a dark wreath on the angled door
and its shadow a distorted lozenge
on the fractured tiles of the walk
a wind rocks the tiny bell
of a neighboring church
and the tone is like a toll
VISCERAL
by Alec B. Kowalczyk
The pair of lions' heads in stone
flanking the courthouse steps
the dynamic tension in their jaws
ready to spring-shut at any moment
as any passing child knows instinctively
as any sleeping adult knows intuitively
the unimaginable made imaginable
to have a hand caught in the vice-grip
of those incisive locked jaws.
MID-CITY AMUSEMENTS
by Alec B. Kowalczyk
A rolling tumbleweed
bisects a circular patch
of stone shards
that once supported
a merry-go-round
…forging a beeline
past the boarded-up rink
where a lone roller skate
rusted at the end of
a disintegrating lace
…dead-on toward
an overgrown grove
of trees gone wild...
the wreckage of a tangled
timber rollercoaster―
charged sub aural screams
from cars that jumped the track
left hanging in the air.
About Alec B. Kowalczyk
Alec B. Kowalczyk is a native of South Troy, New York, a civil engineer by day, with an interest in the mechanics of poetry. The kind of world he would like to inhabit would be slightly off-kilter...as in The Hour After Westerly by Robert Myron Coates.
His work has been published in 69 Flavors of Paranoia, Semaphore Magazine, Pif Magazine, ChiZine, Yellow Mama and others, winning a Dark Animus Award for poetry. Snark Publishing released his chapbook titled Shadow and Substance.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000799343969
AN ALIEN POEM
by Joe R. Lansdale
You may think this is just a poem.
You'd be wrong.
It's a form of alien mind control.
We are the aliens.
This is our poem.
We write them because if you read them―
we got you.
You are now one of us.
We are taking over the world.
Problem.
It would take centuries
for enough people
to read poems
and become one of us.
Even poets don't read poetry.
Hell, can you blame them?
So, we're thinking of switching,
to encoding our thoughts
in pornographic websites
instead of poems,
or into car commercials.
We would get more people to become aliens
that way.
Whatever we decide to do
in the future,
this is the end of this poem,
and—
—HA!
We still got you sucker.
You should have stuck to video games.
DEATH BEFORE BED
by Joe R. Lansdale
In dark cloak
and bunny slippers
I ride the country wild.
With scythe and croaker sack
I gather them up,
those shadows strong or mild.
I put them away,
and kick them some,
to quiet them down of course.
And then I carry them
quick to home,
Carry them fast,
like a tornado wind
where a hole in the earth awaits.
I toss them down,
I push them down,
I kick them in the ass.
Down there in the pit,
where the flames lick up,
I leave them and laugh.
APACHE WITCH
by Joe R. Lansdale
In the wild country where the West wind blows,
the demon of the desert comes and goes.
Dark like a shadow, a mouth full of blood,
there's nothing out there but it and the dead.
Lives in a cave near a dark red butte,
hides there by magic, in an old cavalry boot.
Released by a spell from an Apache witch,
it twists and it turns and howls like a bitch.
Lizards and coyotes, buzzards and men,
it kills and kills, again and again.
But kill it must, and each night it comes,
until a cowpoke arrives with a lamp and a gun.
The lamp is lit with oil from a dog,
and around the cowpoke's neck,
on a string of braided gut
is a dried up frog and a hickory nut.
The rifle is packed with bullets of silver and lead,
little charms buried deep in the ammo heads.
An Apache woman, the witches daughter, the cowpoke's wife,
made it to save her husband's life.
So Apache magic meets head on.
The demon whirls with a desert song.
The cowboy fires his gun and throws his lamp.
The demon roars and the night turns damp.
Out of a cloud against a moonlit sky,
comes a rain of black lumps like a cobbler pie.
It blows and it whirls and it twists and it turns,
and when it hits the demon it smokes and it burns.
The cowpoke's magic makes the demon cry.
It even melts the damn thing's eyes.
The rain on the cowpoke is heavy and wet,
but for the demon it's the worse thing yet.
The demon becomes a twirl of smoke,
and the cowpoke laughs like it's all a joke.
On his way home he yells and he cries,
for the demon was made of his poor child's sighs.
The baby's breath stolen by a cat
that was black as the pit and little pig fat.
The Apache witch sucked the baby's soul,
because his daughter made the child in a soldiers bed roll.
So stealing a boot
and casting a spell,
the witch had wreaked vengeance
so very well.
Wearing moon silver
like armor and mail,
the former soldier,
rode home to his wife.
They dried their tears and climbed in bed,
the stars at their window,
the wind at their door,
the howl of the coyote like the call of the dead.
They came together in a tearful wail,
loved one another with all their might,
tried to make a child that very night,
did what they could to set themselves right.
Back on the desert,
next day in the sun,
the Apache witch man
was dead and done.
Found at the mouth of a cave near an army boot,
the witch man was burned and wadded,
with a hole in his chest,
the demon of the desert had left its nest.
About Joe R. Lansdale
Joe R. Lansdale is the author of over thirty novels, twenty short story collections, screenplays, comic scripts, essays and non-fiction. His novel Vanilla Ride, from Knopf, is part of his Hap and Leonard series. Others in the series are currently being reprinted by Vintage Books.
Joe R. Lansdale's novella, Bubba Ho-Tep, was the inspiration for Don Coscarelli's cult classic film, starring Bruce Campbell and Ossie Davis.
And now there is a new Lansdale book: The Best of Joe R. Lansdale. Lansdale's favored themes run from zombies to vampire hunters to drive-in theaters, and his storytelling encompas
ses everything from gross-out horror to satire.
http://www.joerlansdale.com
DARK SHADOW CLUBBING
by Everett Madrid
Dancing there alone in the shadows,
my eyes started to ring and sting.
When I saw that it was the real you,
I wanted to cry and silently scream.
Then I barely realized with fright,
it was only a cracked mirror.
You were dancing in the background,
glaring at me and dancing nearer.
It was too dark to see,
what it was you held in your hand.
It was too late to stop,
by the time I realized what you had planned.
You get to have all that you want,
when you dance with me behind the Black Door.
A thorny rose with black pedals dripping in your blood,
the perfect gift I have been wishing for.
DANCING IN REPRISE
by Everett Madrid
I'm here to serenade you with the letters,
written as you recently requested.
The fuzzy line between you and me,
just went quantum with what you be-quested.
I know it's that bad and I've been there myself,
many times before in another life full of strife.
The end is not the answer we're searching for now,
until fully experiencing the roller coaster of this life.
I know you were expecting only one for you,
mine must come as quite a pleasant surprise.
It wrote itself to the music as I wrote yours,
two little suicide notes dancing in reprise.
I know you won't do it because you're not through yet,
with yourself or me and so I can't let you be.
I can't let you in good conscience end it this way;
writing the note that blames your pain on me.
Whatever the time that brings you to the very end,
it is going to be in the cradle of my arms or not at all.
If you end it with step off of this very steep cliff,
I'm going to catch you before the end of our fall.
INVISIBLE HAPPY EMOTIONS
by Everett Madrid
You are now gone and not because of death,
once again I feel close to complete.
You left me with nothing but my last breath,
and the empty feeling of deplete.
The day has finally come to linger,
you are no longer part of my existing life.
When I think of you now I'll only remember
the sickness and lonely, constant strife.
I should have known it was doomed to land,
when the desire to have you was gone.
You only wanted a golden stage upon to stand,
and my shoulders to place it square upon.
With you by my side I had never been so alone
all of the way, to the terrible very end.
I've forgotten how to laugh, the feeling
to belong somewhere, anywhere, with good friends.
My emotions are mostly invisible now or in rear,
I can no longer imagine happiness as a station.
What I received in return was loss of everything dear,
and a very big bad reputation.
You will not be remembered as an ex-flame,
or the hand for which I was the glove.
You were just an artist I once tried to help,
and the shadow I twice tried to love.
About Everett Madrid
After a successful ten year career as a Navy engineer, Everett Madrid (otherwise known as b.a.d., which stands for beat art dealer) worked as a consultant and sales engineer for the semi-conductor and telecommunications industry. He completed advanced management application training (Total Quality Management), in addition to earning a BA in Organizational Management in 1995 at St. Mary's College of California. He left the corporate culture to follow his passion and entered the art business as a sales consultant. His passion for excellence and love for the arts enabled his quick rise in the gallery world, landing him a director position in one of the largest art galleries in the country.
Over the following five years, Everett would deal in the works of Pablo Picasso, Marc Chagall, Salvador Dali, Rembrandt, Andy Warhol and a myriad of historically important and contemporary artists.
While it was exciting dealing in the great arts of the past, Everett's true passion grew to be contemporary art and promoting the careers of living artists. Launching Gallery Culture in 2003 as a hobby, he provided free artist portfolio hosting and event listings, thus creating a national network of artists and contacts. In 2003, he produced a six-month bi-weekly mini-series covering the San Francisco emerging arts community in addition to conducting countless interviews. In 2005, he curated his first museum exhibition that included the publication of the artist's catalogue reasonne and a documentary film.
A RESPONSE TO SETH GRAHAME-SMITH'S ABRAHAM LINCOLN: VAMPIRE HUNTER
by Juan Perez
The proverbial log cabin ax
Shining with moonlight
Where otherwise covered
With foreign, crimson fluid
Death, a fact
To someone or something
Always, yet what
A barnyard blitz
On a concrete jungle
Puzzle pieces waiting
To recover, return
To its owner
A human converted
To the blood-sucking disease
Surely will not stand
So long as the hunter lives
For man cannot endure
In a place half-human, half-beast
For one will surely end the other
As man divides against himself
So long as either shall live
For as long as the hunter shall resolve
As the last best hope for earth
Lincoln, for the ages
ONE NIGHT'S LAST STAND
by Juan Perez
Sana, sana, colita de rana
Si no sanas ahora, sanas mañana
Precisely the morning
That I had to hold on to
My hands melting away
Holding on for dear life
La bruja was pleading
Kicking, screaming
Biting, clawing
To get far from meI, frightened for life
She, attempting to claim my soul
For a strange night of sex
The smell of sanguineous sulfur
Her morphean skin, my human one
Begging to be mine forever
Assume any form I wanted
Any woman I desired
All I had to do was let her go before sunlight
Yet, I would lose more
Than I could ever gain
Lust and one damned bottle of tequila
Had gotten me here
At the end of my proverbial rope
Holding on to a sobering dear sun
To burn this sin completely away
A witch's death on my mortal hands
Her dark husband shall have to wait
A far, distant chilly night
Before claiming what she paid for
In this hot, beautiful new sun
My scarred, melted hands
Reminding me of this senseless conquest
Sana, sana, colita de rana
Si no sanas ahora, sanas mañana
THE MEXICAN WHO TRIED TO SAVE THE WORLD
by Juan Perez
Standing alone
Where oblivion is not as noisy
As I had first imagined
Where all I knew
Where all I loved
Was sucked away
Into a faceless vacuum
Where my thoughtful warnings
Did nothing to stop self-destruction
Where life and counter-life
Danced the wicked beat of time
Where oblivion steps in now
Not as noisy as I first imagined
Had I not attempted
To save this world
Only dissatisfaction would remain
With no room for lovely memories
With no room left to be human
Had I imagined a noiseless ending
I would not had bothered as much
Besides, human is my final name
Yet, that too will soon be forgotten
For what oblivion has truthfully taken
It will never share again
And death its only partner
Yet that is okay somehow
For life was a noisy world
Oblivion not so much
Not as I had first imagined
CENTAUR-LET BI-POLAR OWNER
by Juan Perez
I lassoed a Martian centaur-let
[to kill it]
So my little Machitaz could have it
[to eat it]
How lovely they really are
[on a platter]
Here on the red planet Mars
[let's kill more]
My lovely Machitaz, she loves her