To When Ever They Don’t
by Paul Killebrew*
Everything the soul throws is wholly
inside the horrible shoebox of a skull, but still
I forget: How a desire waits between me
and anyone else, twists its little invisible
things into the resonating edges … How to
get the girl to “I do” into a family … How all true
going is taking … And then the weather
hangs triumphant from the hospital moon a while,
the stiff yogurt clouds strung there, they drift
into a line to ring the rising points the sun
expresses through others. I feel better
about the breeze, feel better than the person
I have lived as for someone else. But just today
I’d like to be the room
my things know. To live off
the temples of work, scoring matter
on the problem itself. To be
“Like, anyway…”
* from Flowers, “Invisible Scoring”
This Fall
by Mark Lamoureux*
When them thick clay limbs
clamor, grove of sticks
on the ground, the irrefutable
ghosts come contained
with this sack of visages & scarves. We bury
the blood each day & say
“This justice drinks.” The sea
is prodded with a portentous swirl.
A warm torrent still sings
the gourds up from the ground.
The arid bones throw them
unwanted tontine shadows. Around
the hill, we repel a fragrant air
with the herbs & the potions of this
dip, the bowl wherein
the stars are many & swerve
as one.
As is.
* from Spectre, “Tontine”
Despite the potentially deceptive titles, these poems are solely the “original” work of the poet Travis Macdonald. They were composed by rearranging the words of others into an entirely new order and form. The poems from which they are adapted, and the books where those poems can be found, are footnoted beneath each poem.