Kugel decided then and there

that he would die a happy man,
that he would consider his meager life
a success, if
in years to come,
somewhere,
someday,
someone
kicked in Jonah’s door
and Jonah was surprised.
Shocked.
Amazed.

Let him be utterly
bewildered, dear God.

Let him wonder,
raised-eyebrowed and slack-jawed,

They kick doors in now?
Since when?
Hang on, hang on—
they’re putting people in ovens?
You can’t be serious.
Since when
do people
put other people
in ovens?

From Hope: A Tragedy by Shalom Auslander (2012). By Ailsa Holland.

Snakes

I don’t mind snakes
but sometimes
they’ve been quite

you know: snakes
going up legs
and snakes everywhere
warm on your skin

lots of snakes
like giant white albino pythons
I don’t mind them
so it’s all right

I don’t mind them
I quite like them
but yeah
if you didn’t I mean

From an interview with Kate Moss in The Times, 26 January 2012. By Thom.

A relationship with the vernacular

Let us also recognize
our own native
detachable snake-hips,
our rangy legs,

our educated feet.
Our arms and fingers
wave and snap
in a special way.
Our shoulders hang
as no other people’s
shoulders hang.

A quotation from the writings of Lincoln Kirstein from ‘Musical Myths of the American West’, by Stephen Brown, a review in the Times Literary Supplement, 9 November 2012. By Rishi Dastidar.

Game over

Even our ideas
Rick
are most certainly not our own

We have read everything
somewhere
or have heard it
somewhere

We’ve got nothing
really
except each other

And we hate each other

From a discussion of the political divide on Salon.com. By Wesley Brown.

Ontology

And
painters don’t
know they are.

Not
Ed Ruscha.
Not Robert Indiana.

They
just don’t
know. But they

are.
It’s good
they don’t know.

They’d
be impoverished
by their art

if
they knew.

Taken from Will Vispo Last? Will Vispo be? on dbqp. By Andrew Bailey.

Guitar practice

Wait until the moon is out
then go outside
eat a multi-grained bread
and play your guitar to a bush.
If the bush doesn’t shake
eat another piece of bread.

From Captain Beefheart’s 10 Commandments of Guitar Playing. By Grace Andreacchi.

On Feet

Slippers are designed
to be slipped into
without help from the hand.
They are monuments to
the hatred of bending down.

A quotation from Theodor W. Adorno’s Minima Moralia: Reflections on Damaged Life. By Marika Rose.

This much I know

I remember running
across the sand at Seaforth beach
when I was three
chasing a red bouncing ball
and hearing my aunt scream
before picking me up
her stepping between silver studs
in the sand

I’d run into a minefield
There was no red ball
It was the family dog
that I had chased
It had been blown up

From Roger McGough: this much I know. By Lisa Oliver.

Top Floor, Duke William

An upstairs room
with red and gold chairs,
military pictures,
a dumb waiter.
A corner bar
with interesting lights-
An intriguing locked cabinet.
And below,
a framed photograph
of the queen.

From a poetry group email sent after meeting in the Duke of William pub, Matlock. By Margaret.

What is the use of our being told that we live in a democracy if we want fountains and have no fountains?

By all means
let us have a policy
of full employment,
increased production,
no gap between exports and imports,
social security,
a balanced This
and a planned That,

but let us also
have fountains –

more and more fountains –
higher and higher fountains –
fountains like wine,
like blue and green fire,
fountains like diamonds –

and rainbows
in every square.

From J B Priestly’s book Delight, 1949. By Ailsa Holland.