Olivia McGill ~ Joel Sattler ~ Adreyo Sen

Trois par Trois

 

 

Olivia McGill

catacombs

 

if we ever opened up the old fireplace

i think we’d find

a catacombs of pigeon skeletons

Hell’s Kitchen

the doll’s house of a railroad tenement

i see my mother laying in bed

pearls hang from picture frames

and she makes me think about

women’s women

and men’s women

which is odd because

she is neither

the cats lump on top of her

mimicking her catlike malaise

she is flat

watching sensationalism

in silk underwear

the TV has a broken tube

that wipes across all faces

do i want to be a

woman’s woman

or a people’s woman

or a people’s person

the room beats dull

my dad bombards

ruffles the stale stillness

shakes my mother’s dusty body

into indignant motion

the tender harmony

of the family sets in

with his presence

now i want to be

a man’s man

or a people’s man

my dad only did one cruel thing

they asked him to get rid of the rats

so he plastered the entrance

to their nest

and the diners complained

of the squeals

my dad chuckles

shuffling unwelcomed energy

like the meaty, papery

birds my mother despises

 

 

Destinations

 

Set down in the canyons

on business

Splintered yellow signs

Curls of neon

The air cradles long wingspans       

set to the soft quiet

of new England

Where friends weave

new orbits

Cows look

somehow always

like they are more natural

dead than alive

like we took electrical currents

to the steaks

and now they stand wobbly

With wide fearful eyes

And bony protrusions

Skin and meat hanging

unnaturally from their

bulky frames

And next week

a direct flight

to just right of

those thick auburn giants

The ones in dreams of

the archetypal forest  

Holding Michelle’s hand

as she reads a short

tart summary

of her mother's life

What is the next destination

and what is the event

that drives us there

 

 

Rialto

 

I went to Ireland

to visit my 12 cousins

from my father’s 7 siblings

 

I felt that slight discomfort

from standing next to a stranger

who has a slight resemblance

 

Sonya and my sister and I

We all have these wide hips

Sonya and my sister have slender fingers

 

The beer and charcoal

Of my father's landscapes

Hang in each sibling’s home

 

I met my uncle Joe

and we brought him my father’s art

and then I heard that he made art too

 

And I still feel the heaviness

The globby pink tree on a

kelly green backdrop

 

Late at night after the pub

I whispered with my aunt

about how mental illness is a demon

 

And then I dreamt of the demon

Standing in the doorway and I thought--

No matter who it is, it's this inside them

 

When it's all over

My sister and I vibrate with travel

My mother and father sit in separate rooms

 

My father is afraid of paperwork

His dark hair has two white veins

One for each of us

 

Because of his white lines

And us heavy stones

He floats stranded in the undercurrents

 

We are free

To float where we please

Gather the updates on babies and sickness

 

Kick stones around Sandymount

Gawk at the fish and chip shops

Sniff out his childhood home

 

And I stand in front of him silent

Blocking his TV show

“What is it love?”

 

 

Olivia McGill is a young poet from Hell’s Kitchen who currently lives in Brooklyn. She was raised mostly on Broadway musicals, Irish pubs, and the starkness of post-industrial Youngstown, Ohio. She currently writes mostly at a diner called Star on 18th. She also frequents Westway Diner, where she hosts a Writers on Writing book club for the public. She incorporates her knowledge of cognitive psychology into much of her work. Her work has been featured in Ant vs. Whale literary magazine, and at many dinners and diners throughout New York City.

 

 

 

Joel Sattler

Don’t Ask for Tomorrow 

[based on a translation of ODES 1:11 
by the ancient Roman poet, Horace 
(Quintus Horatius Flaccus, 65 BC – 8 BC)]

don't ask 
don't ask 
you don't really want to know what for 
the end has in store for us 

O Luke, Lucretius 
reading the stars is useless 
you're better off not seeing 
it's better not to guess 

it's better to simply endure 
whether or not you are sure 
of what will come to pass 

whether or not Jupiter 
will grant us one last winter 
on the Mar Tirreno shore 

so wise up and pour the wine 
cut back on talk so wild 
cause while we drink time slips away 
so reap the day my child 

and don't trust in tomorrow 
tomorrow never knows 
and we must seize the moment 
before the West Wind blows 

don't ask for tomorrow 
don't ask 
you don't really want to know what for 
the end has in store for us 

just trust 
trust in fate 
before it's too late 
don't even ask 

don't ask for tomorrow 
don't ask for tomorrow 
don't ask for tomorrow 
don't even ask 
 

All of a Piece

[Based on a translation of "Tout Entiere" 
from FLEURS DU MAL by Charles Baudelaire] 

the Demon of my upper hall 
this morning came and paid a call 
and tried to find in me a fault 
and said "I'd like to know it all 

"of all the magic beauty here 
that of her body do compose 
which is the sweetest and most dear 
of all the wonders black and rose 

"do you suppose?" oh my soul 
of this abhorrence I replied 
"no piece is better than the whole 
if I said other then I lied 

"when I am much too delighted 
it's so hard to get it right 
it dazzles as the dawn is brighted 
overwhelms me in the night 

"and even harmony exquisite 
governs best her beauteous corpse 
I am a poor analysist 
my judgment turns and twists and warps 

"Oh metamorpho mystical 
all of my senses merge to one 
even her breath is musical 
and her voice makes me undone!" 


Cat Cat Cat 

[based on a translation of "Le Chat" by Charles Baudelaire 
from LES FLEURS DU MAL] 

come my cat my beauty heart 
hold back your claws right from the start 
and let me look into your eyes 
made of agate metal lies 

let me caress your back and neck 
and feel the pleasure electric 
and in my mind I see my wife 
her gaze on me cuts like a knife 

cat cat 
cat cat cat 
cat cat 
cat cat cat 

and for how long from head to foot 
one step before the other put 
a subtle air danger perfume 
swim around and round the room 

cat cat 
cat cat cat 
cat cat 
cat cat cat 
 

 

Joel Sattler is a bookseller, and has been published in a number of different places. These poems have previously appeared on the songwriting site kompoz.com.

 

 

 

Adreyo Sen

My Dear Ghost

 

The ghosts we keep close to our hearts

are the frenzied beat of raven wings

against a cage of glass.

 

One such ghost are you, my love.

Did your shadow merit the protest

of the earth?  Did your breath etch

your name on a window's hazy glass?

 

Perhaps you're real, even as

the melancholy whisper in those valleys of my mind

that are my allotment of Faery.

 

Let me take your hand, with your courage

have me sit by your side

in the little black boat that is Death.

 

 

Eternal Children

 

A lost child 

is the death of a promise,

a still-life painting

whose vivid shades hurt and maim.

 

Children have the courage

to hold dear unfashionable dreams.

And dreaming of becoming

cops and firemen,

they really hope to be

angels of mercy.

 

Which is why 

most police officers caught unguarded

resemble sleeping children.

 

Awake in the valley of the dead,

they play hopscotch and hide and seek,

only pausing to plunder Death's delicious kitchen.

 

 

Scheherazade

 

As a child, I was a despot,

my kingly raiment, frog-patterned PJs.

My sister was my Scheherazade

 

She turned the table (that is, the bed)

by telling me stories

in which the school hockey team's final stand

was really the fierce battle of Thermopylae.

 

As my sister spoke and sang,

her voice became the black boat

on a still black ocean

ferrying me to my gleaming palace.

 

And so I know my sister is never far from me,

even if I no longer know her kiss.

 

Each night I look out my palace window,

into the blackness of the night

and past the blackness of the ocean,

past the black boat paused adrift,

I see my sister's night gowned figure

standing on the other shore,

a blessing warm upon her lips.

 

 

Adreyo Sen is pursuing his MFA at Southampton College.