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Adair, Jay |
Adhikari, Sudeep |
Ahern, Edward |
Aldrich, Janet M. |
Allan, T. N. |
Allen, M. G. |
Ammonds, Phillip J. |
Anderson, Peter |
Andreopoulos, Elliott |
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Armstrong, Dini |
Augustyn, P. K. |
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Ullerich, Eric |
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Vilhotti, Jerry |
Waldman, Dr. Mel |
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Walters, Luke |
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|
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Bloody
Mary
by Dr.
Mel Waldman
Mary Jones, the
owner of the Bloody Mary liquor store in the South Bronx, stood almost six feet
tall and weighed 350 pounds. Women gossiped about the full-figured gal and
labeled her grotesque and bestial. But most men claimed she had the prettiest
face in the borough.
Mary had a few
sidelines—dealing drugs and running an after-hours S & M club. Most folks
feared her. But secretly, Bloody Mary loved Tommy the Toy, her midget lover and
accountant.
Tonight, the
Bloods had ordered a hit on the big mama, initiation rites for a wannabe Blood.
At 11, Tommy dozed
off in the back room.
At midnight,
Harvey Stone, Joe the Beast, and Jimmy the Speed Freak arrived.
At 12:05, a skinny
kid rushed into the store brandishing a .38.
“What the fuck?”
Joe the Beast yelled, pulling out a large piece.
The kid blew his
head off.
Jimmy screamed.
Harvey fainted. He killed them, too.
Mary took out her
.45 Magnum and shot the kid exactly when he blasted her.
Later, Tommy woke
up, kissed Mary’s corpse, took the money, and sauntered off.
|
 |
THE GIRL FROM PLANET XES By Dr. Mel Waldman The pencil-thin girl from Planet
XES came into my office six months ago for an emergency session. With protruding bones
and dark brown eyes, the ghostly little thing stood about five feet tall. “Dr. Jacob Weiss referred
me to you.” “How is my former colleague?” The girl stared blankly at me. “Did he give you a referral
letter?” “No.” “Well, what seems to be
the problem?” “I just returned from Planet
XES.” “Planet XES?” “Yeah. The motherfuckers kidnapped and transported me there.
They XESED my brain, body, and soul.” It took her forever to tell me she had discovered a glowing object
in a corner of her bedroom. When she gazed at the minuscule thing, she blanked out and
woke up on Planet XES. “After they XESED me, they
left me alone in a glittering white sphere. The burning light blinded me. And suddenly
I was home again.” I made a couple calls yesterday. Found out Dr. Weiss vanished a
year ago. Now, I sit with the girl. Her
freaky eyes glow fiercely. They XES me, take me there,
enslave me. Planet XES is real. “Who are you, MOTHER-XESER?” I look into her hellfire eyes and burn. REVOLUTION IN THE MADHOUSE by Dr. Mel Waldman In a
jabberwocky universe, you can pull it off, switch places or sneak in and hang out, on the
inside. Why not? Indeed, in
antediluvian Shrink-land, other explorers conducted secret experiments on psyche
wards, tricked the staff, and discovered weird truths, the color of gunmetal, which blew
the minds of the uptight status quo bureaucrats. Now, I’m intoxicated with
this thrilling notion of a one-day or one-week revolution in the madhouse, more breathtaking
and exciting than a pulchritudinous femme fatale. My revolution isn’t crimson
or bloody red; it’s the color of creamy white gardenias or pale pink azaleas, or
perhaps, yellow or white daffodils; my revolution is not a bomb or volcanic explosion;
it’s not about deadly force or any other kind of power; my revolution is soft and
curious, and sweet as an old-fashioned vanilla malted and a slice of creamy cheesecake
with whipped cream; and in a jabberwocky universe, it’s about empathy, compassion,
and love—the ultimate inner space exploration. But here, in the rational universe,
I need the approval of the Committee (that’s a bummer), and an experimental design
(perhaps, you could help me work out the kinks). And, if all goes well (and I
drill a hole through the brick-red wall of resistance and cut the thick red tape), I will
feast on infinite out-of-the-box ideas, high on knowledge; but if not, in a jabberwocky
universe, I can pull it off, alone. COMMENCEMENT DAY by Dr. Mel Waldman The end was the beginning, and it arrived in the summer
of ’65, for time is a cannibal that devoured Mother, a tiny woman clutching a small
ration of life that remained in the quiet ruins of that seething apocalyptic day. Her gold eyes perched on
olive skin gazed at us as she lay in bed. She held a fake plastic cigarette in her minuscule
hand, I imagine. Or was she caressing Father’s trembling hands? An oxygen tank stood tall
on the night table, like a centurion guarding a moribund prisoner. Outside our home, a
womb of death, Brooklyn overflowed with Eros, the life force. We watched her gasp for air, black out,
wake up, open her celestial eyes, and whisper, “I thought I was dying.” And
then she passed away, quietly, and forever. In that cutting moment, I, too, crossed an
invisible boundary, and began a long, unfathomable journey.
VANISHING MAN by Dr.
Mel Waldman I watched the
old man vanish, when he came to stay with me after his third wife kicked him out. He flew
in from Florida. Sometimes he disappeared in the
middle of a conversation, or when he was mute and meandered around my small apartment,
naked and confused. On occasion, he lost control and
suddenly, like a Hemingway bull, he looked ready to charge. But he didn’t. His dark brown eyes glared at
me. He roared and shrieked and when his body shook, I hugged his fragile torso and whispered,
“Dad, I love you.” The little man grew a big fat
smile and proudly displayed his glittering gold tooth. I remember our time together. He often vanished, but
always reappeared, until he left for Florida, and his wife, and destiny. She shipped him off to a nursing home where his merciless
disease ate his mutilated brain. And when I spoke to him long distance, he whispered, “Yes,
no, yes, no,” until he vanished forever. On empty nights, I sometimes gaze
into my meandrous mind, a broken road with scattered potholes of forgetfulness, and
mutter, “Will I vanish too?”
AN UNHOLY VISION: THE TRANSVERBERATION
OF THE INVISIBLE MAN By Dr.
Mel Waldman After midnight, the invisible
man saunters along Ocean Parkway in sidereal time, the
empty wasteland of his barren pitted face pointing upward, his dead eyes whirling around
the Heavens & back to Earth, & drilling through the darkness as he slowly approaches
Coney Island, a distant dream & a vanishing point in his moribund mind; & when he arrives at
the swirling center of the unholy night, he drifts toward the Coney Island Boardwalk &
slithers beneath its low ceiling, lies in the seething swirling sand of the sultry
August night, a sweet phantasmagoria, & falls into a deep abysmal sleep; & suddenly, an unholy vision sweeps across
his dissolving brain cells, & trapped in inner space, he witnesses the transverberation
of the invisible man—the piercing stabbing
death of his fragile diaphanous flesh; & perched on the phantom stars of his multilayered nightmare,
he shrieks hellfire as a frozen icicle burns & slashes his heart until he is still
forever in an unfathomable landscape beyond Space & Time; & tomorrow, after the tempest, his
mutilated corpse lies buried in the deep snow of winter in the sweeping whiteness of Coney
Island beneath the cold barren boardwalk for the invisible man
has passed through the labyrinth of final dreams & discovered the soothing heat of
summer in sweet phantasmagoria, an eerie place & last exit before a chilling unreality
of unending stillness
LADY XES
by Dr. Mel Waldman
She struts across
Mallory Square like a glamorous Hollywood movie star, a deliciously divine diva walking
the red carpet.
Yet she does not wear high heels, no stilettos tonight,
in Key West, no see-through gown, diaphanous and devastating, with long slits revealing
lovely legs.
Her sensuous buttocks swing and sway and sashay in tight
and torn blue jeans, and her tiny feet move inside soothing soft-blue slip-ons, Proenza
Schouler espadrilles.
& now, in a low-cut red T-shirt that purrs, XES ROCKS, she enters the dock, mystical and magical, and watches weird performers,
freaky and fantastic.
& all wandering eyes find her, for she is Lady XES, femme fatale of the 21st century,
Lady XES from Planet XES-XESY, XESUAL, and mother XESer of the unfathomable universe, here on earth to be with us,
& vanish every night with the sinking red sun into the eerie sea and the
distant horizon, dying in the Gulf of Mexico, resurrected in the darkness, and returning
tomorrow, perhaps, to XES us for eternity
THE METAMORPHOSIS OF MY IMAGINARY
COFFIN by Dr. Mel Waldman
Come with me into my coffin, my imaginary coffin, a voice within a
dream whispers, then
swirls into a sphere of turquoise light & vanishes. & after, I
awaken, inside a wooden
coffin, ensconced in a
whirling dream, a frostbitten dream
of winter, within an ocean of dreams; & looking up, at the cold wood covered with the flowing chill of darkness, my frozen eyes observe the metamorphosis of my imaginary coffin, nestled in a fierce phantasmagoria, where I am empty
inside this eerie emptiness, & still, like the silenced dead; & through the
blinding black hole I watch a frightening alchemy— wooden coffin
becoming gold & glowing in the House of Non-Existence, then flowing into a turquoise light & vanishing,
becoming raw dust, but resurrected in the bowels of the earth, & soon, a nameless weapon of glory, drills through
the foul earth, rises
furiously toward the snow-covered Heavens, explodes & obliterates the cosmos, & inside this supernatural
coffin, my Post-Apocalyptic home, I lie, alone, for eternity, in a locked box, nothing above, or beyond, only the monstrous Void
A DEATH BEFORE DEATH IN THE DEEP SNOW OF ALZHEIMER’S by
Dr. Mel Waldman My father passed through a black hole and disappeared.
I waited for his return. When
the mind dies, it sleeps in a frozen coffin. Buried in the deep snow, and tasting flakes of non-existence,
as real as the wet, whirling beasts in his vanishing brain cells, he suffered a death before
death. Strangers gazed at him and saw a peek-a-boo man, clothed in a shroud of non-identity,
a ghostly veil of human emptiness. I saw a
man named Father. I watched him vanish into a shattered
time capsule of random, remote yesterdays, swaddled in a strait jacket of unbearable
restraint. I witnessed his death before death.
When the mind dies,
it hides in the deep snow. He disappeared in front of me,
his dark, vacant eyes far away, perched in nowhere. My soul-severed eyes darted and flitted back and forth,
between the mutilated spaces that connected us. I reached out to his moribund mind-spirit.
I could not save him. When the mind dies, it dangles
between nowhere and nowhere. Before his final death, a private
snowstorm swept mercilessly across the wasteland of his mind. The blizzard covered his
battered brain, almost obliterated it. Yet sometimes, he was reborn for
a few seconds or minutes, resurrected by chance neural connections. We’d say hello.
Instinctively, he grew a big fat smile, revealing his precious gold teeth. His eyes were real until
they became vacant again. I discovered death in his dark
brown eyes. In his heyday, he was a fierce,
ferocious man who did not know how to love or be loved.
We raged against each other. But at
the end of his fragile life, I loved him fully, forgave his flaws and sins, and forgave
my own. I witnessed his horrific death
before death. Strangers saw a peek-a-boo man. I saw a
man called Father.
A
DEATH IN OLD BROOKLYN by Dr. Mel Waldman
Old Brooklyn is dead, drifting in inner space, lost & lingering in antediluvian brain cells & dangling between shattered synapses too, Old Brooklyn is dead, & I mourn for the soothing snow of my mythological
childhood, a celestial landscape in constant flux & recreation; I mourn interminably for the boy-dreamer I once was, covered in dead time in the coffin of the past; I mourn for him & this lost spirit-love inside me, & the dream-shards dangling in still life & the scattered sparks of divinity frozen in the seething fires- the porphyry of burning
time, & merciful angels suspended in mid-air before the unending freedom journey; & I mourn incessantly for eleemosynary thoughts merging with celestial visions of the child; Yes, I mourn for so much- too much of my life used & spent & buried in the death-box behind me, a tomb of everlasting vastness & longing, the transverberation of my shrinking
spirit; I mourn unendurably, & sometimes, after a preternatural sunset, in sidereal time, beneath the mystical stars, I gaze backwards into the reconstructed landscape & resurrect the boy & the soothing snow & my mythic childhood within a holy ring of purple-red stones, a prophetic porphyry of fugitive
dreams, & a death in Old Brooklyn rushing away from me in frozen time, here & now, everywhere & nowhere, never touching tomorrow
BLESSINGS BEFORE THE APOCALYPSE by
Dr. Mel Waldman The snow falls interminably. “Come
now with me, into the holy house. It is time to receive the blessings before the Apocalypse.” But the others rush off, vanishing in the rolling hills.
& so, I enter, alone, and when the holy man speaks, his sweet voice is a zephyr brushing
against my olive skin, and his words are a river of revelations, holy susurrations that
flow into me and soothe my shattered spirit, a kaleidoscope of crippled butterflies. “Welcome, fellow travelers of the unfathomable
universe, and bless you.” He
speaks to a chimerical throng of believers, for I am alone, with him, and a sphere of holy
light encircles me. “After
life flows into death . . . and death feeds the earth . . . beyond the ruins . . . is the
ferocious mystery . . . the ineffable miracle of resurrection and . . .” My gold eyes rush to the mammoth window to my left,
swallow the deep snow that covers the moribund earth and I say goodbye to my life and all
that I have loved and the world outside. It is time to pray and hide beneath the canopy
of the prophet’s visions. Ensconced
in the vastness of his words, and this holy place & time, nestled in a cocoon of revelations
& silence, I close my eyes and wait for the Apocalypse, and after, a swarm of monarchs
and mourning cloaks may rise from the ruins and soar, or perhaps, nothing, not even
traces of our dreams, shall exist to reveal who and what we were or why we did
not hear or heed, in time, the deafening words of the prophecy

|
Art by Mike Kerins © 2016 |
CRIMSON
FACE Dr. Mel
Waldman Look closely at my sweet-smelling face. Come close now. Stop! And smell
the roses. What cologne am I
wearing? Can you guess? I am the Garden of Eden. Take a deep breath and inhale
the seductive scent I wear. Does it belong to Adam, Eve, or the snake? Is it Eternity, or Eros, or the foul
suffocative smell of Thanatos? Come close now. Beneath the sundry masks I wear, do you see the real me? Touch my face—the soft, smooth skin.
Remove my masks. Peel them off, if you dare, and discover the crimson face—the bloody
cauldron of rage. Now, do you know who I am? Or are you confused by my
disarming smile, my gentle demeanor, and my melodious voice? Come closer into my arms, look up—into my cannibalistic eyes and
see who I really am and
let your mind and heart dissolve in a long eternal kiss while the killer inside me, the beast with the crimson
face, caresses and strangles you to death. MY POEM, MY PRAYER By Dr. Mel Waldman (on reading Jack Kerouac’s
poem-Hymn) After dark, in the deep of
the night I drink the stars
outside my Brooklyn home & gazing upward
at the glorious unfathomable creations, I turn inward, look into the
mirror of my meandering mind & rushing slowly into inner
space, I pray to our
unknowable Source, bathe in the
beautiful darkness & the omniscient silence, enter the Oneness, & I pray until my
prayer blesses me with creation & a turquoise
butterfly appears & swirls around my brainwaves & in
a poignant moment, perhaps, in the everflowing circle
of the night or in the deep
silence of the dawn, when crepuscular insects awaken with me, I write my poem,
my prayer & on the blank
page of metaphysical creation, in my minuscule blank book, I scribble my
holy creation—my hymn to Brooklyn & to the majestic universe of celestial conundrums that surround it & my words weep the sadness &
joy of prayer & sing a
cornucopia of sweeping emotions in the vastness
where I shed the skin of loss as I create & remember the Coney Island of
my youth, the whirling
wonderland by the sea, where we gathered— & Mother, Father, Sister, &
I devoured Nathan’s frankfurters
& French fries & the soothing innocence of our time & we believed in something beautiful
transcendent & real as lovely as this poem, this prayer & as real as the invisible landscape
of boundless love where Mother& Father live now ensconced in my beauty in the mansion of my mind on the
Coney Island pier of Yesterday, gazing at the rolling
waves of the Atlantic Ocean & the swirling rhapsody of the
Coney Island rides, & smiling
majestically at me in their Seats to
Heaven while I stroll along
the wooden Boardwalk & sing songs of love & scribble words
of glory in the deep silence of creation until my
poem, my prayer comes forth, out of nothingness, the omnipotent music of the Source SILENCE, DEEP SILENCE by Dr. Mel Waldman (on reading Stefan
Brecht’s poem “Silence”) Silence, deep silence inside the swirl & falling into a
fallen divinity & the stone
speaks silence & I listen & drift
into visions of an old man with a Charlie Chaplin
moustache dives
into the river of silence caresses a
little lady glowing with the opalescent light of love & lovelier than Greta Garbo & I weep silence swallow phantom voices Mother’s otherworldly whispers celestial softness
brushing against my olive skin & Father’s ferocious
gorgeous grin gold tooth glittering after dark rushes across
the ruins of silence reaches me growls love & gallops off
through inner space AWAY
FAR AWAY & I drink the river of despair & drown in the deep silence of
the apocalypse & vanish in the
mournful flood of loss as I kiss &
taste the succulent lips of silence & long for
redemption, perhaps, the Queen of
Rebirth, a fallen divinity asleep in the
vastness where the stone speaks silence waiting for
me to awaken her waiting for
us to save each other in the
deep silence
THE SUDDEN DEATH OF MY UNKNOWABLE
FATHER LONG AGO IN LOST TIME, A STRANGER IN THE HOUSE OF MY
SOUL by Dr. Mel Waldman (on reading Joanne Kyger’s poem “My Father Died This
Spring”) Long ago, inside the
labyrinth of lost time, my unknowable father, a faraway man, distant in life & shrouded in
secrets, died suddenly in a Florida nursing home, a ghost of a vanishing man, shriveled up
& emptied of thought, gazing mindlessly at a moribund TV & a soporific
soap opera in the sultry dayroom decades ago, his dark brown eyes fixed on
random images floating in raw
nothingness on a Spring day until the old
phantom, having suffered the 1st
Death of No-Mind, brainwaves dissolving inside the wasteland
of the Deep Snow, slumped over in his rickety chair
& slipped off into the otherworldly Void that swallows all life-the nowhere-hole of
oblivion for those forever bereft of the cosmic breath
of life & banished from
earth & our human flow—the furious beautiful rivers & oceans of Eros. Looking back through a
swirling oval darkness, my weary eyes locked shut, I sit within a
circle of silence & plummet into my private space & a mournful past; but soon, I hear
the cutting voice of an interloper, the hallucinatory soliloquy of the Beat
Poet Joanne Kyger slicing the
seething silence, speaking of her dead father, confessing, “You
can’t say he wasn’t strange and difficult.” I listen to her poignant words
again & again, orange-red flames of mournful music that fill my emptiness
until her haunting voice melts in the merciless fire, becoming a murmur-whisper-susurration,
& vanishing in the abyss. After, I am alone,
once more—terribly alone. Father, my unknowable
father, you’ve passed through the sacred wormhole into the beyond & the lost landscape
of eternity. Now, tell me who you
are & I shall discover who I am. Father, you are a
stranger in the House of My Soul. Yet I welcome you in. Come now, come into my home.
Father, my unknowable father, you are undecipherable & unfathomable like
the universe & the Source of all life. I am too. So come
now, from far away, come into my
home, & let us search together for our truth & let us love

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Art by Ann Marie Rhiel © 2017 |
A
BEAUTIFUL
CHAOS
by Dr. Mel Waldman
Follow me
into a beautiful chaos
in
the
flowing rear space
lit up
with
the fire of efflorescence.
Follow me.
&
the clock explodes
within
the whirling yellow-orange labyrinth of unreality
&
still
Rabbi Silverman teaches Torah at a corner table.
Nearby,
I read Yehoshua November’s poem “Prayer”
&
my phantom soul flows up & down the Tree
of Life
&
glows with otherworldly phosphorescence
&
a few feet away,
Mike,
my funny Egyptian Muslim friend,
unleashes
the swirling music of Saturday
Night Fever on his smart cell phone
&
he & the old timers of Dunkin’ Donuts dance
with John Travolta & Karen Lynn Gorney
&
we caress the past with the Bee Gees & Tavares,
free
in
our little Tower of Babel
for
this
is our world
beyond
Heaven & Hell
different voices & tongues
coalescing
in
the blessing of one
PHANTOM
VOICES
FLOATING
ABOVE
BROOKLYN
SING
REVELATIONS
OF
THE
DEAD
by
Dr. Mel Waldman
(on reading D.
Nurkse’s poem-The Dead Reveal Secrets of
Brooklyn)
Phantom
voices
floating above Brooklyn
wafting
to earth
&
resting
secretly on the old roof
of
James Madison
High
invisibly
swirling & whirling beyond time,
&
perched on Pandora’s Box in a preternatural meditation,
phantom voices
sing
revelations of the dead.
&
Mr. B
sails
across Brooklyn on his 1955 Vincent Black Prince,
majestic motorcycle
flying
high from Coney Island to Midwood northbound on Ocean Parkway
&
turning east on Kings Highway & south on Bedford Avenue
sweeping
through
the unreality of sweet phantasmagoria within my whirling dreamscape
my private divinity
&
Mr. B
returns
to James Madison High
&
I-to Yesterday-wearing the ethereal shroud of euphoria/dysphoria
circa
1958
rushing to his English class &The Poetry &
Philosophy Club
&
I kiss
Destiny, the strange seductive flower growing in the Garden of the Past,
I
return to You & caress
my ferocious flower within my Dream-Mind
&
what shall
I find when You awaken within my dream?
With
Your rebirth, what shall I find?
&
ghostly
voices, light & mellifluous as the susurrations of zephyrs &
opalescent angels,
whisper,
The dead never die.
&
an invisible orchestra plays Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue
&
phantom
voices sing
&
phantom voices sing
&
phantom voices sing revelations of the dead
&
death is the boy falling into the deep snow of mourning
in
the
very hot summer of despair as sweat falls from his (my) brow
&
He . . . floats with phantom voices
&
I taste the eerie emptiness of mother’s lost lacerated voice
She lies beside her otherworldly oxygen tank, rises suddenly, &
shrieks,
“I thought I was dying,”
&
dies,
blasting
off
into the unfathomable black hole of everlasting stillness.
as
I plummet through the trapdoor of my electrocuted brain
&
I die too.
&
Dr. Z,
my high school Hebrew teacher,
frees
me, asks the dream-boy at James Madison High to read again from Isaiah 2:3-4.
Why?
Why do I pass through this supernatural door?
Now, the boy sings poetic words, sings
revelations of the dead,
“. . . and they shall beat their swords
into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.”
Then suddenly, Dr. Z & dream-boy vanish,
&
within
the harrowing hour, in a mournful, mutilated room of black flowers,
one unfathomable day,
I hear,
Young X, honor student,
member of the rifle club, has taken his life!
I hear,
as C, the
robotic school official, tells us—the senior class—this soul-cutting truth,
&
rushes off while we meditate on death.
&
phantom voices sing,
. . . the evanescence of
death is everlasting . . .
&
. . . everlasting
is the obscene evanescence . . .
&
K,
the young Kafka of James Madison High,
asks,
Why?
&
I die while phantom voices floating above Brooklyn sing revelations
of the dead
&
within the swirling dream-flower of my life
I
die too forever,
again & again
I
die

|
Art by Elise Daher © 2018 |
CONUNDRUM STREET. by Dr. Mel Waldman (on reading Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s poem “The
Long Street”) On Conundrum Street I follow a throng of haunted
humans & a cornucopia of
creatures to Coney Island to taste
the cool metaphysical air & inhale
the raw wisdom of the burning sand & the bestial
ocean & ride on the
cosmic Cyclone again & the otherworldly Wonder Wheel & whirling around a chimerical
omphalos I look up at the
Parachute Jump our antediluvian landmark & mourn for the old & weary
& obsolete & the dead &
the lost & the living dead until I saunter off in a trancelike state to Nathan’s to devour sizzling hot
dogs supreme & crackling
crunchy French fries majestic & soon, oblivious of who I am & where I’m going I rush
slowly across Conundrum Street the unfathomable street that swirls
around the world & pirouettes
across the universe & mindlessly I go
on my magical journey & meander through
Brooklyn orphan cockroaches &
odd creatures by my side & weird humans with vacant
eyes still in the wilderness & wild
anorexic beings with turquoise
auras & telepathic powers & peripatetic phantoms too join me & mindlessly I go on my odyssey
through Brighton &
Manhattan Beach & Sheepshead Bay
& Midwood & all the neighborhoods
I know & all the ones still undiscovered & along the way I find
myself in Lily Pond at Brooklyn
College until I wander off to
Brooklyn Heights & stroll along
the Promenade & gaze at the
Twin Towers no longer there & so
it goes on Conundrum Street I time travel too return to
the Garment Center sit with
Father hard working dress
salesman in Horn &
Hardart & listen to the little man’s
voice & the vastness of
his dreams & look dreamily
into his dark brown eyes perched on his Austrian
horse-scarred face adorned with a
Lilliputian equine bite cascading down one cheek above a thin black moustache & a glittering gold tooth majestically revealed protruding with a wide
wicked smile & childlike joy & I
see my Father-God & his bestial beauty unalloyed ecstasy but how odd that
we- are oblivious of our mortality & harrowing destiny & fast-forward
a few decades & recall
the death of Father’s mind & memory the insidious death before death slithering in the remains of a broken brain the snake that eats the past devours synapses severs the self
on Conundrum Street that swirls around
the world & pirouettes across the universe merges time caresses yesterday swallows now & tastes
tomorrow a street that never
ends even when it comes
to a cul-de-sac & bathes in
frozen stillness the peculiar blessing of non-being it follows phantoms through the
House of the Dead to the
other side of Conundrum Street & beyond

|
Art by Elise Daher © 2018 |

|
Art by Ann Marie Rhiel © 2018 |
UNFATHOMABLE RHAPSODY OF PSYCHOSIS by Dr. Mel Waldman Unfathomable Rhapsody beautiful & grotesque rushes eerily through
crackling exploding brain cells & the other hears hallucinatory music the harrowing
& haunting Music of Un-Reality & phantom voices riding oceanic
waves flood the wounded self drowning in the
dreamscape & the unfathomable rhapsody rushes through
the apparitional universe. The other
drinks
the overflowing ocean of psychosis swallows a
cornucopia of madness & OD’s
on otherworldly sensory overload but awakens & dances deliriously to the
spectral music of trauma. “Psychosis is a blessing,” a phantasmal
voice whispers. “Or is it a bestial
blizzard of unbearable revelations, a
strange rhapsody or fantastic
requiem for the living dead?” A ghostly
chorus shrieks, “Salvation or sudden death?”

|
Art by Shiela McGuckin © 2019 |
HOUSE OF UN-REALITY by
Dr. Mel Waldman (on
reading Tomas Tranströmer’s poem “The Blue House”) On trauma-filled
days I return to the
vanishing house of my youth the House of
Un-Reality in Old Brooklyn on East 7th
Street around the corner from
Ocean Parkway a phantom flowing
vastness galloping to the lost
time of Coney & beyond Avenue
Yesterday & Highway to nowhere for even the Coney
Island of the boy exists now only in
a spiraling dream a distant vision a phantasmagoria from far away rushing & cascading down Chimerical
Falls into an ocean of
electrical synaptic chaos & still I return
to Old Brooklyn hunched over in Trauma
Time across the street from
the house I once lived in & I gaze
wistfully at my House of Un-Reality lost in blossoming
waves of longing & melancholy swept away in a swirl
of iridescence dancing butterfly wings & shimmering
peacock feathers & glittering sea
shells pirouetting across a
mythical seascape— a flood of
nostalgia & fluid memories & magically with
the X-ray vision of Superman my gold eyes
puncture the past see through the
brick façade & look inward
where the phantom boy
gallops around a child’s
little universe wearing a Hopalong Cassidy
crown-shaped black cowboy hat the Champie & a Hoppy
double-holster with gold revolvers & black grips for Hoppy’s
a child’s hero in the now of yesterday’s dream a beautiful
blossoming flowing symbol of good
in all black pristine & sinless
man of morality fights evil with
gallantry captures villains &
foe Hoppy’s a child’s
hero mounted on Topper his white horse in a dream in the House of
Un-Reality & the boy’s
oblivious of real gunfire happy in play galloping around
yesterday & soon when the boy inhales
the fire of Father’s fury he’ll become Hoppy
again & be free Hoppy, Hoppy, Hoppy, Hopalong Cassidy

|
Art by Darren Blanch © 2019 |
THE GHOSTS OF BORGES & OTHERS RUSHING SLOWLY & RISING THROUGH THE UNDERGROUND LABYRINTH OF THE HOUSE OF UN-REALITY By Dr. Mel Waldman (on reading Tomas
Tranströmer’s poem “The Bookcase”) I am not alone in this
alone-ness place here in
the nowhere of nowhere in the House of Un-Reality I am not alone Gold eyes gaze into
the tomb of trauma in the swirling Room of Infinity the eerie omphalos & phantom center of ghosts a barren cornucopia & dystopia
of emptiness & the
human-less vastness & the
wild waves of snow for miles & miles & the blessings of oblivion ineffable vision overflowing in the blind
man’s blizzard the ghost of Borges
in the House of Un-Reality Above, old objects
possess preternatural power in the unspeakable
hour of revelations mundane objects in
metamorphosis approaching transcendence & illumination— mutilated antiques convex & concave
mirrors & swinging doors
through a wormhole into the soul & metaphysical paintings singing of non-being & Bizarro portraits of the dead & wounded walls & harrowing
halls & torn books read
long ago adorned with ashes
& dust ruins & rust & moribund
bookcases with broken shelves & splintered wood & lost selves & obsolete manuscripts & esoteric notes on Post-its about
the nature of the universe & the Apocalypse Below, the ghosts of Borges & others rush slowly &
rise through the underground labyrinth while metaphysical notes
pirouette across non-being unfathomable sound from the
underground & a ghost
rhapsody & in
a transcendental chasm of time a schism in space a pause
in Un-Reality carved with
the celestial hand of Dali & the
fabulous words of Borges this is
the blessing & despair while the
mystical clock chimes nowhere & after the Apocalypse this is the trauma & the ecstasy while the deathless clock chimes divinity & the ghosts gaze into the quantum
universe in search of Schrödinger’s
cat & revelations before rising again in
the ineffable hour of illuminations for a rendezvous
with old objects in metamorphosis— the keepers
of history & the
secret Labyrinth of Infinity & the boundless Mirror
of Anguish & Bliss

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Art by Ann Marie Rhiel © 2019 |
I AM BORGES TRAPPED IN THE OVAL MIRROR OF BLACKNESS by Dr. Mel Waldman
I am
Borges trapped
in the oval mirror of blackness gushing darkness in a barren universe of non-being bereft
of the blessings of light a spectral dot in a vacant galaxy whirling around the rim of
a wounded dream dead eyes looking out & cutting through the shroud of the everlasting
night & tasting broken glass & the swirl of a dust devil & eating
celestial visions I am
Borges diving
into the deep of phantasmagoria a magic lantern on fire exploding with chimerical light
& unreality I am
Borges blessing
you with the metaphysical flow of divinity the metamorphosis & miracle of sacred words
illuminating the unfathomable universe

|
Art by Ann Marie Rhiel © 2019 |
I AM HESSE by Dr. Mel
Waldman
I am
Hesse soul-hunter a stranger in
the forbidden kingdom of Shadows lost in the bestial landscape I
cross in the celestial light & the oval darkness the eerie swirls of night
in search of my fugitive self Unblessed
& trapped in my antediluvian House of Duality I dangle in inner space between the divine
& demonic like my Steppenwolf half-man
& half-wolf In
the deep of despair, I descend into the Shadows & swallow the flood of
darkness overflowing with loss & death & drink & drown in self-pity
in mourner’s unreality After
Mother’s death & my absence from her funeral I eat everlasting emptiness &
time is a mustang galloping across phantasmagoria & unholy years vanish until I taste
the fire of foul Truths—Father’s death my distant Johannes & my youngest
son’s terrible illness my precious Martin & my wife’s voyage into madness
poor Mia’s schizophrenia—& plummet into oblivion I am Hesse intoxicated & vanishing in the kingdom of sin a
sensuous stranger commanding me to be you within
the bestial bars & lurid dance halls of Zurich for I am my creation Steppenwolf
too Now
I enter therapy with Dr. Lang & float in the sea of Jungian archetypes & see for the very first time through the preternatural window of perception
for this is my crisis & psychoanalysis is my labyrinthine exit out of melancholy
& the abyss &
when the merciless hour of anguish returns I meet with Dr. Jung in search of self &
spirituality & my psychoanalysis is a holy metamorphosis & catharsis for from the
throes of depression comes healing & integration & the transcendent oneness of
a thousand selves I am
Hesse the
soul-hunter floating
in the sea of Jungian archetypes luminous images rushing through the psyche & a cornucopia
of revelations from the collective unconscious Persona,
Shadow, Anima/Animus, & Self & . . . now I unmask my social faces
& gaze into the maw of darkness & see
the eerie female in me in syzygy & the oneness of self the oneness of who I
am

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Art by Ann Marie Rhiel © 2019 |
I AM CAMUS by Dr. Mel Waldman Born in the bestial
abyss of poverty I am Camus child-man of the sun & sea tasting the
African sun the sprawling canopy of fire above & the Mediterranean Sea that
bathes my flesh & feeds my unfathomable being in the blazing universe & I am Camus fatherless in a foreign universe Father— Lucien Auguste
Camus—I did not know you killed in WWI I was less than one bereft & left with
Mother & older brother & a chilling anecdote that burned the ferocious truth into
my brainwaves the barren revelation that once you witnessed a public execution & got
deathly ill from this obliteration & this visceral micro-story filled my
emptiness & an un-blessing entered my mind & body became part of me imprinted
in the invisible universe within & so I wrote & wrote & wrote transforming
pain into words for
this is my metamorphosis & yes this is my being
& evolution as a writer Mother— Catherine Helene
(Sintes) Camus—you were deaf & illiterate & after Father’s death we
moved to Algiers & lived with your family condemned
confined incarcerated in a claustrophobic prison cell of poverty a raw merciless
flood mind drowning in the ruinous downpour of reality I am Camus child-man of the sun &
sea intoxicated with the sensuous universe cosmos of splendor cornucopia of gorgeous glorious
galaxies the sensuous universe the African sun nature’s
grandeur everlasting & the everflowing
panorama is a rhapsody the music of the desert & the mountain the sky &
sea & the strange beautiful bestial paradox of
paradise & poverty side by side & man is alone in this grand universe I am alone tasting & swallowing
the chilling fire of cosmic indifference no God no transcendence only the furious waves
of human existence in an ocean of absurdity Heaven & Hell here & now in the African
sun & the Mediterranean Sea & I am Camus & like Mersault,
my fictional creation, I too am a stranger drifting along a seething beach swallowing the
African sun & nature’s majesty & drinking the opalescence luminescence of
the meaningless universe & its monstrous beauty & eating my aloneness
isolation & merciless mortality in the maw of death
my everlasting ebony hole of nothingness the abyss of my nonbeing in the
overflowing cosmos oblivious of me child-man of the sun & sea Fatherless in a foreign universe
I am the isolated man forever the stranger &
the outsider observing the inside world & gazing inward swallowing the Sisyphean struggle of my being quietly singing the song of the
rebel solitary man ferocious sensualist
natural man lover of nature for the sensuous universe is all—it is Father & Mother
& I am the other & its lover I am Camus Father of Catherine &
Jean the twins
call me loving soothing Papa & we play soccer
& I laugh uproariously child-man of the sun & sea & I am Camus lover of women 2 wives
& sundry mistresses Yet with Simone my
1st wife I was alone poor Simone hooked
on morphine Simone Hie we had to say goodbye Francine Faure my 2nd wife gave me more Mother of Catherine & Jean But did I drive my
precious Francine into the unforgiving & unfathomable abyss of madness? Is this my guilt
& un-blessing for my carnal lust? Must I confess again
& again? Yes I love the others too my mistresses my lovers
but you Francine are my precious wife for life & Mother of Catherine &
Jean & to you I am your husband Albert Camus I am Camus child-man of the sun & sea & wounded man who
almost died of TB lover of the grand universe lover of gorgeous galloping nature
lover of 2 wives & sundry
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