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Andes, Tom |
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Ayers, Tony |
Baber, Bill |
Baird, Meg |
Baker, J. D. |
Balaz, Joe |
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Berriozabal, Luis Cuauhtemoc |
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Blakey, James |
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Brown, Richard |
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Burke, Wayne F. |
Burnwell, Otto |
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Campbell, J. J. |
Cancel, Charlie |
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Centorbi, David Calogero |
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Davis, Michael D. |
Degani, Gay |
De Neve, M. A. |
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Dillon, John J. |
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Doyle, John |
Dunham, T. Fox |
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Fortier, M. L. |
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Grey, John |
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A NEW LIFE
by John Grey
Deep in the woods is a clutch of graves
and the man who killed them and buried the
bodies
now dwells in a metropolis two hundred miles to
the west,
where he lives with his dear, dear wife.
He seems right in the head now he shares an
apartment,
and sleeps far from the scene of all that
butchery and digging,
and the cottage, now burned to the ground,
along with every bloodstain.
He keeps the two separate— the second floor
flat, the undiscovered crime scene,
the wife that he loves and the strangers who
just happened to be there.
Two worlds— one that puts food on his table,
warmth in his bed,
the other where every human tic was cause for
dismemberment.
Deep in the woods, the shadows never lift.
In the city, sun’s reliable, breaks through
each morning.
All he needed was love to emerge fully from the
darkness.
No more stabbing the irate neighbor or the
coughing boy.
No slaughtering the obese woman or the girl
with the stammer.
No beheading the man who looked at him oddly.
He and his wife live happily and solitarily.
Other people can safely go on with being human.
A NEW LIFE
by John Grey
Deep in the woods is a clutch of graves
and the man who killed them and buried the
bodies
now dwells in a metropolis two hundred miles to
the west,
where he lives with his dear, dear wife.
He seems right in the head now he shares an
apartment,
and sleeps far from the scene of all that
butchery and digging,
and the cottage, now burned to the ground,
along with every bloodstain.
He keeps the two separate— the second floor
flat, the undiscovered crime scene,
the wife that he loves and the strangers who
just happened to be there.
Two worlds— one that puts food on his table,
warmth in his bed,
the other where every human tic was cause for
dismemberment.
Deep in the woods, the shadows never lift.
In the city, sun’s reliable, breaks through
each morning.
All he needed was love to emerge fully from the
darkness.
No more stabbing the irate neighbor or the
coughing boy.
No slaughtering the obese woman or the girl
with the stammer.
No beheading the man who looked at him oddly.
He and his wife live happily and solitarily.
Other people can safely go on with being human.
MOIRA WALKS HOME LATE AT
NIGHT
by John Grey
It was late at night,
the streets were dark and empty
and she had the feeling
she was being followed.
Only ten more blocks
to her apartment house
but it seemed miles away.
She heard no footsteps,
no cough, no breathing
and, when she risked
a glance behind
there was nothing but shadow
in the shape of the buildings
she’d hurried by.
She knew she was being foolish.
Her imagination had created
some creature out of nothing,
and that was her mystery pursuer,
a figment, threatening, deadly,
but a figment, nothing more.
But then suddenly she did hear footsteps,
and a cough, and breathing.
She began to shake,
Her forward progress was more
of a sideways wobble.
“Is that you, Margaret?” said a familiar voice.
It was Mr. Benson,
the man in the apartment below.
She sighed with relief.
But also disappointment.
Her life was safe.
But her fantasies were on shaky ground.
THE HEAD
by John Grey
Don't start thinking
I'm a mere parlor trick
performed by the one
who brought me here.
I can see and think
for both of us.
And all this without a damn thing
below my severed throat.
No windpipe of course.
No veins and arteries
flowing back and forth
from the heart.
A machine does the work
performed formerly by my body.
He's placed me on a tabletop
like a vase full of flowers.
But, instead of petals opening,
I provide, for your enjoyment,
lips like mating slugs
mouthing silent sounds.
Some would say
that I am not really alive,
just a simulation,
some electronic wizardry
fronted by a borrowed skull.
But see my eyes blink.
Watch my nose and ears twitch.
Take time to read
what my slave has written here.
CONTENTS OF THE ATTIC TRUNK
by John Grey
Moldy letters,
jigsaw puzzles,
bronzed baby shoe,
faded photographs,
Uncle Jake’s handwritten confession
to the murder of Aunt Lucy,
a moth-eaten wedding dress,
false teeth in a bottle,
a severed hand,
Aunt Lucy’s I expect.
THE DEAD MAN TO HIS HEIRS
by John Grey
The view from the coffin
is a welcome change
from what I saw
through bleary eyes
on my deathbed.
Despicable relatives,
treacherous so-called friends
and all manner of toadies
no longer hold their breath
for my last puff of air.
Now, their nerves
are on high alert,
in anticipation of the reading
of the will.
The words of comfort
are as insincere
as a Tammany Hall politician’s.
The tears are still fake.
Even the one who smothered me
with that pillow
could give a bawling crocodile
a head start
and beat it by a lachrymose gallon.
They’ll get their share
and then their descendants,
their hangers-on,
will wait impatiently
for them to die.
They think they’re getting money.
But I will to them voracity,
distrust and hypocrisy.
Oh yes, and a pillow in the face
when they least expect it.
HOLDING OUT FOR A RAINBOW
by John Grey
It has
been raining for days.
The grass is green and lush
outside
but here,
in this rank and ratty
second floor apartment,
the
fungi and mold
sprout.
I sit in a kitchen chair,
elbows on table,
head in hands.
That
is,
when
I bother
to
get out of bed.
The slime is oozing
out through my brain.
And I’m cursed with inward eyes.
THE TIDE by John Grey I’m by the ocean, on the
beach, body attentive to the sun’s last rays but mind distracted by the idea
of darkness and its promised full moon. It’s a particular kind of
hunger that nature, for all its wild beauty, cannot sate. I
can only make footprints in sand for so long before they turn into pawprints and the trail leads away
from the beach, to where people live in their supposed fortresses. Horizon streaks with blood. Streetlamps flicker on. I’m little
changed on the outside but, for my innards, there’s a seismic shift. I lope more than I walk. I growl instead of speaking. Don't be surprised
if, within the hour, I'm at your doorstep. It’s a different world to what God had
in mind. Civility has gone out on the tide and I am coming in.
FOLLOWED by John Grey I can’t be at ease, not
as long as I walk these dark streets, tracked and followed by
a sound. Call it a cough, a clip-clop, even a heavy breath, it’s
always back there somewhere. Touch may never come into it. I
could die of what I hear.
HE KNOWS by John Grey The vampire is aware of every virgin tucked away in cottage beds,
or in rooms above the tavern, fifty, at least, in the village as if they were
items on a menu, fulsome, buxom, fair-haired and blue-eyed, each dreaming a hopeful
story like the reading and rereading of a fairy tale, a tale that can’t
survive the lure of an open window to the messenger of death flying by. It’s an old Transylvanian fallacy that nighttime’s as
safe as daylight with a cross between breasts, garlic flowers hung from walls. But each is an
Ariadne’s thread through the maze of darkness, a sign that here is something precious, a
damsel worthy of protection. But it’s an unfinished circle, an
incomplete composition, an aura ripe for penetration. A man of centuries knows the lay
of the land of dreams, the grammar of soft breathing, the rituals of fear. Fresh blood runs
like a stream in spring and his is the perfect passion for it.
SCALING THE WALL by John Grey It’s crawling vertically, and side to side. The thing is just below your wide-open window, about
to scutter up onto your sill. It could be a vampire or maybe just some kind of venomous arachnid. You could die a slow death or a quick one, passionately sucked of all blood or terrifyingly paralyzed in a heartbeat. It’s all your mother’s
fault. She only ever warned you about married men.
ON
THE COMMUTER TRAIN by John Grey Baron Frankenstein's head is
buried in an old yellowing chemistry book. Igor
sits beside him, hands fidgeting, the ones in his large brown bag
likewise. Larry Talbot rubs his chin, wonders, "Did I shave this morning? Does that even matter?" Count Dracula is primping in a mirror, combing,
adjusting, fiddling, until he can't see a thing. Doctor
Jekyll and Mister Hyde almost didn't make it . . . a
half hour trying to convince the ticket seller they should only pay one fare. The Mummy just wants to add a momentary doze to his many centuries of sleep but the nouveau-frightful, Jason, Freddy Krueger, and Chucky are being loud and obnoxious. And the alien boards suddenly and violently, tearing through the ceiling of the train. "Decrepit mansions not good enough for you," sneers the butler from the old dark house. A gaggle of ogres is ogling She-who-must-be-obeyed. "She can give me orders any time,"
one snickers. "Tiny out of the way English village" and the invisible man departs. The Witch-finder General
gets off at seventeenth century superstitious
British Isles. Various poltergeists detrain at
American suburbia, giant bugs at the 50s stop. More
journey. Another station. "Fog shrouded Whitechapel in the
1880s!" screams the conductor A
well-known artist, a member of the royal family, a
Russian sailor, a Hungarian butcher, and a Harley Street specialist, all glance up.
PREY by
John Grey The spirit is so
weak, it’s unwilling . . . surrounded by listening devices, ripple-faced, hiding
out in dreams, writing
notes to myself away from probing eyes . . . outside, the threats
draw closer— hook-clawed
creatures and
the rotting smell of night. How unearthly the Earth at such
times . . . health
collapses, surrounds pantomime with flickering light and wall-shadow, enlist the thugs of
darkness, buzzing insect satellites,
bizarre cannibals of the latest technology. And how drawn this
mouth, the last smile
from what seems centuries ago, turned upside down, distorted, pungent, green,
warped . . . to
name just a few of my companions. How pointless these
defenses . . . I
turn myself inside out and yet it’s still me, a broken
toy, the
split wires of a powerline, loveless among uncaring ghosts, threatened by
gangsters, Russians, monsters,
artificial intelligence and barons of the black arts. Now, I am a flesh
and bone alarm with
a bell that rings in my head— the sound is the
same as always . . . what
bothers me is the frequency.
SCREAM by
John Grey A woman screams from
the house next door. Windows
rattle. The
flowers on my kitchen table fold up in an instant. I drop the book I’m
reading. A
shudder ripples through me. Sure, there’s been reports
of monsters in the neighborhood. And my doors and windows are locked with bolts and chains. But high-pitched
cries can go where intruders cannot tread. Her terror is in the room with me. I can fight off an
intruder but not the beast of sound.
THE LEAKING FAUCET by
John Grey Drip. Drip. Drip. The
bathroom faucet leaks and, despite his best efforts
with wrench and washer, he’s
clearly no plumber. His brain sometimes resounds with his mother’s
words— “You’ll never amount
to anything.” But
now his mind is consumed by that persistent drop of water on enamel. Madness
is such a shape-shifter. He can terrify women, hack up whores, show his mother what
a man he is. But pipes are a maze
of metal, so
many joins, so many cracks, more weak points than
a drunken date. When his mother speaks, he can take to the
streets, the
clubs, the cafes, stalk and seduce and strangle, show her how wrong
she is. But when the faucet leaks, he’s the only victim
here.
THE SILENCE by John Grey The silence of a place where people once lived is eerie, cruel
even. Eerie, for how much the
creak of my foot on a stair echoes through the rooms. Cruel, for how those who
dwelled here are forgotten. so forgotten, it’s as if they never
were. And the silence of a place where
people once lived, can also be gruesome. Gruesome, for the rotting, cobwebbed,
bloated corpses hunched around the dining table, with scraps of a rat-nibbled long-ago
meal, on cracked china plates before them. But that silence can also be reassuring. I can move in here. The rent, undoubtedly, is cheap.
PACING by John Grey By day, you pace the many rooms of
the old manor. At night, you blow out the bedside candle, dark clouds encumber the high
window and, as you lie back on your pillow, pull the blanket up to the crest of your chin, it’s
time for another kind of pacing. Your mind is the floor this time. Your
memory provides the footsteps. As does your guilt. And the ghosts. Back and forth, back and forth, by the time you fall asleep, your
evil history has worn a hole in your head.
POEM FOR
AN EX by
John Grey There were nights when I saw hands and only hands. Tiny or large, floating in the darkness, flexing
their fingers, easing to the left or to the right, as if angling for the clearest, quickest route to my bare throat. There were no bodies. Not even the shape of one. Just hands. Old wrinkled hands. Strong sturdy hands. Even the occasional
child-like hands that lunged then drew back as if the act of strangling a man in his
bed was beyond them. But some hands persevered, drew closer and closer, prepared to wrap
around my neck, and choke the life out of me. They were my hands. You peeked through the keyhole, watched the goings-on appreciatively.
HIS GALLERY by John Grey At first, she's impressed,
awed even, by the stuffed and mounted heads on his wall. "That rhino made the mistake
of charging me," he says, as she admires the huge gray head topped with one, erect, threatening
horn. The lion is even more dazzling. His mane is high and proud. Those intimidating teeth look
set to rip a man's flesh from his bone. "It was either me or him," he explains. But when it comes
to the smaller, cuter creatures like the rabbit or the squirrel, her mood droops
like her face, is overwhelmed by sadness,
sympathy. "Practice for the real thing," he says. And then, beyond these tiny
feature creatures, the display turns into something more horrifying. She trembles at the sight of a human head, a middle-aged
man with florid cheeks, eyes bulging, mouth wide
open, frozen in eternal castigation "The old man and me never did get along," A few more young men follow. "You tend to
have a lot of enemies in this business." And then a beautiful, though
sour-faced, woman. "It never did work out." There's one space on the wall, room enough for one more trophy. Before
she can ask for whom or what it is intended, he
whispers in her ear, "You know something, you
could very well be Miss Right." She
smiles but then realizes, her tour began from the far left.
DEAD WORK by John Grey It's exhausting
but it's the dead's job Walk around when your
legs are rotting. Touch when hands crumble
at the merest contact. The dead are under orders.
Exit coffins. Burst through earth. Wander neighborhoods after midnight.
Enter houses, bedrooms. No one alive can be relied upon
for vigilante justice So shriek though
your tongue's worm-riddled.
Flap and flail at the risk of losing the other arm.
Press your decomposing cheeks hard against the face of
the one who did this to you until they die of fright.
Remember, revenge is a dish best served dead.
HOW HE DIED by John Grey The soil has memory but
no conscience. It knows where the bodies are buried but cares not a grain of dirt for how they got there. Died peacefully
of natural causes or smashed violently over the head by some guy with a shovel— it’s
all the same to the three feet of earth that buries the bones. The soil will
just go about its business of gnawing away at the body, using the crumbs of flesh
and bone, for its own ends. But the tree it nurtures
is a different story. Some trees bend and moan. Others stand mute and upright.
They tell you what the soil will not.
THE MAN IN THEIR MIDST by John Grey He’s where he is and he’s
where he is not. At the exact moment that he’s stroking the fur of his cat, he’s
praising his pet for the mouse she hasn’t caught yet, that will flap in her jaw, sometime
near the witching hour. What is now a good cup of coffee will be a triumph of bloodlust
come midnight. And as he looks out the window at the young woman passing by, he foresees his
eyes as hands, her confident walk as an unwitting stroll into terror. Anything
flying free in the morning will flop dead on the floor of its cage. The healthy will sicken. The
dying, die all the more. Everyone’s out in their latest summer clothes. Too bad the fashion
around here is body bags.
John
Grey is an Australian poet, U.S. resident, recently published in Sheepshead Review,
Stand, Poetry Salzburg Review, and Hollins Critic. Latest books,
Covert, Memory Outside the Head, and Guest of Myself are available
through Amazon. Work upcoming in
Ellipsis, Blueline, and International
Poetry Review.
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