http://www.levelerpoetry.com Mon, 30 Jan 2012 17:44:47 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en levelheaded: Poem Unless the “you” in “Poem” plays a literal violin—and even if so—right smack at the start of the piece the speaker’s extreme worldview is apparent. With the instrument’s cameo, we can’t help but think of the world’s saddest song on the world’s smallest violin, and the array of characteristics ... http://www.levelerpoetry.com/ab-poem-levelheaded/ Poem I want to be a tiny mike on your violin the gem that solves everything. I’d love to be a Liz Taylor, rising up from the foam of every thing— the Adriatic in commercials, techno-azure—dripping water n pearls— plain matchless. I’d gone years in the service of the county of L, one of its smaller ... http://www.levelerpoetry.com/ab-poem/ Tetris Logic I have not been chosen to work on the extraterrestrial project, but then neither has anyone else. All those years of mastering my private world with Tetris logic has not paid off, but continues to perpetuate itself none the less. To please the remaining earth I will make a small car that is powered by a ... http://www.levelerpoetry.com/tetris-logic/ levelheaded: Tetris Logic The first line of C.S. Ward’s “Tetris Logic” takes on a sad (I am unemployed) or prophetic (I have been chosen to do something more meaningful than work) meaning before being undercut by the humorous line that follows. As a whole, the first sentence is a silly self-lamentation. ... http://www.levelerpoetry.com/tetris-logic-levelheaded/ levelheaded: A Cyborg Lover Would Be More Dependable The early jumps this poem makes—from Leonard Cohen to feng shui, from feng shui to pointing babies, from pointing babies to a cyborg—shadow the speaker’s thoughts about decay, the poem’s most prominent thematic thread. This consideration of decay begins when the speaker playfully ... http://www.levelerpoetry.com/a-cyborg-lover-would-be-more-dependable-levelheaded/ A Cyborg Lover Would Be More Dependable I am uniquely suited for my karaoke solo: I will sing “I’m Your Man” and Leonard Cohen will die a little bit inside. I know dried flowers are bad feng shui; in fact I am versed in the sounds of decay. Babies, pointing at the homeless vets on Burnside ... http://www.levelerpoetry.com/a-cyborg-lover-would-be-more-dependable/ Her Art I picked the wrong hand. The wooden nickel was under her tongue. She slapped my attention away and it melted into the sand. When the pain subsided like a ship on the horizon I collected my clothes and my self and tried my lips again. She tasted like winter through a window. Could anything solid be that far away? I only wanted to claim the ... http://www.levelerpoetry.com/her-art/ levelheaded: Her Art “Her Art” is her elusiveness. Chambers’ poem opens with the speaker recalling losing at a classic shell game. The “wooden nickel” that the woman was hiding suggests that the game was rigged from the beginning, and the false coin’s hiding place—“under / her tongue”—adds a sense of eroticism ... http://www.levelerpoetry.com/her-art-levelheaded/ levelheaded: En Vogue: A Relief The verb phrases “ask of” and “to dye” are simple enough alone, but when paired up as in the first three lines of this poem, they make for a jarring and ambiguous opening sentence. Who is doing the asking? The “chiseled experiments”? Is the omelet expected ... http://www.levelerpoetry.com/en-vogue-a-relief-levelheaded/ En Vogue: A Relief Endless chiseled experiments in cookery ask of the omelet made with human hair to dye tapioca the same shade as caviar. Wilding women in Mexico pass mirrors unnoticed. "You shouldn't need to fake it," erases in paint the woman with horse hair hovering within the hem of her invisible cloak.  She ... http://www.levelerpoetry.com/en-vogue-a-relief/