FIVE: excerpt of GHOST GFS by catch business

a poem from GHOST GFS
by catch business

 

just like me

loud enough so
you can like me

i ask if you’ve cheated
or if you would

and we decide
if you want her

you will tell me
you don’t have to

i hear her
in your pill-dry voice

fringed elements
of our emotions

you say we need to work on us
that there is no me in me now 

so what else can i show you?
other than the limbs bent before you 

i believed i would never bend again 

not for her not for your love of her
and not for a fantasy of three

as if these possibilities
occurred outside of the we 

she defined for you
to use on me 

lesson plans to reflect
intrigue with your clumsy tongue 

invitations carried thru
the nameless crowd
she asked to sit near you

behind a sequined mask
i could’ve become 

a chance for you to feel
what she made you feel

Catch Business is the author of GHOST GFS (Electric Cereal, 2015) and Able To / Always Will (CCM, 2016). Follow her on Tumblr and Twitter.

Electric Cereal is an indie press and online journal. Follow them on Twitter and Tumblr.

FOUR: excerpt of BAVEUSE by Sara Sutterlin

poems from BAVEUSE
by Sara Sutterlin

1995

Pine scent, backseat of
a Toyota
Two dresses;
both velvet, one crushed
saying Merry Christmas!
and having affairs

—

My hands grieve for
your gentle enthusiasms
Every morning
I am heavy with contradictions 

Sometimes, but rarely,
the Night is fast

—

Crowned with pity

God is chaos
and so
I <3 God 

Little deaths begin
to pile up
inside me,
inside you 

I was a
tender object
living in your house

Sara Sutterlin is the author of BEVEUSE (Electric Cereal, 2015) and I Wanted to Be the Knife (Metatron, 2015). Follow her on Tumblr and Twitter.

Electric Cereal is an indie press and online journal. Follow them on Twitter and Tumblr.

THREE: excerpt of FIRE SIGN by Katherine Osborne

poems from Fire Sign
by Katherine Osborne

FIRE SIGN

I walk the property
inventing
trees one at a time

Be careful they say
No, you be careful

I say back.

—

Every possible horse is happening off the coast

of Iceland. Are friends starting to look closer?
I am downloading the earth until she’s face first
in forensic blue, the ocean starts right here where

the drifts get deeper. I can feel

Nova Scotia, her saltmarsh getting close where my

mouth accidentally. you keep handing me a
megaphone and then you say that’s just a cup

of water you don’t need to take a holiday in it.
I like when my sister talks about past lives.
I’m delirious with ideas because I want to be
another kind. I’m the one who can’t sleep
I can’t say paper cut without feeling it.

I can’t say anything without
feeling it. A circle ends and then
immediately begins oh god print

this out before it goes streaming live.

—

My son died. The stage is lit
with famous poets. I know
they are famous because
their sons died, too.

Now it’s August

Your hair on fire for him is a very old idea.

Let’s look through magazines. Take some
quizzes instead.  I woke up
to the sound of cicadas
levitating into taller trees,
trees with their mouths open. 

Last year is getting

expensive. I think 

you both should walk through
the quiet mall on your hands, maybe your
hands and knees, and ask
what it was you wanted. And if
it’s done yet.

Katherine Osborne is the editor of Little River and the author of Fire Sign (Electric Cereal, 2015). Follow her on Tumblr and Twitter.

Electric Cereal is an indie press and online journal. Follow them on Twitter and Tumblr.

TWO: excerpt of NERVOUS UNIVERSE by Kate Monica

a poem from Nervous Universe
by Kate Monica
 

Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Last One-Artist Show at the Baghoomian Gallery

I’ve split open all the oranges I possibly could to see
the wet jewels shining like teeth in the sun and I’ve pushed

my fingers into the meat of it and I’ve popped the small
striated pouches; the sweetness is all over my hands and I am washing it off
without ever having tasted it.

This is how my mother describes my life to me over the phone.

For a while I wanted no money and every night
met a girl on my neighbor’s roof to tell her
something inconsequential.

For a while I had a jean jacket with white-ringed sleeves and a sign saying
‘Death To Docility.’
I had her hand
also.

I played clarinet in the hysterical twilight on the corner of Green and Franklin—
Feel better feel better feel better
I rotted under her pillow and it was dark and warm and I liked it.

There is a sore under my chin from sitting so long
in the smoke of the city while my father loudly changed the page of his newspaper.
The graffiti on the walls and freight cars are about him.
I wrote it in my sleep sort of.

I am nodding off in someone’s basement.
I like the way this music goes with her hair.
I feel better don’t you feel better—

in the corner of the room do you see him the boy from my 9th grade science class is sucking cock for coke
for the past 15 years I have felt like a hollow skull with an unhinged jaw and a football helmet on

my mother told me of Samson breaking down the temple
I am tearing all the nets off the tennis courts

these two broad brush strokes this orange this blue
are a madman crying in his hands or laughing
I don’t know
I dreamt of my lifeless body because I didn’t know what else to do
I kissed her because I didn’t know what else to do
she tasted like a black-alley cackle and a figure slouching
towards me and the dripping and a Cheshire cat grin from a
red red face yellow eyes and
i’m standing there equidistance apart from both brick buildings
all the audience poorly drawn mannequins
only their yellow heads visible oval-shaped gawking
they eat me alive and i love it
the quick flick of their tongues over my corpse-thin extremities
red face yellow eyes
my art is hanging on the walls it’s as simple as that i am striding in front of the paintings in an armani suit the gallery is full of people the girl i love is smoking outside she won’t come in i’m icarus and she’s the sun i’m icarus and she’s the sun my father my father my mother is so proud i am the yellow skeleton oval-shaped corpse-thin extremities raised overhead in triumph riding my black horse towards death my mother my father are so

Kate Monica is the author of Nervous Universe (Electric Cereal, 2015). Her work has been published in The Quietus, Words Dance, and Drunk in a Midnight Choir. Follow her on Tumblr and Twitter.

Electric Cereal is an indie press and online journal. Follow them on Twitter and Tumblr.

ONE: excerpt of ANIMAL PROBLEMS by Katie Foster

poems from Animal Problems
by Katie Foster

AT THE END OF THE WORLD

I tell Julia “I have no loyalties.” 
I tell her if Russians come 
tomorrow with bombs & the whole
parade to invade I tell her
“I will be Russian.” I tell her too 
someone is in my bed 
who is not usually someone 
who is in my bed. “This is a new 
thing,” I tell her. I tell her, “Right 
now that someone he’s sleeping.” 
He’s sleeping in my bed. “This 
real live boy came,”
I tell her, “and found my bed 
and planted himself there. 
Then when I came & found him 
planted I told him, ‘You can stay 
until the Russians come.’”

HARD PARTS

Cutting my toenails I think, 
"This is the hardest part 

of me." Other hard parts: 
night, teeth, a penis

if I had one. Little triangles 
in the cross hatches of my hand 

skin. Mackenzie, his almond 
speech. For a week we eat

lips the soft part in the dark 
in his car in Los Angeles. 

When in the light we see
a wet spot on his pants. 

When his mother asks if he is good 
to me I say, "He farts on me

sometimes." Nut, knot, bolt.

HOME ALONE 1

Last night Hannah said, “You get here 
and you’re back in it.” She kept saying 
“You’re back in it.” I’m back 
in it. An hour and ten minutes 
ago I made plans with Jenna to go
to a party in Boulder. Ten minutes ago 
I cancelled the plans. In St. Louis all
the houses were pretty. This I felt
was highly suspect. Mackenzie’s dark
hairs are on my pillow. My less 
dark hairs are on my pillow. He left
this morning to go to Las Vegas. 
My parents left this morning to go
to Albuquerque. Different deserts. 
I went to Whole Foods and saw
many attractive young people. 
I thought, “Where are you – ” 
but did not finish the thought (“all
coming from”). I meant to buy
tempeh, mushrooms, rice. Instead
I bought a pre-made put-it-in-
the-oven vegetable pot pie. Right
now it is in the oven. Mistletoe
and holly tablecloth. The dog
in his cage. A timer running
back in it.

Katie Foster is the author of Animal Problems (Electric Cereal, 2015). Her work has been published in The Chappess, The Quietus, and New Wave Vomit. Follow her on Tumblr.

Electric Cereal is an indie press and online journal. Follow them on Twitter and Tumblr.