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Strange FruitSee me: I’m a very strange fruit My ugly life doesn’t quite fit It never has given your constrictions Your positive glow, your outlook, the one that binds me so Real life doesn’t quite fit your restrictions Real life? I wonder on things endlessly, incessant terrible things, play across my mind, like tennis for eternity. Right, wrong, right, wrong. Is this right? Is this wrong? My life regrets its song Do I sing a false happy melody? Do I sing my song? My fear of fear restricts me so Acceptance is a concept, invisible, cold, and running wild With nowhere left to go, it dies upon contact, with pitch fork communities, running free, running wild. Judgement passes quickly We’re taught this from a child.
#Real #StrangeFruit #Poem #TheUnknown #Restrictions #Acceptance #SocietalNorms
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Things That Didn't Happen
By Jane E. Hamilton
QuailBellMagazine.com Editor's Note: Originally appeared in Jen Pastiloff's Manifest Station.
Why not February?
1) That day I landed in Paris, alone, no French to pout my lips, anti-gay protests spilled into the streets, shooting rapids of hatred. Queers had to navigate them, no oars. When I walked down Avenue Henri Martin to find an open store, I looked like what I was: an MEC-bedecked North American dyke, shapeless as a continent. Two men radared in. Vitriol tones a language; it hatcheted towards me on streams of spittle. The guy closest shoulder-checked me and I stumbled into a wall, scraping limestone. Then they were gone, and I still needed oranges. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Black GoldDo the big dappled koi notice the one black goldfish in their pool or is he as invisible to their eyes as to mine? Subaqueous eddies will swirl till his darkness meets the surface and a fly disappears within him. He is my favorite, his beautiful brethren must know: only he gets pizza crusts and crickets I buy and drop to move him to materialize. Do I love him just because he is so there and not? Or because he hides in the shallows from his kind to wait for me? #Unreal #Poetry #Nature #Life #Koi #StandOut #Renegade Visit our shop and subscribe. Sponsor us. Submit and become a contributor. Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Grasping the Blades of Books
By Armando Jaramillo Garcia
QuailBellMagazine.com I’ve wondered about these things as many have before Your hair the windblown clouds smudging the sky Your face hiding but shaping the shy light If I had to kiss one part it would be your cheek With my love made of otters in mud If I had to eat one part it would be your lips With my hunger made of passing trains Without a country or vassals I hum to my feudal self Your neck full of dahlias and delicate frills Not altogether lacking in intellect of course A happy carbuncle polished en cabochon The gothic lexicon long in the pocket of my highwayman’s coat Your seahorse’s tail grasping the blades of books The current further exhorting the bland to a noisy crash We could join hands but demur And let it all pass #Unreal #Poetry #Imagery #Nature #Love #Diction Visit our shop and subscribe. Sponsor us. Submit and become a contributor. Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Apex Predator
By Thomas Johnson
QuailBellMagazine.com *Editor's Note: This piece was previously published in Pearl Magazine, No. 42 five years ago I keep coming back after death. Each time as a more vicious killer. I’m dead again and for the last time when you read this. I was executed for more murders than any one in history, I’ve been told, but I have killed many more than that before becoming human. I have memories of being a bird of prey, a lion, but the most clear and recent is that of being a fish. Carcharodon Carcharias. Better known as the Great White shark. Today I go to Anti-Glory, Agonyville, Heaven-not. Crazy, I’m not. Before I go I want all to think differently about my sanity. I’m looking forward to meeting my father, the Devil. I’ve charged my worthless lawyer with one mandate. After I’m put to death, publish this autobiography/biography (me as a shark) to avoid the do-gooder, anti-death-penalty jerks from screaming that I was insane, and should have been in the loony bin, or cookoo’s nest under drugs for life. To live any longer would be cruel and unusual torture. Why would you torture me for being me? But they do put down pit bulls for being pit bulls. Put me down! I bite. I don’t have much time, I’ll start my narrative. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
A Daisy's Plea
If your heart can love,
Then please don’t pluck my petals. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Bohemian Street
By Craig Kurtz
QuailBellMagazine.com “‘Tis not enough, ye Bards, with all your art,
We’ll have no wine,
the art is strong enough; your masterpiece, complete, is all we need to celebrate. Rice and beans and coffee were discretions we required; saving every cent we could for your canvas, consummate. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
The Trouble With Her Is That She Can't Take A JokePark the car at the side of the road. You should know time’s tide will smother you. It takes an hour and fifty minutes to drive from my city to his city without excessive cigarette breaks. None of this will make any sense, unless you know that: The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
On NostalgiaOn Nostalgia and burning sensations of fingertips that ride the fire of their memories, unsettled by the smoke of their own oozing fire. On nostalgia for little curls of dust and sweat that corner themselves in punishment away from the merciless face of the sun. On nostalgia for all things unforgotten, unsmeared, untainted, whole, yet barred to touch. On nostalgia for storms that take nothing away yet rearrange the course of the wind they hold on their back; for thunder that mistakes its voice and runs in fear behind a round waist, to hide its pebbles of washed rain, underneath. On nostalgia for eyes marked, underlined by faults of shade; for the sun-kissed armor of flesh, against an Eve's pretense of fear. On nostalgia for he who rightly claims his, the gaps between the breaths; the vacuum behind the disintegration of the ancient dream. On nostalgia for the god who rarely remembers he is god, but chuckles, nonetheless, in disbelief.
#Unreal #Poetry #Nostalgia #Past #Memory #Imagery
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A Cynic’s Epistle to Love
By Craig Kurtz
QuailBellMagazine.com “Whether the Charmer sinner it, or saint it,
It’s been a long, long time
since I took up a lover’s rhyme. Maybe I wax a bit enchanted wanting to be took for granted. |