Death

 

Photograph by Manuel Faisco from Flickr

Dear readers, and contributors,

After much reflection, I have decided to close down Beakful: the blog and the press. This decision was not made lightly, as this space has been a cherished home for creativity, connection, and the beautiful art of poetry.

I am incredibly grateful for all the poets, readers, and supporters who have contributed to the adventure. Your passion and engagement have made this journey truly special.

While this chapter is coming to an end, I encourage you to continue exploring and sharing poetry in your own lives. Thank you for being a part of the journey.

***

Chers lecteurs et contributeurs,

Après mûre réflexion, j'ai décidé de fermer Beakful : le blog et les éditions. Cette décision n'a pas été prise à la légère, car cet espace a été un foyer précieux pour la créativité, la connexion et l'art magnifique de la poésie.

Je suis incroyablement reconnaissante à tous les poètes, lecteurs et sympathisants qui ont contribué à l'aventure. Votre passion et votre engagement ont rendu ce voyage vraiment spécial.

Alors que ce chapitre touche à sa fin, je vous encourage à continuer d'explorer et de partager la poésie dans votre vie. Merci d'avoir participé à cette aventure.

WR

The Invisible Man by Lynn White

Invisible Man Seen in Whitehaven by Alan Cleaver from Flickr

 first published in Praxis, November 2019

There was a large handwritten sign
‘Invisible man - naked and destitute’
I could see where he was standing
he was wearing shoes
naked except for his shoes.
In front of him was a cardboard box.
It was almost full.
not only with coins
but also an apple,
a woolly hat,
a sandwich,
a cup of coffee.
A cup of coffee!
The rest could wait,
but the coffee was slowly cooling.
Perhaps he’d fallen asleep.
I stretched out a hand 
to wake him
but it met no flesh.
How strange.
It must be
that he was only there in spirit.
Do spirits drink coffee?
I shall soon find out.

The Difference between a Homeless Man and Studying Poetry at School by John Grey

Homeless by Psyberartist from Flickr

You’re not Walt Whitman,
just some homeless guy 
who scours trash barrels for sustenance
and sleeps under a bridge.

As long and white as it is,
your beard grows 
for lack of a razor 
and your hair’s so tousled
because it never sees a comb.

As much as you wander
the river bank by day,
the park at night,
you don’t respond 
to what’s around you,
merely body-jerk, mumble,
from the faulty wiring 
in your brain.

Yes, your eyes are 
heavy enough to pass
for the bard of Camden’s
and, stick a broad band hat 
on your head,
you could pose for 
a Whitman house-tour brochure. 

But your art 
is blinkered and private.
Your poems are secrets
so long-kept,
you don’t remember them.
And kids laugh at you.
If you were Whitman,
they’d groan.

Eleven Crackers in the Pack by John Tustin

Potter's Crackers by Amanda M. from Flickr

There are eleven crackers in the pack.
That’s what’s left.
I folded the open part of the inner sleeve over
but they still get stale fast.

There is a woman’s clothing drying
on someone else’s line.
The neighbor’s cat doesn’t come anymore.
He’s found another home-away-from-home.

The ducks will come back here soon.
Until then, it’s still night becomes day
becomes night becomes day.
The moon folds into itself by morning.

There are eleven crackers in the pack.
That’s what’s left.
They may be stale now.
Eleven crackers tonight – all for me. 

***

John Tustin’s poetry has appeared in many disparate literary journals since 2009. His first poetry collection from Cajun Mutt Press is now available at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C6W2YZDP. fritzware.com/johntustinpoetry contains links to his published poetry online.

The Wasp at Midnight Whispers by Matt Dennison

Wasp Guarding Nest by Mark Chinnick from Flickr

First published in The Collidescope, September 8, 2019

My gladlings, you spinning blades to be, close brood

of a hot front porch: There is no you, no I, only Nest

and Queen; for it is Nest-making by Nest for Nest,

Queen-making by Queen for Queen. We are but wasps,

sleek machines of sexless Fate. Though infinitely invested

by Survival’s right indulgence, use your stings wisely,

for only one fertile among us endures—And here I tap

upon your leathered heads so thinly egged together:

Be food for no one but feast on many. Acknowledge

neither fly nor moth in passing—they are beasts, inelegant,

lacking our furious halos; fit only for bellies and scat.

Ignore as well the squirreled rumors of cold to come,

the exchanged supremacy of Sun and Moon, for Sun

is the metal of excellence, beaten, my revving engines,

upon and by the blistering wings of Strike, Moon

its dull sister. Know this too: house lizards lick

the mud dauber’s nursery seeking pupae of the absent.

Know this in gratitude from your unwritten tomes

of hot-papered youth: We are present. Though wasps

are never thought to piss or dream, I piss and dream

on you. Accept. Think only of your next sting,

your next little necessary. Fall openly upon your prey,

their arms breaking backwards. Make a bit of wind

about them, snake vessels exploding in chests,

for it is in murder we delight, be it of Moth or Moon

or comely Sap. Our hum upon Nest is ours alone,

quickened by Sun’s needleization of Grace, that scurry-cat

stalking the madness of summer only to pause at the edge

before pouncing—I tap thus on Nest to inform Eternity.

Thoughtless in our replete, the small-breasted tree

with her singing frogs is of no use to us, only the friable

wood of those who hate. Wish and hope death on those who,

as snakes whose venom wounds their mouths must strike,

would crush, would poison us. Though we come in glory,

they think we come into this world to make a hell’s-ditch

of the window box, the desiccated scarecrow, our nimble-

quick descent into violence worse than their clock’s

man-whip of reverie. Ask them, those proud snails of Not

with their fat lips dripping rust and the gathered mud

upon their young: Can you, as the wild goose barks

across the sky, embrace Helios? Can you, as we,

sail a ship through your face in the middle of the night?

Remember, though we do not remember: They know not

of Nest, the eternal among them, the one true architect

on the gold-fired lip of Sun sitting in gold encased in gold

suckling and throbbing and drowning in gold until gold

is gold no more, is Nest Queen of stung delight.

***

Matt Dennison lives in Mississippi and is the author of Kind Surgery, from Urtica Press (Fr.), and Waiting for Better, from Main Street Rag Press.

Shall I Go Gently? by Lynn White

 

Sunsetting behind mountains in Chirbasa, Gangotri by Dhruv Mittal

First published in Light Journal, Finishing, September 2019

I’ve always been indecisive
and I’m still undecided
but soon
I will have to choose
whether to build my ship,
and furnish it
comfortably
and sail with you
gently
into the dark
into oblivion
gently
or to rage and fight
scratch and bite
kick and scream
so that you have to drag me
to where I will not follow
gently
into oblivion
into the darkness
the inevitability
of the end
whichever way I choose.

***

Lynn White lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries of dream, fantasy and reality. She was shortlisted in the Theatre Cloud 'War Poetry for Today' competition and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and a Rhysling Award. Find Lynn at: https://lynnwhitepoetry.blogspot.com and https://www.facebook.com/Lynn-White-Poetry-1603675983213077/

The Ex Files by John Grey

 

There’s something outside my window.
The shades are drawn
but I can see a shape, a wisp,  
a shadow on the glass.

There never were such sightings
when this bed was shared.
The world beyond the house
was as it should be.
Nothing coalesced into a face.
No eyes peeked in.

Most folks get the moon at night.
I suffer through a collage.
For isn’t that a strand of her hair?
Isn’t that silhouette
just crying out for her features?
She had a certain way of sauntering.
So does that starry outline
in the pane.

If only memory would stay in my head
where it belongs.
Why must it exist outside of me?
I could call on it when necessary.
Instead it shows up as it sees fit.

*****

John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in New World Writing, North Dakota Quarterly and Lost Pilots. Latest books, ”Between Two Fires”, “Covert” and  “Memory Outside The Head” are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in California Quarterly, Seventh Quarry, La Presa and Doubly Mad.

Undertaking by Susan Shea

Nina Baldwin from her Women Gathering series
from her website

 

That gathering was a downpour
of easygoing, so why did I see
too many wanting sunbeams

why did I feel drained

when it was over, watching
the hostess sweep the floor,
maybe hoping we might get
the hint that it was time
to move along
like all good fragments

Susan Shea is a retired school psychologist who was raised in New York City, and now lives in a forest in the mountains of Pennsylvania.  Her poems have been accepted by Ekstasis, Across the Margin,  Feminine Collective, New English Review, and others.

Bobby Darin sings the blues by Mark Young

 

Bobby Darin, 1959
General Artists Corporation (management)/photographer: "Bruno of Hollywood",
Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

from The Codicils

His polonaise
was a work of 
some bravura,
taking the 
framework of 
the national 
dance, adding 
augmented & 
diminished 
chords in the 
root positions, 
ending with a 
feminine cadence 
excerpted from 
Macaroni & Cheese: 
52 Recipes. The
balance struck,
yin & yang
maintained—
there is no 
such thing 
as gender-
less culture.

 

***

Mark Young’s most recent book is Ley Lines II,  recently published by Sandy Press & available through Amazon.

The Indigenous Story: a Horror Tale Unheard of and Untold a review by Mona Angéline

 

We are not Animals book cover

 If you had to talk about the lives of the indigenous peoples that inhabited California before and during the arrival of whites, would you have much to say? Do we really know much at all?

That was precisely how I felt before I read "We Are Not Animals" by Martin Rizzo-Martinez. Their real story, the way they must have felt, the way they must have made sense with a world pulled out from under their feet.

To me, the indigenous story had always been effusive. It was a world so far away and so unheard of, so unspoken of, that it felt near impossible to really connect, to understand the fragments I did learn of.

And then, Rizzo-Martinez’s book appeared in my life. A work of art that taught me so much, a read I won’t forget for a long time to come.

The author's masterpiece is an indelible read. It is not for the faint of heart however, both because of its violent content and the academic style that makes for a somewhat strenuous read. I am an academic, and even I avoid tough material for fun!

I wouldn’t be able to give the manuscript any less than five stellar stars however because it is an incredible work of research, and I can't think of anything out there that covers the depths of the hardships that the indigenous peoples of California (and especially those of the San Francisco Bay and Central Coast areas) faced. The only book that does come to mind is Jean Pfaelzer's "California, a Slave State".

Rizzo-Martinez relays the history of the Native American diaspora with such detail, and on the basis of documented individual lives, that I was able to really relate to the indigenous world for the first time. And believe me, it's not that I haven't been trying.

The author describes the indigenous journey in the area as a timeline of violent horror that played out, roughly, in five steps.

First, we read about the arrival of the Spaniards in today's California, prompting mass baptisms of local Native communities. Many of their members moved to the missions after being baptized and were practically imprisoned there as a result.

We are then introduced to a brief period of emancipation after the missions are closed and secularization is established, which grants Native Americans Mexican citizenship and even (theoretical) land ownership to the indigenous population.

This is short lived though. Once California becomes American, the horrors of a massive genocide ensue, the story we've heard and shivered from.

How do the remaining indigenous people manage to stay afloat after being the target of a government endorsed coordinated mass extinction? Their answer lies in individual survival. People resort to hiding among and disguising themselves as the non-indigenous. The loss of the tribal community this entails is irreversible however.

The book concludes with a short foray into today's attempt at a consolidation of the original tribes, with the reestablishing of culture, traditions, nations, and in some cases, land.

This terrorizing journey spanning approximately 200 years is so rarely told that I deem this book among the most important I've read in a long time.

I applaud the author's in depth research and comprehensive history. We need more of these works, more efforts to tell the stories of a people forgotten. I hope that this book will lead to a more narrative, accessible story told widely.

It is immensely important to disseminate the truth about the indigenous story. It is time.

 

***

Mona Angéline is an unapologetically vulnerable writer, reader, book reviewer, artist, athlete, and scientist. She honors the creatively unconventional, the authentically "other". She shares her emotions because the world tends to hide theirs. She is a new writer, but her work was recently accepted in a number of literary magazine. She's a regular guest editor for scientific journals. She lives bicoastally in Santa Cruz, California, and in New York and savors life despite, or maybe because of, her significant struggles with chronic illness and mild disability. Learn about her musings at creativerunnings.com. Follow her on Instagram under @creativerunnings and on Twitter at @creativerunning.

Poem by Mykyta Ryzhykh

 

First published in Crank, May 2023

Copper night knocks
On the back of the head asks:
"What street is this?"
And this is not a street,
This is the whole life.
Here at the age
Of 4 I drank sleeping pills,
At 14 I lost my virginity,
At 24 I lost my family,
At 34 my father died (thank God, my father died).
Now I'm free like the cry of a newborn.
I'm single, like when I was born.
A lonely body without everything
Meaningful, invented, composed.
The body, by its movement forward,
Has reached the very beginning.
Ashes close to dust.
And suddenly the night opens its
Lunar hood, and now death looks
At me with its bony eyes.
"Come on, friend," I said to death,
"I hope you don't turn me into a zombie."
The door of cast iron milk opened.
And I started drinking.
My teeth turned black and fell out.
Birds pecked out my eyes.
My body fell off me. Copper night,
Pig-iron milk, golden memory.
And suddenly: emptiness.

Man and Pelican by John Grey

Photograph by Michèle from Flickr

 

At six a.m., I am sipping coffee,
as the first pelican of the day
perches alone on a jutting rock,
before setting off
to poach on the sea’s salt lands.

I am only moderately awake
but the bird goes from sleep to hunt.
from one need to another,
while I’m still gathering up
all of my mind’s belongings.

By the time I swallow the last drop of java,
that pelican will have snared his first fish
maybe a second, even a third,
with a plunge that I’d need
two more hours of yawning and eye-rubbing
and twenty years off my age to match.

The pelican is only ever what it is.
At six a.m., I am half the man
I used to be, and maybe 2/5
of the one I am now.
So far, today, I’ve accomplished nothing.
My gular pouch is empty.

 

***

John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in New World Writing, California Quarterly and Lost Pilots. Latest books, ”Between Two Fires”, “Covert” and  “Memory Outside The Head” are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in Isotrope Literary Journal, Seventh Quarry, La Presa and Doubly Mad.

Dandelion Water Bird by Katie Hughbanks

 

Dandelion Water Bird by Katie Hughbanks (c)

Katie Hughbanks’ photography has been recognized internationally, including two honors from the London Photo Festival. Her photos appear in various publications, including in Peatsmoke Journal, In Parentheses, L'Esprit Literary Review, New Feathers Anthology, Glassworks Magazine, and Black Fork Review. She teaches English and Creative Writing in Louisville, Kentucky, USA.

My Instagram handle is katiehughbankspics

Strange Fruit by Lynn White

Banana (Musa) (1904) by Elsie E. Lower.

First published in Cajun Mutt Press, November 4 2020

 “If this is justice I’m a banana,”
I remember this being said
and I liked the sound of it
humour and pathos 
combined
incongruously.
So sometimes I used those words
to express how I was feeling
in various situations.
But strangely
the oddness,
and incongruity
of the expression
impressed no one.
So I moved on to express myself
with different words, 
forgot about it,
until now
when the sight of a banana
hanging singly by it’s stem
on a hook not made for the purpose
(how could it be?),
made me realise
that the banana,
a fruit with no juice
and usually no seeds,
is always incongruous
always out of place
wherever it appears.

***

LynnWhite lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries of dream, fantasy and reality.   https://lynnwhitepoetry.blogspot.com and https://www.facebook.com/Lynn-White-Poetry -1603675983213077/