A GENERAL THEORY OF LOVE OR, A KISS IS NEVER JUST A KISS Unless it’s porn—as it potentially eroticizes an innocence, beauty, or truth it cannot readily contain or claim. Or, perhaps it fetishizes darkness and unknowing-- Choice, the loose spectre-- of what once was. Or, maybe it’s in a car from the 60’s parked at the point, the wind and salt whipping about as she moves back further and further away from the inevitable waves as her head smacks the glass.
WE FOLLOW THE SKY Until our end, feed on hot sun, red birds, bracken weed and thirsty meadow-promise. The internet knows everything…so we hide our adages in the cloud where the words of our ancestors give us comfort.
ORDINARY NEPHOLOGY Or,- A Poethic Nomenclature of Johns’ Sitting tree branches. Faces Pointing skyward—O Heart of the cloud, O quick of the night—All prone &starry-eyed &interwoven.
CLOUD HEAVY LONESTAR Ever-possible grief is dancing in the million-faced Sea of Narcissi, reflecting the quiet quiet storm of please, please, please—the price of distance—of darkness—of light. O, Numerous star-racket.
IF THOUGHTS WERE CLOUDS We might wonder, where does the static go? —O shell-heap, O Star-gobs, O clatter-weed of the unkempt, yet, we drive on— in our fleshy dressed bone-suits made of burnt-out matter, star-stuff. We drive on—to the clang that follows and later echoes, lost among us.
MY DAUGHTER MADE A CLOUD IN A JAR My daughter made a cloud in a jar today. Google told her how to do it. Is there no stranger coincidence than that of my daughter deciding to ‘make’ a cloud in a jar today? The very day I am writing cloud poems after Kristen Hanlon? The experiment calls for a mason jar, hot water, a match and some ice. The experiment calls for the experiment of the response. I tried to find the cloud in the poem today. My daughter tried to find the heart of her cloud today—she tried to find her cloud’s shadow in the glass.
THE UNBODIED SUBLIME Begins with a tightening in the chest and fog of heavy clouds. The head carried around in a vague halo for a time—confused obscura. Sometimes time follows with a measure of quick foxes, a turning—palms facing upward-- release any pretense or serious contemplation of control—which loosens the set furrows when breath and still and now and breath and still and now and breath and still and now comes still again.
WITHOUT SADNESS WE KNOW NO JOY Everything must happen in measure. Even in letting go-- as space is measured by what isn’t—I try to determine any potential outcome with compassion. But what shall contain us? What will our end story be? If hate and fear are used as on-line indoctrination for terror, why can’t love be used similarly to combat it? Love for love’s sake? LET’S LOVE!!! Let us love the earth and the sea and the trees and the sea and the air and the sea and the sea and the ozone and the sea and the sea and the sea and the sea and the sea and even the awful orange men among us.
THE HEART HAS ITS REASONS Says Pascal, Whereof Reason knows nothing.
Tumult at heart-- O, Asphodel,
All authentic and whatnot, her seeds carried by the wind and the sea and other elements--
defining and redefining itself in its fluky augers.
Susana Gardner is the author of the full-length poetry collection:s [ lapsed insel weary] (The Tangent Press, 2008), HERSO (Black Radish Books, 2011) and, CADDISH, Black Radish Books, 2013. Her latest book, Somewhere Upon a Time / / Oceanids & Dreampomes is forthcoming from LARK BOOKS in 2017. Her poetry has appeared in many online and print publications including Jacket, How2, Puerto Del Sol, and Cambridge Literary Review among others. Her work has also been translated into Icelandic, Italian and French as well as featured in several anthologies, including 131.839 slög með bilum (131,839 keystrokes with spaces) (Ntamo, Finland, 2007) NOT FOR MOTHERS ONLY: Contemporary Poems on Child-Getting and Child-Rearing (Fence Books, 2007), KINDERGARDE: Avant-garde Poems, Stories, and Songs for Children, Black Radish Books (2014) and in the forthcoming CITY AND SEA Anthologyfrom Frequency Writers, Providence. She lives in Rhode Island where she teaches, writes, edits and curates the online poetics journal and experimental kollektiv press, Dusie.
