Tuesday poem #617 : Beatriz Hausner : The Music of the Sea

(on a collage by Ludwig Zeller)

 

 

I sat on a cliff by the sea.
I heard and heeded
the deep sounds 

                                    of liquids inside the box
                                    of water. Play, play, play
                                    the strange music of the sea.

 

Oceanus girding earth places
himself closer to the Goddess
receiving in mouth the slow

                                    

                                    misplaced likeness of other seas
                                    fades into waves rising with
                                    large mollusks as greater

 

waters begin illuminating the
night. Crashes of thunder burst out
amid flashes of lightning the fish

                                    

                                    and the creatures of the world
                                    jump out of the water and rejoice.
                                    A gaping breach brings inside to

 

outside of water and echo of
strange land animals returned
to the origins of water. In prayer

                                    

                                    is woven the route to the sea of stars
                                    in their eyes: night is day with
                                    inverted milky way contained

 

inside folds of shell surrounding
us. While we delicately strum on string
ridged instruments the polyphony

                                    

                                    of fish and all living things is
                                    resurrected in deep sea: this throat
                                    bails out the masses of salt water

 

these lips surround noise the music
of the waves and their sound rise
like mountains of foam.

 

 

 

 

Beatriz Hausner [photo credit: Maria Vega] has published several poetry collections, including Sew Him Up (2010), Enter the Raccoon (2012), Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart (2020) and She Who Lies Above (2023), as well as many limited edition chapbooks. Hausner’s translations of Spanish American surrealist poets have exerted an important influence on her own writing. Hausner has edited many publications in the past, including three issues of Open Letter, Ellipse magazine, is the poetry Editor of Exile Quarterly and is the Editor of Someone Editions.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

Tuesday poem #616 : Beth Follett : Store Window View #6

1973
Watercolour

 

 

Where shall I make my home?
          In the vast emptiness of
          the spacious heart? Its four
          chambers, its four seasons?
          My childhood home in the
          left ventricle, beach umbrella below.

Night sky, Perseids in August,
          all the skies of summer, heavy
          as forest, as dreams.

Where shall I make my home?
          In the vast memory of the
          shadow world? The river of
          childhood, its four seasons.
          Desire in the right ventricle,
          my secret place below.

Where shall I take the colour blue?
          I could make my home in sorrow’s
          face, its four seasons,
          Maxfield Parrish blue.
          The road below the house,
          below the night sky, the road
          through story, through
          river, the road, the
          dance, four seasons.

 

 

 

Beth Follett lives in St. John’s NL. She was the publisher of Pedlar Press for twenty-five years.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

 

Tuesday poem #615 : Maria Hardin : Devotion IV

 

 

be your own pony
your own mother
birth a world without fathers
lose yourself in the holy ghost

the cosmos is withdrawing
but we just want to keep on touching

as longing impregnates
the soil
the humidity
our lungs

as wild brains lag
as wild horses cease to exist

 

 

 

Maria Hardin is a Swedish-American artist and bilingual poet based in Stockholm. She is the author of Cute Girls Watch When I Eat Aether (Action Books) and Sprawl Coquette (Creative Writing Department). Maria’s work has been exhibited across Scandinavia and her writing has appeared in American Chordata, Burning House Press, Denver Quarterly, Fanzine, Gutter, LIGEIA Magazine, SLFFCK, Spam Zine, Spectra Poetry, Wigleaf, and elsewhere. She can be found at mariaology.com.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan

Tuesday poem #614 : Catriona Strang : Cattle, sheep, crops, money

 

It’s been the ruttiest
week, all peaky looking
rust bins and how did I even
get here, as the man with the hip
flask barges over and links arms
with global trade? What if jute sang, or
cotton or iron, ships or steel, a defence
unpicked by a chip just drunk enough
to be fierce in this communal
game played in a rebel’s self-
washed kit now glorified by
empire’s trade in myth, prejudice
and illusion – nought’s had, all’s
spent – so we flew into
our new enemy, at Brockton Oval as at
Stirling Bridge, our basket-weave
adaptation taking shape
on the fly: tackle him low!

 

 

 

A founding member of the Institute for Domestic Research, Catriona Strang is the author of Low Fancy, Corked, Reveries of a Solitary Biker, and Unfuckable Lardass and co-author of Busted, Cold Trip, and Light Sweet Crude with the late Nancy Shaw, whose selected works, The Gorge, she edited. A new chapbook appears next week with above/ground press.

She frequently collaborates with composer Jacqueline Leggatt, and lives with her two grown kids on stolen xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səl̓ilwətaɁɬ Lands. She is recovering from decades of caring labour.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan