poetry
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Sonnets to Orpheus XVII
XVII WHERE, in what blessedly-watered gardens, on what trees Out of what tenderly unleaved bloom, Do the exotic fruits of consolation ripen? These Delicious fruits, of which perhaps one In the trampled meadow of your poverty, you find. From time to time you wonder over the fruit,— its size, Over its soundness, the smoothness of… Continue reading
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Kama Sutra of Cuddles
She can’t bend her aging body to love like that, but next to her in bed I just lay my cheek on her arm and settle in,skin to skin, and she lays her cheekon my head and at my age that’s practically skin to skin and we just settle in, some painter’s portrait of love,exploring… Continue reading
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Stop Reading Berryman’s Sonnets, Dammit
(16) Writing poetry is an unnatural act — Elizabeth BishopNothing kinky. Think cuddles: the collapseof two into one, of that one into comfort:the innocent–the long hug, the movie couch–and the afterwards, coming back from blisswhere union is fully consummated by touchskin to skin, hands measuring from shoulder to hip the full depth of desire, while… Continue reading
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The Sonnette
In an effort to curb my voluability, let’s consider a poem of two stances of four and three lines for a total of seven or have a sonnet, with a clear Volta. A Sonnette “I was cured, all right.”—Alex DeLarge in Kubick’s A Clockwork Orange It’s not enough to be possessed.You must enter the… Continue reading
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“To find my home . . .”
To find my home in one sentence, concise, as if hammered in metal. Not to enchant anybody. Not to earn a lasting name in posterity. An unnamed need for order, for rhythm, for form, which three words are opposed to chaos and nothingness. —Czeslaw Milosz, Berkeley–Paris–Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1981–1983 Which brought Wallace Stevens “The Idea of… Continue reading
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Bukowski’s Bluebird
Not only words in his mouthbut what look like feathers,clamped tight in his teethlike an anxious gambler’s cigarette.Cat eyed and smiling at the bar,he caught beauty perched on a stooland swallowed it in one bite.Now odd notes issue from his throat.His words emerge as song.First appeared onThe Dead Mule Schoolof Southern Literature Continue reading
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Grinding Ink
My partner and first reader/editor thinks this is a little preachy if not in fact curmudgeonly ranty. Thoughts? Grinding Ink“To whom do we tell what happened on the earth, for whom do we place everywhere huge mirrors in the hope that they will be filled up and will stay so?”—Czeslasz Milosv, “Annalena”I want to swallow… Continue reading
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Reading Myself to Death
Tie me to the chair first, honey. I’m a glutton for delicious torment. I’m reading all of Czeslaw Milosz which is not as emotionally fraught as reading through all of Louise Glück. I enjoy the change of tone, from feminine to masculine reflection, like one of those flip over bathroom mirrors. Much of Glück is… Continue reading
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Sing, Goddess
I decided to reread Emily Wilson’s Odyssey before I consider seeing the movie and then start again decided well why not read her Illiad first because my eyes are always bigger than my plate. I never thought I’d fall into a list of men and ships until I read Emily Wilson. I dreaded Book Two for… 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 