The Best of Mad Swirl : 01.17.15
"What is life? A madness. What is life? An illusion, a shadow, a story. And the greatest good is little enough; for all life is a dream, and dreams themselves are only dreams." Pedro Calderon de la Barca
••• The Mad Gallery •••
“Happenstance” (above) by featured artist Gerard Bendiks. To see more Mad works from Gerard, and our other contributing artists, please visit our Mad Gallery.
••• The Poetry Forum •••
This last week in Mad Swirl's Poetry Forum... we mourned a morn built on survivor's guilt; we who wondered what transpires on the morn of shed garments, wondered more; we met monuments mowed with priests as crows; we heard heart-doors crash when our lover left, "no vacancy" flashing in chambers bereft; we shed smock for smudge to smother in smoke; we recompensed sans repentance, a pence to pay penance; we preened in repose for a midnight meet with a love-crossed star. The night is ours, our stories in the stars. ~ MH Clay
Just in case you missed it, here's a taste...
FRONTS SHEERED OFF
As I lie falling asleep at night
bedroom facing the street
I picture the walls of my
yellow house crumbling away.
Here I am revealed to all in
my striped pajamas
curled up on my side
books, reading glasses and
tissues strewn on the
husband’s side of the bed.
I lie under the tiger blanket
used by Father when he was
dying, a white feather comforter
atop that, an occasional duck
feather quacking its way out.
Noises are few. The furnace
clears its throat. The fridge
hums a Beethoven sonata
and the water dispenser on
the outside is lit up when I
enter the dark kitchen
like the Milky Way.
I sit up.
An unfamiliar noise. Is it
the intruder I’ve been
waiting for all my life?
I open the front door.
The stars pounce on me.
The bird houses quiver.
Barefoot, I step outside, feeling the
cold stone steps, littered
with autumn leaves.
I pick up a red maple and
press it to my mouth.
A star fallen to earth.
- Ruth Z. Deming
(1 poem added 01.17.15)
editor’s note: A midnight tryst with a star-fallen lover. (We welcome Ruth to our creative conspiracy of Contributing Poets with this submission. Read more of her madness on her new page - check it out.) - mh
Set Sale
Here alone
in the dead of this coolish night
I wear cloth spun by hands
I will never hold
Hands which pull water from wells
dug into decrepit soil
filled with excretions of electricity
pulsing through crackling machine looms
spinning webs
I cocoon myself in
a softened shirt costing just under a
decade of dollars
One penny shy, to be exact,
demarcated on a paper tag
which caught my eye and promised
a piece of copper for my green guilt
So I lounge in my trap, my Doom,
as I drag manicured nails over this
woven cage, admiring
comfort that exhorts a soft sigh
from my tender lips
It's easy to ignore the manacled claws
that caress me from afar daily
for far less than the cent I tossed
into the gutter drain
I hope it gets carried by the
waste of my washings,
slides across oceanic slime
and falls into those distant hands
- Robert Wesley
(added 01.16.15)
editor’s note: Consumerism with conscience; a penny for that thought. - mh
hag
in the middle
of the shoe shower
dressed in smock.
(why? been busy
and unwilling to miss the thing)
it was
Withdrawal of a smog
(her whiffet of the stuff)
- been too long and boring mostly -
booted crossly
by 'em all
and so
With rebound backwash of the organ and the Monkees
She stared fascinated
She saw the smoke.
And got the beat of it too firmly
Her woe of smooch
was way too smooth for smother
She smouldered then
and turned into the smudge.
- Volodymyr Bilyk
(added 01.15.15)
editor’s note: From smock to smudge, sense is made from Monkees and cross bootings. - mh
Landmine
I learned to cradle
my body in my own arms,
to keep my distance,
stifle yawns and sneezes.
I never knew my ribs were involved
in every movement until they hurt,
until she decided the best way
to my heart would be straight
through my chest.
She told me once she heard it snap.
She said this like my rib breaking
was something that just happened,
like I could have prevented it
if I had been less fragile, if I’d answered
her knocking on my sternum
by opening my ribcage like a door
and inviting her inside.
I don’t remember how it happened.
My mind misplaces things sometimes.
What I remember is leaving,
reaching for my seatbelt, the sudden,
absolute pain that emptied me
of thought and breath, driving myself home.
I stood shirtless in front of my bathroom mirror,
studied the layers of bruises on my collarbones:
sick yellow, deep
crimson, throbbing purple.
I counted her teeth in them.
- Logen Cure
(1 poem added 01.14.15)
editor’s note: An open door policy gone wrong. (We welcome Logen to our crazy confab of Contributing Poets with this submission. Read more of her madness on her new page - check it out.) - mh
Stonehenge
Alfalfa, mown one afternoon,
is baled in the morning
and hauled away before dark.
But for those few hours,
the bales look thousands of years old:
Sacred stones, arranged
by ancients with wisdom we've lost
to catch the sunlight just so.
And the crows that worship there,
though none come twice, not necessarily,
look so much alike
from one harvest to the next
that they might as well be immortal.
- Don Thompson
(added 01.13.15)
editor’s note: A snapshot of a sacred sanctuary; birds only. - mh
Nirvana
My silence is a Gothic church
where I douse the night
after nirvana.
Hemlock
reverberates
the foot-steps of fire
and water.
Before standing
on the cliff of the azure morning
I threw
my garments of light away.
- Bhargab Chatterjee
(1 poem added 01.12.15)
editor’s note: Naked time on the morning after Nirvana. - mh
A MORNING
A morning when silence clings
To tree trunks in gardens
To traffic lights
That blink apologetically
To paddocks where ponies
Sensing the invisible
Graze distractedly
A morning with no function
But to pass in anticipation
Of the hour
When life ended
Even lawn mowers
Go about their work
Apologetically
A morning of stillness
Bereft of birdsong
The television’s prattle
Halted temporarily
I scribble notes
Recording thoughts
Hesitatingly
A morning with no meaning
Without what follows
A film on freeze frame
One image flickering
Soon it will be time
To dress in dark clothes
And assemble guiltily.
- David Subacchi
(added 01.11.15)
editor’s note: Some days it's our turn to break out the black band. Good morning, All! - mh
••• Short Stories •••
Need-a-Read? Howsabout two reads? Our short story queue is bursting at the seams! So for the next couple/few weeks we’ll be squeezing in two. Yes, blessed we be that these fine writers are sharing their word wares with us. And on that note…
Here is what Short Story Editor Tyler Malone had to say about the first pick-of-the-week tale, "The Shy Man" by Darryl Lorenzo Wellington: "Artists, these words we spend intimate hours with become us, but what happens when we lose our voices and ourselves in the rich madness all around? In that struggle to learn how to speak, then you'll find something to say."
Here's a bit to get you goin’:
Shyness is climbing a circling staircase.
Shyness isn’t stasis, paralysis, paranoiac fear of leaving the house, venereal disease, fire ants, or rain storms. Shyness isn’t cabin fever. Shyness is ambling along beneath cloudless weather and noticing the same buildings the same houses. Again. Again. The dead lay down. The terribly shy keep walking.
The staircase leads beyond the passages beyond, life’s slow accretion of days, perpetuating his daily, monotonous grind. The rings of hell could not best the monotony. The staircase climbs toward a horizon of mirrors. Reflections. None colorful, nor colorless. The tints slightly blur at the edge of the banisters when meteorological effects intensify, blurring the glass roof tops. And purpling the glass clouds. There are not experiences enough to fill the mirrors. The stairway climbs beyond houses, hints of purple, reds, foliage, greenery, sights, visions, winks and nods, reflections, reflections, daylight, dawn and darkness.
The Shy Man had begun thinking about decrying the terrible sameness. But his feelings were too ambiguous. His emotions weighted by commas, stutters, and hyphens. He wrote words, just words…
Get the rest of your read on here!
•••
Here is what Short Story Editor Tyler Malone had to say about the second pick-of-the-week tale, "Most Pay Homage” by Kim Farleigh: "We wish, sometimes, that it was a short stop after a short drop, because sometimes, to our own dismay, our own demise is drawn out. It lasts so long that we think we've found happiness."
Here's a bit to get you goin’:
David was studying when his father came home. His father's face glowed, same as the mahogany table David sat upon. The wood looked burnished by silver light.
"Elizabeth and I are getting married," his father said.
Frank sat for the first time ever with his son at that table that was owned by Frank's mother.
"When?" David asked.
"The date hasn't been decided yet."
Silence consumed a car's droning outside as if the sounds never existed.
"It's not going to be easy for her," Frank continued, "living with three teenage boys. You, Richard and Rob are going to have to make things easier for her by doing the dishes and setting the table and taking out the garbage, etcetera. But keep this under your hat until the wedding date is announced."
"Okay," David said.
"I'm so in love," Frank declared…
Get the rest of your read on here!
•••••••
The whole Mad Swirl of everything to come keeps on keepin' on... now... now... NOW! Every second, every minute, every hour, every day, every week, every month, every year, every decade, every every EVERY there is! Wanna join in the mad conversations going on in Mad Swirl's World? Then stop by whenever the mood strikes! We'll be here...
Swirlin’ Madness,
Johnny O
Chief Editor
MH Clay
Poetry Editor
Tyler Malone
Short Story Editor
Madelyn Olson
Visual Editor
••• The Mad Gallery •••
“Happenstance” (above) by featured artist Gerard Bendiks. To see more Mad works from Gerard, and our other contributing artists, please visit our Mad Gallery.
••• The Poetry Forum •••
This last week in Mad Swirl's Poetry Forum... we mourned a morn built on survivor's guilt; we who wondered what transpires on the morn of shed garments, wondered more; we met monuments mowed with priests as crows; we heard heart-doors crash when our lover left, "no vacancy" flashing in chambers bereft; we shed smock for smudge to smother in smoke; we recompensed sans repentance, a pence to pay penance; we preened in repose for a midnight meet with a love-crossed star. The night is ours, our stories in the stars. ~ MH Clay
Just in case you missed it, here's a taste...
FRONTS SHEERED OFF
As I lie falling asleep at night
bedroom facing the street
I picture the walls of my
yellow house crumbling away.
Here I am revealed to all in
my striped pajamas
curled up on my side
books, reading glasses and
tissues strewn on the
husband’s side of the bed.
I lie under the tiger blanket
used by Father when he was
dying, a white feather comforter
atop that, an occasional duck
feather quacking its way out.
Noises are few. The furnace
clears its throat. The fridge
hums a Beethoven sonata
and the water dispenser on
the outside is lit up when I
enter the dark kitchen
like the Milky Way.
I sit up.
An unfamiliar noise. Is it
the intruder I’ve been
waiting for all my life?
I open the front door.
The stars pounce on me.
The bird houses quiver.
Barefoot, I step outside, feeling the
cold stone steps, littered
with autumn leaves.
I pick up a red maple and
press it to my mouth.
A star fallen to earth.
- Ruth Z. Deming
(1 poem added 01.17.15)
editor’s note: A midnight tryst with a star-fallen lover. (We welcome Ruth to our creative conspiracy of Contributing Poets with this submission. Read more of her madness on her new page - check it out.) - mh
Set Sale
Here alone
in the dead of this coolish night
I wear cloth spun by hands
I will never hold
Hands which pull water from wells
dug into decrepit soil
filled with excretions of electricity
pulsing through crackling machine looms
spinning webs
I cocoon myself in
a softened shirt costing just under a
decade of dollars
One penny shy, to be exact,
demarcated on a paper tag
which caught my eye and promised
a piece of copper for my green guilt
So I lounge in my trap, my Doom,
as I drag manicured nails over this
woven cage, admiring
comfort that exhorts a soft sigh
from my tender lips
It's easy to ignore the manacled claws
that caress me from afar daily
for far less than the cent I tossed
into the gutter drain
I hope it gets carried by the
waste of my washings,
slides across oceanic slime
and falls into those distant hands
- Robert Wesley
(added 01.16.15)
editor’s note: Consumerism with conscience; a penny for that thought. - mh
hag
in the middle
of the shoe shower
dressed in smock.
(why? been busy
and unwilling to miss the thing)
it was
Withdrawal of a smog
(her whiffet of the stuff)
- been too long and boring mostly -
booted crossly
by 'em all
and so
With rebound backwash of the organ and the Monkees
She stared fascinated
She saw the smoke.
And got the beat of it too firmly
Her woe of smooch
was way too smooth for smother
She smouldered then
and turned into the smudge.
- Volodymyr Bilyk
(added 01.15.15)
editor’s note: From smock to smudge, sense is made from Monkees and cross bootings. - mh
Landmine
I learned to cradle
my body in my own arms,
to keep my distance,
stifle yawns and sneezes.
I never knew my ribs were involved
in every movement until they hurt,
until she decided the best way
to my heart would be straight
through my chest.
She told me once she heard it snap.
She said this like my rib breaking
was something that just happened,
like I could have prevented it
if I had been less fragile, if I’d answered
her knocking on my sternum
by opening my ribcage like a door
and inviting her inside.
I don’t remember how it happened.
My mind misplaces things sometimes.
What I remember is leaving,
reaching for my seatbelt, the sudden,
absolute pain that emptied me
of thought and breath, driving myself home.
I stood shirtless in front of my bathroom mirror,
studied the layers of bruises on my collarbones:
sick yellow, deep
crimson, throbbing purple.
I counted her teeth in them.
- Logen Cure
(1 poem added 01.14.15)
editor’s note: An open door policy gone wrong. (We welcome Logen to our crazy confab of Contributing Poets with this submission. Read more of her madness on her new page - check it out.) - mh
Stonehenge
Alfalfa, mown one afternoon,
is baled in the morning
and hauled away before dark.
But for those few hours,
the bales look thousands of years old:
Sacred stones, arranged
by ancients with wisdom we've lost
to catch the sunlight just so.
And the crows that worship there,
though none come twice, not necessarily,
look so much alike
from one harvest to the next
that they might as well be immortal.
- Don Thompson
(added 01.13.15)
editor’s note: A snapshot of a sacred sanctuary; birds only. - mh
Nirvana
My silence is a Gothic church
where I douse the night
after nirvana.
Hemlock
reverberates
the foot-steps of fire
and water.
Before standing
on the cliff of the azure morning
I threw
my garments of light away.
- Bhargab Chatterjee
(1 poem added 01.12.15)
editor’s note: Naked time on the morning after Nirvana. - mh
A MORNING
A morning when silence clings
To tree trunks in gardens
To traffic lights
That blink apologetically
To paddocks where ponies
Sensing the invisible
Graze distractedly
A morning with no function
But to pass in anticipation
Of the hour
When life ended
Even lawn mowers
Go about their work
Apologetically
A morning of stillness
Bereft of birdsong
The television’s prattle
Halted temporarily
I scribble notes
Recording thoughts
Hesitatingly
A morning with no meaning
Without what follows
A film on freeze frame
One image flickering
Soon it will be time
To dress in dark clothes
And assemble guiltily.
- David Subacchi
(added 01.11.15)
editor’s note: Some days it's our turn to break out the black band. Good morning, All! - mh
••• Short Stories •••
Need-a-Read? Howsabout two reads? Our short story queue is bursting at the seams! So for the next couple/few weeks we’ll be squeezing in two. Yes, blessed we be that these fine writers are sharing their word wares with us. And on that note…
Here is what Short Story Editor Tyler Malone had to say about the first pick-of-the-week tale, "The Shy Man" by Darryl Lorenzo Wellington: "Artists, these words we spend intimate hours with become us, but what happens when we lose our voices and ourselves in the rich madness all around? In that struggle to learn how to speak, then you'll find something to say."
Here's a bit to get you goin’:
Shyness is climbing a circling staircase.
Shyness isn’t stasis, paralysis, paranoiac fear of leaving the house, venereal disease, fire ants, or rain storms. Shyness isn’t cabin fever. Shyness is ambling along beneath cloudless weather and noticing the same buildings the same houses. Again. Again. The dead lay down. The terribly shy keep walking.
The staircase leads beyond the passages beyond, life’s slow accretion of days, perpetuating his daily, monotonous grind. The rings of hell could not best the monotony. The staircase climbs toward a horizon of mirrors. Reflections. None colorful, nor colorless. The tints slightly blur at the edge of the banisters when meteorological effects intensify, blurring the glass roof tops. And purpling the glass clouds. There are not experiences enough to fill the mirrors. The stairway climbs beyond houses, hints of purple, reds, foliage, greenery, sights, visions, winks and nods, reflections, reflections, daylight, dawn and darkness.
The Shy Man had begun thinking about decrying the terrible sameness. But his feelings were too ambiguous. His emotions weighted by commas, stutters, and hyphens. He wrote words, just words…
Get the rest of your read on here!
•••
Here is what Short Story Editor Tyler Malone had to say about the second pick-of-the-week tale, "Most Pay Homage” by Kim Farleigh: "We wish, sometimes, that it was a short stop after a short drop, because sometimes, to our own dismay, our own demise is drawn out. It lasts so long that we think we've found happiness."
Here's a bit to get you goin’:
David was studying when his father came home. His father's face glowed, same as the mahogany table David sat upon. The wood looked burnished by silver light.
"Elizabeth and I are getting married," his father said.
Frank sat for the first time ever with his son at that table that was owned by Frank's mother.
"When?" David asked.
"The date hasn't been decided yet."
Silence consumed a car's droning outside as if the sounds never existed.
"It's not going to be easy for her," Frank continued, "living with three teenage boys. You, Richard and Rob are going to have to make things easier for her by doing the dishes and setting the table and taking out the garbage, etcetera. But keep this under your hat until the wedding date is announced."
"Okay," David said.
"I'm so in love," Frank declared…
Get the rest of your read on here!
•••••••
The whole Mad Swirl of everything to come keeps on keepin' on... now... now... NOW! Every second, every minute, every hour, every day, every week, every month, every year, every decade, every every EVERY there is! Wanna join in the mad conversations going on in Mad Swirl's World? Then stop by whenever the mood strikes! We'll be here...
Swirlin’ Madness,
Johnny O
Chief Editor
MH Clay
Poetry Editor
Tyler Malone
Short Story Editor
Madelyn Olson
Visual Editor
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