toothfall
season
on moons
of disrepair
Light’s
egglike
silence
Rock
paper
infant
Infant
omen
hair
I listen to my son’s heart
Peel an orange
Sleep
empty
no hours
on this poster
the museum
of not
being found
no anything
but friend
it’s the hours
touch
in a sunless
microwave
where burns
the ghost
of both
The mirror’s been up all night.
The I think I can't speak for everyone here reading series will have its first event on Sunday April 21st, at 4pm EST and will be held over Zoom. Featured writers are NC Smock and Benjamin Niespodziany. Lovely writers, both. Please email bluejawedsnake@gmail.com for the Zoom link, and/or to sign up for the open mic that will be held after the featured readings.
Benjamin Niespodziany is a Chicago-based writer whose work has appeared in the Wigleaf Top 50, Booth, Conduit, Indiana Review, and others. His debut poetry collection was released in 2022 through Okay Donkey and his novella of connected stage plays is out now with X-R-A-Y. You can find more at neonpajamas.com.
NC Smock lives and works in the community sector in Baltimore, Maryland. His creative writing efforts are mostly channeled into grants for community organizations. He is currently working on a written and spoken word project, No Arrival, which is anchored by his sketches and paintings. This project will soon be available in video and audio snippets, as well as a flip book where segments can be rearranged and read in any order. The project will be published under the name Wyeth Mann.
~
Please look out for other events, scheduled so far as such:
Sunday April 28th, 3pm EST, featured: Tom Snarsky and Darren C Demaree
Saturday May 18th, 4pm EST, featured: Nadia Arioli and Jay Besemer
Sunday May 19th, 3pm EST, featured: Pamela Kesling and Bee Morris
Sunday May 26th, 3pm EST, featured: Dylan Krieger and Alina Stefanescu
(no events will be held in June)
Long
were we
awayed
I don’t
make things
I can’t
have
from
deer as permission to die in Ohio
OUTSIDES
The space between birth and death is the same for every creature. I say this lightly and I say this as two rooms enter my stranded room. Eating disproves god. Dream is a wasp that sells as its own a mosquito’s art. It’s okay you wanna catch the slow angel. I’ve never been alone and neither have you.
AGAINST INTERIORITY
The astronaut called to recut porn and the caterpillar to soften the palms of the crucified. The pill living in the pill you take. Toy noise from a phoneless hell. Blue doll, erasable wrist.
THE BULLET GOES THROUGH MORE PEOPLE THAN BEFORE
Cannibal on the
moon, ghost at the piano.
The rain gone missing.
BREATHING MACHINES MADE IN OHIO
Unending angel
of a terrified stomach.
Tadpole, eye’s daydream.
THE SLEEP GOD GETS
Lightning finds a vein.
Password sends a nude.
SMALL POEMS AGAINST DYING
The sleepwalker and the insomniac asking god to switch their hidden pregnancies.
A vaccine for object permanence.
The fly
my ghost
calls rain.
~
deer as permission to die in ohio
43 poems, pocketbook style
April 2023
collection is pay what you want
can be purchased via:
paypal (bartsmock@gmail.com)
or Venmo: @Barton-Smock-2
or CashApp: $BartonSmock
cover image by Noah M. Smock
kingsoftrain 