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I know we're older now and lost again.

          - Cinder Well, The Wise Man's Song

Making amends with needle and thread . . .

the tape rolls . . . into another year

the cul de sac heckles . . . 

in the heat . . . words

costumed against the clock . . .

Why shallow fonts reflecting medieval myths? . . .

Unambiguous delivery, is that it? . . .

with all the boxes checked

ready to return the unwanted item,

asking What was I thinking? . . .
They have to put it somewhere . . .

and then there's the restocking fee, as if  . . .

As if, what? . . .

As if misdirection, you know,

seductive angularities . . .

Perhaps the stained suburb

with its unremarkable scripts

which never quite materialize . . .

Branding the trend

climbing into the high seat

shiny deisel stack fluttering

and here's the yellow brick road . . .

and here's the awkwardness of the stand-up comic . . .

and your willingness to try on

different disguises

different genres

different voices . . .

a mark of something . . . courage or curiosity . . .

I put the kettle on, the wise man's song for you . . .

Categorizing cobwebs to forget

the confusing slipperiness

belying insouciance

fragments of warm nights

suitcased against the mind's insistence on winter . . .

Dancing with you in an empty room

windowed in a dream

vaporizing with a fretless riff

all eyes on nits

and you sliding into a limo's back seat

with suits of armor

gaming a rightness

in putting things together wrong . . .

The taming of the neighborhood's Oscar Wildes

the same face of damp sand

a story in a stone

on a beach where ocean yields to sky . . .

Cinder Well

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You're running lines at Costco's pumps

eavesdropping foreplays

among pencil nubs . . .

The slippery slope of ramping up . . .

And so it went . . .

white horses close reading Golden Books

rearing up for the

Thanksgiving holiday traffic . . .

You once knew Brooklyn

and the ghosts at Ebbets Field

driving a cab

to your father’s Koshered delight

motoring upstate one lonesome blizzard

to harpoon lattes with Starbuck

whose chucking elicited oohs and ahs

from landlinelubbers . . .

Sending Snaps on Snapchat

sounds like a plan

not unlike launching weather balloons

according to code

at dawn's early light

in the high peaks . . .

The Geek Squad is lobbying

to shut down the magical portal

adjusting the resolution

of Nobel Laureate Anne Carson's

bouncing words doing what they must do . . .

leaving your mouth dry

with a bunch of toys

stockpiled against retirement's emptiness . . .

Nobel laureate Anne Carson (profile) . . .

Words bounce. Words, if you let them, will do what they want to do and what they have to do.

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Enjambment as a fun house mirror . . .

lines jostling for the part

of winter . . . time racing to infinity

following the path

with yesterday’s metric 

as if renting a

Royal Enfield Himalayan

for the last stretch to the base

where some gear junkie

is touting approach shoes

redirecting you to Kierkegaard

on simple living, resilience,

and closeness to nature . . .

walking as philosophy,

as physical training, as refutation . . .

how you felt a shift

in your chaotic whirlwind,

what next life,

when a voice told you to slow down,

and you listened, you listened . . .

Paolo Roversi

Poetry's Trans . . .

So I’ve been playing around with the idea

of how poets make poems.

How some, that I call transcribers,

try to take a snapshot of the moment.

How others - translators -

try to extrapolate the essence of the moment.

And how still others - transformers -

try to springboard beyond the moment.

These three non-hierarchical elements -

transcription, translation, transformation -

engage to different degrees

when poets make poems.

Tim Burton's Corpse Bride

From my Proust's New Eyes

Albertine Simonet is Marcel’s mistress . . .

Marcel is the narrator of Marcel Proust’s

seven-volume À la recherche du temps perdu . . .

In Search of Lost Time . . .

Marcel is Proust . . .

Marcel is obsessed with Albertine . . .

He wishes to possess her . . . to own her . . .

Albertine appears in three of the seven volumes . . .

Her name occurs 2,363 times . . . on 807 pages . . .

Albertine is first seen pushing her bicycle

on a beach . . . skirts billowing . . .

Marcel will return again and again to this image . . . 

Albertine is asleep in 19 percent of the novel . . .

Asleep, she becomes a plant . . .

her hair like crinkly black violets . . .

Proust uses plants as metaphors

for female sexual desire . . .

In The Albertine Workout the poet Anne Carson

notes that plants expose their genitalia . . .

Marcel observes that sometimes in her sleep

Albertine throws off her kimono and lies naked . . .

Hence, Proust’s fascination with sleep . . .

Fade to black . . .

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And the question: What now? . . .

This re-enactment . . . to what end? . . .

Of course, the interruption

chirping throughout the fugue state

unsettles . . . as night cosplays

fueled by excitement, with you

unhitched and fascinating,

rereading chapters on enchantment,

within which the unwary

are  about to be entranced . . .

You have been told

to ignore the commonplace

go with the thrill, before scarring

traps your rambunctiousness . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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This idea of ritual cleansing . . .

rehearsals sputtering on

about mathematical equivalence

as two theories

developed independently

tapdance along the parapet

with much to say

given the tugging fortnight

already vehement . . .

Look, it could be worse . . .

The extras have been duly noted . . .

You were told . . . and told again . . .

Throwing a tizzy will register disapproval

among the misled, pale and flummoxed . . .

Yet another instance of serial-whistling . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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You're buried in a potboiler on the beach

in the middle of a turkey sub

wondering what hasn't been done

and done again as life is done

in watermelon sugar

with how-to's what-not's and what-ever's . . .

Will time tell beyond the plantar fasciitis

springing up with every step

of an insistent go-between? . . .

Why go between, yes? . . .

Why the culinary curves of odysseyites

in anorexic kitchens? . . .

Why late at night lying in bed

without the gift of sleep

you dream archival footage to be found

in discovery among trembling windows

with offcolor shutters? . . .

Why the shake, rattle, and roll? . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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Your life skirts the edge of a backstory

looking out from within

with information overload ready to pounce . . .

How quaint, yes, this throwback

to earlier, safer times . . . cushioned

by innocence and ethical underpins . . .

Sitting on your hands will be zoomed

but think of the day's other options . . .

When will it stream on Netflix? . . .

When will it arrive? . . .

When will it close? . . .

You’re about to shift into overdrive

which is nothing compared to the day's triggers

awaiting mispronunciation in the condiment aisle

coupon-slingers milling about . . .

I saw you there in all your paginations

colorful and wonderful and anticipatory . . .

as if your flight had been rerouted

in the last chapter

of your shortlisted autofiction . . .

Antonio Palmerini

Lake Myosotis

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You wonder the entanglement of a cafe

in a city you don't know

the quiet desperation of regulars

sidetracked by modal elements

as if confusion is a friend . . .

Your work, yes? . . . What is it all about? . . .

Words arranging themselves

rearranging themselves

making public your proxy . . . like you're all of it

before and after . . . getting lost

in your head . . . and this is good . . .

quickening the strained look . . . 

the horseplay on the path to elsewhere . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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The closeness . . . misinterpreted . . .

misunderstood . . . enraptured . . .

by angularities

by semblance

by excitement . . .

Proportionality as part of it, yes? . . .

the retreat to the periphery

of your entanglement? . . .

The invisibility inevitable . . .

Nothing spectacular

save for the acknowledgement of distance . . .

The moment-to-moment nomenclature of glances

with the silence of a rewrite . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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Rehearsing the penultimate

with a strange tongue

for those garden languagers

that can make it here there anywhere . . .

The alternatives crumble

to no-one's surprise . . .

understanding someone's gameplan

includes time-outs

for wrinkled foreheads . . .

Conjuring the dimmest memories

may work for a bit

but the inevitability of intimacy

as hoped for

will doubtless remain locked in memory . . .

False positives, yes? . . .

borrowing lines from the afterlife . . .

as if there is one

pissing and moaning

about yet another attack

on obscurantism . . .

the handcar leaving the station

notes and revisions

that would have made a difference

taking to the air

packing the house

with unknowns and toys for the endgame . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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You're copying pages from the book

you found creased in the sand

but nothing else . . . the emptiness

straddles the drama . . . with you

in over your head . . . a good thing

notes to yourself to close read . . .

the deconstruction . . . an element

to be hoisted onto the mast

with language for the solo voyage . . .

You hammered Moby Dick along

with your other prestidigitations . . .

a Siren entrancing odysseyites in full . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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Moving through characters

voicing their words

not unlike climbing into Instagram

playing the parts

form and function

forgetting the toxicity

of the overblown

with its confinement . . .

Out and about

with this year's seedlings

before the storm at least

before the avalanche at least . . .

Why the nonchalance? . . .

Running the changes as a distraction

fascinated by the fingering

the once and future

something or other . . .

Little matter what . . .

The crowded nursery with cart wielders

eyes and such

speed reading the tabs

imagine close reading . . .

What a trip! . . .

But what about next year? . . .

The ongoing transformation

is the trip you’ve wanted to take . . .

The trip you've been waiting for . . .

Paolo Roversi

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You plant an alphabet in your sleep

and wake to appropriation

as if the characters had been hacked

while counting guests . . .

The math checks out

but the logic to your dismay is playing dead . . .

Far too many have suffered comeuppance

with AI-generated scripts . . .

Don't worry, when the call is made

you'll have a good excuse . . .

The synchronicity is one way to go

but to insist on simple stories

shreds the complexity of language . . .

Misunderstanding's around the corner

and with everything everywhere

if you can imagine that . . .

A cold plunge into translation

would be worth it in bargaining chips

but why? . . . Why the amplitude

of pages in the book on your nightstand? . . .

I thought you were beyond that . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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The lions you've been wondering about

are crossing the River Styx

on a raft with Huck and Jim . . .

Is your man white . . . or black? . . .

Simon and Garfunkle have walked off the set

looking for America

in a time of innocence . . .

Kathy boards a Greyhound 

in Pittburgh

after Jack Gilbert's

Pittsburgh and happiness high up

each time almost remembering something

maybe important that got lost . . .

But where is Kathy now? . . .

Is Kathy still reading her magazine on the bus

in Simon and Garfunkle's America? . . .

And is she with Mrs. Robinson? . . .

And where is Joe DiMaggio? . . .

Inquiring minds want to know . . .

The dealer clears her hands

for the eye in the sky . . .

The streets are blocked off for a 5K

heading into Memorial Day

a miniscule inconvenience by comparison

surely not Bruce Cockburn's lions

on SNL circa 1980

coming through the rye

with Salinger's appropriation

of Robert Burns . . . but what the heck

it fits . . . doesn't it? . . . Holden, yes! . . .

indeed, it was a time of confidences . . .

Bruce Cockburn (SNL May 10, 1980)

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Out of earshot, yes? . . .

Meanwhile the collective belch of the day

bridges gaps in memory

deconstructed at all hours

or odd hours . . . whatever works . . .

The difference is in the fabric

the tongue-and-groove conversations

among grocery shoppers

tagged for manager specials by AI . . .

The days unfold the same . . .

quite close to the arithmetic

of a calliope . . .

Nothing can be done

but no matter . . .

the comings and goings

covering distance with more distance

protective of what the ears cannot hear . . .

Pull up the night train

with cartilage still pliable

and willing to take a stab

at identifying the flickering scent

emanating from elsewhere . . .

It's the frugalitarianism crapping out . . .

Paolo Roversi

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This will have to do for now . . .
There should be enough
especially the second movement
with its surprising reprieve . . .
There will be coffee of course
and days squandered

before confusion enters the room

and bolts the door . . .
Again this year the soil will be turned
hours set in motion against the dwindling light
yielding memories like meaty tidbits
picked at by gnarly-clawed
Rhode Island Reds, plotting escape . . .

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There's the anvil again

and the rythmic strikes of the hammer

on the red-hot steel

re-shaping the drill point

while the road crew chills with smokes

next to their idling rig . . .

And the Rhode Island Reds

their strange, soft, drawly clucking

filling the air

milling about outside the coop

scratching for worms

with gnarled, yellow claws . . .

the clotheslines . . .

attached to the telephone pole

squeak in harmony

with a push mower

and with the bell in the cherry trees

shooing away Robins . . .

You're trying to connect the dots

hungry for meaning

now with age more interested in narrative

as the bell lap sounds

in the roll and stretch of a dream . . .

the same dream . . .

the same black and white dream . . .

fearing so many things

a terrible kind of proof

so as not to be crushed

by the stupid or the vacant or the void . . .

There's this scene in Bela Tarr's The Turin Horse

with a young woman sitting next to a stove

with its pot of boiling potatoes

looking out the window at the dust storm

imagining other worlds . . .

The Turin Horse (2011)

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The argument collapsed and you were left

sifting through the shape of water . . .

The can of spray paint

used to highlight the separate steps

was found and dusted . . .

with odysseyites analyzing the has-been . . .

A beautiful mind was awakened

to walk among and comment on

the plantings . . . a horticultural escapade

for those in the know . . .

Counting worked wonders

and in no time the path to the argument

was uncovered and made presentable

which seemed to have been part of the plan

from the get-go . . .

Paolo Roversi

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You're asking about the doors

and why they're opening and closing

and why Kafka's path - beginning middle end -

had to have been put down simultanously

as corroborated by footage

that didn't exist . . .

So a walk in the garden among the peerless

the moment you realize

the connections that the writer/director

had diligently worked out

in the late hours of their mind . . .

It's not so much the expansion

of thoughts as it is the extension . . .

the detritus of the day-to-day

with meanderers choosing happiness . . .

aloud no less so that others might appreciate

their impulsivity and the seedlings

scattering in time to the second movement

of the drama unfolding in your backstory

despite the missing pages . . .

Where to go next? . . .

But there's time . . . yes, there's time . . .

Paolo Roversi

At the Transfer Station

Rain sheets the windows of the black Dodge.

There’s a young guy in the passenger seat

and he’s giving you the thumbs up.

His grandfather is unloading the Dodge.

You're getting soaked, wrestling trash bags

out of your SUV, but you stop, put down the bags,

and give him the thumbs up.

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But more often it has to do with

insecurity or the desire to impress . . .

So they copied the painting

signed their name

and sold the painting . . .

Is this a problem? . . .

Hybridization opens a door . . .

The confluence of theory

and autobiography . . .

a no-brainer as you walk off

to look for America . . .

Would you care to elaborate

on the unique building blocks

of your interiority

all magically held together

with Elmer's Glue? . . .

But these trifles

will suck the living daylights

out of your fabrication

leaving you picking nits . . .

rearranging the colors on your palette

with ultramarine blue

in the twelve o'clock position . . .

Read the draft

as if it's the first time

to see if you've veered too far

off the yellow brick road . . .

If you want to remake a point

just go for it so to speak

in the moment

regardless that all hell

will break loose . . .

The normativity of stringing words

is choreographic . . . the listener

playing catch-up and enjoying it . . .

You were here . . . We were here . . .

just a moment ago . . . and now we're gone . . .

vaporized . . . poof! . . .

Anka Zhuravleva

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A voice warns not to sweat imprecision . . .

It's easy to drop names

gaslighting the insecure

into interpreting grocery lists

for identity thieves

posing as Alice . . . in Wonderland

sacking drivebys

doubletalking wordplay

cluttering walkups . . .

Just think makeshift or landlubber

and you'll be fine and dandy . . .

Numbering your thoughts

will doubtless serve the same purpose

until the Uber arrives

to take you to the neighborhood

medical pop-up for a quick look . . .

And what’s with the local chapter

of hand wringers? . . .

They seem exasperated . . . but why? . . .

Imagine everyone elsewhere . . .

What then? . . .

Overdubbing the verbal miasma

will open the floodgates

to a double header

where you'll be able to enjoy

the warning track

without hitting the wall . . .

Calling out for pizza

has again jammed the works

of this run-around-in-circles

kind of day . . .

Addenda have lost

their sense of purpose . . .

You are sliding off the edge

of the looking glass

while documenting rapid physical changes

transformative changes . . .

curiouser and curiouser . . .

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You're freighted with imaginary concerns

highlighting text for tomorrow's comealong . . .

Someone called in a lockdown . . .

Confrontational aesthetics is today’s special 

with teams of horses circling the wagons . . .

The stop-and-go is standing down . . .

You are stop-actioned by the congestion

at the roundabout and throw the dice

out the window . . . A voucher for a turnaround

has been duly noted . . . Now tell me again

what led you to this . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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You're calibrating a Bloch sphere

highlighting symbols in an aspiration space . . .

Cartoon characters are on deck

disturbing the peace

hammering the latest modifictions

you signed off on . . .

So it's good I guess that you've called in

for a personal day

the outer crust, the parched surface . . .

Nothing can be said

about the rhyming dictionary

that elbowed its way in

with detached conversations . . .

Someone just threw in the towel . . .

A long period of adjustment is about to launch . . .

Variable cloudiness is pouring in

with locals awaiting direction

like kites slipping along ramps of air . . .

an open-air theater

the fourth wall under construction . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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You are released with a nametag

and operating instructions . . .

The Best of . . . leaks cantankerousness . . .

The opening was abysmal

with a smattering

of almost but not quite . . .

Reliving the future, yes?

with outtakes stuffing the iCloud

counting on Number Theory

to turn the tide of indifference . . .

What's the ETA? . . .

You had better plan for a rewrite

in cuneiform loaded with appositives . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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Isn't it about time to finetune

the lawn tractor for a trip

to the seven wonders

of the neighborhood? . . .

The days when Oreos sandwiched in . . .

The peeling paint on this two-story

hides a medieval mural with cryptograms

awaiting decoding . . .

You're enjoying a beefsteak tomato

from the neighbor's garden

thinking cello lessons

with the retired music teacher

down the block . . . back home

after a stroke . . . Your autofiction

pops up in a snow globe

on a piano in a doilied parlor

where a tabby kneads a dream

between bouts of stripping wax

at the elementary school

while visitors to the cemetery

across the road

place pebbles on the headstones

of little-known castrati . . .

The full catastrophe is on standby . . .

Antonio Palmerini

Gone

You have faced the final storm,

and now float, high above the seas,

guiding fellow sailors,

your last words, Goodbye, my love.
The days have begun to lighten;
the nights are open windows.
I turn the soil for a vegetable garden:
tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, eggplant.
Rhode Island Reds appear
scratching for worms

with gnarled, yellow claws.
My grandfather, a blacksmith,

is here, too, from the dead,
a stubby Philip Morris

dangling from his lower lip.
He speaks to me, in Polish, about happiness.

Catherine Connolly (July 7, 1969 - April 5, 2012)

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You revisit memories

knowing that soon some will be overwritten

permanently deleted . . .

Several refuse to come out . . .

Others waffle . . .

A long ball into the right field bleachers

the runners advancing

too late now to rethink the gameplan . . .

You too had to be dragged in here

by the scruff of the neck

pockets turned out, shoes and socks removed,

trying to buy time, incoherent . . .

and then, of course,

the room you pretend doesn't exist . . .

Sorry, but the title has been reworked . . .

The scene rewritten . . .

Someone had to do it, yes? . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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Voiceovers of dress rehearsals

with you in the wings

running lines for passersby . . .

the moment fanning out

to memories of desire . . .

And so it returns . . .

the insistence of wind

in the guise of the lost . . .

players cast about for alternatives

losing themselves in the paroxyms of reason

grief segmenting the past

making it more interesting

than it possibly could have been . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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Why this urge for clarity? . . .

for lucidity? . . .

A Range Rover bloated with conceit

edges onto a logging road . . .

Shapeshifting bemusement

as you drop a bucket into the stream

and piece together the polyphony . . .

Begin at the beginning? . . .

You have traveled the island

collecting peculiarities

picking the actual over the real . . .

spending your allotment

thumbing up-close and personals . . .

The moments float by on a continuum . . .

Ducks in a row, yes? . . .

This self-preservation mode is a how-to

bordering elsewhere

like everything . . . in need of revision . . .

giving of yourself with no turning back . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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You inhabit fragmentation

the ins and outs

ups and downs

going through the motions

taking notes

revising scripts . . .

Everything obscured . . . obliterated . . .

layered over, as Hockney would say . . .

Matthew Brady, moving the Civil War dead

instead of the cameras . . . making it more . . . 

You talk about likes . . .

and the drama:

Call me Ishmael and all that

through however many chapters

until the Rachel appears, and finds you clinging

to drowned Queequeg's coffin . . .

A theater of lockdown drills

students huddling in the corners of rooms

doors shut

shouting sirens gunshots drones whistles engines . . .

A Day in the Life . . .

I read the news today oh boy . . .

But what of the reliability of retrospection? . . .

The eyewitnesses' embellishments . . .

unintentional yet instrumental . . .

How you enter the frame and alter it . . .

Enter the room and the conversations change . . .

You're not surprised, are you? . . .

The Doobie Brothers' Takin' It to the Streets

and you on lunch break from the bureaucracy

with a reference librarian

and they're doing a sound check

and people are beginning to segue

into the weekend . . .

he said . . . she said . . . muddied . . .

Wait . . . let's run through that again . . .

Warmify it this time, please . . .

Manipulate the image . . .

Move the dead . . .

Later, comparing notes

for the retrospective report due Monday morning . . .

In search of . . .

recording days

with a small 70's style reel-to-reel tape recorder

the loud silences

the ambient buybacks

the magic of a perfect day

convinced that there is such a thing

that it's not a fiction . . .

that there is in fact a perfect day 

not unlike the perfect day

in the film directed by Wim Wenders

about Hirayama, a janitor

who finds beauty in the world

cleaning public toilets in Tokyo . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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Semantic drift leaves you stuck mid-thought

on the slippery slope of your backstory

with corners folded . . .

In the last scene you redact emptiness

on the deck of a steamship

ferrying steampunkers

to an island of breakdown lanes

echoing the cacophony for multiple voices

when midnight matters little . . .

Particulates contaminate the River Styx

with the pushback taking on a life of its own . . .

Soon a moment of silence . . . Have you AI'd? . . .

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You're filming the in-between moments

with a hand-held camera . . .

You're pretty sure they mean something . . .

The power grid of your memory

is not a black hole

nothing like that at all

with crumbling facade along an overgrown path

sprouting shoutouts of Data Breach

expecting somersaults at inopportune times

begging for an unpacking of subject matter

thrown out in the last downsize . . .

It's the in-between moments, again, yes? . . .

the in-between moments

that have to be filled

with something, anything? . . .

How about the box of loose ends? . . .

The latest opening was cringeworthy

made more so by the late start . . .

You were perfect for the backlot scene

before you went underground with hobblers

following a trolley loaded with ho-hums

reimagining how it might have played out

if happenstance hadn't happened along

with innuendoes roaring over you

like an unscripted mudslide . . .

Antonio Palmerini

Outtakes

(reposted from Friday, June 15, 2012)

I am not now that which I have been.
          - Lord Byron

You befriend a Chinese Puzzle Box,
walk through scenes of over-rehearsal and exasperation.
The (mis)direction is good for both of you.

This time without the backdrop.
You begin to lose interest, yes?
Nonetheless, proceed as if smearing paint on canvas.

Forget the image. There is none.
Wing it.
Let yourself be enveloped by the drama

of the moment, the spontaneity
of the lens, the elements of time captured.
Bemoan the loss.

Again, this time with tension.
The method is beside the point
resurfacing as binaries

which down the road will have their say
striking a chord with many.
(Pretend an audience.)

See how far you can take it.
The surprise will be costumed in the next chapter
however oppositional.

Antonio Palmerini

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The edge of a conversation

a word here a word there

trying to piece together the fragments

trying to follow . . .

Then in the courtyard

somnambulists exchange dreams

but again you're out of the loop

so you retreat to the next chapter

of an instruction manual

filled with asemic writing

but the way in is the way out

adding to the mixtape

with tattlers exposing Easter eggs

for ventriloquists

in the throes of a talkout . . .

It's the same old same old infinite loops

from the first act breaking stride

sending the dappled engagement

off on its own golden goose chase . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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Has reading between the lines helped? . . .

What about the blank page? . . .

Is it the intimate interiority

of a different life floating in

at all hours . . . covered with snow

that keeps you young, yes? . . .

keeps you moving across

the mind's moors . . . visiting

metaphysical what-ifs, haystacks,

brick-and-mortar clock towers

the inevitability of the postponed

as you try to fit into place

the last piece of the puzzle . . .

The dropdown menu of possible endings . . .

The wherewithal coming into view . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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Can anyone die without even a little bit of poetry?

          - Mark Strand

A sudden anticipation . . . this routine of words

portending immortality . . . however fantasized . . .

A dialectic with obscurity and belatedness

participating in various dreamscapes . . .

weather mounting . . . offshore . . . rain moving in . . .

Apollo clutches Daphne . . .

You clutch a mug of morning coffee

and you get it, yes? . . . this parallel dimension

where you appear . . . unannounced

in dress rehearsals for your present waking life . . .

Antonio Palmerini

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The rustic earworms of your fantasies

storyboard Paradise Found

as you review choices made

in your past shuddered life . . .

eroticisms whispering Etch A Sketch images

infusing your DNA with new ways

into your days . . . without which

but that would be what? . . .

impastos unshackled? . . .

the clock continuing . . .

this unnecessary cupping of hands, yes

awaiting a sign . . . on this snowy night

traveling through the secret air

down the steep, down the stops, down the deepenings

until asleep . . . dreaming . . . mirrors, faces, all . . .

Kelly Boesch

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The answer in question awaits

costumed and ready . . .

There's little sense

in mapping the route

or in reconstructing the argument . . .

The cat has escaped the bag

with dissertations

waiting in the wing

to move in and have at it . . .

Just look at it differently . . .

Kierkegaard's rotation method, yes? . . .

You have passed the Driver's Test

and are finally roadworthy . . .

Advisors are at your beck and call . . .

Soon you will be off and out . . .

No need to be squeamish . . .

Kelly Boesch

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An unkindness of ravens stalks you

with forked-tongue misdirection

pulling labels, stalling the machine . . .

You fear for your inertness,

intimidated and defensive . . .

the question, How Should A Person Be?

drops with forged watercolors . . .

And now word salad is being served

as placation . . . but the bigger story . . .

yes, the bigger story . . .

Abecedarian assemblages are no exception

with beauty the answer

and not just that . . .

so thoroughly disrupting

the urge to impose,

through a sense of your evolving self

despite the irrepressible narrative . . .

Sheila Heti

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A closed timeline curve plasters walls

with canary flyers opening to the fluidity

of dreamscapes . . . Everyone is inked . . .

in solidarity . . . the word out is beyond scary

looping back onto itself . . . painstakingly

slow black-and-white panning

squeezing scripts to fit the moment . . .

the experience . . . a thousand voices . . .

You raise your hand and are dropped . . .

Kelly Boesch

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Painting with a muted palette . . .

the foreboding promiscuity head-butting

to tempt happenstance

but how to do it

without intentionality, yes? . . .

Trails groomed by AI . . .

Objects of desire vanishing . . .

There is no joy in Mudville . . .

A Magic 8 Ball rolls in

with Ask again later . . .

Now what? . . .

Are you ready to click Resume? . . .

OK, maybe go with the cosplay? . . .

but what if a much of a which of a wind

{in fact} gives truth to the summer's lie? . . .

Kelly Boesch

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Getting the words out, yes? . . .

the joy at the level of the sentence

despite hallucinating chatbots

with you touting your next iteration . . .

long lines followed by short lines

saying the real say

a window into the why . . .

Is it alive? . . .

away from the non-presence

of philosophical yadas . . .

the kinship among the disillusioned

pushing the disembodied space

into something else

energized by nature’s calisthenics . . .

You can do this . . . you know you can do this . . .

Serge Barbeau

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So what's a little queasiness? . . .

This is what you wanted, yes? . . .

this staging of the ethics of representation:

who was there? . . . who wasn't? . . .

the magic . . . what sustains it? . . .

what snuffs it out? . . .

The engaging motleyness

emerging from somewhere deeper

than rationality . . .

trying not to be judgmental . . .

the menacing collage

the porosity of stalled time

the bucket list leaking indecipherables

into your playpen of dreams

the rate of polymer degradation

awaiting your inner film preservationist . . .

Implausible . . .

Would you rather something else? . . .

How then pharmaceuticals

in the throes of ecstasy? . . .

Deep discounts? . . . of course . . .

Repercussions bouncing around

the breezeway at all hours . . .

Throat singers trailing scripts, yes! . . .

And now the day . . . with coupons . . .

Can you wait it out? . . .

Blanche Sewell

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Filling in the blanks . . . especially the urge

to drop your story

doing your Shangri-La with wait staff

unselfconsciously . . . without worry . . .

shredding the shell game . . . under glass

a peaceable array of mock-ups

gradually falling in sync . . .

The outermost dunes of imagination

with character studies for those in waiting rooms . . .

You have returned in your favorite backstory

as an elementary guide

through the valley of bass clefs . . .

The moment-to-moment on the tenth yard line

with eye sockets appended to enjambments

as if ideosyncracies managed to get through secuity

without the usual discomfitures . . .

This is good . . . with you without remorse, yes? . . .

Marcin Szpak

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I suppose that's how it began . . .

odysseyites worrying the crossing

with Facebook friends 

roadmapping next steps to happiness

morning rounds interrupting

the magical mystery tour

promised by the maître d' . . .

But the sign-up sheet? . . .

Forget that, it was a misstep . . .

But you mentioned a vague disquietude,

a vexation totally unexpected? . . .

That too was part of the excitement . . .

Apparently, you didn't get the memo . . .

So many do not want to be bothered

opening Door #3, fearing what,

identity theft? . . .

You mean tweaking? . . .

Not a big deal . . . bringing

something new to the table

should help you navigate the unknown . . .

Marcin Szpak