Chantarelle's Notebook

Echo

Hear me on the wind,
this wanting never ceases.
We aren’t strangers to each other
even after a decade in and out of this desert.

I’ve known since we were seventeen,
how you dream about being surrounded
by constellations, tangled up in galaxies—
how you only feel free at midnight
in the cool mountain air, sleeping
as stars fall around us.

I held hungry words for you then—
longed to get my healing hands on you,
before I knew what kind of power they possessed.
Now, I am branded—yours; feel what bliss you bring.

 
Hive

Every woman I know has been storing anger for years in her body and it’s starting to feel like bees are going to pour out of all of our mouths at the same time. — Erin Keane

You want a constant supply of honey.
A simple craving, you do not want to know
how it is made. Cradle the honeycomb,
on your tongue, savor this moment—
lie to yourself and say this treat
is only for you—it cannot exist without you
wanting it. Forget flowers, and pollination—
greenery is a distraction anyway. You want the bees
manageable, to follow orders—find purpose
only in you. Hum this tale to yourself.
Ignore the approaching swarms.

 

Marisa Silva-Dunbar’s work has been published in Apathy Press, The Hellebore, Horny Poetry Review, Dark Marrow, Dear Reader, and Marias At Sampaguitas. She is a contributing writer at Pussy Magic. Her work is forthcoming in Sybil Journal, The Charles River Journal, The Cabinet of Heed, and Silk + Smoke. Marisa is the founder and EIC of Neon Mariposa Magazine. You can find her on Twitter and Instagram @thesweetmaris.

UNLOVE POEM

Cloak my salvation in bath-water, blood lover.
Your second row of teeth has gone too long unnoticed.
Teach me to floss those gums to bleed.
Teach me to notice mouths again.
This painted beach swarms with krill carbon, mineral shapes
Staining bleached coral on your bathroom floor.

You only know how to speak in lavender, you accuse.
You only know how to bring out the worst in me.
I watch your breaststroke turn to sink.
Hesitating dive as I follow you under.

Beneath the waves, we propel ourselves through opposing lights.
Your skin, blending into blue. Mine, a target.
I cannot tell when your eyes find crimson,
Only that a passing flounder whispers a warning.

When did this happen to us? I cannot ask, swallowing you first, propelled from floodgate.
You reply without question, When jellyfish took up residence in your neck.
We dissolve in slow motion against this current,
Divisions taking their place in our guided drift.

Back then, I could not separate my blood from the salt.
Now, you cannot separate the wound from the healing.

Proposal. Let’s engage in an exercise: three laps.
Interspliced. My buoyancy balancing.
We wonder: why not float open.

 

Amber Auslander is a nonbinary poet with a passion for clowns. They wish they were kidding. Follow them on Twitter @corpsedroid for some poetry updates and even more screaming.

It is an incontrovertible fact of science

It is an incontrovertible fact of science
that people are born with
holes in their hearts and
that over time these holes
seal themselves up.
However,
there is a substantial segment
of the general population
whose hearts do not mend.
These poor souls wander the earth
with chest pains and indigestion
in search of a miracle cure
to seal up that gap inside them.
They go from doctor to doctor
rattling tin cups
searching for something
to plug their hole.
Passersby will drop whatever they see fit
into dust-caked cups─
mostly rosary beads and religious tokens
but among the sacred baubles
some of these wanderers are fortunate enough
to get something else.
Maybe a couple of dollars or
a tube of lipstick or
even some PYT’s phone number.
If they can’t count on someone else
to fill these holes
they’ll use bits of chewing gum
or chunks of steak (medium rare)
or if they’re really in trouble
a cigarette butt and
a few drops of vodka
will be just fine until
they find something more permanent.
Sometimes these travelers succumb
to the emptiness inside them
but those are rare instances and
more often than not
they fall to whatever
patch they have jerry-rigged,
whether its bacon grease,
high quality personal lubricant,
or good old fashioned
Mexican black tar heroin.
A heart can’t beat properly
when it’s clogged with all that refuse.
It might get along in the short time,
but that’s no way to play the long game.
The rub isn’t that these holes can’t be filled,
but that there is no single cure.
We have not found
a master key for these many locks.
Rather,
a key must be handcrafted
with tender touch
and caring caress
for each individual hole.
There is no easy way out.
Denying the very existence of these holes
will not put blood in your veins
or oxygen in your lungs.
There is only one way
to fill that hole in your heart
and you probably
saw this coming
but it’s

 

 
How it feels to lose your hair

It’s a lot like falling out of love.
It doesn’t happen all at once.
It’s an insidious
gradual thing
You pretend it’s not happening
but it’s as slow and inevitable as a glacier.
Each day you lose
Just a small piece
A little here
A little there
Leaving a trail of it
Wherever you go.
Sometimes it will make you
Curse the world
And wish for it to burn.
Other times it will be
a benchmark of the past
that will make your heart twinge.
In the end,
It’s best to just
cut it off
entirely.

 

Mick Theebs is serving as the Poet Laureate of Milford, CT until 2020. In addition to poetry, Mick also writes prose, satire, and scholarly articles. His work has been featured in a wide swath of books and publications, including Massachusetts’s Best Emerging Poets, Tiny Flames Press, and P.S. I Love You. More of his poetry can be found in his book Somnambulist. For spicy takes and dumb jokes, follow him on Twitter @MickTheebs.

Snowdon

We lost our father in the mountains:
on Snowdon, where the land
is pinched

into sharp ridges, the air
clearer than glass, the light

creating endless shadows
where he might have been
but wasn’t.

We could see to the horizon and it
was empty. My spit

turned white with fear.
Our voices rose – the air
we breathed pure helium –

and every cry bounced back to us like calls
put through to voicemail.

When we came down it was late.
The tarns held what was left
of the day’s light.

(previously published in Tower Poetry Summer School anthology, 2016)

 
Afon Dwyfor

At Afon Dwyfor –
where in last summer’s woodland
we picked blackberries –

we take handfuls
of you from a plastic sandwich bag
and for a moment you are

solid and substantial,
like holding your hot firm hand
as you sat on the sofa

with eyes closed, finding
you could no longer stand
or walk.

We trickle each fistful
of soft pale-grey ash
through fingers

or throw it so it hangs
like a cloud of smoke, lands
in complex patterns

and is carried away
to where the current expands,
thicker and darker

than I knew water could be.
Upstream, a fallen oak spans
the banks like a bridge.

The task done,
I edge along this grand
old tree to where,

half way across,
the river is so loud I can
speak without hearing my voice.

 
Strain

I press my father’s thumb
firm to my eyelid, feel

the hatchling’s
heartbeat, here

then gone again, dog
dreaming behind my eye.

Strain, spasm, tremor, pulse,
something

stirring, hive inside
a wall. Insect

wings, doubt
that nags.

Tiny wise goddess
waiting to burst

through, moth
against pane,

tapping Morse code
for let us rest.

 

Emily Pritchard is a poet and reviewer, studying for a Masters in Poetry and Poetics at the University of York, UK. Coming from a performance poetry background, she has taken part in the Roundhouse and BBC Edinburgh Fringe poetry slams, and hosted the Slay on Words slam in York. In 2018 she won the Helen Cadbury Award in York Literature Festival Poetry Competition. Find her on Twitter @poetrypritch

Mantle

In fossicking
among abandoned memories
searching for the gleam of precious things
I have learned
to let my focus slip

I used to hunt for pearls
where I expected them to be
in the grand gestures and
scattered around the milestones
the places where everybody looks
and nobody finds

In the quiet spaces
the cracks between
that is where the jewels wait
stars at the edge of my vision

I see one
where I am safe and small in the circle of your arms
listening to the metronome in your chest

And other moments
as if emboldened by the first
come crowding
the scent of sawdust and oil
the knowledge of making and mending
curls of wood licking from the jaws of a plane
worn grips and keen blades
your thumb through the fragile mantle
of a gaslight
your hand on the back of my bicycle
and your voice
full of every emotion
keep pedaling
pedal

I rode away
left you behind
in the tender cruel way that children do
and the gifts you thought you gave me
are forgotten
but my life is filled with pearls and stars
from all the quiet spaces

 

 
Night rain

the city’s neon colours
blur bright
against a wet black canvas

every streetlamp
brags alchemy
haloed in raindrops

night slithers gutterward
while a gust of lamplight
pirouettes into a side street
and yesterday’s news
finding it has the alley to itself
waltzes for a moment
with the breath of the storm

 

 

Niki Baker is practically nocturnal, enjoying the world best when the stars are out and most of the people are in. She has received recognition for numerous short stories, poems and travel articles, and is currently seeking a publisher for her first full-length novel. Find her on Twitter at @NRBakerWriter