Absence by Jeffrey McDaniel On the scales of desire, your absence weighs more than someone else’s presence, so I say no thanks
to the woman who throws her girdle at my feet, as I drop a postcard in the mailbox and watch it
throb like a blue heart in the dark. Your eyes are so green – one of your parents must be
part traffic light. We’re both self-centered, but the world revolves around us at the same speed.
Last night I tossed and turned inside a thundercloud. This morning my sheets were covered in pollen.
I remember the long division of Saturday’s pomegranate, a thousand nebulae in your hair,
as soldiers marched by, dragging big army bags filled with water balloons, and we passed a lit match,
back and forth, between our lips, under an oak tree I had absolutely nothing to do with.
Other poems I enjoyed reading this week: (Links attached for the full poem) "So life lets you have a sandwich, and pie for your late night dessert. (Pie for the dog, as well.) And then life sends you back to bed, to dreamland, while outside, the starfish drift through the channel, with smiles on their starry faces as they head out to deep water, to the far and boundless sea."
"You put your bombers in, you put your conscience out, You take the human being and you twist it all about So scrub my skin with women Chain my tongue with whisky Stuff my nose with garlic Coat my eyes with butter Fill my ears with silver Stick my legs in plaster Tell me lies about Vietnam."
-To Whom It May Concern by Adrian Mitchell + Listen to the poem here.
"If you can’t eat you got to smoke and we aint got
nothing to smoke:come on kid let’s go to sleep
if you can’t smoke you got to Sing and we aint got
nothing to sing;come on kid"
-If you can’t eat you got to by e.e. cummings
"Let me now sleep, let me not think, let me Not ache with inconsistent tenderness. It was untenable delight; we are free– Separate, equal–and if loverless, Love consumes time which is more dear than love, More unreplicable. With everything Thus posited, the choice was clear enough
And daylight ratified our reckoning.
Recommended Listening:
Hold Back - The Living Sisters
Baby you got it - Brenton Wood
City of the Sun - Intro (The xx Cover) | Sofar NYC
Beautiful Stories from Anonymous People
Links of the Week:
Illustrations and poems go on blind dates in DF’s Monsoon Editorial
The Art of Making Noodles by Hand
Cry, Heart, But Never Break: A Remarkable Illustrated Meditation on Loss and Life
Boas that eat bhakarwadis, lazy goldfinches and anxious Scrimmlers by Rucha Dhayarkar
Feminine Hairstyles From Popular Folklore Embroidered on British and American Currency