Live Nude Poems

  Line by line retranslation of Ashbery Waiting makes time democratic, you just said so Then a white horse ran by, repeatedly running back and forth Like a messenger passing straight through various rooms from the front door Out through the back door, I waited like this for twenty-seven years. Initially it was the honey of distortion brewed in the rooms distorted in your convex mirror And that gesture was both an invitation and a refusal Unfolding for me a moment that fluctuated incessantly A crack that exists, the circulation of water in the ocean A ring formed by a self-devouring serpent in motion In between is the void filled with power This mirror of others reflects oneself at the same time Allows all the images of leaves stacked in the depths of the mirror to remain Like a demon in a bottle floating on an infinitely transparent surface Longing for the light of your face, symbolic stones They only stop temporarily in order to focus Forming some kind of meaning, then they are qu...

An Affair on Lombardy Street The landlocked Airbnb has a nautical theme and an irregularly shaped board nailed to one wall that might work if they installed hooks, I offered to the man I’ve loved for 24 years before we kissed and carried each other into the bedroom. The backyard is at this time off-limits to guests, though we are encouraged to dispense of our trash there due to an ant problem for which we may be charged. Renters may also be charged for using acne products immediately prior the towels. Likewise, silicone lubricants are prohibited. The Airbnb sits a block and a half from the marketwhere my cousin and I used to buy croissant sandwiches when the jazz bar closed where the man I’ve loved for 24 years used to play. The Airbnb has a keypad for a lock and I give him the code. I wake to his face for the first time in years. I send him home in a shirt wearing wrinkles and the perfume my ex-husband sayssmells like my mother. My hosts have left two thick, hooded robes hanging in th...

Trespassing Aloud Listening to the wind misspell my name I sense desperation, a bruise of waxen yellow flesh. The wind explores the ruins of a factory abandoned decades ago, a complex of smokestacks and oil tanks, brown weathered brick and rusting machines the use of which no one alive knows. Why is the wind taunting me with its private misery when grease stains almost eighty years old still offer comforting stinks. I shouldn’t be here exploring private if useless property. I should go home and practice spelling my name correctly in case the wind has influenced my flimsy sense of myself. The factory closed after the war. Not even mice find sustenance or aesthetic pleasure in noting the aloof geometry, purposeful and rigid enough to warp the wind. I pocket a large rusty bolt and declare myself a petty thief, giving voice to all this loss. William Doreski lives in Peterborough, New Hampshire. He has taught at several colleges and universities. His most recen...

Our Most Vulnerable Maybe the phrase has always meant to misdirect A gunmen is taking aim at shadows in dark corners It must be someone’s job to ask after each life still here I was once someone noticed each must consider No fear I know like alone awake & shaking Losing all my grounding thoughts with no protectors left Mark Danowsk y is Editor-in-Chief of ONE ART: a journal of poetry. He is the author of four poetry books. His latest poetry collection is Meatless (Plan B Press). Take Care is forthcoming from Moon Tide Press in 2025. His poems have appeared in many journals including Right Hand Pointing, The New Verse News, Eunoia Review, Anti-Heroin Chic, The Summerset Review, Alba, The Healing Muse, and Gargoyle.