The International Poetry Review: Soup Bowls and A Site to Behold

I already received my copy of the journal a few days ago. Now, I can post my poems here because they're not available online.

The International Poetry Review (IPR), Spring 2013

A Site to Behold

What a sight
Beauty, behold Manila
on the streets
a fresh Bawal Tumawid
warns you not to die
like many before you

See, we’ve tidied up
the slums with a makeshift wall
whitewashed, fresh as a new page
awaiting possibilities
a spattering of starfish, squid, corals
intricate pipelines, circles and squares

See, our new kalsada
fenced and repainted
a lane for motorcycles
a lane for buses
(more or less)
moving us forward

See, even the tindera
peddling candies on the sidewalk
applies her daily mascara
and smiles as a cat steals
the half-eaten fishball
she had for breakfast

~

Soup Bowls

At the other table
two men are talking

over plastic bowls of reheated
soup and cheap egg noodles.

Father and son perhaps
somewhat reminds me of home

only instead of fastfood plastic
we sipped soup from smoothed

coconut husks, mother frowning
across the bamboo table for I said,

the food is bland
there's not enough

rice. Those two men have finished
their meal, and here my soup has gone

cold.

Mission: Fave Poem/Story of the Week

To get my bum ass up and reading, I'm going to post about my favorite poem or story for the week (every week). For a writer, the stuff I read are pretty limited. I haven't read Kafka, Murakami, Camus, Le Guin... I haven't even read The Game of Thrones or The Hunger Games.

I'm one of those people who'd rather play games, spend my money on Muay Thai, hand wraps, and running shoes, and watch TV series. Though I do enjoy books by Stephen King, John Grisham, and a host of sci-fi / fantasy writers like Bruce Sterling and William Gibson, I think I need to expand a bit.

For one, I've discovered a gem of a site for speculative poetry, Inkscrawl. I really enjoyed The Mermaid's Winter song by Brittany Warman. It's opening line is fiery and magical-- "In December I string the stars through my hair." I love how the images of white, cold, solitude and winter all come into play to create an icy image you can almost touch

And just to plug this in because I'm shameless like that, I finally got an acceptance from F.J. Bergmann, editor of Star*line. Star*Line is the official newsletter and network instrument of the SFPA (Science Fiction Poetry Association), established in 1978. It is a venue for speculative (including science-fiction, fantasy, and horror) poets and poetry enthusiasts, and features interviews, articles, reviews, member news and letters, association business, and poetry—by members and nonmembers.

Two of my poems, "Caterpillar Man" and "Why I Will Not Attend Your Wedding" will be published in one of their upcoming issues. Did a lot of work and re-work for those two pieces, but they made it through in the end, and now they have more muscle. Will post more on this when I have more on this.

Atlantis, Giant Pyramids and Sphinxes

I bought a book when I was younger. It was all about occult stuff like levitation, poltergeist, seances... I was most interested in stories about Atlantis. I was amazed at how explorers in the 1950s described ruins that showed a culturally-advanced society that used a different energy source to power their city. The energy they used was supposedly generated from crystal pyramids. Some occult groups believe that crystals are natural energy accumulators due to their capacity for "vibrations." The structure of pyramids are also believed to concentrate energy into usable forms.

Recently, interest in Atlantis and lost ancient Egyptian cities have resurfaced. In the Mediterranean Sea for instance, the remains of pictograms, mummies and statues have been unearthed. It is believed that the discovery may be the lost city of Heracleion. The Huffington Post writes:

"It is a city shrouded in myth, swallowed by the Mediterranean Sea and buried in sand and mud for more than 1,200 years. But now archeologists are unearthing the mysteries of Heracleion, uncovering amazingly well-preserved artifacts that tell the story of a vibrant classical-era port."

And some of the finds:

Too cool, right?

Another recent find is a couple of giant crystal pyramids and sphinxes in the Bermuda Triangle. The scans show that the pyramids are really MASSIVE. Pyramids of that size have long been theorized by occultists to be potent power sources. From the article "Two Giant Underwater Crystal Pyramids Discovered in the Center of the Bermuda Triangle":

With the use of sonar, oceanographer Dr. Meyer Verlag discovered giant glass pyramids at a depth of two-thousand meters.  The use of other devices have allowed scientists to determine that these glass giants are both made of a crystal-like substance, and are nearly 3 times bigger than the pyramid of Cheops in Egypt.

 This city is believed to be connected to Atlantis, and may have sunk during the last pole shift.

Image from Altering Perspectives

I hope they continue digging and studying these amazing archeological finds. Crystal energy seems particularly interesting, as it might be an answer to the current energy crisis.

Published and Available for Reading

I've forgotten to post about these! These titles were accepted a few months ago and some are now actually published and available in print and/or online:

Online

• How Five Fish Survived a Two-year Journey Across the Pacific
• The Unsaid Apologies While on the Train
• One Haiku

Print

• "Piso" in Poetry Cornwall Issue 37:

Piso

A child opens his hands
to receive my coin

A child opens his hands
now empty

A child opens his hands
now still

A child opens his hands
still and empty.

In my hand
a cold coin shines a dull sheen.

• "Summer" in Paper Wasp Winter 2013

Summer

a breeze sways
the chipped garden swing—
our prayers

to the three Saints
we dance the pandanggo
sudden rain

kaimito season
the first fruit falls
from our tree

clouds
kapok in full bloom
our unborn child

drought
just a pile of coins
in the well

closing the blinds…
a streak
of dry tears