May 2012
10 posts
Vol. 2, Issue 7 [Brendan Newcomb]
Dakota Hey Mr. Lennon, tell me about the nightmares about the jaws that wait for you to close your eyes, for the measuring tape to fall from the sky to show you that you ain’t quite bigger than Jesus yet. Tell me how to start a religion, I’ve been too scared of the voices in the walls to start one myself. I used to leave craters in the record grooves until you compared yourself to Him....
Vol. 2, Issue 7 [Dayna Patterson]
Vol. 2, Issue 7 [Karly Fesolowich]
A Letter To Alexander Graham Bell From His Deaf Wife Mabel:
Standing before a priest; I still felt as though we were playing dress up, lace soft like your breath across my skin, no longer trying to hide the glow I have around you. Your tie matches the green flecks in your eyes and I don’t need sound to feel the music.
I turn to see the priest wrap his lips around the word...
March 2012
8 posts
23 tags
Vol. 2 - Issue 6 [Cassandra Ashley]
The Wash [After Christophe Champenois, a 3-year old-boy who died after his father put him into a washing machine as punishment for throwing a classmate’s drawing in the toilet. Here is what the washer would say to his father.] I was made to clean the socks. The sweat marks. Rinse off the proof you’ve worn today thinner, messier. Then, swallow. Hide the carelessness of your body, from the...
7 tags
Vol. 2 - Issue 6 [Rachel Voss]
Polyphemus “…thy love afar is spite at home…” (Ralph Waldo Emerson) You took my light, faith that the heavens right the earth. I am a brute, but you are not a god. I seek neither women nor treasure—home is woven into my being like a story. Neighbors warm themselves at your hearth, your wife’s loom full of grief. I prefer my meadows, sheep, sheltered cave, the beach— the open seas frighten me....
9 tags
Vol. 2 - Issue 6 [Robbi Ramirez]
Death by Chocolate Go ahead, try me. I dare you. Just one bite, and you won’t be able to resist me. I see you, all eyes and stomach. I see you rip through my friends with abandon. The plate of nachos you pretended were for the table. The porterhouse steak you licked clean to the bone. Oh, but the fries, those you didn’t finish. You need room for me, after all. Not room in your belly, mind you,...
9 tags
Vol. 2 - Issue 6 [Yvonne Blomer]
Is it Opera? Where are my clothes and why must everyone look at me? Death of the body, flight of the spirit, drown every inch of me in the language of analysis: colour of skin, sample taken; pubic hair, sampled too. What laugh lines form around each incision? It is a Comic Stage, my laughing belly. It is a Tragic Play, my grinning clitoris. Smeared here, swiped there and what? Oh, you want to...
15 tags
Vol. 2 - Issue 6 [Paul Brucker]
Ten minutes and 14 seconds with Edgar Allan Poe
Just because business is business and should be done in business-like way, because by accident I put my right foot into my left shoe, because justice is a poor joke and hope a promise yet to be broken, is that sufficient reason for the sun to depart, absorbed by the stream and the trunk that gave it birth, is that sufficient reason for darkness to...
11 tags
Vol. 2 - Issue 6 [Tod Caviness]
X Boyfriend Dear Jeannie, my phoenix, my marvel girl. The first time you died I saw you in that split second before you went up like a sun. I blinked because you gave me no choice and by the time I opened my eyes you were dust. I closed them again and kept them shut the full ten minutes it took for the burn of your face to heal. The second time you died I closed my eyes, and you weren’t there...
8 tags
Vol. 2 - Issue 6 [Jake Sheff]
Family Trips I. Olivia Bolivari Stephen dove into the sleepy river 180 feet off the bridge 5 minutes after our minivan drove over on its way to Dollywood. Music of the Happy Goodmans played softly. Paul steered the new Chevy round the bends as grandma and baby Danny slept in back. This photograph from that trip: Danny’s hair is red as sunset or autumn leaves, Gram’s a shade of blue...
9 tags
Vol. 2 - Issue 6 [Dane Kuttler]
It Gets Better
Rachel, Poughkeepsie, NY, 2010
Hello? Hello. My name is Rachel, and I would like to tell you something. My granddaughter, who is beautiful and smart, and finished top in her class at Vassar College told me about this project where adults tell young people how life gets better, so they shouldn’t kill themselves. I...
February 2012
8 posts
The new issue is coming. Stay tuned.
Vol. 2 - Issue 5 [Chris Siteman]
Vol. 2 - Issue 5 [Laura Da]
Advice to a young Indian Agent:
This country will not cradle the eye.
Lope through a buffalo wallow with only your head lolling above ground like a specter. Flickering swish of your mare’s chestnut tail. Note the map: Indian Territory—no less than six times the breadth of Ohio, and who can say we failed to provide for these souls in anything less than a Christian manner? Do not neglect your...
Vol. 2 - Issue 5 [Kate Carito]
The Toy It was in the park one day That I saw a boy about four Playing with a stuffed animal toy A bunny rabbit gray with a white button nose Its color weathered from attention Probably given to him at birth By an uncle or a God-mother Years of love had left a tare at the toy’s armpit And fluffy white stuffing poured from the hole Like the contents of a heart Oblivious to the wounds The boy spun...
Vol. 2 - Issue 5 [Jesse Parent]
Guess My Name Jonathan was no beauty, at least, not physically. His spine carved his back like a path through the Black Forest. His face so gnarled and lined with boils it looked like a jar of marbles. He was a mish mash, a goblin, a thing that made children scream through the night. Jonathan loved children. Not to eat, like the sharp looking bone crags in his mouth might suggest. He longed to...
Vol. 2 - Issue 5 [Richard Binkele]
button hole You said you were a button and I a button hole and when I begged you stop you said in a minute. There are some things you don’t forget. I am one you did, but over years I have not, can not and until I tell what you did, I will always be a hole.
Vol. 2 - Issue 5 [Gus Wood]
Plaything After Chuck Palahniuk’s “Exodus”… Take me stale from the evidence locker, all weighted and unbreathing, my body lumpy with its almost flesh. Touch me, everywhere, for days. Never shower, do not wash your hands, hollow me out mess and sweat stick. I will not object. I cannot stop you. In more ways than one, I was made for this. Vessel me, disposal me perfect....
Vol. 2 - Issue 5 [Daniel Roche]
January 2012
6 posts
Vol. 2 - Issue 4 [Joey Connelly]
My Own Midwife I am angry enough to die. Jonah 4:5 The fish was convenient. Had I fled across the desert, you would have sent hyenas to kill me or perhaps something harder, a poisoned fruit. Those three days I considered your call for death. The cost for my betrayal to become part of an underwater compost heap. I was covered with fish vomit, afterbirth ruining my clothes....
Vol. 2 - Issue 4 [Leslie D! (Rose)]
Live. Laugh. Love.
(This poem is based on the gentrification of The Mount Holly Gardens in Mount Holly, NJ.) They say we are all made of dust And we will become dust again I was formed out of the dust of red bricks, saw mill, and caulking fluids Before they kept good records and right after the Korean War I am 17 Saul Place I can still hear the laughter of the men who pieced me together ...
Vol. 2 - Issue 4 [Tyler Atwood]
A message from Hunter S. Thompson to Charlie Sheen Charlie, You are a vortex, howling outrage to dark stars, habitually loaded with potent intoxicants and a skull full of Beethoven-grade egomania. I like you. We are both a maze of complex behavioral experiments our parents find hard to explain. So, if you’re looking to be a Freak Power candidate, if you’re looking to get Gonzo,...
Vol. 2 - Issue 4 [Holly Day]
The last thing
My mother asked Was for me To please stop smoking. Please. The last thing I asked her Was please Don’t die. She died. I’m still Trying to quit.
Vol. 2 - Issue 4 [Emily J. Cousins]
My father once told me to never let anyone but family get this close to your exposed heart. He said it would not be worth cracking your sternum for them, to watch them feast on you slowly. My father is the kindest man I have ever known, but I never took anyone’s advice so badly. Because he knew then what I do not fully know now. He knew how much I always wanted to please...
December 2011
3 posts
The new issue is coming!!!
Despite a few technical difficulties, it’s on the way. In the meantime, get psyched and spread the word!!!
2012 Pushcart Prize Nominations!!!!
Borderline is proud to announce its nominations for the 2012 Pushcart Prize: Anthony Lioi, Syd Arnold, Gus Wood, Curtis X Meyer, Drea Kato, & Chris Leja. So much love for all that you guys do. Congrats, fam ♥
November 2011
10 posts
Borderline Poet PAULIE LIPMAN on Indiefeed
Paulie’s poem “Squeaky,” first published here at Borderline, is currently being featured up on the Indiefeed: Performance Poetry Podcast website. Click the link to give it a listen & spread the word to support the Borderline family!
Vol. 2 - Issue 3 [Syd Arnold]
Helen of Troy Sometimes I imagine myself as a vast wooden horse. I am ten stories tall, carved of oak and pine. I am polished to a gleam. A work of Art. A peace offering. Sometimes I imagine thirty men crouched inside the twisting dark of my belly. They are sharpening their knives. Waiting.
Vol. 2 - Issue 3 [Jaime Martin]
Alice at 50 Writes to her Old Friend Chesire I started to agree with the people who tell me it never happened I think it’s easier that way they say story adolescent fantasy drug-induced frenzy hallucination your floating grin, no body, no face, just eyes and teeth substitution for some face I’ve not allowed myself to see years of therapy tell me you are some sort of coping mechanism the...
Vol. 2 - Issue 3 [Brandon Amico]
Death’s Tongue When you come to me, come thrashing. Use what remains of your resources; your warrior species has always been one to squander. Smash your bottles filled with saints. Reach, for your philosopher’s pillars. Hurl dice at my eyes. Cling to the potency of your dead language, claw, reaching for the crumbling walls in Latin tenements. You forget that I am the one who’s fluent. Kick the...
Vol. 2 - Issue 3 [Amar Mirchandani]
The Last Meal A gaping hole in my sock. Spacious enough for one toe to find its way through. The prisoner runs for quick escape. Previous attempts were futile. Freedom was a farfetched notion. Dreams became distant hopes. Crying at night, hands to bars. Weeping. Daunting tomorrow. Yearning mother’s breast. Now curled up, I’m with the rest. Confined to solitary. This tree grows secluded. In the...
Vol. 2 - Issue 3 [Jeremiah Akin]
Shove
Red is center stage again. Hours spent juxtaposing the Dionysian and Apollonian and lining up the lyric with the rhythm of my right hand are all a waste once the bass comes in. With the fiery grace of a drunk and stoned Irishman he beats and plucks his poor P Bass like he is simultaneously bludgeoning a dead chicken and preparing it for dinner. Chuck plays perfect fifths over my...
Vol. 2 - Issue 3 [Hiromi Yoshida]
Speaking for Edvard Munch’s Sin
I am your sin long-haired woman coiling serpent praises round your throat: I cling to you like the fragrance you wear compulsively without my consent. I am the carbon monoxide your rattling ribcage exhales; the jeweled oxymoron; thorn in the flesh of your Achilles heel, your frailty housed in treacherous nunnery dark after vespers evaporate a catacomb stench of...
Vol. 2 - Issue 3 [Amy Silbergeld]
Pillowbiter When she turned fifteen, Jane was given a special bedroom next to her fathers’. She was a pleasant but private girl, plucked her pubic hairs one at a time, ate as much as her brothers, who were large, and as private as Jane. When she turned sixteen, Jane was given a statue by her father. It was stone and erect, he showed her how to climb it, clench thighs, throw arms over its cold...
Vol. 2 - Issue 3 [Michelle Denise Jackson]
Hera’s Vows to Zeus, On Their Wedding Day
On the day when my breath becomes an ailing furnace and my skeleton is the ramshackle remnant of this massacre we call living, I hope you will still see me as I am today, a girl on a mountaintop in a white dress jumping from an unguarded precipice into you. On the day when my breasts are no longer the archetype for the planets and the humans...
Vol. 2 - Issue 3 [Chris Leja]
The Prayers of Bullets After Annelyse Gelman Forgive us our velocity, the way we can only love inside out— our piety has always been clumsy. But we still remember creation— The day you tore us from the sky, and we marveled at the thunder you had placed in our throats. This was how we knew that you would always hear us. We had named you gods long before you sculpted us from lightning, before...
October 2011
12 posts
Vol. 2 - Issue 2 [Curtis X. Meyer]
Straight And Upright Position “A couple who spent a little too long ‘making out’ in the bathroom of a Frontier Airlines plane set off a security alert on Sunday, the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. When passengers noticed they had been in the bathroom for a suspiciously long time, crew members alerted the captain, and authorities dispatched a pair of fighter jets to accompany the...
Vol. 2 - Issue 2 [Anthony Lioi]
Hermes to Persephone, After the March: May 1, 2006 —for Sarah Avery Listen, sister, don’t get me wrong— I like it that the dead followed you from hell to the Washington Metro, that you surfaced at DuPont Circle and gave those fascist anti-immigrant bastards the finger. The finger is a good thing. Here in Jersey, it means don’t fuck with...
Vol. 2 - Issue 2 [Angelique Palmer]
A Viscous for a Warlock Dear Warlock: Come here. This is the pail where we will make wine out of raisin’s tongue Conjure-call the 7 sisters nearer to red clay invite them to watch the trade of cadence and lightning the bend of the book and cauldron smoke and chant and chant, and chant, and chant. My Enchanted: Find a place on me to put your spells I’ll tuck mine where ever...
Vol. 2 - Issue 2 [Jeff Scolley]
The Boy Who Spoke to Stars There are parts of life that we don’t understand. Certain things are simple like why is it harder to enter than exit something. Some are not so easy. Michael lived not so easy too often and it showed on the scars beneath his eyes where he used to scrap tears away with a sandpaper crease in his arm. You know, when he was seven, Michael had a dream that his ears were caves...
Vol. 2 - Issue 2 [Christine Reilly]
We Spend So Much of Our Time Going In and Out of Bathrooms I search every ladies’ room in New York City. The toilets look like upside-down teardrops on a dirty face. At night in the bars the restrooms are smoky-discreet, waiting rooms for the homeless. I stopped putting up the signs —Have You Seen Gretel? — having found them defaced with word-slurry, marks drawn on her...