RON PADGETT

war

Do not go gentle into that, good knight.

I say that for several reasons.

First, etc.

Second,

it is my way of making war

go away.

Third—

there always has to be a third

and a tree for it to sit in,

silhouetted against its waving boughs—

the cadets shoulder arms,

harquebuses (ouf!) and lances, maces

and daggers, dirks and devilettes,

pots and pans, and clank,

clank away into the evening whose maw

is famished for clanks and they of course

are just the starter course.

Stairway to the Stars

“And then there were three

whereas before there had been four

or two

And then there were four or two.”

Thus spake the King.

No one dared ask what it meant.

He seemed satisfied by the beauty

of the logic that had arrived,

the royal hall now lightly radiant

as he arose from his throne

and the world fell away,

courtiers, battlements, and clouds,

and he rose like a piece of paper

on which his effigy had been traced

in dotted lines whose dots came loose

and flew away to a place in history

where nothing mattered.

And then there was one.

* * *

CHANGMING YUAN

Prosperous Tomorrow Programmed

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* * *

ALEC NEWMAN

The Inversion of Decadence

Rousseau’s spread

open, as

                                    (he)

surely should

                                    (be),

binding cracked

                                    (and)

pages gummed          

                                    (to)

circular

beery marks.

We expel

plumes of smoke

                                    (from)

Lucky Strikes

that expound

                                    (in)

paisley curls

of ethereal

blue about

                                    (the)

Chartist bar

                                    (of old)

like the blood

                                    (of self)

sacrifice

in a clear

Kinder Scout

pool. I drink

Bitter, you

                                    (drink)

rum and coke.

* * *

POLLY BLACKLEY

Enough                                                                            

The river is no longer enough;

my own reflected neck

arching deep into the dark.

Three elements and none is mine;

I push the air away with creaking wings,

look down at endless green.

My heart pumps cold;

dense layers of feathers keep the inside in

and the outside out.

Still                                                                             

Somewhere in the middle of a glaring Sunday

is a small patch of lawn, where you look for the contact lens

your sister lost while playing French cricket,

where the smell and dampness of the earth make you shiver

despite the heat of the afternoon – a patch you can

kneel down on, grass printing patterns in your knees,

and graze like a cow; this little circle of the world

you accept, shrink to the size of an ant, crawl,

tilting, over grass-blades and plantain-heads,

then look up across the valley’s angle –

all the way over to the other side –

sheep against green, silent trees, the long skyline

where huge white clouds drift so slowly

you have to stare to believe they aren’t

motionless forever.

* * *

ANDREW NIGHTINGALE

Other Irrealis Moods

CURTALATIVE

mood: the occurrence of an opportunity too alonglate to have any consequence

indicator: auxillary <bloan> or <bitter>

FOLLATIVE

mood: in statements referring to an attempt to capture a bloan offer that failed

indicator: prefix <fell->

HARKATIVE

mood: relating to a missed gift and the resultant felldreams that never existed

indicator: auxillary <hark>

PANATIVE

mood: of possibilities that play beyond hark the physical constraints of the body

indicator: suffix <-pawn>

GRATATIVE

mood: when feasibly the wordspawn could never have been made available

indicator: suffix <-lakluk>

UNREQUITIVE

mood: should an event comelakluk when an infinite amount of time has passed

indicator:  prefix <alast-> or <along->

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