I gave my tongue to you
Loud and silent
Curled between your teeth
It was too much or not enough
My tongue does not tell the stories of your past
Only what is possible
It is just a muscle
Like my heart
Made to expand and contract
Author: South Broadway Press
South Broadway Press is a publisher of poetry through books, print journals, and on our online journal.
introduction – ghost #5
glen canyon dam – ghost #909
We’d traveled hundreds, or maybe even thousands, of miles into the deepest recesses of the desert land to see the Bottomless Pit of Babies for ourselves. We all peered down into the abyss, my father holding me up over the edge for a better look.
“See, look over at those ones. They’re trying to climb out. Isn’t that the cutest?”
We all peered down into the seething, teeming bowl of fresh babies–mewling, crawling, naked, red, and raw, faces scrunched and fists balled, crying out for the mothers from which they’d be ripped away, screaming at the fathers that let them go.
Yeah, it was a bottomless pit of babies. That was for sure. And we all saw it. Paid for the pleasure, even.
Oh, and they even set one up for display up there. So we could all see what they looked like, up close.
But it was just a baby.
placing memory – kim peter kovac
Psychologists, neurologists, and biologists define memory as gathering, storing, and retrieving sensory and intellectual information. Sadly, though, they’re dead wrong: true memory is a place, or rather, infinite places, or really, infinite plus one. Usually, our acts of remembrance follow the paths laid out by conventional wisdom; only a fortunate few find the ken to journey to their true memory-place (or places), and there is no map. When you least expect it, this true path will be noted by five (always five) disconnected items from your past; the trick is to know those are the ones, to weave together, for example, a square lemon lollipop, a broken baseball bat, the sound of a dog scratching at the door, the specific odor of the Kent cigarettes your long-dead father smoked, and a Pond’s Cold Cream jar.
The path to a true-memory place is marked by the connections of the disconnections.
Kim Peter Kovac (non-ghost #1206) works nationally and internationally in theater for young audiences with an emphasis on new play development and networking. He tells stories on stages as producer of new plays, and tells stories in writing with lineated poems, prose poems, creative non-fiction, flash fiction, haiku, haibun, and microfiction, with work appearing or forthcoming in print and on-line in journals from Australia, India, Ireland, Dubai (UAE), England, Scotland, Singapore, South Africa, and the USA, including The Journal of Compressed Creative Arts, Red Paint Hill, Elsewhere, Frogpond, Mudlark, and Counterexample Poetics. @kimpeterkovac
spells – ghost of the scarab
she took me to spells and what i mean is
she took me to the edge of her bed
and draped legs on each side of me
lips on each side of me
eyes preying/praying outside of me
tongue pushed inside of me
and she pressed down on top of me
hips swinging billy idol fast beat swing
and immediately i wanted to write a letter
to whatever cosmic collision birthed her
and thank said cosmic collison
for what was truly her work in her
unadulterated presentation of honest soft lips
as dizzy she took me to spells and back to rock
and roll and some more and finding myself pulling
subtly at her clothes with my fingers
and my teeth she demanded me to be honest
with the intentions of my fingers and my teeth and pulled me in
fingers crawling back to you to reach for what lies beneath
and damn damn bangarang clothes strewn true on the floor
each deep breath flooding the floor and each deep sweat
a reminder that sometimes brunch tastes like silk rope
and sweet death and god damn she had me singing baby
straight from my chest and baby, you had me tied down
by your teeth as we started to reach and we started to
reach and we started to end and can you really sleep beside a dream?
wherein you find that there can be so much light in the dark?
and wherein you find that when you’ve been fighting and fighting
and fighting for a sense of reality
that maybe what you’re truly craving
is a taste of magic
she took me to spells
and i died so many times
in the confines
of her room
so soon after she gave me
a sweet tour of the space
she was claiming
as her own.
then i fell in love – ghost #7
so what’s left – john grey
after the parades die down
and three hundred million of us
are left with nothing to do
but pick up trash from the sidewalk:
take down the signs
as troops are dispersed
to go home
and look at themselves
in the mirror
and the presidents and senators
and colonels and capitalist
are secure in their counting houses
and it starts to rain
on flagstone on brown boot
on hair and bald head
on whatever flesh dare expose itself
even on a faded tattoo of a heart
and on rusted auto of course
dead junco live pigeon
even all over two people
who cross themselves
in a flamboyant Godspeak
then quote the desiccated Gospel of love
and rats tinkle bells
like old Rita’s cow
and ancient tongues speak
a diffused paranoia
and the young stir their names
in the muddy ground
with the last of the slicks
made of broken limbs
from trees once everywhere
now shipped in from elsewhere
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in the Homestead Review, Poetry East and Columbia Review with work upcoming in Harpur Palate, the Hawaii Review and North Dakota Quarterly.
water me down – ghost #11
When they tell you through
The television that
You are still not quite enough
I stew my own tender meats inside me
I watch as you preserve yours
To be devoured in private
Your eyes are kitchen windows
I am looking up at you
from inside the pot
When you ask
What’s getting to me
I become a soup kitchen
Ask you to taste it in front of me
Does it need more salt?
The anger makes a fine marinade
It often spoils the whole batch
Emotion will do that
Dilute the point
Onlookers eat me up
Leave me with only broth.
figure 8 – fm ghost
We could skate around
the issue like a figure 8
each falling down forever
the holes of a sideways shape
Where would we be
in this infinity dream?
backward into eternity
or forward toward unknown
We could cut our palms, make a pact
to help each other usher change
mix & match our blood
but the colors stay the same
We could do nothing
simply take a breath
swallow all the stones
we’ve placed within our throats
Truth is we tend to complicate things
in most cases make the bleeding worse
from a fight that isn’t there
to wanting the last word to get in first
What would we do if we
were what we claimed to be?
tumble into eternity
or headlong toward unknown
Falling forever
Into infinity
Sideways always shaping
Who we claimed to be
found wikipedia poem – the french destroyer bambara
commercial energy / varying order and similar error constants / floor to collapse / derived from the equation / throughout the history of pine / totally nude erotic dancing is expressive conduct / an optimal balance of biological control attributes / ixnay on the hombre / she exhibited her etchings / many people who committed minor offences were executed by him / the project on middle east democracy / the war continues / interlopers from the future responsible for this / to support any government / to form a new coalition / radio stations and translators / purchase and drain / trials and friendlies / the french destroyer bambara /
south broadway press 