Margaret Elysia Garcia… Negotiations

Posted on August 31, 2014 by randomlyaccessedpoetics

Negotiations

I put on the red dress

and the leopard fur collar

and I know already

it’s for me, it’s not for you,

but it’s Friday night

and Mom is watching the kids

and we’ll go through this charade

of working on it

whatever it is that’s suppose

to keep us together

to keep us a family

for how much longer

til they have diplomas in their hands

and resentment in their hearts.

We keep looking to make it work

but the engines are running

the wheels are turning

the lights are glowing

it’s just that no one’s home

it’s just that no one’s here.

I meet up with you and you’ve

showered and cut your hair.

It looks romantic and sexy

and the dinner won’t be bad:

We’ll eat from each other’s plates

and pay from each other’s bank account

all things equal; all things fair

all things sleepy; all things square.

I want to tell you that I quit looking

I want to tell you to keep on—

You might find her yet,

whomever she is that can look

you straight in the eye and sigh sweetly.

My love is tainted;

but you should have known that

a decade plus,

you should have known that.

If you wanted to find

the good time

the good mother

the good lie

the good truth

the good house

the good home

well I’m your woman, I suppose.

But you want the heart, the wife,

the everything I can’t.

Pushcart nominee Margaret Elysia Garcia is a fiction and creative non-fiction writer and poet based in Northern California. She’s a contributing editor for the newly relaunched Hip Mama Magazine. She also does private writing coaching as well as a memoir writing workshop in Quincy and Chester, California.

Copyright © 2014 by Margaret Elysia Garcia

Rachel Rosenberg….Fantasy Girl

Posted on August 24, 2014 by randomlyaccessedpoetics

Fantasy Girl

I have arrived.

I am what I have always wanted to be;

the fantasy girl of a man

with a cult of personality.

So while everyone gathers around him without even realizing they are doing it,

turning to him like iron shavings to a magnet,

I can sit smug.

I can lounge on the other side of the room,

secure in the knowledge that while every one of those people think they have a special bond with him,

I actually do.

But it is to both of our advantages to appear single,

playing on the hopes of those who think our sexy is something they could get

so they will give and give

for the privilege of pretending,

for the privilege of not knowing they are pretending,

because we are pretending.

I am the one he winks at from across the room.

I am the thought he touches himself to

when he is finally, blessedly alone.

Notice, he hugs me just a little bit longer than you.

Notice, he’ll make sure I acknowledge him before I leave.

He won’t do that

for you.

But now that I have arrived,

I start to wonder;

when fantasy becomes flesh,

does it make me any less

of a strong, independent woman

to want this?

Shouldn’t I want my own following?

Shouldn’t I have the self-respect

to wanna be equal?

I don’t want to be equal;

I want to be better.

I want him to visit me,

to come to me begging

to show someone the real him and he wants that,

he wants someone to force the truth out of him,

someone to whom he can show

trust.

Truth is, sometimes he amazes me…and I want that.

I want a man I find impressive,

because then it’s respect when he calls me impressive,

not the slavish devotion I have come to despise from weaker specimens,

those boys I end up chewing up and spitting out

because even when we both know I’m wrong,

they will not stand up to me.

I want a man with his own life,

not one who’ll make me his

because love is the icing on the cake

so don’t make me your insipid cake.

I will blow off the boy that does that like a candle;

he is the birthday.

The man will sneak into my room to share the tub of icing bare-handed,

making me giggle when he tells me about the party games.

I like being the lighter behind the flame,

not the fuel, but the spark.

I like having all the power

over all the power,

having him look at me

the way they all look at him.

I am the top of the food chain.

I am what I have always wanted to be;

the fantasy girl

who lives up to the fantasy

of the man

with the cult

of personality.

Rachel Rosenberg is a 25-year-old lawyer/recent graduate of Lewis & Clark Law School and an alumnus of Kenyon College. She has been writing poetry for 17 years and performing it for the last two. Her poems have been published in a number of online and print journals.

Copyright © 2014 by Rachel Rosenberg

Don Comfort… Rights of Spring

Posted on August 17, 2014 by randomlyaccessedpoetics

Rights of Spring

Who will endure the sacrifice,

A price named by the gods

For renewal of the cycle,

A year’s circle once rewound.

The living owe a blood-debt,

And it is paid in full

When fetid blood reeks on the ground

Of newly planted fields.

And those may call it wasted

Who will not taste the harvest,

The wise will treasure blessings

From unborn sons and daughters.

Everything you need to know about Don Comfort can be found on page 98 of “The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy.”

Weldon H. Sandusky… The Salvation Army

Posted on August 10, 2014 by randomlyaccessedpoetics

The Salvation Army

A huge van picks us up, secures our

Money buckets and tapes the ringer

On our little bells.

Competition is fierce. I come in Sixth.

A fat Santa Claus man first.

We’re congratulated, almost elf like.

Giggle. And go home.

Like hungry lions we’re

Careful next day and don’t get

Too close. We keep an eye on our bucket.

And it gets cold. Depressing.

Facetiously displaying joy.

Scrooge like counting pennies and nickels.

Ho! Ho! Ho!

Then oddly we all really laugh.

When several ringers

Are gone one night. Bucket and all.

A skeleton tripod remains.

A crew of martyrs and misfits.

Waiting outside a door.

A driver who is at least

A Captain in the Salvation Army.

Weldon graduated from Texas Tech University in 1968-a B.A. in English. He then got an M.A. in English from the University of Wisconsin and a law degree (J.D. l975) from the same school. Divorce followed as did commitment to , first, the private psychiatric hospital, Timberlawn, in Dallas, and , later, the State Mental Asylum in Terrell , Texas. Mr. Sandusky petitioned for habeas corpus claiming a conspiracy to unlawfully commit him existed in violation of his constitutional rights. Upon release, Weldon got a job at Exxon/Mobil where he worked twenty years as a cashier-nightman. During August, 2005he underwent open heart surgery at St. Paul’s Hospital in Dallas and have since been declared totally disabled. He has coronary heart disease.

Christopher J. Jarmick… Poem Starter

Posted on August 3, 2014 by randomlyaccessedpoetics

POEM STARTER 1009

If you insist

on pretending to be someone else,

then you’ll never know

who you really are.

AWARD WINNING POET

Her poetry: technical mathematical formula perfection

without a trace of sentimentality in dull metaphors

obscurely connected to emotions

resonating as if written by extinct languages

known only as Yonkalla or Rumsen.

Applause, applause.

Breathe.

BLOCK

When the eye of the needle

blinks

I can’t make the words

go through.

POEM STARTER 90210

Like depressed delphiniums in vivid blue

who never succumb to their own toxicity

the young Hollywood starlets

at an industry cocktail party,

dream of a Beverly Hills Housewife

middle age.

Christopher J. Jarmick published poem at 12 Born East Coast Los Angeles writer/producer award-winning PBS Documentaries, Hard Copy, Entertainment Tonight. Re-located to Seattle; co-wrote novel The Glass Cocoon, Former PEN USA board member, Latest Poetry Book: 2010’s Ignition: Poem Starters. . . Hosts/Curates Poetry Readings. Articles/Reviews: Rattle, Raven Chronicles etc. and online.

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