__ Catch / Confetti

WASEEM

me

Quit saying

“okay & ya”

& putting hand 

up to mouth. 

What I like about

Waseem.

I like his black

eyes. The way I can

see myself inside 

them and the way

they sparkle. I also

like the way he knows 

all those songs and 

the way he looks at up

Eric in POETRY

A quick note to let you know about some very lovely poems in this October’s issue of Poetry by my friend Eric Ekstrand. They’re each called “Appleblossom”. Via Poetry:

“Each “Appleblossom” is a verse translation from the Japanese of a short selection from the notebooks of Chiri, Bashō’s traveling companion during the years between Withered Chestnuts and Travelogue of Weatherbeaten Bones.”

I really like Eric’s “Appleblossom” poems- there’s an attention to sound that, along with the longer lines, make each poem feel whole, like I could drop one on the ground and it’d be okay. They smell like fields & grass & rocks & wind. There’s a delicate homoeroticism running through the work, something I always enjoy. 

If you don’t have the October issue of Poetry, you can (and should) read the “Appleblossom” poems in Poetry’s online archives. 

Two other poems by Eric appeared on _Catch/Confetti back in April. Coincidentally, they’re perfect for Halloween- have a look at Eric’s poems ON BECOMING A GHOST and THE HOUSE ON VERSE LN.

A Relic

The monarch, 

stuck to my car battery,

detaches intact,

 
wings folded down

in paper-mâché flight.

Just that side

is ruined, burned black

where the fingers— like

veins in a leaf—

touched the electric box.

I show it to my sister,

holding the petrified-

pollinator up 

like half a flower. Then

I rest it on the corner

of my desk

and examine the slated

wings, stitched with dust,

and the legs

cooled into a cringe.

The eyes shine back

and to the side, saying

you wake up one morning

and it’s all dreams, 

then nothing,

this life you have now.  

 

by Michael Klenda

Set Your Auras to Psychopathic (it's Friday)