Cheng- Chueh

Silent and serene,
forgetting words, bright
clarity appears before you…

Vladimir Nabokov

“The pages are still blank, but there is a miraculous feeling of the words being there, written in invisible ink and clamoring to become visible.”
Vladimir Nabokov

Locked Doors

Locked Doors
by Anne Sexton
For the angels who inhabit this town,
although their shape constantly changes,
each night we leave some cold potatoes
and a bowl of milk on the windowsill.
Usually they inhabit heaven where,
by the way, no tears are allowed.
They push the moon around like
a boiled yam.
The Milky Way is their hen
with her many children.
When it is night [...]

Come out, come out whereever you are

Melancholy
by Baron Wormser

Weakness—the pale succumbing to loneliness,
Refusing to admit anyone else, indulging
The blue perquisites of adolescence
Long past their sensible deliquescence.
He knew it but went on drinking and regretting,
Not calling his friends and regretting,
Making scenes over nothing and regretting.
It helped to make him despise himself,
Which was, he sensed, what he wanted. He was
Then, in his oblique [...]

Billowing Habit

Square Dancing with Sister Robert Claire
by Michael Cleary
First week of junior high, Kel wised off to her
same as he’d done to the one all year before.
I can still see it. Her so short, the uppercut put
all her weight under the whack of her pudgy fist
against the V of his chin. Kel arching a back-dive, landing
legs [...]

Pages

EMPTY PAGES NO LONGER YOUNG

 

f-i-n-g-e-r-s-p-e-l-l-i-n-g

I have voices in my head that relive the past. I have voices in my head that pull open my file cabinent of thought. I have voices in my head that demand I replay portions of my past, wishing I said things I wish I said, and I have voices in my head that
MAKE UP [...]

I am supposed to write.

I need crayons. I have them. I need markers. I have them. They sit in empty coffee cans. They are waiting to be used. Use me, Periwinkle screams. Use me, Marigold screams. No! Use me, Gray screams. I will use all of you, I will bide my time, my dear ones, I will not only [...]

the Earth

 
                                          speaks to us in whispers
 
listen
 
O Earth, wait for me
 …toward which corner of the mountain no one can tell, in these misty clouds; it is only beginning, the beginning of an ending, ending a beginning, thus.  …toward which direction the rooster points, the door faces North, downward pointing to the gates of Hell, my good sir.   [...]

sarah with the red door has impeccable taste

so you want to be a writer? — Bukowski

if it doesn’t come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don’t do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don’t do it.
if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don’t do it.
if you’re [...]