The Recovery Project Collaboration: ‘Creatives Making a Difference’

THE RECOVERY PROJECT

More than several months ago I had an idea about creating a mini-collaboration on the theme of the mental health term  ‘Recovery’. This is not only particularly relevant to me because I have bi-polar and am in a state of recovery myself, but also because ‘recovery’ is important for lots of people (including creatives) who are affected my mental health issues. It’s a universally important theme and experience.

With this in mind I asked the poets Carol Robson, John Mansell and Rebecca Audra Smith (all accessed via Twitter)  if they would like to collaborate on this and write a poem for the project, each taking up a particular facet of the path to recovery. Carol took up the theme of DESPAIR, John, MUDDLING THROUGH and Rebecca ‘RECOVERY’. I asked 3 artists who were then paired with the poets: Ray Bentley, Photographer Jeremy Moseley and Hugo Smith (all accessed via Twitter) to produce artwork inspired by the three poems. I also asked audio visual artist Shaun Blezard to write an accompanying soundpiece for the three sections. So this whole project is completely fuelled by new literary pieces, artwork/photography and sounds. The piece can viewed in sections or be taken as a whole. I have also produced a mini-film  which includes audio versions of the poems, and will give you an idea of the piece as a whole and how it could be turned into an installation of sorts (watch this space…).  It is worth mentioning that everyone involved in this project either has direct experience of the issues or an explicit interest.

The Recovery Project is an important bench-mark for ArtiPeeps for it really represents the first contribution to a new mental health initiative we are going to be instigating more explicitly in October: ‘Supporting Mental Health’.  This ongoing  initiative will produce collaborative material which will form an online artistic and  therapeutic resource for people in need. This will be part of other larger shifts in ArtiPeeps’ intent. There will be more news of this and its implications as time unfolds. But it’s all good.

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THE RECOVERY PROJECT

“Recovery is being able to live a meaningful and satisfying life, as defined by each person, in the presence or absence of symptoms. It is about having control over and input into your own life. Each individual’s recovery, like his or her experience of the mental health problems or illness, is a unique and deeply personal process.”Scottish Recovery Network 2009

Recovery is not about ‘getting rid of problems’. It is about seeing people beyond their problems – their abilities, possibilities, interests, and dreams and recovering the social roles and relationships that give life value and meaning”Julie Repper and Rachel Perkins, 2002

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THE RECOVERY SOUNDCSAPE

by Shaun Blezard

Section 1

DESPAIR:

Restraint Chair No.1 by Ray Bentley

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Another Psychosis

by Carol Robson

 

Here in a place, which I should be
I need to be here and in all places
Yet! an urge to run rages through me
fear of physical contact, my brain now in overload
here, feeling alone in a place full of people.

Like a frightened gazelle
taunted by its hunter
I search for the exit to safety
an egress to my solitary state
my place of safety in my Prozac stained mind.

Neural networks firing their manic impulses
ignoring my vain attempt of rational logic
craving for their mania overload
knowing again, they will fight a long battle
against the Lithium army, that will bring them down.

Highs and lows come and go
trying to live your normal life
my exterior facade is all you see
as it hides a mind and soul in turmoil
just trying to get through to the next hour.

A life in a day to day existence
that craves for whatever is normal
a time bomb mind with a fragile trigger
controlled by whatever the drug of choice is.

Clinging to a life of hopes and dreams
that is out of this drug controlled despair
I will one day rise again like the Phoenix
out of the ashes, of Another Psychosis.

© Carol Robson 2011

 

Section 2:

MUDDLING THROUGH

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Photography by Jeremy Moseley

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Solitary Lights in a Forsaken Landscape

by John Mansell

 

Day opens like a strange flower.
Had it really closed?

Eyes adrift with bitter tears.
I see you viewing me with unease,
…………toothbrush in hand;
Do not call me stranger.
Do not make me mute
……….by filling my mouth with dread.
Lined linear colour,
the implements of survival
…………in their little compartments
…………………….with designated times…..
Consumption of the divine;
a woman purled in momentary
silence forages the impression
that once she knew me.
And then, like a shoot that appeared too soon
……….is gone…..
Each moment a disgrace to pleasure:
………..the floods of worry
…………………..have strewn me along
…………………..various embankments…..
And when certain suns shine,
I know it is a worry
as unnecessary as
…………the solitude I veil myself with…..
Walk with me these grim corridors.
Though I was able yesterday, today I have fears
that arrest me.
I see faces and eyes rimmed with farewells.
I hear names spoken,
and children laughing…..
If I listen intently enough, I am sure
one of those children is me…..
I am sure there were good days once…..

Shift the falling grains
so they rumple not to the
………..gathering years
but the trench of a memory
…………you think may have held yesterday;
as if your yesterday never existed.
The moisture of dreams drowns
the fallen edifice of your time…..
You are, but never was
because you fear
what you were for it would exhibit
………what you
………………..would be…..
you keeper of empty paintings.
Sleep in a place
where time is a flick of a page;
the dying groans of lost hope,
the flippant drapery
………..of a night
that will come despite
…………your efforts, thief of my life
…………despoiler of all I held beautiful…..

Day closes like a strange flower.
Had it really opened?

 Section 3:

RECOVERY

‘Trying For the Brighter’ by Hugo Smith

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Recovery

by Rebecca Audra Smith

 

Hunting for the key
that can slot into my ear
unlock who I am, with
its slow turn and click.
 
I can hear it in my head,
doors open to staircases lead
to cellars where weeds chatter
about sunshine, light and seed.
 
Fumbled fingers in the bed
searching for a lighter
to set fire to the sun,
board a chariot, ride far.
 
I could have burnt my home
to ash, to dust- my family
rooting for my bones;
I’m trying for the brighter.
 
Planting keyholes inside tulips,
my hands are full of keys
each day a little lighter,
a stronger step for me.

The Recovery Film:

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Global Connections #5: Poems from The Global Twitter Community Poetry Project

Welcome to ‘Global Connections’ where each week you’ll find the work of 2-3 poets especially chosen by Michelle Vinci from The Global Twitter Community Poetry Project her ambitious social media collective poetry showcasing initiative (90 submissions from 23 countries). See here for more details. ArtiPeeps couldn’t be happier to be collaborating with this project and contributing to the further proliferation of the talent that can be found throughout the world. 

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This weekend we are featuring poems from Shetland UK, Florida USA and Slovenia by:

Nat Hall, Lou Graves and Nataša Dolenc

peaches

(nb.The blog template, unfortunately wouldn’t support the original form of Nat’s poem. Apologies to Nat. I’ve done the best I could )

golden healers.

I remember ’78.
the double bed,
brown édredon –
tucked inside padded
squares and Mamie’s love,
struck with illness so juvenile,
pêche melba for fighting hurt & chickenpox,
she gave me peaches for a smile.
’78 – her tenderness poached
inside fruits;
another year & latitude,
this time,
en tête-a-tête
with viral hell,
torn ligaments,
my childlike hand handles
a spoon inside a jar waiting for me in the larder.
and remember my grandmother,
smiles of pleasure,
ripe tenderness;
I still taste it,
as I delve again in nectar.

– Copyright Nat Hall @nordicblackbird Shetland, Scotland, United Kingdom – 2013

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broken bells

the mercurial sky hung above
me like the milkiness of a blind
woman’s eye furthering the hermetic
loneliness of my grey day

and my
ego floated around
me like
a slight breeze and

i thought about the
sad ghosts, the scarred
angels rotting quietly in
their dark corners of the
city like dead cockroaches

their egos simply
fading like
broken bells content
with the silence

their steps
like seconds
ticking down an
hour and
their breath
like a
slight breeze

i don’t want to
die with holes in my
shoes i
want to dance i
want to hear
the ringing of
those
broken bells

– Copyright Lou Graves @Lou__Graves Saint Augustine, Florida, USA – 2013

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trash

after we’d had sex she turned to
me and threw her head back saying
“oh shit, i forgot to take out
the trash”

her sunken face almost
smiling “and now it’s
raining”

i could see shanks (her cat)
moving through the
hallway and could
hear the rain and my
lips spilled my thoughts

“well, let’s get
dressed, smoke a cigarette and
i’ll take out the trash”

she thought about it then
pulled my body towards hers and
we remained
naked and warm falling
asleep together

and the trash
never got taken
out

– Copyright Lou Graves @Lou__Graves Saint Augustine, Florida, USA – 2013

Biography: Lou Graves is a poet and an artist who has been writing ever since he was able to hold a crayon.  He was born and raised in the south of England but left for America at seventeen and has lived there ever since.  He has lived in Los Angeles and Colorado but currently lives in Saint Augustine, Florida.  Lou sees words as an extension of breath, as a way to purge the sickness and to turn life’s destitution into it’s exaltation. www.lougraves.webs.com
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AGE FOOLS US

owl is howling into the deep of the night
date is changed within one second
I’m sitting on the bottom of your closet
your clothes hanging like dead bodies
while you lay naked on the sofa, asleep
the hot air plays tricks with the mind

I can barely remember how I felt turning twenty-two
—- my favourite number
spent it with strangers who were too eager to become friends
and you’d like to believe the fun will last
but it’s no better than those birthday parties I had as a kid,
when nobody showed up
feeling uncomfortable in clothes they made me wear
now I can’t recapture the meaning a cake had

god is like a girl picking daisies
playing “love me, love me not” with our lives
we like to believe we change
but there are things we can’t shake off
never being courageous enough to trust myself
with responsibility on my hands
always feeling like a first time playing the game
akwardness in my mouth and my fingers
forgive me for always doubting, never trusting the words
and you use the sweetest one’s which calm me down like a spell
I’ll take you for a walk if you can listen to my silent thoughts

age carries prejudice into which we are fooled to believe
as if years shape all of us in the same way
as if we gain respect by mere number of our age
as if it really matters how old our flesh is
age fools us in a way and leaves no room for closeness
but I just want to sit beside you as you paint

– Copyright Nataša Dolenc @Natasek86 Slovenia – 2013

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CHILD LEFT BEHIND

days roll faster and faster
things you knew and loved
have gone away or been replaced
pages written have gotten fewer and fewer
you acknowledge the change in the years number
but you’re stuck at a point in the past
abandoned by the spoken words
mind free to run through the fields and far beyond
to bathe in the lake of your imagination
found yourself in a conflict with the form
for it is unmoving, stable and caught
but it taught you senses through which you feel
in search for a way in which you could be at ease
to grab the thing that keeps you from singing
and not to be a friend of shadows
there are so many stories in which you played a part
but left them before the end was written
in this world it only matters
how good you sell yourself
how good you please others
what kind of living is this?
when you feel most alive in your dreams
but the fear and expectations push you further
as the desire to return to the child
left behind gets bigger and bigger

– Copyright Nataša Dolenc @Natasek86 Slovenia – 2013

Biography: Nataša Dolenc was born in November, 1986. Although she hails from Slovenia, she soon adopted the English language as a way of expressing her thoughts. She has been writing poems since a young age and that remains her passion till this day. Poems come to her, demanding their own style, without form or rhyme. They have been published on website pages under the pen name Natasek and in a collection of poems and photographs called “Colours of the sea”. Her formal education includes a degree in public administration and midwifery. She can be found on blogspot: natasek.blogspot.com and twitter: @Natasek86.

Global Connections #5: Poems from The Global Twitter Community Poetry Project

Welcome to ‘Global Connections’ where each week you’ll find the work of 2-3 poets especially chosen by Michelle Vinci from The Global Twitter Community Poetry Project her ambitious social media collective poetry showcasing initiative (90 submissions from 23 countries). See here for more details. ArtiPeeps couldn’t be happier to be collaborating with this project and contributing to the further proliferation of the talent that can be found throughout the world. 

>>

This weekend we are featuring poems from Indonesia, Pakistan and London, UK by:

Anita Leowardi, Sultan Abdul Haseeb & Dill Darling

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The Enchanted Lady

by Anita Leowardi

An enchanted lady, she is…
Her eyes, a pair of brilliant stars
Those warmth hands full with embrace
Time to time, she stood against the wind
Knitted a sheet of love and peace
One day when the wind crazed
That laid her down in a valley of aches
And put the thorns inside pulmonary
In her everyday rest
Yet she built freedom outside her downfall
And fought like a warrior
Never gave up life
Though the pain killed her rhyme
Yet in the end, an angel gave her wings
She smiled, flew away and free.

– Copyright Anita Leowardi @nocturnegrace Indonesia – 2013

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Jasmine #gogyohka

by Anita Leowardi

Fragrance of Jasmine
breeds upon the air
when tiny drops
of twisted clouds
lay upon petals.

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– Copyright Anita Leowardi @nocturnegrace Indonesia – 2013

Biography: Anita Leowardi is a poet from Indonesia. She enjoys exploring poems, storytellings, quotations, and wordsplay. She appreciates the journey of imagination. http://www.nocturnegrace.wordpress.com

 

As the world breathes in
He breathes out
And with that he whispers
His last words
That get carried away
And lost with the wind
Only to be found
Rusted and broken
from all those years of lonely.

>>

– Copyright Sultan Abdul Haseeb @hasee6 Islamabad, Pakistan – 2013

Biography: Just another dreamer in this world who wants to stand out from the crowd. Have been writing since I was 9 years old and published in various international magazines. Blogs at www.sultanabdulhaseeb.wordpress.com

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On Being Tricked By The Devil

by Dill Darling

He said you can’t hide from love.
I said oh yes I can.
He said you can’t, I said I can
and so it went on

long into the night and part
of the next day, until I was blind
with rage and dying to pee/sleep/eat, but damned
if I’ll give way to a black and white mind.

To prove my point I hid myself
in the darkest recesses of the world. Moved
with the kind of filth no girl would dare to
(unless she had a point to prove).

And it sucked me down, in, under – I drowned
and burned and screamed and stank,
howled, growled and begged for mercy
realising, at last, who it was I had to thank

for this brutal hell, this loveless place. Alright –
you win! Damn, you’re good, I choked and cried.
Now please, let me go. I don’t think so, said a voice
that sounded like mine and came from inside.

– Copyright Dill Darling @DillDarling68 London, United Kingdom – 2013

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Unrest In The Kennels

by Dill Darling

Today could be one of those days
when cats ride in cars with the wind in their ears
and dogs don’t give a damn
for people-pleasing.

Inspired by the boldness of their pets, men
will leave for work without a tie. Overnight
the collar will become obsolete, by the end of the week
the suit will follow.

Telephone salesmen will croon
I just called to say I Iove you
and doctors confess –
the drugs don’t work.

We’ll see chicken shed doors left ajar,
electric fences powered down,
televisions hurled from hotel windows
and people stepping outside.

Women will come together to reinvent cheese
with nothing but cheese in it.
Young people might just hitchhike again
and there’ll be plenty more fish in the clear blue sea.

Yes, my friends, today
could be one of those days.
If only cats and dogs could be relied upon
to stop scratching and spearhead a revolution.

– Copyright Dill Darling @DillDarling68 London, United Kingdom – 2013

Biography: Dill Darling is a writer and artist (and a few other things) currently living in London and the Cotswolds, England. Her poems have been published in a number of magazines and anthologies and she’s been nominated for the Forward Prize for Poetry 2013. She’s currently working towards publication of a pamphlet while also making surreal collages of hybrid human-animal creatures, re-learning to play piano, and messing around with some slightly odd song lyrics.

 

 

 

The Tiniest of Things #3: The Warehouse

Welcome to The Tiniest of Things, A monthly mix of ‘writerly’ observations and poetry from poet Tiffany Coffman

My name is Tiffany Coffman, and I’m a poet. I know. It sounds like quite the declaration of an addiction, and in some way I suppose it is. I have no formal education or a degree hanging on my wall, but what I do have is the breadth of my life experience and the appetite for creativity that drives me to write. Poetry has been with me since childhood, a curious cohort that has permitted me to get absolutely lost in imagination and disclose what I absorb through the senses, through memories. As a creative, the ability to bend words to my advantage, whether in rhyme or by natural flow, then revel in the middle of it all is the stuff of magic. I write from an organic place, a place of fidelity, wherein I attempt to gift the reader with imagery and storytelling so inviting that you’ll have felt you’ve shared something with me. I don’t write for myself. I write to take you along with me on a ride of emotions and confessions, whether they’re mine or yours. So we’ll take the top down, throw the map away, kiss the asphalt, and roll.

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“Every man has reminiscences which he would not tell to everyone, but only to his friends. He has other matters in his mind which he would not reveal even to his friends, but only to himself, and that in secret. But there are other things which a man is afraid to tell even to himself, and every decent man has a number of such things stored away in his mind.” – Dostoyevsky

The Warehouse

I wasn’t raised by the warmest of mothers. My memories of her are of emotional and verbal abuse and heavily lacking in affection. I despised burnt toast as a child (still do) and more often than not my mother burnt mine. While my sister had no issues eating it, I couldn’t stand the taste, so my mother would have to make another batch. There was just something about the surface taste of burnt toast that I found unappealing and possibly a little uncaring on her part. How easy it seemed for my mother not to care.

As writers, we must care about our work even though it means digging deeper and paying closer attention to what we’re attempting to do; how we’re attempting to affect others with our writing. Staying on the surface as a writer can be unappealing and lack tremendous flavor for the reader, but for the writer it may be the safest place to reside. Herein you never have to push boundaries within yourself and can churn out work comfortably and at a nice clip with minimal reveal. In essence, there is no danger.

Every day I take the same route to work, but the past few weeks I’ve noticed a man of average age in the mornings walking the length of the block. He strikes me as odd as he walks at a slow pace always wearing the same clothes. There is nothing unusual I notice about him that would make sense of the slowed way in which he walks except that he appears to be quite content meandering back and forth. I began to wonder if he ever left the block, or changed his clothes, or if he gets a wild hair and sprints for a few. What if we do this as writers? What if we get stuck on the same length of block, never venturing beyond into danger, finding ourselves content to remain in our safety zone?

Danger is a grand thing as a writer. It’s imperative if you intend to evolve beyond everything you believe about yourself. I’m not talking necessarily about revealing your secrets in a confessional manner, but you have to dig deep as a writer and find pieces of your unique experiences to flavor a piece or add dimension to characters. You can only do this by revealing those things inside yourself that are deeply recessed. This type of self-understanding will add authenticity to your work as the reader will find you credible and real regardless of what type of writing you do. It’s all about connection between the reader and writer as you never write for yourself alone.

I’m always looking for ways to change things up as a writer as I can get stuck in a particular way or on a particular theme. By constantly challenging and pushing yourself by tapping into those raw materials you’ve so conveniently stored away in the warehouse, you will allow for the most engaging write that when exported to the reader will give them a sense of who you are. This realness that you deliver will

keep them coming back to explore your work, connecting. And it’s not about attempting with your writing to be different for the sake of being different at all. In fact, should you deliver something that feels in the slightest way faked or forced the reader will call you out. It’s not about being different but going deeper; getting off that same stale length of block and seeing what courage lies in you to move further down the road.

 As writers, it’s our job to see the extraordinary out of the ordinary – to dig up those dusty memories we’ve buried so deeply and examine and expose them. W.B. Yeats said, “Why should we honour those that die upon the field of battle? A man may show as reckless a courage in entering into the abyss of himself.” So it’s not about finding a different abyss, or scratching the surface, but really diving in to the

depths of your own warehouse that will take your writing to the next courageous level. It’s not in any way easy at times digging up old bones, but I say better to be an archaeologist than a grave digger. Fall crazy, mad in love with the abyss of who you are. That’s where the good stuff is. Take a courageous peek at what you think you believe about yourself – your recollections – and then weave it into words.

 A few weeks ago while making breakfast I burnt my toast. It was the last two pieces of bread I had left and damn it, I needed that toast. So I decided to scrape the burnt surface off to see if that removed the terrible flavor I’d always hated. Sure enough it did. In scratching the surface I’d discovered something deeper; a mother who could’ve just as easily scraped off the surface in lieu of making another batch of toast for me. And in that moment, she was the most caring mother.

 Dive deep into the warehouse.

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You can find more of Tiffany’s poetry and prose here:

http://tlcoff.wordpress.com/

Global Connections #4: Poems from The Global Twitter Community Poetry Project

Welcome to ‘Global Connections’ where each week you’ll find the work of 2-3 poets especially chosen by Michelle Vinci from The Global Twitter Community Poetry Project her ambitious social media collective poetry showcasing initiative (90 submissions from 23 countries). See here for more details. ArtiPeeps couldn’t be happier to be collaborating with this project and contributing to the further proliferation of the talent that can be found throughout the world. 

>>

This weekend we are featuring poems from Beirut, The United Kingdom and New York by:

Pierre Mhanna, Katie Beviss & Susan L. Daniels

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Where the World Unfolds

 by Pierre Mhanna

The brown moth of solitude settled down
Amid the verdant boughs that my head crown.
And by and by, the woods opened their doors
Showing many leaves scattered on their floors.
A faint sound arose as from distant shores,
Waves softly flapping through the sycamores.
A laughter I heard raining with the dew,
Rising up to the clouds as the wind blew.
My heart’s waters became a lucid pond,
Gazing the azure, the sun as it dawned,
And my soul running with the crystal streams
Stood to feel the world, the breath of its beams.

– Copyright Pierre Mhanna @weaveofsilence Beirut, Lebanon – 2013

Biography: Pierre Mhanna, a wandering poet.

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Moon

by Katie Beviss

A luminous
organic moon
rises high-
flashes its
mineral glow
a halo of orange
light dissolves
into gold

aglow, a blue
rim forms, like
a frozen pond-
magical for the
moment before
it dissolves,

the incandescent
purple-blue shine,
like the presence
of undesired bruises
tainting skin.

– Copyright Katie Beviss @KateBeMe, Stanstead Abbotts, United Kingdom – 2013

Biography: Katie Beviss grew up in a tiny village called Stanstead Abbotts in rural England. As a child she found the best way to express herself was through writing, coming from a loud and fairly big family it also gave her space. She has been writing poetry since she was eleven and wouldn’t know how to stop. She is currently a student and intends to study psychology and creative writing at university next year.

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25 Versions of 1 Snowfall

by Susan L. Daniels

the plural of snow
is snow, how flakes join and fall
into one wholeness
*
winter is
less snow and more cold
to keep it
*
snow does not
know us and happens
where it wills
whether we
welcome it or not. the trick is
to meet it smiling
*
In ten words, it spirals soft
from sky to earth
*
that bird
we call winter
lines her nest
today
and that softness
ripped from her breast
catches in my hair

white feathers
like missed kisses
melting
*
snowsnakes
slip from trees
to twist at my feet
*
shivering
newness
opening to
wonder
*
in Buffalo
it snows sideways
and from the ground up

a miracle
just like that rain
Forrest Gump hated
minus the heat
*
the constellations of winter
are lost in the steam of our breath:
the hunter, the bull
the greater and lesser dogs,
the sea monster and the man that killed him
rest by the celestial river
or reel with the twins

but those jewels, high up
cannot compete with the small stars that fall
to melt in our palms
*
the first snow
we never want to let go
the second and third ones
are what leave us so numb
*
he is set in snow
a ruby burning, preening
cardinal flames his wings
*
snow
a fall
erasure
winter’s white bloom
scentless daisy chains
cold covering in drifts
a blanket that cannot warm
yes, the snow itself is lonely
*
gifted
with this brilliance
this light-catching sameness
my ungrateful eyes
starve for green
*
there is physics to skating:
friction and momentum
curving Newton’s third law
into a glide

and physics in that lesson of snow
teaching lightness
in falling
*
the leaves fell, sparked
brightness arced fades
to dark, and snow
*
snowfall
winter’s beauty
paints this everything
with whiteness we shape angels in
snowfall
*
the radar-generated snow
falls, like feathers
from ripped pillows
I taste winter
with my tongue
and breathe
in this coldness
like oxygen
the spirit opens
to take deeper
*
we are snow
what is unique in us
melted & lost in water cycling
*
I am merely saying & saving
some of what’s wild, grinding
a brightness to pass to you
in a sting of snow, dancing inside a trace
of what phosphoresces under oceans
in a kiss we call sustenance:
what makes us go.
*
(E)very snowflake
is different.

How (can) we
get off our knees?
(erasure, Jeanette Winterson)
*
you sing summer to me
but our seasons are opposed–
winter in my heart
*
pieces of sky fall
sifted confectioner sweet–
we stick out our tongues
*
I crave that covering over
everything raw
snow promises

the blindness of winter

how small things together
change what is seen
to iced monochrome
*
what it means to be pine

memory quietly hummed
and almost scented

beneath the bite of snow
and resin they wear
*
the snow comes
gently, and with softness
in a careful arrangement of atoms
the snow comes
like sky broken into crumbs
but each one flawless
the snow comes
gently, and with softness

– Copyright Susan L. Daniels @susan_daniels Eden, New York, USA – 2012

Biography: Susan Daniels is a poet who lives in Western New York.

 

 

 

 

Global Connections #3: Poems from The Global Twitter Community Poetry Project

Welcome to ‘Global Connections’ where each week you’ll find the work of 2-3 poets especially chosen by Michelle Vinci from The Global Twitter Community Poetry Project her ambitious social media collective poetry showcasing initiative (90 submissions from 23 countries). See here for more details. ArtiPeeps couldn’t be happier to be collaborating with this project and contributing to the further proliferation of the talent that can be found throughout the world. 

>>

This weekend we are featuring poems from Vietnam, New Zealand and New York by:

Vo Tuan Hoang Vy, Katarina Reedy & Julian Gallo

sewing rain
water threads
embroider loneliness

– Copyright Vo Tuan Hoang Vy @vonguyenphong22, My Tho City, Vietnam – 2013

red sunset
the silent river falls into
dreamy nostalgia

– Copyright Vo Tuan Hoang Vy @vonguyenphong22, My Tho City, Vietnam – 2013

passing plane
white line left behind
a crow keeps chasing

– Copyright Vo Tuan Hoang Vy @vonguyenphong22, My Tho City, Vietnam – 2013

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Biography: Vo Tuan Hoang Vy, born in 1990, works as an officer. Vo loves writing haiku and stories.

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  Hei Tiki is an iconic male Māori cultural carving worn as a necklace.

This poem is about a particular Hei Tiki I fell in love with, and gifted to my daughter, Mary-Rose Reedy for her 21st birthday. 

He now resides with her.

Hei Tiki

Hei Tiki, Taku Tau e…

Hauntingly translucent. Transfixed, I stare,
At a familiar icon, made exquisitely rare,
Light reveals loveliness, beyond compare,
I’ll have you for my own, oh Tiki, I will not share.

Your likeness is mine Tiki, but what is this?
A shadow interrupts, my glistening bliss,
My adoration is unrequited, you don’t see me at all,
Head cocked to the left, you listen for her call,

Hine Teiwaiwa e i e…

Your eyes seek her, they look right past me,
For you were the first man to solve her mystery,
Her beauty, beyond words, impresses you still.
If she called from the past, you would bend to her will.

You’d haka for her gladly, given the chance,
One hand beating your heart, to quicken the dance,
One hand slaps a thigh, to slow down the pace,
A stealthy routine repeated with fluidity and grace.

He Taonga Tuku Iho Koe…

I shall give you away Tiki since you don’t see me,
To a beautiful maiden from a town beside the sea,
She is not your love, nor a replacement could she be,
But she is so hauntingly exquisite, her love will set you free.

You are a weighty gift Tiki, and I give you with love,
To my dearest daughter, our gift born from love,
Hei Tiki, As she wears you and you fit like a glove
Bring her strength and courage to always rise above.

– Copyright, Katarina Reedy @bubblesreedy, Turanganui, Aotearoa, New Zealand – 2012

Four Micropoems from my twitter collection …
“An indulgence into Micropoetry on Twitter”

I

Letting go
Is hard you know
I never thought it would be,
Fly redbreast
from this emptier nest
Swiftly to the sea,
All the best.

– Copyright, Katarina Reedy @bubblesreedy, Turanganui, Aotearoa, New Zealand – 2012
____________________

II

And I owe it to them
To write.
My grandchildren
Twinkles in the eyes
Of my babies.
I shan’t delay
For tomorrow is too late.
Sure fingers begin to tap.

– Copyright, Katarina Reedy @bubblesreedy, Turanganui, Aotearoa, New Zealand – 2013
____________________

III

Contemplation.
An almost silence
A neighbor sings
As he paints his house
Cicadas harmonise
And the distant hum of traffic
Completes the band.

– Copyright, Katarina Reedy @bubblesreedy, Turanganui, Aotearoa, New Zealand – 2013
____________________

IV

Empathy
Is a fitting necklace
Bejeweled with many hearts
Held fast by the love of the world
Featuring a rough pendant
Circling forever…

– Copyright, Katarina Reedy @bubblesreedy, Turanganui, Aotearoa, New Zealand – 2013

Biography: My name is Katarina (Bubbles) Reedy. My Mountain is Hikurangi, My River is the Waiapu and my tribe is Ngāti Porou. I am Māori and from Aotearoa, New Zealand. I teach Digital Media and Technologies and Co-founded the Turanganui Poetry Collective. I am hooked on the power of the spoken word and love writing English medium poetry with flecks of “Te Reo” the language of my people in it such as the poem presented here “Hei Tiki”. I aspire to be published. My musings can be found here http://bubblesreedypoetry.blogspot.co.nz/

_______________________________________________________________________

 

Michelangelo

I would build you a glorious palace
with ornamental roads and
wondrous sculptures if I could
but I only have these two clumsy hands
to work with.

They are the best I have to offer you
but these hands will work wonders
if given the chance.
The trouble is, I don’t really

know if I should have that chance.
Sometimes you have to do the best with
what you have to work with
and these hands may accidentally destroy

the very thing they are trying to make so
beautiful for you.

– Copyright Julian Gallo @JulianGallo66, New York City, NY, USA – 2013

Biography: Born and raised in New York City. Julian is a musician/writer/painter who has poems and short stories published in about 40 magazines and journals throughout the United States, Canada and Europe and also has 13 books under his belt: “Standing On Lorimer Street Awaiting Crucifixion” (Alpha Beat Press, 1996), “The Terror of Your Cunt is The Beauty of Your Face” (Black Spring Press, 1999), “Street Gospel Mystical Intellectual Survival Codes” (Budget Press, 2000), “Scrape That Violin More Darkly Then Hover Like Smoke In The Air” (Black Spring Press, 2001), “Existential Labyrinths” (Black Spring Press, 2003), “Window Shopping For A New Crown of Thorns” (Lulu Press, 2007), “November Rust” (Lulu Press, 2007), “My Arrival Is Marked By Illuminating Stains” (Lulu Press 2007), “A Symphony of Olives” (Propaganda Press, 2009) and “Divertimiento” (Propaganda Press, 2009). His second novel “Naderia” was released in January 2011, “Be Still and Know That I Am” (Beat Corrida) was released in September 2011. His fourth novel, Mediterraneo, was released in June 2012. He is also currently playing guitar and bass for NYC singer/songwriter Linda La Porte.

Contact: www.juliangallo66.blogspot.com

 

 

 

Global Connections #2: Poems from The Global Twitter Community Poetry Project

Welcome to ‘Global Connections’ where each week you’ll find the work of 2-3 poets especially chosen by Michelle Vinci from The Global Twitter Community Poetry Project her ambitious social media collective poetry showcasing initiative (90 submissions from 23 countries). See here for more details. ArtiPeeps couldn’t be happier to be collaborating with this project and contributing to the further proliferation of the talent that can be found throughout the world. 

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This weekend we are featuring poems from North Carolina, Pennsylvania and New England by:

Ed Bremson, Francesca De Grandis & Jeremiah Walton

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catfish
his mustache
and mine

>>

– Copyright, Ed Bremson @EdBremson, Raleigh, North Carolina – USA 2012

 

rippling the creek
like raindrops –
minnows

>>>

– Copyright, Ed Bremson @EdBremson, Raleigh, North Carolina – USA 2012

 

on my table –
Buddha
with his back turned

>>

– Copyright, Ed Bremson @EdBremson, Raleigh, North Carolina – USA 2012

 

Biography: Ed Bremson is an award winning haiku poet and founder of Mijikai Haiku group on Facebook. He earned his BA in Philosophy from North Carolina State University, and his MFA in Creative Writing from National University. He has been writing and publishing poetry for more than forty years. His poems have appeared in Wisconsin Review, Luna Negra, Chapel Hill News and other journals. Recently he has published several best-selling poetry ebooks. Ed lives in Raleigh, North Carolina.

 

#31, a Five Tweet Poem

by Francesca De Grandis

#31, Pt 1 of 5: All words to a loving purpose cannot fulfill their purpose unless #lyric. There can be naught but #poetry to the mystic. 

#31, Pt 2 of 5: Does marking just some tweets #micropoem deny that daily speech is lyric or illuminate it? Should it stay secret?

#31, Pt 3 of 5: Indecipherable “#poems” can be elitist oxymorons to intimidate others into distrusting innate #lyric. #33

#31, Pt 4 of 5: Trying to make life a #poem, I can’t mark just some tweets #micropoem; all—all, all—my words are sincere attempts at #lyric. 

#31, Pt 5 of 5: I strive hard to make all my speech #poetry. If I mark tweets #micropoem, will someone still notice my other words’ lyric?

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Copyright – Francesca De Grandis @outlawbunny, Pennsylvania, USA – 2013 

>.

Less Talk

by Francesca De Grandis

When poetry is no longer a puzzle made indecipherable by elite, it will belong to all of us again, the gorgeousness of daily speech recognized as invocation, sincere prose known as lyric and spell-casting. There will be less talk of magic. There will simply be magic, so a student will not choose spiritual teachers based on their words, but by the texture of their moments. There will be less talk of freedom. There will simply be freedom. When all talk is recognized as poetry and as spells, there will be less talk.

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Copyright – Francesca De Grandis @outlawbunny, Pennsylvania, USA – 2013 

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Biography: De Grandis is a humorist, shamanic guide, mystic genius, public figure, semi-recluse, bard, painter, middle management for Chaos Gods, Whedon fan, spiritual innovator, busy elf. www.stardrenched.com

 

33

by Jeremiah Walton

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An assemblage of comely
angels, squirting
muddy come, murky
ethereal orgasms.
masturbating to
Earthling lovers
understanding
they’ll never
understand
the sweet
dalliance
between man
and 
woman
God says,
“You can
be human.
Go.”

>.

– Copyright Jeremiah Walton @NostroviaPoetry New England, USA – 2013

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Formulaic Future

by Jeremiah Walton

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Yellowed lungs
Tilted to the Sun
Open 
Absorbing air purer than
Manchester Transit
Excreting screaming angels
Rejoicing with dried bums
Each convulsing,
sharing Holy Poverty,
Richness in thought
Corner of Brown 
and Goff Falls Ave
Under bloody blue skies
Of H capital
Heavy on
Scenic railway of Man

>>

– Copyright Jeremiah Walton @NostroviaPoetry New England, USA – 2013

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HomeFull

by Jeremiah Walton

>>

Does the lonely desperate elderly woman,
with valley tits and witing eyes,
(eyes that have conceived enough and naught experience)
craving sexual attention,
care about gender?

>>

– Copyright Jeremiah Walton @NostroviaPoetry New England, USA – 2013

Biography: Jeremiah Walton is the author of several publications including To Your Health: Humanity’s Diagnosis (a non-profit e-book), LSD Giggles, Modus Operandi, and Nostrovia!.