anagrammed
This has been roiling around in my head, a moment years ago that I wish I had done differently. anagrammed fist wrapped around stem bubble spit laid on lip elbow crumpled menu you called me codependent while I anagrammed each step out the door tend cope end – Halsted M. Bernard
Read MoreThe MFA Octopus: Four Questions About Creative Writing
lareviewofbooks: Mark McGurl Frank Conroy © Bruce Davidson 1. Why do people hate creative writing programs so much? Well they don’t really, not everyone, or there wouldn’t be so many of them—hundreds. From modest beginnings in Iowa in the 1930’s, MFA programs have spread out across the land, coast to coast, sinking roots in the soil like an improbably invasive species of corn. Now, leaping the oceans, stalks have begun to sprout in countries all around the world, feeding the insatiable desire to be that mythical thing, a writer. Somebody must think they’re worth founding, funding, attending, teaching at. But partly in reaction to their very numerousness, which runs afoul of traditional ideas about the necessary exclusivity of literary...
Read MorePoetry.com has closed
Poetry.com has closed Lulu shut it down last Thursday. Did you notice?
Read Moregood dog
good dog the dog is dying that’s all we can talk aboutthe dog pees all over the living room floorand so we put plastic down and that’s all wecan talk about dolly was such a good dogwasn’t she but she’s not dead yet it’s all wecan talk about the not-yet-dead dog that isdying and peeing all over the living roomfloor and how good the dog was and howthe dog always came when you called her ohdolly what a good dog you were and she’snot even dead yet you’re not even dead yetare you good dog are you but we still talkabout you like you have gone into the pastquiet like your midnight excursions past thepiece of plastic to push your wet pup noseagainst the sliding glass door and look outat the blue patio at the bats that flit fromlight to light at the edge of...
Read MoreBulletproof pants.
Time for another spam poem! All lines were taken from my spam folder, and only punctuation and line breaks have been added. The fall of Saddam Hussein has brought destruction/Hell to our great country and everything is so difficult now and all our opportunities are closing up, the new Government is trying to frustrate all our businesses. Life was better when I was younger, and with this secret potion, life seems young again. Why aren’t there bullet-proof pants? You do not know me and neither do I know you. If you are in not good state and have got no cash to move out, I know that you will grant my request in good faith. Regarding the transfer: Mulberry bush aside, would a monkey really chase a weasel?
Read MoreIt was not the quesadilla.
It was not the quesadilla, the sloppy concoction of flat and goo. No, she decided, it was most certainly not the quesadilla itself, but the idea of the quesadilla, the meta-dilla that offended her. Even now, even hours after lunch, six washings with perfumed soap, six applications of scented lotion, and in between all that an hour at the firing range. Lavender? No. Gunpowder? No. Only the crass grease and onion stink. Lovers, too, were like this. Long after they should have gone, they persisted with deserted panties, apostrophes of basin-beached hair. Now email and its hungrier cousins encroached on every absence. The heart grew annoyed, not fonder. She longed for the gentleness of memory in all of this rotting truth.
Read MoreThe Old Phone Book
He threw it away. How was he supposed to know that his father would want to keep that old phone book? But I look up my friends that way, his father said. Dad, that was 36 years ago. I don’t care. So he drives down to the library and makes photocopies of the old phone book. His father will be grateful, but it is like reading torn pages from someone else’s Bible.
Read Moreinfected
If you are reading this, you have been infected. Proceed to the Wellness Center. At the door, remove the piece of clothing you like best. This certainly carries the disease, and will be destroyed. No one will greet you. There is no one staffing the Wellness Center in this time of crisis; all personnel have been deployed to less fortunate towns. You may not see another person during your intake assessment. There is no need for alarm. Sit in the blue chair. The green chair will turn blue at times. It is temperamental. Do not be fooled. Wait long enough for the blue chair to prove itself blue. This will take a short amount of time, but longer than you think. The screen above you will descend until it is approximately one foot from your face. Look directly...
Read Moresocks
A pile of hopes, socks just out of the dryer, top a new year. That is fine, but everyone wants you to be careful to match the socks. I am not careful. I am tired of being careful. I throw love at you, and it could hit you in the face. It is tiring to be loved haphazardly, I know. Someone will tell you things about your past, about how you should feel about your past, or about how to match the socks. All I say is shapes and colors matter little. Some of them have gone missing anyway. Love with force. Match or don’t match. Just catch. – Halsted M. Bernard
Read MoreNestcam
The cam was last on Friday, May 4.
Hello What
I am Halsted, a/k/a cygnoir, and I do stuff with words.
My favourite things to do with words are keeping this diary, writing stories, and organising information.
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Reading
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- 39 - Explicit Version
Tenacious D
5 days, 9 hours and 24 minutes ago - To Be The Best
Tenacious D
5 days, 9 hours and 25 minutes ago - They Fucked Our Asses - Explicit Version
Tenacious D
5 days, 9 hours and 26 minutes ago
Plugging
