ROBIN OUZMAN HISLOP: Born UK. Childhood in Lyme Regis & Poole Dorset. Lived Scotland & Scandinavia, The East & Spain. A great deal of my life has been spent out of England, my mother's side is Scottish & I take the name Hislop, as writer's name from her family name.

Bachelor in Arts (Hns). Philosophy & Religion. Manchester University. Resident at Pakistan, Lahore. Studies at Punjab University, New Campus, Lahore: Sufism (Tasawuf), Jalal-U-Din Rumi & Ibn Arabi. Sheffield University: Spanish & Latin American Cultural Studies. Resident in Spain from 1985 until December 1998 (Madrid and Salamanca): Resident at Salamanca, 1996-98: English Language teacher and translator for “El Ateneo”. Organisation of bilingual poetry readings at Casa do Brasil, Madrid Complutense University, Escuela Oficial de Idiomas, (Madrid Official School of Languages), Cafés Manuela and Magerit, O’Connors Pub, Madrid, El Ateneo and El Corrillo in Salamanca.

Translations of poetry include 1927 Spanish Generation Poets: selections of F.G. Lorca, Luis Cernuda, Rafael Alberti, M. Altolaguirre, Miguel Hernandez and Vicente Aleixandre’s poems; and the Chilean poet Andres Fisher, Las Diosas Blancas an Anthology edited Ramon Buenaventura, an anthology of poetry Alchemy by Tessa Duncan from Spanish and James Stephens Fairy Stories into Spanish have been more recent activities. I hope to feature these, as well as introducing new translations with originals on my web page soon to be opened IBIS. I am interested in revivalist movements in modern poetry.

Appeared in Dawn Millenium Anthology published by Kedco Studios & this year appeared in their Crystal Dawn Anthology. Frequently featured in the E zines Poetry Life and Times, Autumn Leaves, Sonnetto Poesia, Canadian Zen Haiku, appeared on Artvilla, Poetry Repairs, the Celtic Pagan Poetry Pages Journal, as featured poet in the Beltane edition & Ancient Dawn E zines amongst others. This year will publish own anthology Blue Corn which will incorporate performance, on web cam and voice recital with Kedco Studios. My present book After the Cave the Comet was published this month by Mystic East.

Became a Resident Poet of Poetry Life & Times in January 2005.

More of Robin's work can be found here:

Amparo Arróspide's Gift of Tongues:
www.giftoftongues.co.uk
(Co-editors Robin Ouzman Hislop and Amparo Arróspide)

EXCLUSIVE NEWS UPDATE: Some of Robin's poems are due to appear in an anthology "Blue Corn", to be published by Kedco in 2005.

Also Robin's exciting epic "After the Cave, the Comet" is now available for purchase either as a CD or Ebook at www.giftoftongues.co.uk

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Richard Vallance Our Commonweal In memoriam Juan O'Neill (1931-2006) Director, Sasquatch Literary Performance Series, Ottawa Yes I'll remember you well, Juan O'Neill, you who've peered so many Sasquatch cafés, our Apollo casting poetry's spiel here on us all where Bytown's * wild Muse plays. You've entertained us all with irony! you've welcomed poets young and old for years, you've led us laughing to your Cuban glee, your verse as sad as light, our source of tears. You've always cast on us your bright appeal, you've shared with us your life's tales, as ours too, aware as you were of our commonweal, aware as we are you have seen us through. So pardon me if I should pause and ask, "Is anyone here equal to your task?" © by Richard Vallance March 18th, 2006 * Before Ottawa became the capital city of Canada when our nation became a Dominion in 1867, our city used to be called Bytown. A Cat, a Cat! * A cat, a cat, an Ode to be a cat: I'm not. I'm barely human, I wish I were Feline. I'm not. Can you imagine that? I'll freeze in the cold, 'cause I have no fur! I can't climb trees at all, my Maine Coon can. I cannot clean my rump, my Maine Coon does. Don't shadow me, kitty, though you're no man! You hide on me. "You'll wonder where I was!" Panic! Can't find her, to my sheer chagrin. I scour high and low, she's incognito. "OK, come out, you Coon. Uncle, you win!" I know you abhor pawing through wet snow. But spring springs in again. She wants out NOW. We're headin' out, for the giddiest bough! © by Richard Vallance March 31 2006 * This sonnet, plus many more of my cat sonnets, quatrain and Odes will appear in my new chapbook, "Kitties Are so Witty", to be published by the Canadian Poetry Association later this year. The SPAM Sonnet There was a time when SPAM was on TV. Our parents made us sandwiches out of it. We'd gag it down, but never got VD. ** With mustard on it, it tasted -- well -- like shit. One day, aw heck, we fed it to our dog. We'd tried to feed to the cat. No can do. Now Rover wolfed it down, he was a real hog, though when he had, his face turned furry blue! How times have changed! The SPAM we get today is e-mailed, FREE -- which no one quite digests. Can't swallow that? Damn Spammers, GO AWAY! You're nothing but a pack of online pests! Wherever's SPAM, you'll have to swallow it. Well, either way, it all amounts to shit. © by Richard Vallance March 30 2006 ** the consonantal half-rhyme is deliberate, for comic effect. The New Plieades CD ROM e-book - to be published in January 2006! Click the CD cover picture above for more information, also see Vallance Review No. 52. RICHARD VALLANCE was Born in Guelph, Ontario, Canada, March 11th., 1945.  He holds an Honours B.A. and Master of Library Science, and is fluently bilingual in English and French. He also reads Spanish and Italian, ancient Greek and Latin well.  He wrote his first major poem at the age of 18, in 1963.  Richard has also distinguished himself in the field of library and information science.  In 1983, he won the $1,000 Data Courier Award for Excellence in Online Published Papers. Richard has composed over 2,500 poems.  He is the Chairperson of the Ottawa Chapter of The Canadian Poetry Association, website = Canadian Poetry Association: Affiliation Ottawa Chapter.  He is also a member of The Canadian Federation of Poets, where he is the Canadian Federation of Poets/ Featured Poet (January 2005).  Richard judges and pre-selects all rhymed verse poetry for CFP's official journal, POETRY CANADA. Richard's world class poetry page is Poesie’s laissez-faire Faire Foire, which showcases over 40 poets worldwide.  PLFFF features sonnets, haiku, contemporary and historical poetry.  PLFFF is a member of Phenomenal Men of The Web: Arts & Humanities. Richard is the Editor of 2 Canadian poetry E-Zines, Canadian Zen Haiku canadien ISSN 1705-4508 and Poetry in Emotion = La Poésie à s'émouvoir ISSN 1705-4516, and is the editor of the sonnet journal in print, SONNETTO POESIA ISSN 1705-4508, to be listed in 2006 Poet's Market and distributed online by OpenMic.com. Creativity Pays (USA). Richard's poetry and sonnets frequently appear in such in print poetry journals as POETRY CANADA, POEMATA (Canadian Poetry Association), The Neovictorian/Cochlea (Madison, Wisc., USA) and The Nisqually Delta Review (USA). His CD-ROM book, Canadian Spirit Voices, Kedco Studios, Las Vegas, NV © 2003, ISBN 1-878431-44-7, some 500 pp. long, contains over 130 of his poems, almost 300 haiku, 32 translations of poetry in ancient Greek, Latin, Italian, German and French into English poems by the author, a novella, DENIZEN, and the 100 + pp. essay, "The Historical Evolution of the Sonnet". He is the Editor-in-Chief of the all-new multilingual international poetry anthology, The New Pleiades Anthology of Poetry = le Florilège de la nouvelle Pléiade, Kedco Studios, ISBN ISBN 1-878431-52-8 to be published in the summer of 2005. Finally, Richard is co-editor with Sondra Ball of the USA, of the North American poetry anthology, The Human Face = le Visage humain, Kedco Studios, ISBN ISBN 1-878431-52-X, to be published in 2006. Richard Vallance moderates 2 major poetry discussion groups, The New Pleiades Mirror and Canadian Zen Haiku canadien. CONTACT:  Richard Vallance Back to top

Michael R. Burch Tremble Her predatory eye, the single feral iris, scans. Her raptor beak, all jagged sharp-edged thrust, juts. Her hard talon, clenched in pinched expectation, waits. Her clipped wings, preened against reality, tremble. © Michael R. Burch (Originally published by The Lyric) The City Is a Garment A rhinestone skein, a jeweled brocade of light,– the city is a garment stretched so thin her festive colors bleed into the night, and everywhere bright seams, unraveling, now spill their brilliant contents out like coins on motorways and esplanades; bead cars come tumbling down long highways; at her groin a railtrack like a zipper flashes sparks; her hills are haired with brush like cashmere wool and from their cleavage winking lights enlarge and travel, slender fingers . . . softly pull themselves into the semblance of a barge. When night becomes too chill, she quickly dons great overcoats of warmest-colored dawn. © Michael R. Burch (Originally published by The Lyric) The Forge To at last be indestructible, a poem must first glow, almost flammable, upon a thing inert, as gray, as dull as stone, then bend this way and that, and slowly cool at arms-length, something irreducible drawn out with caution, toughened in a pool of water so contrary just a hiss escapes it–water instantly a mist. It writhes, a thing of senseless shapelessness . . . And then the driven hammer falls and falls. The horses prick their ears in nearby stalls. A soldier on his cot leans back and smiles. A sound of ancient import, with the ring of honest labor, sings of fashioning. © Michael R. Burch (Originally published by The Chariton Review) Discrimination The meter I had sought to find, perplexed, was ripped from books of “verse” that read like prose. I found it in sheet music, in long rows of hologramic CDs, in sad wrecks of long-forgotten volumes undisturbed half-centuries by archivists, unscanned. I read their fading numbers, frowned, perturbed– why should such tattered artistry be banned? I heard the sleigh bells’ jingles, vampish ads, the supermodels’ babble, Seuss’s books extolled in major movies, blurbs for abs . . . A few poor thinnish journals crammed in nooks are all I’ve found this late to sell to those who’d classify free verse “expensive prose.” © Michael R. Burch (Originally published by The Chariton Review) Auschwitz Rose There is a Rose at Auschwitz, in the briar, a rose like Sharon’s, lovely as her name. The world forgot her, and is not the same. I love her and would not forget desire, but keep her memory exalted flame to justify the thistles and the nettles. On Auschwitz now the reddening sunset settles; they sleep alike–diminutive and tall, the innocent, the “surgeons.” Sleeping, all. Red oxides of her blood, bright crimson petals, if accidents of coloration, gall my heart no less. Amid thick weeds and muck there grows a rose no man shall ever pluck till he beds there, and bids the world “Good Luck.” © Michael R. Burch (Originally published in a slightly different version by Neovictorian/Cochlea) MICHAEL R. BURCH is the editor of The HyperTexts, on-line at www.thehypertexts.com, where he has published the work of three Pulitzer Prize nominees and recent winners of the T. S. Eliot, Richard Wilbur and Howard Nemerov awards. He has been twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize, and his work has appeared over 450 times in literary journals and sundry publications in the USA, England, Scotland, Canada, Australia, South Africa and India, including The Chariton Review, Poetry Magazine, Verse, Poet Lore, Unlikely Stories, Light Quarterly, Writer’s Digest – The Year’s Best Writing 2003, The Best of the Eclectic Muse 1989-2003, The Lyric, ByLine, Icon and Nebo.. Back to top

The best of poems by: JAN SAND RANDOM ENCOUNTER “Could you be,” I said to the first bald man I met on the street, “The famous poet?” He glared, shrugged, “My name is Dan.” I shook his hand. “Nice to know it.” “I have,” he said, “ small talent for rhyme But on occasion I can alliterate. Will that do?” “Formalisms, in good time,” I replied, “can be of good utility.” He raised one eyebrow. “I contemplate”, He countered,” some futility In chaotic conversations of this kind.” Both palms upraised I nodded. “Excuse me, I had hoped you wouldn’t mind.” Hands pocketed he prodded. “What in Hell are you at?” Smiling, I replied. “Mere idle curiosity.” “You seem”, he said, adjusting his cravat, Voicing some bellicosity, “To have the brains of a kangaroo.” I backed off, turned to retreat. Things had progressed too downbeat. He screamed at me and threw his shoe. © Jan Sand, from Poetry Life & Times Resident Poets, May 2005 STORIES My mother told me tales Of incandescent whales That floated through the skies like live balloons. They’d been blown from out the sea From a spot quite near Capri By huffy puffy windy strong monsoons. She told me that their glow Could drive the clouds to snow Which, at times, was made of lemonade Or when weather became lucky Somewhere south of east Kentucky The snow came down ice cream of purest grade. The stories mother told me Would frequently enfold me In worlds where oddest things have occurred. There was, she said, a cave Where rabbits, small but brave, Ruled a hundred thousand frogs and a bird. Raising mushrooms for their meals They bartered surplus off to seals For variety of diet, mostly fish Which they fried with lima beans By concocting wild cuisines Which for frogs was an appetizing dish. So, with ogres, dragons, thieves And djinns made out of leaves I gained a sense of what was really real. And, frankly, what I see As normality, Has, for me, very small appeal. © Jan Sand, from Poetry Life & Times Resident Poets, June 2005 THE CONCERT Impatiently the clock’s baton Taps the music to start up. The orchestra is tuning. I’ve heard a growling stegodon, The fluting zip of positron, The whine of humming magnetron, A loon’s tragic crooning. The melody’s been fugitive, The theme wholly evasive. The direction’s inconclusive. Anticipations are abrasive.. The composer is a mystery, With a foggy, misty history Evoking mass confusion As to the true conclusion. The orchestra should soon commence. The piece, of course, will be immense. And, hopefully, it will make sense, For up to now the tune-up has been looney. The clash of motivations With experimentations Is amorphous, a shapeless hapless discord, a din. The band is ready, waiting, The baton anticipating. The time has come for the music to begin. © Jan Sand, from Poetry Life & Times Resident Poets, June 2005 © Jan Sand, 2006 JAN SAND is sadly retiring from Resident Poets, from this month. The above is a selection of some of his best work included to date. He will still occasionally appear in Featured Poets, so we are not saying farewell to him, simply adieu from this section. His whimsical style and ready wit will always ensure him a place with us to showcase his work. I first met him on a Usenet forum called alt.arts.poetry.comments. One of my funniest encounters with him was when he posted an amusing poem called "Tribute To Edgar Allen Poe", which triggered a kind of poetry "duel" with several of us posting reply poems in a similar style. We became friends ever since..... .......................Sara L. Russell (see below for Jan's bio). Jan Sand is a poet and illustrator from New York (now residing in Helsinki), is a regular contributor to Poetry Life & Times and the newsgroup alt.arts.poetry.comments. A great deal of his work is about animals, or science fiction. Recently Jan was published by Kedco Studios Artist Profile Press, on their latest CD ROM e-book, "A Way With Words (Poetry Real and Surreal), which also includes complete books by Dale Houstman, Sara L. Russell and Keith Gabriel Hendricks. Jan's illustrated book on the CD is called "Wild Figments And Odd Conjectures", which is also sold separately, in a limited-edition "single" CD. To see an illustrated article about Jan's poems, visit the November '98 issue of Poetry Life & Times, and scroll down past the Editor's Letter. He also has his own poetry pages on Charlotte's Web at Artvilla. Back to top

Sara L. Russell (Editor) Two Sonnets on the theme of Pride & Prejudice 1: Kissing Mr. Darcy Descend into the subtle lotus bloom, Whose dewy petals beckon to ensnare; Intoxicating texture, rare perfume, Deliciously oblivious to care. His lips are heaven's manna, angel's sighs, His tongue the willing playmate of my own; Unspoken words of love soften his eyes, Familiar, yet enticingly unknown. Within the gentle haven of his arms, His hair and neck invite my fingertips, Yet nothing in the number of his charms Rivals the tender kisses of his lips. His temperament leaves no cause to repine, Behind closed doors, those sullen lips are mine. * * * * * * * * * 2: Mr. Darcy's Sarabande She's moving with decorum, down the dance He moves alongside, tall and leonine, They turn about, he risks a covert glance In search of any subtle lovers' sign. Her tender neck has drawn this dreamer's gaze, Her eyes make merry sport with his desire He concedes, as the music softly plays To love, where he meant only to admire. He circles her, she slowly circles him, Their conversation irks on either side, She can delight or torture, at a whim, He hesitates between candour and pride. The music ends, they bow and soon depart, She frowning, he with wildly racing heart. © Sara L. Russell, 2005 & 2006 SARA RUSSELL Poet, cartoonist and short story writer. Founder Editor of Poetry Life & Times, this month leaving that position to become simply a Resident Poet and continue with The Perils of Norris cartoon, along with other cartooning projects. Newsgroup signature was originally 'Pinky Andrexa, Last Of The Cyber Vixen Poets From Outer Space'. Won Internet Arts Award from Kedco Studios Artist Profile Press. Runner-up in Capricorn International Love Poetry competition 1998. Her website Poetry Life & Times recently won the Alpha Poets' Poetic Eyes web award. Won Poet of the Week in the Poetry For Thought group (The Globe groups) for the week April 28-May 4th, 2001, with the poem "If You Were Mine". Inducted into The Poets' Hall of Fame, 2001, and included in its anthology for that year. Recently broke several bones after falling from a train; now fully recovered after almost a year, and walking without a limp following a recent successful hip operation. Published Works: 5 illustrated e-books published by Kedco Studios Artist Profile Press (most recent first): Worlds Inside The Head, Quickies, Spiders And Gliders, A Way With Words (in collaboration with four other poets) and Pinky's Little Book of Shadows. Also published in several Kedco e-book anthologies and Forward Press bound book anthologies. Back to top