cryptical envelopment
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Birth
Shame on all the advocates and aggregators of poetry that they have not gifted this one to the Internet. Birth Milovz CzeslawFor the first time he sees light. The world is garish light. He doesn’t know these are shrieks Of garish birds. Their hearts beat quickly Under enormous leaves. He doesn’t know birds live In… Continue reading
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The Poet and The Machine
Will it swallow us whole as it has devoured all knowledge ever printed or filmed, every song ever recorded, as it digests your question and feeds it to build the threshing linkages driving it ever onward without a throttle? Let poets step forward and cast the first stone into the works. Sonnets to Orpheus: The… Continue reading
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My Initiation in the Mysteries of the City
That memory is sharp and clear because I recognize it now as the first level of my initiation into the mysteries of the city, my first step toward leaving Robert E. Lee Boulevard behind, entering a broader and deeper city I was sheltered from even on those crosstown shopping trips and by my Uptown education. I… Continue reading
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Killing Me Softly with K-9s
I go to the forest to manage the stress of living in this dysfunctional city and this cracker-ass backwards state and this disintegrating country. I go to hear song birds and the cries of the water birds, to the chorus frogs celebrating the puddly places after it rains, for the quiet when it comes. I… Continue reading
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An Ode-ious History of New Orleans
I can’t think of anywhere I could try to publish this so I’m putting it up here. After the “Beautiful Times” and “The Capital”sections of Czeslas Milosz’s “A Treatise on Poetry”“I remember everything.”—”Natura”, MiloszThe calas woman calling over the muddy road,mounted by her tignon like the loa of womanhood. German bakers shape the baguettes, smell… Continue reading
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Ekphrasis: The Great Wave off the Coast of Kanagawa
Hokusai’s The Great Wave off the Coast of Kanagawa Through the lens of imminent disaster Fuji—the anchoring backdrop of ten thousand pastoral moments–—is a disinterested bystander. The mountainous water towers over the iconic peak and the doomed boats. The sailor’s backs are turned to the crest of threatening fingers, their hands clasped in muscular prayer… Continue reading
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Thauma
Thauma (Greek: θαῦμα) is a noun meaning wonder, marvel, or astonishment. Etymologically, it derives from a root meaning “a thing to look at” and is related to the verb theaomai (to gaze at or view). In Biblical Greek, the term appears twice in the New Testament, referring to a concrete marvel that evokes emotional astonishment:… Continue reading
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Learning From the Birds
I have loved what is beyond my reach so it’s no surprise I spend a lot of time alone with the water birds in the forest arboretum. I didn’t realize learning to appreciate beauty in this way was an emotional apprenticeship. The egrets are fly-away skittish but others–anhinga, green heron–will linger nearby comfortably in my… Continue reading
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Fifth of July
Yesterday I posted here a poem titled Moloch which was basically me riffing on part two of Allen Ginsberg’s Howl out of my own and more contemporary experiences. Shortly after I took it down and replaced it with Quiet Fireworks. I then posted a video on the socials of a small upside down American flag… Continue reading
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The Misappropriated Mermaid
The misappropriated mermaid lords itover poorly paid women told to smile while taking orders. We all are thoroughlytrickled on again. I no longer own a house to leave to my children to bicker overor perhaps to share because who can afford one on their own anymore? It’s toast, hold the avocadoes, from now onin this… Continue reading
About Me
Mark Folse is a provincial diarist and aspiring minor poet from New Orleans. His past blogging adventures included the Katina/Federal Flood blog wetbankguide on blogspot.com which David Simon told NY Magazine was one of three blogs that helped inform Treme, and Toulouse Street–Odd Bits of Life in New Orleans, which once outranked the Doobie Brothers on Google Search. His work has appeared in The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature, Trampoline, Unlikely Stories, Peauxdunque Review, LMNL Anthology, The New Delta Review, Metazen, New Laurel Review, Ellipsis, What We Know: New Orleans as Home, Please Forward, The Maple Leaf Rag IV, and A Howling in the Wires (which he co-edited).
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Well Bottom Blues 