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ROBIN OUZMAN
HISLOP
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ORC
Hinterland 2000, first book of (Trilogy) In Memoria.

~Just Suibhne So:

~After the Cave, the Comet: Read here the full text

~Least Assuages Revisited

~Blue Corn, 2002
Selected from The Orc Poems* collection


Tallyho 2007.

A nation’s milk
skates on thin ice.
Gun at hedgerow

He knows every
square inch of the land,
over forty years

Born in the mould,
redcoat, horse, dog
blood & hunt.


Winter’s Garden Sculptures

Legless & headless,
Lady butterfly undressed,
A summer breeze rapes.


Cemetery Views.

Beside the faceless grave stone
The waiting wind voices alone
A hollow silence that stills to chill
A surprised world that overspills
To blood on the ground & parades
A battle field of tombs that fade.

Sole Fruit*

He who laughs first laughs last.
Woe is me to have fallen thus.
Now soles must press grape but to dust,
Where once in white cymar* she’d my lust.
Submitted to poem of the week
www.guardian.co.uk
The poem had to have the title Sole Fruit
Or Soul Fruit be of 4 to 14 lines, in any form,
& contain the word last in the first line,
An archaic word & a word either beginning
In Cy  or ending in Ade, a proverb &
A rhetorical figure.
*Cymar. A loose light garment for women,
Esp, a chemise.  Disrobed of all clothing
Saving white silk. Scott.

Put on the Light

Put out the cat,
Give teeth to the multitude.
It’s an important parade
For a tortured world,
That hapless throng
Joined in yet another anthem,
“Arisen again homo sapient” 
Alas in the breach but yet
That thunder clap that sent
You mad & of course the moon,
Put out the cat.

**

Recommended Further Reading: ORC Poems

ROBIN OUZMAN HISLOP: Born UK. Childhood in Lyme Regis & Poole Dorset. Lived Scotland & Scandinavia, The East & Spain. He now lives in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, UK. He appeared in the  Dawn Millenium & Crystal Dawn Anthologies published by Kedco Studios. When he first joined the world wide net he abandoned his previous poet performance career, mostly had in Spain and often as bilingual joint translation recitals. His collected works now appear in Poetry Life and Times every  month, so far Hinterland 2000 and Blue Corn 2002 have appared. Next comes  After the Cave the Comet 2004, Just Suibhne So, Least Assuages Revistited & Hunters Moon 2006. The entire collection will be available in the epic form  2 Trilogies In Memoria. He started as resident poet with Poetry Life & Times in March 2005 & took over its editorship together with Spanish poetess  Amparo Arrospide from Sara Russell in May 2006.

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SARA


RUSSELL

Further reading:

A Review of The Pain and the Itch, by Bruce Norris, featuring Matthew Macfadyen, by Sara Russell


Perils of Norris
Cartoon


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SARA RUSSELL

The Dancing Witch (For Beth)
Sara L. Russell 27/1/08
 
Deep thunder roars, the moon's under duress,
Lightning throws spears of fire across the sky;
It's time to don my midnight chiffon dress
And dance beneath the storm's celestial eye.
 
Trees bow before the wind's rampaging breath,
Nocturnal creatures seek their hiding holes;
I dance with forces spun of life and death
Laughing with voices of legions of souls.
 
Odin stares through the faces in the trees,
The Goddess sends new shoots piercing the earth;
One truth pierces a thousand travesties,
Sterile destruction sundered by rebirth.
 
The storm subsides, cool rain refreshes me.
It's time to go inside and brew some tea.
 
 
 
The Absinthe Fairy
Sara Russell 15/7/07
 
When evening comes, with carapace of gold,
To still the wingbeats of another day,
Again, as with artists and bards of old,
La Fee Verte comes, to spirit me away.
 
She laughs at all my weaknesses and vice,
Stealing my dreams to sprinkle them like dew
Upon my unsuspecting, dreaming eyes,
To give my fantasies a greener hue.
 
Beware the sly persuasion of her lips,
Take care to tiptoe where she leads astray,
Seeking the lotus, where the dreamer sips,
As darkness meets the closing eyes of day.
 
Beware her kiss, beware her luscious taste,
So sweet a snare might lay your soul to waste. 

**

 
Further reading:
Perils of Norris Cartoon

SARA RUSSELL Poet, cartoonist and short story writer. Founder of Poetry Life & Times. 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.
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.

The Perils of Norris Cartoon by Sara Russell has moved to its own gallery here... don't miss cute Norris misadventures!




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MICHAEL


BURCH


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By MICHAEL BURCH
Three Poems

Epitaph (II)  

Do not weep for me, when I am gone.
I lived, and ate my fill, and gorged on life.
You will not find beneath this glossy stone
the man who sowed and reaped and gathered days
like flowers, knowing that they do not keep.
Go lightly then, and leave me to my sleep.

   
Floating

  Memories flood the sand’s unfolding scroll;
they pour in with the long, cursive tides of night.
 
Memories of revenant blue eyes and wild lips
moist and frantic against my own.
 
Memories of ghostly white limbs,
of soft sighs
heard once again in the surf’s strangled moans.
 
We meet in the scarred, fissured caves of old dreams,
green waves of algae billowing about you,
becoming you hair.
 
Suspended there,
where pale sunset discolors the sea,
I see all that you are
and all that you have become to me.
 
Your love is a sea,
and I am its trawler–
harbored in dreams,
I ride out night’s storms.
 
Unanchored, I drift through the hours before morning,
dreaming the solace of your warm breasts,
pondering your riddles,
savoring the feel
of the explosions of your hot, saline breath.
 
And I rise sometimes
from the tropical darkness
to gaze once again out over the sea . . .
You watch in the moonlight
that brushes the water;
 
bright waves throw back your reflection at me.


First and Last

You are the last arcane rose
of my aching,
my longing,
or the first yellowed leaves–
vagrant spirals of gold
forming huddled bright sheaves;
you are passion forsaking
dark skies, as though sunsets no winds might enclose.
 
And still in my arms
you are gentle and fragrant–
demesne of my vigor,
spent rigor,
lost power,
fallen musculature of youth,
leaves clinging and hanging,
nameless joys of my youth to this last lingering hour.
***

 c. Mike Burch, 2008.

MICHAEL R. BURCH is the editor of The HyperTexts 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







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by

HELGA ROSS
(above, with Sherman)
By HELGA ROSS


Time for a People’s President?

Inspired by 'my' favorite candidate: John Edwards, who dropped out of the race Jan. 29/08, after this was written:

“Well, the tragedy is over. The failure is complete. I turn my head and go away.
I took my share in this fight for the impossible.” ~Albert Camus

Your passion speaks to me,
distinctively, with a lilt of local accent,
soft as Southern Comfort, with a kick.
And sweet as it is to these ears,
a swig goes down smooth—the taste translates—
and the tone deaf switch gears.
For the change-challenged: A chaser,
and your message moves the conversation.
Or, ignored,
100 proof will pack a punch, from sips.

Straight talk in dulcet tones,
is more potent than it seems—I feel it.
Seems to me, transcends
the self—You mean it. The delivery
is in the body language—Read it.
You exude youth, in maturity,
and energy, sincerity—I see it:
You want so much to serve.
I want it, too, feeding hope.
To fear your efforts fail, hurts.

You remind me who inspired me,
made me believe—in Peace Corps,
in Camelot—Kennedy.
The look. The moral force.
Reviving kindred cares,
(then, was a Cold War scare)
of a future I dare hope for—like before—
with you to lead, and help us bear,
repair the backdraft
of the last man's reckless acts.

You're Southern and self-made—
and, sadly, white and Southern male
doesn't resonate like black and female—
an underdog, among the rock-star, media,
darlings, and the monied.
The man we've seen fight for what's right
in the past; and need you
to fight to the last,
should your cause—our voice—be lost.
**

© Helga Ross 2008


 
Canadian poet, HELGA ROSS loves the well-written word and loves to write her own; derives great pleasure from great literature, art and life, and the great outdoors. Everything old is new again in 2005 – She’s moved back to her old home town, Burlington, Ontario, after half a lifetime--for a new start. "You can't go home again" so they say -- She shall see. Helga expresses herself through an eclectic writing repertoire of material, style and form. 2004, however, was her literary turning point: She 'discovered' poetry in a big way. Now, poetry is her passion and focus, particularly Sonnet forms, though not exclusively. For Helga, the theme is 'Passion' in the broadest sense. She believes and illustrates in her writing: "The creative mind plays with the objects it loves". - Carl Jung

Her poetic voice is playful, provocative, uplifting. Her serious pieces conclude on a positive note; reflect her approach to life: "Love. Fall in love and stay in love. Write only what you love, and love what you write. The key word is love. You have to get up in the morning and write something you love, something to live for." — Ray Bradbury On the key to success
Recent Accomplishments: Prix Poesie's laissez-faire Faire Award, April 2004. Poetry selections published in Sonnetto Poesia Vol.3 no.2 Spring 2004; Vol.4 no.4 Autumn 2005; Vol. 5 no.2 Spring 2006.

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