Call for submissions: collaborative cleave poems in the Cleave Matrix

We are looking for poets to collaborate and create cleave poems together online, for anyone to watch.

For many the thought goes against the grain – creating something that is not entirely their own.

There is a level of vulnerability also.

There is also the possibility of doing something new, catching the edge of a new wave.

There are other collaborative poetry projects such as likestarlings, mygorgeoussomwhere, poetrycollaborative.

For those willing to get involved please email cleavepoetry @ gmail dot com with Cleave Matrix in the email title line.

I will then pair you up with another poet.

The poems that pass muster will be published here in The Cleave.

Boy Blue by Janet Hamill

                       Boy Blue

Weary of waiting, blue boy  Following the map of a vanished sea

 Blue lights in the harbor  blue sails carry you through
                            twilights obscuring your lodestar
                            with the dusk

  Dark-adapted eyes in the
      period of blindness,  between the gods departed and the
                            gods yet to come

      all that is rare and
                 excellent  furnish your happy isle’s
                            watchtower of white 

 All the soul’s companions
          all that you see  the music of grazing horses plays
                            on the shore

  Shaped by the charity of
             the firmament  blue boy gold scales begin to rise

            Over the water  at the edge of the dreamline

  prevailing winds favor a
                  crossing  go on ahead

The deepest chamber of the
   night will restore your
           exhausted wings  Go on ahead there,

                            The shimmer of leaves breathes a song
                            without words

there is pleasing variety
    in the moon and stars
    awaiting your imprint  and corals lie lost from the track
                           of the world

KEROUAC by Janet Hamill

I had nothing but I had a grey tee shirt		I ironed on black velvet letters
KEROUAC
I had nothing I had four walls on St. Marks Place		a bottle of Calvados and the silence of the universe
I had nothing		but I had you
From sea to shining sea		east to west   north to south
Atlantic Pacific Arctic Antarctic Indian Ocean and the eighth mar incognito		over under inside and outbeyond everything
I had you I had words lines and paragraphs rushing down mountainsides high above the timberline		from Desolation Peak to 242 choruses of blues for the Buddha and fellaheen of Mexico City and every other place
I had your footprints on the beach in Tangiers		your palm print on the wheel of impermanence
your dreams of long childhood walks under the old trees of New England your athlete‘s body your flannel shirts		your handsome face on the fire escape on E. 7th Street
just before the invocation of Duluoz		inhaling one last Lucky Strike for the pent-up aching restless road
farewell subterraneans and water towers of Manhattan		it was time for all that coming back to America
the Lincoln Tunnel oil tanks and anemic skies in New Jersey		Route 80 over the Delaware the road unraveling
the road sufficient unto itself		a twentieth-century pilgrim‘s way
a home for the tathagata passing through the railroad earth   the gas station night		the bebop radio wail of Charlie Parker‘s saxophone clear across Kansas
to San Francisco the little alley off Market Street		Tokay in a paper bag at the mouth of Bixby Canyon
Big Sur‘s ocean roar of vowel sounds		from the far side of eternity
waves laying better than a thousand transcendental diamonds of compassion at your feet		even to the end I had you
to the maenads of fame tearing you to pieces		in the glow of a television set in Florida
to what‘s buried in Lowell‘s Edson Cemetary		Ti Jean nothing‘s buried there
the dust of your sacred bleeeding Catholic heart		with that of the holy ghost
and certain mad and driven saints		has been placed among the stars
I had nothing but I had a grey tee shirt		And I ironed on black velvet letter
KEROUAC

Often inspired by her travels through southern Europe, Morocco, Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya and Tanzania, Janet Hamill has published 5 books of poetry: Troublante, The Temple, Nostalgia of the Infinite, Lost Ceilings,  and her most recent, Body of Water in 2008, with photographs by Patti Smith. Hammill has released two CDs: Flying Nowhere and Genie of the Alphabet. A strong proponent of the spoken word, she has featured at readings in the U.S., England and Ireland.

Of Body of Water Anne Waldman wrote: “Janet Hamill turns her wizard poet’s eye on an immense body of alchemical empathies”, and Patricia Spears Jones said “Hamill’s mastery of form and feeling come together to create a poem that delicately examines celebrity, gallantry, silence, talent, and beauty. Only a poet could do that. Or maybe only Janet Hamill.”

Migration by Phuoc-Tan Diep

Migration

Swifts and swallows leave – while I grasp for memories like

fruit – remnants of home

riddled with holes – my baby cools in my arms

dripping fermented juice – the milk from her mouth

sweet – sticks under my fingernails

under blushing trees – the guards, with eloquent guns, demand my  coat

those that can’t leave expect a cold winter – they smirk at my battered sweetbox

with its few hopes – inside are smuggled postcards of thatched houses

and promises – of English orchards.

This cleave poem was written specifically for the “Don’t be a stranger” initiative launched at this year’s Evangelical Alliance flagship event The Temple Address 2008, given at The Royal Society on the 27th November by The Archbishop of York; The Most Reverend and Right Honourable Dr John Sentamu. The cleave is included in the booklet accompanying this initiative and on the EA website and in upcoming press releases.

Afterwards, Janet: A Murder Mystery in Speech Acts by Diana Manister

Split in Two (or three) by P.A.Levy

Split in Two (or three)

I’ve held –……. night time skies laden with dreams,
stars –………….. and the moon, whose orbit follows lines
in my hand –.. laid down into darkness moulded by caresses,
until light –….. touch of pleasures; sweet songs
escaped –……… crashing into prism colours,
out through –. sonnets I wrote on your flesh
my fingers –…. tracing every wish into a couplet
and then –……. sealing every letter of love with a kiss
I just held –….. and held you until morning became clothed in mists;
cloud –………….. castles crumbled on the drift and I was lost in echoes
whispers –……. that blue is here to stay forever.

P.A.Levy, having fled his native East End, now hides in the heart of Suffolk countryside learning the lost art of hedge mumbling.  He has been published in several magazines, although these days he spends far too much time controlling his characters on the Clueless Collective website at: www.cluelesscollective.co.uk.

After Reading Shelley and Hearing Krenwinkel is up For Parole Again by Laurie Byro

After Reading Shelley and Hearing Krenwinkel is up For Parole Again

by Laurie Byro

A greater impact is
absence as you                Troublesome Love
wield your chisel creating
somebody else’s wound         you are thwarted by
                              inconvenience.
Are you the one?
                              It is the silver hour
                              Crickets will chorus
One of the unfortunate
who settles your stiff legs
into a hunter’s stance
after you claim the body?     in the four corners
                              of my room. 

They will say, as any smart
family will say,
I have gone to Ireland
to be with my aunt.           Soon I will rise, Ophelia’s
                              wet hair clinging to my legs
                              like strands of lake-grass.
You have left me, but I will
walk away from you,
this time.                    Call me the only Romantic
                              in your mad maid’s circle.
You, who have been
with a man.                              

But bury me under a Pointing Tree its fingers brown
from its work under the sun, not woman’s work on paper
falling and covering me as you should have done had you
not preferred my sister.
 ========================================

Laurie Byro is a thrice nominated Pushcart Prize poet who has been published widely in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom. Laurie lives in Northern New Jersey where she works as Head of Circulation in a library and facilitates “Circle of Voices.”

Descending a Double Helix Staircase by Margot Brown

….Descending a Double Helix Staircase

On Ativan …………………..for my trouble with heights
..I can open my eyes………………I wobble with fright
…in this merciless mouth of air…………trembling
……each edge a precipice………no stable sight
…….disoriented…………like a drunk baby ape
………..flailing for a vine…..aloft, out of synch
……….…oh! for a drink…….thirsty from fear
…………….descend……….steps tentative
..……………….swaying…………twisting
…..………………imagining……..falling
………………….……falling….calling
…………………………….calling
………………………………fall
………………………………ing

Margot Brown was born and raised in Massachusetts and now lives in Northern Illinois with a Hurricane Katrina evacuee (Miss Kitty), and her husband, Michael Morrison. Margot’s poetry has appeared in joyful!, The Shine Journal and The Boston Literary Magazine and in an upcoming anthology, Poetry for Suzanne, published by Avalanche.

Please Burn This Poem, Plant this Poem by J.S. MacLean

………………………..…Please Burn This Poem, Plant this Poem

To write a cleave…………………………………………..if it is three poems
won’t be easy………………………………………….or one long one folded
the usual symmetrical……………………..bilateral or triclinic trimeter
approach is to take………………………………………..two to make three
ideas and explore……………………………….more than one the sonnet
all ins and outs……………………………………..or if I actually amputate
with technique………………………………..a formula with three results
until it sounds……………………………………..just like temporal fission
like a Bach’s……………………………………………….C Major Solo Violin
Sonata…………………………………………………………or a Coltrane tune
single melody…………………………………………………………..streaming
into three………………………………………………………………at least two
coexisting………………………………………………..simultaneous in time
if it works………………………………………….in some mysterious world
if a secret door unlocks……………………where you need three sexes
will three know……………………………………………………….to connect
and still respect………………………………………………………each other
in triplicate………………………………………..expecting baseball teams
_____________________________________________
Maybe if I use a mirror…………………………………………………so I did
.write on the glass…………………………………………peer over the top
…holding up to another…………………………………..and there I was
….trying to make sense……………………………..in a two way world
…..of a cleavage………………………………………..layered and lucid
…….like sheets of isinglass…………………..for a furnace window
……….but the poems are looking out…..three no four no more
…………a trillion I suppose……..spawning darkness an abyss
………….behind the isinglass………of monoclinic evil hordes
………………but they are the isinglass……..but all is glass
………………….or just like glass…………….like isinglass
……………………….isn’t it glass………………or isn’t it
…………………………….isinglass……..I guess it is
…………………………………………..isn’t it
……………………………………………..or
……………………………………………..is
……………………………………………..it

J.S. MacLean lives in Calgary Alberta, Canada. His poetry has been published in
online and print publications including This Magazine, The Maynard, Beano Anthology
and Vidya and will appear in upcoming issues of  Every Day Poets and Perspectives.

A Compass Rose, Explained to a Raindrop by Andrea Defoe

A warm welcome to Andrea Defoe.

*

A Compass Rose, Explained to a Raindrop

North, then Northwest – from the black river, – so this is Northeast:

from where the road forks – you empty out into – a pristine lake

you choose like Frost – a manmade reservoir – poisoned with mercury

but both ways are so paved – with a foot-shaped floor – like the god took a swim

as to show no wear – like a shoe slipped off – and abandoned

but if you continue West – to the center, a giant – Eastern style artesian well

you’ll flow into a kettle – cartographer’s teacup – brimming

a glacial relic – all chipped clay and oldness – with a good spring

like the cool grottos – awful musty – and out of use

to the Southwest there are – tents in a campground, – doors facing Southeast

thunder clouds – angled roofs for rain – shut windows

that call you up – so you can drip down – and you’re kept outside

so you can boom – and make mud, – because weather is dirty

feed that hurricane brewing down South.

*

Andrea Defoe lives with her family on the Red Cliff Indian Reservation in northern Wisconsin.

She prefers to think of herself as being at least of few cats shy of crazy cat lady, but she’s

honestly not sure. Her poems have appeared in various literary journals, most recently:

Rattle, 32 Poems, New American Writing and Margie.