· the cultural society · » Stacy Szymaszek

Stacy Szymaszek, contributor

Stacy Szymaszek — Mon, 14 May 2007 16:00:16 +0000

From hyper-glossia

Stacy Szymaszek — Thu, 04 Jan 2007 12:00:50 +0000

observant of landscape and entitled

to alter it

educated guess what’s buried in the trenches

I’ll mandate its rise

natural as everything I

associate myself with

slow momentum

desert weather deck

and bulk merchandise

adapt my speech to the ration of words

per day wardrobe of

consistent head covering

age-old loose cloak

swirl of flax petals

circulatory strategy

*

parts of me left vigilant aortic

and shellacked

someone known from anecdote vanishes and influence vanishes

funny composite smell

of faux animal print
lips abbreviate

a shape like that of a capital S

denoting the next
after R

certificate recaptured

bungle a needless T shape

this passage was always a flare
my tactical advantage

appear signature
calm in pain

I have a repore with
the medical conditions engraved on this medallion

shift at oars (from Emptied of All Ships)

Stacy Szymaszek — Mon, 10 May 2004 16:00:44 +0000

water
relives
reservoir

boat
bottom
draft
displaced

º

lineal
thought
backward
body

no one
knows
the brains
I am now

º

tree
an oar
origin

joints ruptured
soak in
deep ink

º

wallpaper
remnant
flower
float

chandelier

brief
case
hundred words
logged

erode
my
Arabic

º

congestion

of resin

person

forecasts
final position

restless sleep

º

width of
back
belted

sodium
poultice

exhausts
courtship

º

agora

drain
a home
of you

wind
lashes
fronds

cellophane

º

where a
mammal
bled

activity
not yet
diffused

blackened
patch
of water

º

weight
of oyster
in gloved
hand he
shucks

dented
pewter

º

assonance
her aspect

relocated

wind
shatters
plexi

phenomena
forgone
for me

º

shift
at oars

new
muscle
grown
bone

never
held
you

º

case
of dried
apricot

gorge

I am
summoned

º

capable
a day

outlast
forecast

coral reef

feeler

°

paper
cover
mallet
awl

downfall

fire-
box

androgyne

from Some Mariners

Stacy Szymaszek — Tue, 01 Apr 2003 16:00:51 +0000

mummified arm Indonesian
sailor skin
boxed in glass and lead

call it James

arm is fine

art: GOLDEN DRAGONS

H O L D F A S T fingers

to FULL RIGGED H.M.S.

ROOSTER AND PIG
can’t swim

• • •

sleep imperiled

on the sea

forge immutable

friendships

which will become

ink on the knees

held to our chins

during the peril

of departure

dreams of losing teeth diminish as

sea calls aspiration

into question

left with a head of words

we cheat to speak

yours truly,

James

• • •

young gulls have landed

upon his effigy

fuse wires in his sleep

where he is bound

blue effluvium

Vedic aum

of imperishable

syllables whirl

the blood

• • •

pocket knife in robotic hand

James cuts leaves of French pages

in nailed down chair

• • •

phosphorescent plankton

plume the night sea

night watcher

with bartered needle

inks the backs of his hands

in Greek

Sources

The Clouds Float North: The Complete Poems of Yu Xuanji, Translated by David Young and Jiann I. Lin, Wesleyan University Press/University Press of New England, 1998

Love and the Turning Year: One Hundred More Poems From the Chinese, Translated by Kenneth Rexroth, New Directions, 1970.

Su Tung-P’o, Translated by Burton Watson, Columbia University Press, 1965.

from Some Mariners

Stacy Szymaszek — Sat, 01 Feb 2003 16:00:09 +0000

ship followers song reports

within watch coats

inner pockets of stale cake

will joint voyage for

bodily eruption from plaits

downy mast head meeting

• • •

meteor de-orbits

and burns

re-enters what was Friday

20 tons

of debris

O people on Fiiijiii!

• • •

divide hour into smaller units

water clock futurist

mind leaks grass whistles

field of peacock blue

• • •

how can I sleep through a night with no end?

I get up and scrawl lines of words I wish&nbsp ; I didn’t exist

as lightning destroys the sky and the sea wants the boat

I open my night shirt let the torrent

drum my body my shell hardened breast my unbattened sex

all the people in the world and I can only think of you in the curvature of rain

all the wrecks it has seen a bird circles exhaling darkness

                                                      after Yuan Chi and Anonymous (Six Dynasties)
                                                      translated by James

           • • •

chest of phalli cradle

hands to torso till rose

hips in bowl crushed

darkpit of mollusk

lip down scoliatic spine to

foaming Ionian uprise

beneath flex of land

your shores are drowning

from Some Mariners

Stacy Szymaszek — Tue, 17 Dec 2002 16:00:04 +0000

alias James

arm
an alloy

ambidextrous
wonder

yd never

touch

• • •

ink a hinge here

‘n here

‘n mother

make me limber

• • •

grappling iron your legs

moor me in full tide

whet against protean shoulders

breath is fuel open your mouth

seep into luminous prowl of sea

night is shell eloquent

transient lid

• • •

on a ship. awake at night

cool wind bends your trim hazel hair

I open the hatch. pink moon pulls. a colossal bobbin

boat men and sea birds dream the same dream

dorsel fin splashes. baleen hinge creaks beneath

it’s late. creatures and people forget each other

I’d like to amuse you. clever with anchors and cables

time passes swiftly when you eat sleep fuck

whenever you want. I use my sorrow

a scene like this? it can’t last long

                                        after Su Tung-Po
                                        translated by James

                    • • •

private room

James dresses

black flannel

water glows

alphabets flicker

circular windows

transmits a letter

i    t    h    i    n    k
    o    f    y    o    u
o    f    t    e    n

into the mind of his lover

• • •

July corridor

Affined rim

Mum mum when

Echoic I descry further

Species

• • •

easy in sleep

you nuzzle me

betraying your

tortured belly

the skin begins

coda of whales