tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-43887415163197595722024-02-14T12:53:47.239-08:00Sudden Prose: Prose Poetry and Short-Short StoriesCarrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.comBlogger182125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-82754717495351769332022-10-14T00:00:00.002-07:002022-10-14T07:59:26.630-07:00Sudden Prose Reprints: Isabel Galleymore's 'True Animal'<p> </p><p><b><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">True Animal</span></b></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">On a dozy summer's day, a donkey magpied a lion's skin that the hunters had left to dry in the sun. What else had the donkey to do, but chameleon himself inside it? As he swanned across the paddock in his new ferocious fur, the horse began to mouse, the hare grew chicken-hearted, and the chicken hared away. How good it felt to shark among the shrimp, he thought, and let out a proud hee-haw... The daisies widened their eyes. Mid-run, the chicken stopped. The hare, and then the mouse, dared themselves to look. Finding not claws but hooves, each turned upon him and, as any true animal would, parroted a short teaching on natures true and fox. </span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Isabel Galleymore<br /><a href="https://www.carcanet.co.uk/cgi-bin/indexer?product=2249" target="_blank"><i>Significant Other </i>(Carcanet, 2019)</a></span></div>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-59715834400151510792022-01-14T00:00:00.002-08:002022-01-28T14:09:46.858-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Train to Polonnaruwa" by S. Niroshini<p> </p><div><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Train to Polonnaruwa</span></b></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /><i>Colombo, 1995</i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><i><br /></i>That summer seemed so short, standing on the roof of my grandmother's house.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><br />A crow watches from the lane, its black eye half-sunken in pulped aubergine;</span></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><br />strange feast, gesture of street-opulence, only the Poya moon that night familiar.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><br />Trains to Polonnaruwa from Colombo on the horizon, to monuments in stone.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><br />Blind to the violet waves of this country: fake flowers at airports, love cake, ayubowans. </span></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><br />Little girls in white uniforms amble past mosques and churches, holding hands.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><br />In the south-west monsoon, thunderstorms in Colombo are not what you might imagine.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /><a href="https://sniroshini.com" target="_blank">S. Niroshini</a></span></div><p><i><br /></i></p><p><i><br /></i></p>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-87956443230336135902021-04-02T01:00:00.002-07:002021-04-02T03:01:38.259-07:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Cinnamon" by Fawzia Kane<p><b><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Cinnamon</span></span></b></p><p><b><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></b></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Watch how the skin peels, dislodges, is sloughed off to reveal inner layers of mottling, so soft and moist. This holds a tint only burning sugar can show, at that instant when it granulates from smooth clay to sheets of beaten copper. This wound, just here on the trunk, has already dried. Even the leaves turn brittle, curl into fingers, and desiccate to crumbs. Examine these differences of duskiness, the scale of halftones that play out among and over us, during our quick dawns and lingering twilights. How many will mingle in crowds, to be tied to others with strings of painted lines? Which of these, when they touch and interweave with us, will you still believe are invisible? Remember, remember the splintering of their scent through the prism of air, the lick of it, the hot taste against the inside of our throats, the hurt on, the hurt of the tongue. </span></span><b><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></span></b></div><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-82599d4e-7fff-5028-c2e4-1951eff9a570" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-82599d4e-7fff-5028-c2e4-1951eff9a570" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fawzia Kane</span><span id="docs-internal-guid-82599d4e-7fff-5028-c2e4-1951eff9a570" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i> </i></span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-82599d4e-7fff-5028-c2e4-1951eff9a570" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>Filigree: Contemporary Black British Poetry</i>, ed. Nii Ayikwei Parkes (Peepal Tree Press, 2018) </span> <br /></span></span></div>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-19372253977974092962021-02-12T01:30:00.003-08:002021-02-12T06:10:41.192-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Three Young Surrealist Women Holding in their Arms the Skins of an Orchestra – Dalí, 1936" by Geraldine Clarkson<p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Three Young Surrealist Women Holding in their Arms </span></b></span><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="font-size: 18pt;"><b>the Skins of an Orchestra – Dalí, 1936</b>
</span></span></p><span style="font-family: georgia;">
</span><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-size: 11pt; line-height: 115%; margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span>Having
always used her music as an instrument, a gift to stifle hurt in
others, a searching for a niche into which she could stuff pansies or
wallflowers, a grey to be drenched with peony
or tangerine, she became pliable, perfectly responsive to circumstance,
a kitten following its master, chase-and-nibble. At first she didn’t
notice herself changing, so intent was she on pacifying with titbits the
yawning jaw. Filling the jug of subjugation.
Until she awoke in a boulder-desert, stone-faced, immaterial. Her life
shrunk now to two needers who dominated: her mother and her daughter.
Her music no more than a cipher, a distorted keyboard painted on a
banner wrung out, flung out between her and the
others, a mute offering. The godlike gift something less than animal or
vegetable. A split skewed thing. And she, a rock-musician, no longer
able to please anyone.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span> </span></span></span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span>Geraldine Clarkson</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Baskerville Old Face","serif"; font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i><a href="https://ninearchespress.com/publications/poetry-collections/monica%27s-overcoat-of-flesh.html" target="_blank">Monica's Overcoat of Flesh</a> </i>(Nine Arches Press, 2020) </span></span><br /></span></div>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-24228130227905483092021-02-05T01:40:00.001-08:002021-02-05T01:40:07.093-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "A Thursday" by Geraldine Clarkson<p><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><b>A Thursday</b></span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span>Attendant
circumstances: the sun and the moon, in that order. Running home, no
reason to think the house would not be as we’d left it. Mother wiping
workaday hands on her stretchy pink
overall. Father gulping down tea, talking to whoever was there, his
soft-steel presence filling the house, so that we breathed in, moved
carefully into corners. And my brother: thinning, staring, wandering off
for longer and longer, forgetting to say where,
just flushed cheeks and eyes shining like polythene. But the noise
coiled through the windows and walls before we arrived—a wind of tangled
voices sighing and soughing. The back door open. Mother not in the
kitchen. Father, loitering. The next room quickly
dark with cousins and uncles and Irish people, all here not there. On
top of each other, two heads to each person. All the heads crying. And
Mother by the fire, flanked by four aunts. Someone took us to a back
room, away from the sobbing-wind sound, offered
us sweets, as many as we liked, while day turned to night, in that
order. </span></span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span><br /></span></span></span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><span>Geraldine Clarkson</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Baskerville Old Face","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i><a href="https://ninearchespress.com/publications/poetry-collections/monica%27s-overcoat-of-flesh.html" target="_blank">Monica's Overcoat of Flesh</a> </i>(Nine Arches, 2020) </span></span><br /></span></div>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-51774977857435684972021-01-15T01:30:00.001-08:002021-01-15T01:30:03.933-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "I Was Trying to Make Peace with My Past" by Vik Shirley<h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">I Was Trying to Make Peace with My Past,</span></h2><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"> </span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">but my past was making it very difficult. Every time I would go to shake its hand, it put thumb to nose and wiggled its fingers. I tried cooking it a nice meal. All it did was make a fuss about the bones I'd left in the lamb tagine, to enhance the flavour. I tried Martinis: it didn't like olives; pavlova: it had a meringue allergy; after-dinner coffee: it couldn't have caffeine after 3pm. I started to wonder if it might have been easier to have remained enemies. Or better still, if I'd thought of it earlier, I could have poisoned the food and killed the past. But I knew one thing the past liked and that was a drink. So I slipped antifreeze into its Amaretto liqueur, and as we sat and drank, smoking Cuban cigars, listening to Andy Williams, I smiled to myself, knowing that any minute, the ethylene glycol would kick in. It was then the past turned to me and said: "I know I act mean, but I would like to make friends or peace or whatever you want to call it." I stumbled to the kitchen, where I added the remaining poison to my White Russian and downed it. Then we lay together, in each other's arms, until, at last, we were at peace. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia;">Vik Shirley</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://www.haverthorn.com/books/the-continued-closure-of-the-blue-door" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>The Continued Closure of the Blue Door </i>(HVTN Press, 2020)</span></a><br /></div>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-5324354696458147232020-12-04T01:30:00.002-08:002020-12-08T09:51:14.650-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Object Poem" by Jane Monson<p><span style="font-size: large;"><b> Object Poem</b></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">We do not write about the object--we write about the shadow it casts or the reflection it throws back at us. We talk about the setting, the human dramas that crowd outside it. We try to know them all. The language. The disasters. We write about the wind that moves, throws, or breaks it, but ignore that so low to the ground, something like a stone can remain complete and still during the unhinged run of a hurricane, and that stillness of a tiny thing without so much of a flinch when nothing else stands a chance, is worth a thought at least. The words can follow later, in a mere handful, and that is something. Something at least, on which to build, or not, as the case may be.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Jane Monson</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i>Speaking without Tongues </i>(Cinnamon, 2010)</span><br /></div>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-26159909820155931112020-11-27T01:00:00.001-08:002020-11-27T01:00:04.809-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "What Death Said" by Jane Monson<p><span style="font-size: large;"><b>What Death Said</b></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Here the wind is too subtle, too unseen. Even the dew on the grass is safe, the ant's straight line over the slate and the slack wire line from tree to wall--even this is static, stock-still in the air. She waits for a change, a sneeze or a sigh, some shift in the view. She does not trust or know nature like this--inanimacy, she finds, breeds a tension like death. For this, she is always unprepared, always taken aback--to the night on a long lost road, waiting out the surprise that comes when death pricks open her eyes and says: <i>you have known me before I have known you.</i></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><i> </i></span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Jane Monson</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i>Speaking without Tongues</i> (Cinnamon, 2010)<i></i></span><br /></div>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-31490924414930677832020-11-20T02:22:00.001-08:002020-11-20T02:22:00.273-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Early Retirement" by Ian Seed<p> </p><p dir="ltr" id="docs-internal-guid-dd392eab-7fff-4649-51a1-35c9ac03b871" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Early Retirement</span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">After many years abroad, I moved to a small village in Cornwall. The locals immediately took to me because I seemed foreign and exotic. The plump, middle-aged woman at the Post Office asked me if I would take on the leading male role in a production that was going to be put on at the village hall. She would play the leading lady. I was too ashamed to admit that I wouldn’t be able to remember the lines. Instead I told her my schedule was already packed, mumbling a lie about a book to write. She blushed as if I’d slapped her. Perhaps another year, I suggested, though I knew my memory would be even worse by then. She shook her head. My standing in the community would never be the same again. </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ian Seed</span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.shearsman.com/store/Ian-Seed-New-York-Hotel-p102839110" target="_blank"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>New York Hotel </i>(Shearsman, 2018) </span></a></span></p>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-79783430600474986882020-11-13T02:19:00.001-08:002020-11-13T02:19:00.690-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Volunteer" by Ian Seed<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" id="docs-internal-guid-8790cb08-7fff-3009-1b2a-17c41514676f" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Volunteer</span></span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We were all in a large tent. Sitting at untidily laid-out trestle tables, we had to sort out hundreds of letters, stick labels with addresses on envelopes, put the letters inside and seal them with a lick. I was surprised at how quickly my mouth and tongue got sore. I had come in good faith, but was now wondering how I could escape.</span></span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A tall American lady dressed in a red uniform seemed to be standing guard at the flap door. She wanted to know why I was leaving so soon. Before I could reply, she pointed to the ring on my finger. ‘Oh,’ she said, ‘the best ones always get taken, don’t they?’ She gave me a bundle of large letters and envelopes to take home with me, to make sure I was kept busy and useful.</span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ian Seed</span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://www.shearsman.com/store/Ian-Seed-New-York-Hotel-p102839110" target="_blank"><i>New York Hotel </i>(Shearsman, 2018)</a> </span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></p>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-85121685681105307512020-11-06T05:33:00.005-08:002020-11-06T05:33:55.650-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Evolution" by Ian Seed<p> </p><p dir="ltr" id="docs-internal-guid-2d7c2ad2-7fff-1e67-81df-dd8a33c46eba" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Evolution</span></span></p><p dir="ltr" id="docs-internal-guid-2d7c2ad2-7fff-1e67-81df-dd8a33c46eba" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></p><p id="docs-internal-guid-2d7c2ad2-7fff-1e67-81df-dd8a33c46eba" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There were some large black ducks, not unlike dodos, by the German lake. I began pushing one gently by the beak until it pushed back and then slowly and clumsily chased me round and round. From nearby metal benches, some Germans looked on bemused. </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></p><span style="font-size: large;"></span><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We hadn’t been here since my daughter was a toddler. At that time, she was frightened by the birds, and I had played the same game to amuse her. Now she was a teenager exploring the old town on her own, while my wife slept off her hangover. I had nothing better to do.</span></span></p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A German man, roughly the same age and height as me, but much broader in the shoulder, got up and started playing my game with one of the ducks. But he did so in an aggressive and exaggerated manner, as if to parody me. The others smiled and their eyes lit up, perhaps anticipating my inevitable humiliation.</span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ian Seed</span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i><a href="https://www.shearsman.com/store/Ian-Seed-New-York-Hotel-p102839110" target="_blank">New York Hotel</a> </i>(Shearsman, 2018) </span></span></p>Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-10474186798198529612020-07-03T03:23:00.000-07:002020-07-03T03:23:17.383-07:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "XXXII" by Marosa di Giorgio<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">XXXII</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"> They said that the god was coming to visit. The bustling began at dawn. We set out the best tablecloth, the most exquisite eggs in syrup, the little plates filled with ripe olives and pearls. All morning we watched the air and the sky, the trees, the lone clouds. Someone knocked on the door, but we did not answer; we just wanted to be alone and pray.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"> But, at noon, he arrived--we didn't know from where. There he stood with his long braids, his woolen cloak, his colossal wooden staff. We dropped to our knees, praying and crying; we served him the finest food, the fantasy rooster, everything adorned with big sprinkles. He ate his lunch, drank, and explored the house; he declared that he wanted to take something with him, since he was never going to return. He examined the cupboards, the chandeliers, the little porcelain cups, the big clock at the foot of my grandmother's bed; he smelled the oak trees and basil; he searched the wardrobe, drawer by drawer; he looked into the album; he asked which one was Celia. We showed him my little sister.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"> He chose her.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Marosa di Giorgio, translated by Jeannine Marie Pitas</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://uglyducklingpresse.org/publications/the-history-of-violets/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: large;"><i>The History of Violets </i></span></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">(Ugly Duckling, 2010)<i> </i></span></div>
</div>
Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-13653544290947357122020-06-26T03:16:00.000-07:002020-06-26T03:16:14.537-07:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "IX" by Marosa di Giorgio <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">IX</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Last night again I saw the chest of drawers, the oldest, from my grandmother's wedding, my mother and her sisters' youth, my childhood. There it stood with its high mirror, its baskets of paper roses.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"> And then the white chick--almost a dove--flew from the trees to eat rice from my hands. She felt so real to me that I was going to kiss her.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"> But then, everything burst into flames and disappeared. God stows his things away safely.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Marosa di Giorgio, trans. Jeannine Marie Pitas</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://uglyducklingpresse.org/publications/the-history-of-violets/" target="_blank"><i>The History of Violets</i></a></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">(Ugly Duckling, 2010)</span><i> </i></div>
</div>
Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-10492657860142308442020-04-03T00:51:00.000-07:002020-04-03T00:51:04.195-07:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Antico Adagio" by Peter Gizzi<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><b>Antico Adagio</b></span></span><br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Bring down the lights. Bring out the stars. Let the record sing; the vibraphone; the violin; the gong. We call this charm a festooned gazebo in twilight. We call night and her creatures to the summer screen; every beat a wheel every wheel aglow. The soft tight musical light a freshet. And happy who can hear the wood, the ferns bobbing, the stars splashing down. I wanted this glad tight happy light inside the gloaming. I wanted glow. The piping anthem of a voyage listing in lamplight, oboe light; hear it and fly. Hear it fly like friendship like modernism beginning like a steamer pulling out to sea in an old reel dreaming. Married to a song; to a pebble of song.</span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Peter Gizzi</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><i>The Winter Sun Says Fight </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Plymouth: Periplum Poetry, 2016</span></span><i> </i></div>
Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-20874275283497447282019-12-13T03:06:00.000-08:002019-12-13T03:06:01.358-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: from "Of Wife" by Alison Winch<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<b><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">from "Of Wife"</span></span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">i On the Manner in Which Wife Introduces Her Self</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The marriage counselor has me sit on his chaise longue, behind him a long green garden like a secret glade. I pretend to be one woman.</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">On this body is a head, I explain, and on this head is a pack of spaniels, a pack so dense they are a mind. And they fawn over men. Men made up of golden light, muddy crystals, kissing cherries. </span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Alison Winch</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i>Darling, It's Me </i>(Penned in the Margins, 2019)</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></span></div>
Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-54205851183012911272019-01-25T10:12:00.001-08:002019-01-25T10:12:21.312-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "the outside air" by Alessandra Lynch<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>the outside air</b></span><br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Though it's still blue, the mist here is not the future mist and the rain not the same rain and the corner field not a parking lot. No sound from the pond. No after-stir. Charred flies skitter over its silent vellum, and chimney swifts dodge the irrefutable air. And there are other alterations, other speeds.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">From underfoot, doves startle. Leaves hang their dry masks over the trail, rattling slightly. On the western bank, a tree--aloof from its cutoff dress--all sheathed bark, reads as skin, reads as: can-be-shed. Will-be-pared.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">The air once deep enough to breathe, too shallow to wade. Broken armed women sinking and rising. Their mouths, fixed as megaphones. Their faces undone.</span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">Alessandra Lynch</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><a href="https://www.alicejamesbooks.org/bookstore/daylily-called-it-a-dangerous-moment?rq=lynch" target="_blank">Daylily Called It a Dangerous Moment</a> </i>(Alice James Books, 2017)</span></div>
Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-84093063070213432292019-01-11T02:00:00.000-08:002019-01-11T02:00:12.360-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "New Territories" by Jennifer Lee Tsai<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b><span style="line-height: 107%;">New
Territories</span></b></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">
</span></span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="line-height: 107%;">When I
first get off the plane, the heat hits me, tropical, alien. For once, I’m no
different. The anonymity subdues me. This is where my past begins. I meet my
uncle for steamed bamboo baskets of <i>dim
sum</i> and oolong tea. He is tall, fair-skinned, almost like a <i>gweilo</i>, people say. From my aunt’s
apartment windows, I see tendrils of mist rise from Tai Mo Shan mountain.
Mammoth dragonflies hover, translucent-winged, their presence signalling the
imminent fall of rain. I look for traces of my grandmother. A woman I meet,
from the same village as her, mourns for her orphaned children, laments the
tyrant husband, the cruelty of the mother-in law. She remembers my mother as a
child. By day, I read the <i>Tao Te Ching</i>.
I want to understand something about the nature of emptiness, start again
somehow. The character for <i>Tao</i>
contains a head and a walking foot which means <i>the way</i>. In the Chi Lin<i> </i>nunnery
on Diamond Hill, there are lotus ponds, bonsai tea plants, purple and orange
bougainvillea. Behind intricate screens nuns offer fruit and rice to Buddha.
High-rise apartments tower in the background.</span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">
</span></span><div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">
</span></span><div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span><span style="line-height: 107%;">Jennifer Lee Tsai</span></span><span style="line-height: 107%;"> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="line-height: 107%;">An earlier version of
this poem appeared in <i>Ten: Poets of
the New Generation</i>, ed. Karen McCarthy Woolf (Bloodaxe: 2017).</span></span></span>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-40910732536335996012019-01-04T02:30:00.000-08:002019-01-04T02:35:09.700-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "This Is the End" by Suzannah Evans<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjAq0MeqS6zDSMN9SIMgT0IHLhVBkhnUU6bWeu-T2uJWT3Fbok4eayc_QaYysMalPE24-m68f6KN7j-jDfC1IVu23G74H_0QXCLw8fZ6T_2bpVNN1Raa-1i57bESPH032WIxdtgwpLBpo/s1600/Near+Future+Cover_web.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="621" data-original-width="392" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjAq0MeqS6zDSMN9SIMgT0IHLhVBkhnUU6bWeu-T2uJWT3Fbok4eayc_QaYysMalPE24-m68f6KN7j-jDfC1IVu23G74H_0QXCLw8fZ6T_2bpVNN1Raa-1i57bESPH032WIxdtgwpLBpo/s200/Near+Future+Cover_web.jpg" width="125" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">This Is the End </span></span></b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></span></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">It's
1999 and we're rehearsing the school play – a devised piece set at the end of
the world, in a motel run by the devil. <i>Surely some revelation is at hand </i>shouts
Mr Maxwell, millennial prophet and head of Theatre Studies. We shout back <i>Surely
the second coming is at hand. </i>Because this is the West Midlands we
pronounce it <i>Shirley. </i></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">
</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The
performance date is after the predicted apocalypse so no-one's made much effort
with their lines. Mr M makes us sit in the gym with the lights off and listen
to <i>The End</i> by the Doors. <i>Theatre doesn't last forever,</i> he says, <i>like
life.</i> We sit cross-legged on the polished floor while he paces between us,
grinning in the dark. </span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">
</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 58.45pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"> *</span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">In
the early hours of New Years' Day, unsteady with alcopops, we watch the
firework display from the bridge and make our elaborate plans for the year
ahead. </span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 58.45pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The
play gets mixed reviews from both staff and students and Lucifer goes back to
his life as a sixth-former named Gareth. We patch and cut the costumes into
something else, ready for next term's<i> Midsummer Night's Dream. </i> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 58.45pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Sometimes
now I hear that song and remember how it felt to live under that weight of
danger, how I carried those words with me all winter, as ice laced itself over
the pavements, as I walked home under the viaduct and the sky lowered itself
over everything. </span></span><br />
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Suzannah Evans</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://ninearchespress.com/publications/poetry-collections/near%20future.html" target="_blank"><i>Near Future </i>(Nine Arches, 2018)</a> </span></span><br />
<br />
<br />
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Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-18091117137077953322018-12-07T02:30:00.000-08:002018-12-07T02:30:04.516-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "What Did the Orange Gain" by Anna Reckin<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<b><span style="font-size: large;">What did the orange gain</span></b><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"> when it lost its 'n'? Orotundity and foreignness--an orange is rounder than a <i>naranja. </i>It announces its roundness at the very beginning, out loud in black type: O.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">But the 'n' didn't just drop off and fall away, a curl of peel. It slid across into negative space, no-man's land, the indefinite article. There it is, in the middle: empty vessel without so much as an outline around it. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">You can't throw a circle off-balance, but a painting needs a tipping movement. Something to set the eye rolling, ball on a see-saw. Teeter-totter, the clatter of utensils. Cutting board, and the knife's an indicator. Spin it like a needle, and see whose heart it points to. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Not many murder stories happen in kitchens, despite all the knives, the opportunities. Or maybe they're disembodied--the murders, I mean. Acid, or the ones that slowly boil away until the pan runs dry. Spices whose oils evanesce into the atmosphere...</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"> the vanishing's the point.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Anna Reckin</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><a href="https://www.shearsman.com/store/Anna-Reckin-Line-to-Curve-p102839041" target="_blank">Line to Curve</a> </i>(Shearsman, 2018)</span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"> </span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-left: 216.0pt; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-left: 216.0pt; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-34092577750825531992018-11-30T02:00:00.000-08:002018-11-30T02:00:04.313-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Pancake" by Lila Matsumoto<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Pancake</b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Oh! The <i>horror vacui </i>of the crevice between refrigerator and wall. I call my reliable caulker, and she arrives after lunchtime with an armful of smooshable foodstuffs, eventually electing pancakes as her most preferred medium.</span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Lila Matsumoto</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.shearsman.com/store/Lila-Matsumoto-Urn-and-Drum-p102838942" target="_blank"><i>Urn &</i> <i>Drum </i>(Shearsman, 2018)</a></span></div>
Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-16156020841877346302018-11-23T02:00:00.000-08:002018-11-23T02:00:06.781-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Fish" by Anna Reckin<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Fish</b></span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-size: large;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">A few hours after dawn, under a
bridge in the middle of the city, a wooden rowing-boat, with two fishermen in
it. Downstream is the outlet from the printworks, where the swans gather in a
rush of warm water; upstream the corrugated cardboard factory, a choking smell
of damp paper. Along here, the river's shut in, with straight-sided banks and
paved paths, squared off like a canal. I would never expect fish to be here. I
would think that they would stay in the greener shady places where the river
edges what were once water-meadows (sand and gravel still), now playing-fields.</span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-size: large;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">That night I dream of the fish in
the river. The river's course has straightened, blocked off into a long narrow
pool: a tank in a Mughal miniature. The city walls are smooth and high,
fortified, with watchtowers, and the buildings crowd up against them: towers,
domes and minarets. It's after dark, and a single fish hangs in the water,
gleaming in the night-time stone. </span></div>
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Anna Reckin</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.shearsman.com/store/-p102839041" target="_blank"><i>Line to Curve </i>(Shearsman, 2018) </a></span><br />
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Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-62109820949526818572018-11-19T02:00:00.000-08:002018-11-25T09:04:52.103-08:00Sudden Prose Reprints: "Fondant Cake" by Lila Matsumoto<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Fondant Cake</b></span><br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">This fondant cake is here for you. A crisp, almost brittle crust, and a rich and dark crumb. Also this grief bacon.</span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">Lila Matsumoto</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.shearsman.com/store/Lila-Matsumoto-Urn-and-Drum-p102838942" target="_blank"><i>Urn & Drum </i>(Shearsman, 2018)</a></span></div>
Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-56354265813205112252018-03-30T01:30:00.000-07:002018-04-01T14:27:47.070-07:00Sudden Prose Reprints: 'You Always Wished the Animals Would Leave' by Maya Catherine Popa<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;"><b>You Always Wished the Animals Would Leave</b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>after the 2015 Tbilisi flood</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Half the zoo mislaid, the reporter calls them <i>residents, </i>as though they lived in a gracious, gated community. Twelve Georgian men push one perplexed hippo: no Russell Crowe as Noah, no sidekick with a checklist. How to convince a lion to return to its cage when it's seen the Narikala lit at night? The things you wished you would happen in this life have you caught in old affection, fresh confusion. In your version, the animals were never hungry or afraid. They climbed the trees of Tbilisi for a better view. The wolves returned to forests in the Trialeti Mountains. The fate of birds was ambiguous as the founding legend of King Gorgasali who, huntin, shot a pheasant that fell into a spring, cooked or healed, accounts differ. So the literal king named the place "Tpili" meaning <i>warm. </i>Three brown bears lie limp in mud as police, in the ultimate video game sequence, big-game hunt the square at night. Your wish, succumbed to its alterations. At mass, the priest reminds the congregation that bells and crosses melted down by communists became the bars of cages, the ticket operator's chair. You always wished the animals would leave, their problem-solving spirits put to use, lifting fruits from markets, befriending lonely citizens. But time twists your childhood dream until it's nothing but a game of telephone, just as the bird, or was it a deer, or the king himself, fell into the waters and was spared.</span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">Maya Catherine Popa</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>You Always Wished the Animals Would Leave </i>(New Michigan Press, 2018)</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in -13.5pt 0in 0.5in; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "garamond";"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in -13.5pt 0in 0.5in; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "garamond";"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in -13.5pt 0in 0.5in; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "garamond";"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -13.5pt; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "garamond";"><span style="font-size: large;"> You can <a href="http://www.thediagram.com/nmp/" target="_blank">buy the pamphlet of this title here</a> and <a href="http://www.mayacpopa.com/" target="_blank">read more about the author's work at her website here.</a> </span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<!--EndFragment--><br /></div>
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Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-4040156575187282482018-03-23T01:30:00.000-07:002018-03-23T01:30:28.527-07:00Sudden Prose Reprints: 'Long Distance' by Mary Jean Chan<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I read this poem by Mary Jean Chan in <i>PN Review </i>and at once asked if I could reprint it in this series. </span><div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>Long Distance</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">You are running on the rain-dark pavement through Sutton Park. Where I am, all the dehumidifers are on in the house. No fireplaces. Some seas are colder than others, some bodies warmer. I am drinking Iron-Buddha, a cup of tea leaves waiting to blossom. It is too Spring here for my own good, too much green in the salad bowl. Too many stories of salvation; earlier, blue beyond belief. The moon is lying on its back in my dreams. What a smile looks like. A toothbrush touches my lips. Asian steamed sea bass for dinner, with white rice. Polar bears have black skin. Victoria Harbor was named after your Queen. How many hearts in a deck of cards shuffled across two continents? I am catching a plane tonight--thinking about the delicate map of your neck. <i>Roaming. </i></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Mary Jean Chan</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">You can <a href="http://www.maryjeanchan.com/" target="_blank">learn more about Chan's work on her website here</a>.</span><div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
</div>
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Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4388741516319759572.post-25344506022520834902018-02-02T06:42:00.001-08:002018-02-02T06:42:25.881-08:00An interview with Lucy Hamilton on her book of prose poetry, Stalker<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: large;">Ian Seed interviews Lucy Hamilton on her first collection of prose poems, <i>Stalker, </i>here: https://tearsinthefence.com/2018/02/02/an-interview-with-lucy-hamilton-on-stalker-by-ian-seed/amp/?__twitter_impression=true</span></div>
Carrie Etterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09617695047663413425noreply@blogger.com0