dusk's embers linger
old man on a park bench
barely visible
Michael L. Newell
on top
of a sleeping man's butt...
firefly
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
in the mirror
I am dog
obey me
Bart Solarczyk
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
 |   Browse Inside this book |  |
The weaving of the old kimonos is finer than today's, not only visually but also structurally; in them Mr. Umewaka [today's leading Noh actor] can move more freely, or I should say less constrictedly, thanks to some peculiar fashioning of the sleeves which would now cost millions of yen to reproduce. Moreover, he tells me, the artificial fertilizer ingested by the plants on which twenty-first century silkworms feed weakens the silk."
"I would say it [Kerouac's work] was based on observation, it was
based on imagination, it was based on benzedrine, also."
"Oh, Jack ..... Jack, Jack , Jack.
Walt Whitman's WatchingWe sweat & we wipe
work the world's rhythm
sway with the grass & leaves
we drink the day's end
ignore the astronomer
gazing at the stars in our cups
we speak what we will
across cyberspace
bold water, flesh & air
so snuggle up
take off your clothes
let me write a poem on you.Bart Solarczyk
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
winter afternoon
my father explains
the strength of a pawn
Peter Newton
Bart Solarczyk
the fish
unaware of the bucket...
a cool evening
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
Monday the 14th of December is the birthday of Mike Scott of The Waterboys. From perhaps their finest album, certainly my favorite and their most successful commercially, Fisherman's Blues, comes their rendition of W. B. Yeats's haunting, dark fairy story, "The Stolen Child," which is this week's Litrock selection for Issa's Sunday Service. Here's the original poem by Yeats:
The Stolen ChildWHERE dips the rocky highland
Of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
There lies a leafy island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water rats;
There we've hid our faery vats,
Full of berrys
And of reddest stolen cherries.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping
---than you can understand
Where the wave of moonlight glosses
The dim gray sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses
We foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances
Mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight;
To and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles,
While the world is full of troubles
And anxious in its sleep.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping
---than you can understand.
Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glen-Car,
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping
---than you can understand.
Away with us he's going,
The solemn-eyed:
He'll hear no more the lowing
Of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob
Sing peace into his breast,
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal chest.
For he comes, the human child,
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping
---than he can understand.
Scott adds the refrain from Yeats's poem at the opening and so its serves as the chorus for the song. Very nicely done, indeed. This is the first appearance for both The Waterboys and Yeats on the LitRock list, but I have a feeling it won't be the last.
The Waterboys have put together and will be performing an all-Yeats show in March 2010 at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin. The 5 shows have almost completely sold out. No doubt this will be something of an historical event; one can only hope that a recording will be made, either live or in the studio afterward.
****************************************
This week's featured poem comes from Lilliput Review #52, from December 1993. Here's a number from Pittsburgh's finest purveyor of the short poem, Bart Solarczyk. Enjoy.
Words (for Keith Richards)Most things come & go.
Some things last forever.
We are all forgiven.
None of us is saved.Bart Solarczyk
And the master:
have you come
to save us haiku poets?
red dragonfly
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
best,
Don
Before the day
turns hard
the cat's orange head
Bart Solarczyk
Lisa Espenmiller
temple tea--
the cat is served
too
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
In my new robe
this morning --
someone else.Basho translated by Lucien Stryk
Incense smoke mingles
with discarded thoughts—
temple gong.
Rehn Kovacic
Bart Solarczyk
taking turns
with the prayer gong...
mountain cuckoo
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
Bart Solarczyk
Lisa Espenmiller
Back in the day when I was a fixture on the Asbury Park boardwalk, I'd often stop and talk to Madam Marie as she sat on her folding chair outside the Temple of Knowledge.
I'd sit across from her on the metal guard rail bordering the beach, and watched as she led the day trippers into the small back room where she would unlock a few of the mysteries of their future. She always told me mine looked pretty good - she was right. The world has lost enough mystery as it is - we need our fortunetellers. We send our condolences out to her family who've carried on her tradition. Over here on E Street, we will miss her.
--Bruce Springsteen
Love in the Warm Sweet Air of Springtime
Sheets loosen
fall to the floor
the lamps tip
magazines slip
everything is touched
everything is moved.
Janell Moon
oh touch me you fool
and for all he's worth
his fingers fall like
pale leaves into the
wet autumn of spring
Angel D. Zapata
typical male
here I am
getting that
hackneyed
dog shit
creeping out
from under the snow
poem
out of my system
Matt Welter
Columbus Avenue
Sidewalk slick with rain,
the fortune teller's daughter
sits barefoot in a doorway,
her painted toes curl in moist air.
The florist flirts, sells me white flowers,
casablanca lilies, he likes saying.
A street singer cries through this thick air,
he beats good rhythm on his thighs
and I give him money, of course I do.
Lonnie Hull Dupont
Proust
He wrote and
rewrote the
last of Remembrance
in bed, taped
changes on
to changes, some
paper accordion
folded out
across the
room with penned
corrections.
He died days later,
the manuscripts
still near the
bed like a
ticking watch on
the wrist of
a dead soldier.
Lyn Lifshin
the fate of the tang dynasty
ink died
sparrow lives
W. B. Keckler
Note: If you would like to receive the two current issues of Lilliput
Review free (or haveyour current subscription extended two issues),
just make a suggestion of a title or titles for the Near Perfect Books
of Poetry page, either in a comment to this post, in email to lilliput
review at gmail dot com, or in snail mail to the address on the
homepage.
Originally published in "Third Lung Review"
Post-PoliticsDreaming we'd dreamt
a new dream
we slunk off at dawn
ashamed we'd been
dreaming at all.Bart Solarczyk
evening--
he wipes horse shit off his hand
with a chrysanthemumIssa
translated by David G. Lanoue
there are countless sub-stratas of rising surprise from the
human firmament ...
Cover by Harland Ristau
Mark Jackley, who has contributed some great work to Lilliput Review, has a new collection of poems out, entitled Cracks and Slats, from Amsterdam Press, part of the pertly named Gob Pile Chapbook Series. Here's a neat little poem from that collection, one of the endless variations in poetry on immortalizing a loved one:
Poet and DaughterI am my words,
ink and pixels,
you my link
to eternity,
the bright and vast
intensity
of the
empty page.Mark Jackley
-----------------------------------------------------
Lake Shore in Half LightThere is a question I want to ask
and I can't remember it
I keep trying to
I know it is the same question
it has always been
in fact I seem to know
almost everything about it
leading me to the lake shore
at daybreak or twilight
and to whatever is standing
next to the question
as a body stands next to its shadow
but the question is not a shadow
if I knew who discovered
zero I might ask
what there was beforeW. S. Merwin
Jonas Winet
PostcardA light wet snow
waters the back yard.
I watch from the sofa.
I miss your small hands.Bart Solarczyk
Coral Hull
she comes home
still pissed
lets in a flyWilliam Hart
Issa
translated by David Lanoue
a farting contest
under the moonflower trellis...
cool airIssa
translated by David G. Lanoue
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