new poetry 2023

“On the 60th Anniversary of the Killing of JFK”

a poem by Caud Sewer Bile

photo c/o New York Times

“ruthless men seek my life”                       
—King David, “Psalm 54”

Does anybody still believe, in ode or threnody,
Lee Harvey Oswald murdered John Fitzgerald Kennedy?
There was so much corruption in that so-called Camelot,
and false analysis done on the body that was shot.

Which members of the militant industrial complex
joined with police and secret service for such vile effects?
Which judges and which politicians were complicitous?
How many people in the world were duplicitous?

How many had to die to keep the cover-up in tact?
How much fake news flew through the mainstream media, in fact?
Who in the mafia, the FBI, and CIA,
were at the beck and call of ruthless men and LBJ?

XXX

(Caud Sewer Bile is a pen-name anagram for poet Bruce Dale Wise.)

“House Concert” by James Croal Jackson

(THIRD OF THREE POEMS)

Anteater in an audience of

under-thirties. Metal microphone’s

demonic glint. Guitar on green

rack. Sad songs sing for

yellow-eyed grass to sway to.

Kill me, saccharine sugar. I

allowed myself to

undress my fur and

foreclaws.

Fire burns in the auburn

my species warned

against– a crowd of sadness

no nation’s a stranger to.


James Croal Jackson‘s first autumn 2023 poem for us was “Moment (October).”

His second autumn 2023 poem for us was “Fault.”

An Excerpt from “Slick” by Ali J. Prince

A SNEAK PREVIEW OF NEW POP LIT’S NEXT FEATURE

Tyranny doesn’t come in an App
We’ve seen it before

It’s got a moustache and a harsh pair of trousers
It’s old and cold and suffers in silence
All forbidding and grey and indiscriminate violence
It knocks on your door, at four, with a document

And smells of telephone wires and corridors, tobacco and damp pavement

It was in a film with the award-winning actor, he lost a stone to emote in a prison shirt
It was critically acclaimed so they put his hollow bones in a sepia toned aftershave advert

Tyranny doesn’t look like a gurning, groomed comedian

Who has emojis in his bio

And the gait of a hyperactive child

Coming Soon!

“Moment (October)”

A POEM BY JAMES CROAL JACKSON

spring wind

palette of butterflies

                golden hour

                         the shuffled-card memory

                         flipped through photos

                         the month passed

_______________________________________________________________

James Croal Jackson is a Filipino-American poet who works in film production. His latest chapbooks are Count Seeds With Me (Ethel Zine & Micro-Press, 2022) and Our Past Leaves (Kelsay Books, 2021). Recent poems are in Stirring, Vilas Avenue, and *82 Review. He edits The Mantle Poetry from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (jamescroaljackson.com)

This is the first of three poems to be presented here by James.

“Jon Fosse’s Work”: A Poem

by Lars U. Ice Bedew

photo c/o Henrik Montgomery, TT News Agency

Influenced by the Irish playwright Beckett, in his scope,

his plays are bleak, impersonal, and minimal in hope.

From “Raut, svart” to the doppelgängers in “…Septology…”

his novel on Lars Herterveg explores psychology,

where he observes two crossing lines, one purple and one brown,

slow painted, thick, they mix and drip—not how art should be done?

Yet of the things that are most striking of Jon Fosse’s work

is that the prose and poetry are written in Nynorsk;

in short terse sentences he gave “voice to th’ unsayable”,

like a Norse Hemingway’s words, earnest and conveyable.

***

(“Lars U. Ice Bedew” is an anagram pseudonym for poet Bruce Dale Wise.)

“Little Church”

A POEM BY DOMINIK SLUSARCZYK

c/o The Mystic Pilgrim at Flickr

Forever and ever
We converse about this little church.
You want to cover it with shiny baubles and flashing fairy lights
So it will always be Christmas.
I want to fill it with fragile bubbles
So it will always be bath time.

This church has stood strong for centuries
But we will be here to see it fall.

Nothing built with stone can ever last.

I see this church
As shadows in cobwebbed corners.
You see this church
As a soldier angrily piercing the side of the sky.

You have to have lived to die.

////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\

Dominik Slusarczyk is an artist who makes everything from music to painting. His poetry has been published in various literary magazines including Fresh Words, Berlin Lit, and Home Planet News. His fiction has been published in moonShine Review. 

Another Sneak Preview

SEVEN POEMS IN ONE!

“Haikus” by Sara Megan Kay

In a rage, she shot
Fire from her mouth and I
Ran for my dear life.

He undressed close by.
I said I didn’t want to
See, but I had lied.


Clouds burning pink light
Against a busy street.
I feel the cold.


You look at me and
Inside my body quivers.
I despise your youth.


Sitting here alone, I
Await your walking into
My door drunk. Come in.


Moonlight slips on a
Robe of sadness and black
Bearded ladies sing.


Kiss me, Fantasy-
This is why you stay away?
The wait turns me gray.

XXX

More poetry by Sara Megan Kay will arrive soon at our main site.

“The Crow” by Ken Kakareka

(Painting: “Wheatfield with Crows” by Vincent van Gogh, 1890.)

A black crow
blots
a sunflower-soaked
field.
They stare
at him –
his ugliness.
But it
does not
deter him.
He caws
loudly,
it makes
the sunflowers
shrivel.
They squirm
to hide
from him,
to overthrow him,
flustered at
his presence.
But he
does not
relent.
He caws
until the sunflowers
shiver
with hatred.
Suddenly,
another crow
joins him.
And then
another.
Soon,
a whole black mass
of crows,
like an oil spill
in an ocean.
They caw
together
with the
reverberation
of an elephant’s roar.
It folds
the field
of sunflowers
into depletion.
They whimper
at the sight
of the black mass
as it
soars away
towards the sun.

XXXX

Ken Kakareka is a poet, novelist, short story writer, essayist, and editor who lives in Fullerton, California with his lovely wife. He is the author of Late to Bed, Late to Rise (Black Rose Writing, 2013). Ken’s words have appeared or are on their way in a number of rags including Gargoyle Magazine, Route 7 Review, Horror Sleaze Trash, The Beatnik Cowboy and so on. A list of selected publications can be found at kenkakareka.com.