventually into sales and business. He has remained in business on and off ever since, but started writing poetry when he was a teenager and has never stopped. His collection, Time and Fevers, was a 2007 recipient of an Eric Hoffer Award for Excellence in Independent Publishing and also won the “Writer’s Digest” Award for Self-Published Books in Poetry. An earlier collection, Murderer’s Day, was awarded the Verna Emery Poetry Prize and published by Purdue University Press. Other collections include Reflections in a Doubtful I, The Ideologues, The Journey, Manhattan Spleen: Prose Poems, 50 Poems, and The Poor Boy and Other Poems.
Schorb’s work has appeared widely in such journals as The Yale Review, The Southern Review, The Virginia Quarterly Review, The Chicago Review, The Sewanee Review, The American Scholar, and The Hudson Review.
At the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2000, his novel, Paradise Square, was the winner of the Grand Prize for fiction from the International eBook Award Foundation, and later, A Portable Chaos won the Eric Hoffer Award for Fiction in 2004.
Schorb has received fellowships from the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center and the North Carolina Arts Council; grants from the Ludwig Vogelstein Foundation, the Carnegie Fund, Robert Rauschenberg & Change, Inc. (for drawings), and The Dramatists Guild, among others. He is a member of the Academy of American Poets, and the Poetry Society of America.
PRIZE-WINNING BOOKS
BY E.M. SCHORB
Books available at Amazon.com
_______________________________________
Dates and Dreams, Writer’s Digest International Self-
Published Book Award for Poetry, First Prize
Paradise Square, International eBook Award
Foundation, Grand Prize, Fiction, Frankfurt Book Fair
A Portable Chaos, The Eric Hoffer Award for Fiction,
First Prize
Murderer’s Day, Verna Emery Poetry Prize, Purdue
University Press
Time and Fevers, The Eric Hoffer Award for Poetry
and Writer’s Digest International Self-Published Book
Award for Poetry, each First Prize
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times his publications include All the Babble of the Souk and Cartoon Molecules collected poems and Key of Mist the recently published Tesserae translations from Spanish poets Guadalupe Grande and Carmen Crespo visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds) and his latest Collected Poems Volume at Next-Arrivals
I Wonder. A Poem by Judy Moskowitz
If we were all brain with no body, face, or flesh
just one hundred billion neurons
would we create the wonder
of a second thought
know empathy
feel churning hunger
I wonder
in a world unarmed, harmless as a dance
would the flaw of our species
crave the taste for blood
just for the thrill of it
like a first kiss
Judy started playing piano at the age of three, and studied at the Julliard School Of Music in New York City, her native city.
She became a jazz pianist and continues to play jazz. Now residing in Florida, she started writing poetry three years ago, and has been published in the Moonlight Dreamers Of The Yellow Haze anthology, Thepoetcommunity, Whispers in the wind, Indiana Voice Journal. Poetry runs deep in her veins along with Music.
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times his publications include All the Babble of the Souk and Cartoon Molecules collected poems and Key of Mist the recently published Tesserae translations from Spanish poets Guadalupe Grande and Carmen Crespo visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds) and his latest Collected Poems Volume at Next-Arrivals
A HOLOCAUST EXPRESS. A Poem by Milton P. Ehrlich
I drive alongside an 18-wheeler loaded with lambs on their way
to Chuck’s Custom Slaughter in Dixon. Halal slaughter welcome.
The lamb’s melancholy faces protrude from bars in wooden cages,
as if to plead their case from as they eye-ball every passing motorist
for one more day of roaming in the bucolic pastures called home.
I’ll never eat another lamb chop.
Milton P. Ehrlich, Ph.D. is an 87-year old a psychologist who began writing poems after the age of seventy. He has published many of his poems in periodicals such as the Toronto Quarterly, Wisconsin Review, Mobius, The Chiron Review, Samsara, Blue Collar Review Cartier Street Review, Naugatauk River Review, Taj Mahal Review, Poetica Magazine,Christian Science Monitor and the New York Times..
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times his publications include All the Babble of the Souk and Cartoon Molecules collected poems and Key of Mist the recently published Tesserae translations from Spanish poets Guadalupe Grande and Carmen Crespo visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)