\raggedbottom \baselineskip=12pt \font\journal=punksl20 scaled 2000 \font\byline=ccmi10 \font\lsl=cmsl8 \font\smtit=cmr9 \font\tit=cmdunh10 scaled \magstep2 \font\ref=cmitt10 \font\astro=astrosym \font\editorial=cmr6 \moveright -1.8in \vbox{% \centerline{\journal Sand River Journal} \vskip 0.9truein {\editorial \baselineskip=0pt \narrower\narrower\narrower\narrower\narrower Sand River Journal is a collection of poems gathered from the newsgroup rec.arts.poems. It is posted monthly in \TeX\ and PostScript formats. Poems appear by authors' permission, and every attempt is made by the editor to ensure accurate typesetting on the basis of the source file. This document may be freely transmitted, electronically or otherwise, but only in its entirety and in unaltered form. To reproduce individual poems, contact the authors by their email addresses. The editor takes no responsibility for the fate of this document; nor does he claim any ownership to any of the contents herein. Send comments and your best poetry to asphaug@lpl.arizona.edu. Enjoy! \bigskip \hskip 1.7in Erik Asphaug, Editor \baselineskip=12pt} \vskip 0.5truein \centerline{\ref Issue 3, June 4 1993} \centerline{\ref (Total Lunar Eclipse)} \medskip \centerline{\astro d \hskip 0.2in n \hskip 0.2in u } \medskip} \def\title#1{\vskip 0.8in\bigskip\bigbreak\centerline{\hskip -3.5in {\tit #1}}\bigskip\nobreak} \def\smtitle#1{\vskip -0.15in\centerline{\hskip -3.5in {\smtit #1}}\bigskip\nobreak} \def\author#1#2{\nobreak\medskip\line{\hskip 1.5truein\hbox{\sl #1\/}\hfill}% \line{\hskip 1.5truein\hbox{\lsl #2}\hfill}\goodbreak} \hoffset=1.6in \obeylines \title{Degrees of Difficulty} Stop, and you still the ripples. With a finger the tangles are raveled. The knots rot with the rope. \author{Joe Fineman}{jcf@world.std.com} \title{at 4 o'clock under chicago and state} i waited northbound chomsky having sold out at 3 o'clock for the day postcard found for aimee in one hand an architectural walk from the art institute up michigan avenue, in the back of my mind \medskip these three musicians --- they sang and played and harmonized cohering into a mild form of torture: \medskip you are the only woman in the world i have eyes only for you you make me feel so wonderful i want to be only with you \medskip the platform? studded with beautiful women of all cuts and kinds keeping straight faces flashing smiles rolling eyes exchanging glances (discreetly) with all the other women \medskip left out of the world tragically. \bigskip {\bf 2.} \nobreak \medskip i was looking down her split ends it was a crowded ride she was protesting animal testing so i so i --- went untested though we both got off \medskip at bryn mawr. \author{Marek Lugowski}{marek@casbah.acns.nwu.edu} \title{king salmon} Sleep is installments. \quad Salmon rising to empire; \quad Mothers falling to. \quad A nap is no less complex. \quad In forty winks, mama rises to glory on an imperial line. \author{Mary Findlay}{ad110@freenet.carleton.ca} \title{On the Possibility of there being Bad Poems} \smtitle{(doggerel)} Are there no bad poems in this book? Ask me this a year or so ago, And I would have eagerly taken a second look And said that this one was so And that this other one is so so. But today all has changed. The old meanings have all re-arranged Themselves. Books alone are feeble things. Made from dead trees, the dried pressed pulp: We call them leaves. But the only wings That flutter are those of living men, Of the fluttering eye-lash, or scribbling pen. The book alone won't grow Without the trunk of a body to bend it to and fro. Bad writers there will certainly be, But bad readers are always easier to see. \author{daniel}{dgn1717@u.cc.utah.edu} \title{Bill Brandt} bill --- you have put me upside down on smooth stones and the idle backs of seagulls. you have provided a lichen sea to hold these white white fingers. these sun bleached shoulders. \medskip while you. you are outside the weather, inside that red red room. your hands are stained with cranberry sauce. you killed a small girl with your camera. you turned her into mottled marble. \medskip she looks very beautiful beside your hot and squeaky leather chair. \author{helen walne}{g93w5635@thoth.ru.ac.za} \title{Painting the Blame} Pure sweet lips and asking eyes will beg to be forgiven But heavier than lead are lies that come from the hearts of women \author{Patrick Kelly}{kellypj@vax1.tcd.ie} \title{all i am not} sometimes, all i am is a mother is all i am nothing else, and it makes me weep. yet, it is this peace that allows me to love you, a condition of unconditional love, lusting aside. sometimes, because i am a woman and nothing else, my nuturing turns into yearning. and my eyes, they roll down my face with the woman's tears, the woman i think i am not. because all i am is a mother is all. once, before the children, i thought i knew love. but now, now that the children have taught me love, i know it well. and you are the only man i've ever loved. damn, how i weep \dots to be your woman. \author{elizabeth haight}{haight@ipl.rpi.edu} \title{summit} Wind whispers over gravel and granite \qquad\qquad cracking in the sun, \qquad shakes her feet and leaves the dust of worlds behind. Up here, even the clouds must walk \qquad or dance where breezes lead. Snow, retired, soothes the air and weeps \qquad for winter past, tears trickling \qquad\qquad to dead oceans. \medskip Horizons stretch the gusts to stillness. \medskip Wind stirs and shares the kiss \qquad 'tween sky and earth, \qquad\qquad then sighs \qquad and slides her way down through the trees \qquad to worlds that lie beyond. \medskip She will return. \author{\copyright 1993 Bruce F. Webster}{bwebster@pages.com} \title{Stillborn Words} The pen moves bloated on the narrow page, between the blue, confining lines. I write dull bastard verse; my pale and pregnant rage spins out insipid words that have no bite. I push in silence, minus eloquence or wit. I wish my words were surgeon's knives, curettes of stainless steel. So little sense speaks from these swollen lines. Each phrase arrives quite dead, a stillborn babe. Damned muse, no friend of mine is she, but still I scribble pap no child will suck, allow the words to wend their weary passage to the paper's trap. So I grow fevered by this fetal urge; no midwife tends my poisoned, inky purge. \author{Karen Tellefsen}{kt1@cc.bellcore.com} \title{Colour bars in front of our eyeballs} like prisoners walled in colour bars in front of our eyeballs in a fever of expectations we listen to everyday sounds and the threat underneath them \medskip as we sit and talk about peace in the midst of our words the sudden wild scream hundreds of huts catch fire and sharpened spears find their way to the beating heart of our nation openings which go down into the earth like empty wells echoing uncertainties \medskip the birds fall and die the ivy whispers unconfirmed rumours and red leaves tumble from the wall into the black of our eyes \author{Peter Horn}{hornpete@uctvax.uct.ac.za} \title{diamante} \smtitle{for grandmother \dots dreamer \dots tusitala \dots} \smtitle{fiery little spitfire that she was} on her seventy-fifth birthday celebration she watches, from the balcony, grandchildren playing tag in the moonlight \medskip favored melodies from guitars oscillate the wave of time ... \medskip as young swains serenade her with plaintive songs of love she draws her gold-laced mantilla across her face \qquad\qquad and coyly smiles ... \medskip she is eighteen again. \author{zita maria evensen}{bu016@hela.ins.cwru.edu} \title{The Giving} \smtitle{for Thomas Elliott} Just give me a second and I'll manufacture smiles scatter them like dreamrushes, drifting into afternoon Spare me a minute, I'll make the art of hugs a Dali masterpiece made of your arms, my discerning eye pressed against the sculpture of your chest Grant me but an hour; I'll take your hand and show you, free of charge my humble worlds of cyber alleys, chessboards made of palm trees, which I would give to you rent-free And with a generous day, an extravagant weekend, I'd aspire to the role of an offering, ready-to-burn at the altar of your eyes --- but wait --- time's run out --- You glance at your watch, melting on the horizon, clock-face grinning, time to spare is over, the cumulus curtain closes You smile and thank me kindly, gently pushing me aside, late for your appointment with the fourth dimension late for an important date down a rabbit hole where caterpillars blow smoke rings spelling your name and where we were I still am feeling your memory nestling in my throat looking at where you were I checkmated the tesseract but the calendar page is sinking into sand-crab holes submerged by waves of unicorns \author{Aileen Cho}{ac@cheshire.oxy.edu} \title{we will / we will not} you and i will not run over hills my love. \medskip we will make cacoons from silver shoelaces. slip small moons into our coffee instead of sugar. \medskip we will lick the pollen from the backs of tasseled bees. \medskip we will make timeless beds from dandelions; stretch loose-limbed amidst the ashes of shooting stars. \medskip we will kiss with mouths of damp caves and roll like satin starfish through the wet lamps of sunken streets. \medskip you and i will not run over hills my love. \author{helen walne}{g93w5635@thoth.ru.ac.za} \title{prayer} how would i know prayer \qquad when \qquad when i wander into grooves \qquad of monolithic sequoias \qquad kneel on worn dark pews \qquad of medieval gothic cathedrals \qquad and walk barefoot \qquad in white domed temples \qquad i have heated conversations \qquad\qquad\qquad\qquad\qquad\qquad with gods \author{zita maria evensen}{bu016@hela.ins.cwru.edu} \title{Untitled} Off--- on. \quad You join blue to bird. On--- off. \quad Bird fled. Bye blue. \author{Mary Findlay}{ad110@freenet.carleton.ca} \title{Ether} You smell like a doctor --- anaesthetised. Lover, come over here and take my pulse --- remove this rhythm out of me. \medskip Split my eyelids with a scalpel, fever me with science in cross legged consultation rooms. Hold your ether fingers against the white sky. \medskip Tell me i am not contagious. \author{helen walne}{g93w5635@thoth.ru.ac.za} \vfill\eject \bye