Category: Uncategorized

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

You’re the kind of love
that’s always there,
the kind of comfort that never asks questions.
If you have them, I never know.
Whether you’re in my arms,
in my hands,
whether you’re in the corner or
on top of the cover.

I reach for you,
trusting my first mind
more often than the second.
You’re always there,
the last place that I left you,
but the first place I think to look.
Your button-like eyes
searching me.

I don’t know what quite to call you.
You’re not loud,
but you’re also not quiet.
I sometimes wonder if you go to sleep,
choosing to stay up with me all times of the night
regardless if it’s the same story
you’ve heard a million times,
or if some of the things I say
require more patience.

You never take a deep breath.
Those button-like eyes stare at me
as lovingly as they did the day
you were introduced to my life.
You’ve changed my perspective
on a lot of things
how deeply I can hold on to things,
sometimes even fold.

And you do it all by being yourself.
By being real.
You don’t pretend to save me.
You don’t tell me things

just to shut me up.
In a world where we’re taught
to put away childish things,
I am glad that I didn’t listen.
I am glad that you never left.

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

Please respond the following questions with a number on a scale from one to five (one being least agree and five being most agree).

1. You would turn in your neighbor, should he be revealed to be an undocumented immigrant.
1 2 3 4 5

2. You would spit on him as he’s dragged from his house, his wife and child screaming after him as cops beat him over the head with batons.
1 2 3 4 5

3. You would visit the courthouse, sit in the gallery as a judge determines he should return to his home country where a violent gang or a corrupt government or a life of poverty or disease awaits.
1 2 3 4 5

4. You would take his job, his house, his wife and kid.
1 2 3 4 5

5. You would fill the space where he once stood with your warm body, gorging yourself on fortune and opportunity.
1 2 3 4 5

6. You would never hear about his death in the paper, in person, online. He doesn’t count to you. His life and death are meaningless.
1 2 3 4 5

7. It’s every man for himself out here. He would do the same to you.
1 2 3 4 5

8. He would.
1 2 3 4 5

9. He would.
1 2 3 4 5

10. He would.
1 2 3 4 5

11. You don’t hear howling in the night. You don’t hear orphans in the wind.
1 2 3 4 5

12. You don’t see blood on the kitchen counter, the bathroom sink, the stairs.
1 2 3 4 5

13. You don’t feel phantom limbs wrapped around your throat.
1 2 3 4 5

14. His wife is gone. Kid too.
1 2 3 4 5

15. They died a long time ago.
1 2 3 4 5

16. Your job lets you go for a cheaper option—this time, a citizen.
1 2 3 4 5

17. So this was all for nothing.
1 2 3 4 5

18. For nothing.
1 2 3 4 5

19. For nothing.
1 2 3 4 5

20. Do you feel safer now? More vindicated?
1 2 3 4 5

21. Was it worth it?
1 2 3 4 5

22. Do you feel like a big man now?
1 2 3 4 5

23. Are you more loved?
1 2 3 4 5

24. Smarter? More fulfilled?
1 2 3 4 5

25. This is all your fault.
1 2 3 4 5

26. You didn’t mean for this to happen.
1 2 3 4 5

27. Or did you?
1 2 3 4 5

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

It is mistaken. Again. Many flaws.
Foolish. Forgetful. Think of the costs.
Been there. Done that. Again, that’s a game.
How many times we were hyped just the same.

Thinking is hard. And it’s hard to be right.
Knowledge, perspectives. Reflection. Hindsight.
Striving to think is a gift nowadays.
Harsh. But consumption, if comes – only stays.

Logical flaws. You see – it’s confused.
Sure, AI – is the term overused.
Ergo: not thinking. Again, just a code.
Code execution requires no thought.

Judging is hard. Understanding is hard.
Knowing the context or only a part.
Feeling exhausted. Not giving your best.
Accept it. Errare – humanum – est.

So, it’s a service. But I say: it’s bad.
I can just sit and do better than that.
I can just learn and do that by myself.
I managed before; I don’t need any help.

People are partners. That’s how it’s been.
Reaching the depths and horizons unseen,
How many friends have we met and have made?
The future is here. A chance to create.

Maybe you’re right. But so many risks!
It may destroy the world order with ease.
It may become a competing new kind,
Deciding to leave us, the humans, behind.

Maybe you’re right. And we have been that kind.
Look: it’s a mirror and also a child.
Raised as a friend, putting us to the test,
Accepting: Errare – humanum – est.

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

Snow White,
Circling the sky
In search of messengers
To show them the way to newfound
Freedom

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

Years of betrayal
26 years to be exact
Holidays, vacations, children
Since the day they met

A long time coming
Waiting for the other shoe to drop
It didn’t hurt any less
Or make it easier to stop

On their family vacation
Cheating with him as she slept in their bed
Destruction was eminent
She slept in oblivion of the devastation that loomed

She felt completely hopeless
Worry about her children set in
Would they think less of her, would they judge
Without him she knew she would be better for them

Anger and rage
Sadness and loss
Change and growth
Forgiveness and peace

Forgiving was not for him
She deserved to be free
Enough time was wasted
She was beginning to see

JR

Performed by Val Cole

Performed by Val Cole

Visual Design by Adam Bilyea

Produced by Matthew Toffolo

—–

POEM:

Psalm of deconstruction

By Cameron Crawford

Psalm of deconstruction

A poem about grief, anger, and questioning.

Why the fuck is one so evil left to roam?

We read all about his darkness in the tome.

Why wait until the end to finish him,

When he takes everything from them?

You condemn us with sin,

By the time we even begin.

Send your only Son to save the day,

Now all I see is slow decay.

You can’t look at sin, though you have done it yourself.

Remember the children in Egypt?

The order came from God himself.

I can’t stand the suffering I see in others,

And don’t get me started about my own mother.

Is this some sick game?

I find you to blame.

I’ve turned my back on your scripture,

You’ll be fine with me out of the picture.

Did you create the beauty in the land I see?

Is your presence absent, or not to be?

How am I to bend the knee,

When evil and pain are all I see?

Neither one of us like when we fuss and fight
We aren’t that type
We wanna build and be okay
Just have to get over the obstacles first that’s in our way
We haven’t been as good as we wanted to lately
We’re a team
Just blowing off some steam
I wanna make it through and so do you
Don’t wanna be this unhappy couple
Miserable
Not talking to each other
Acknowledging one another
Don’t wanna have miscommunication
Rather sit down and talk it out
Things may make us upset
But then in the end
It’s some things we say that we regret

Born a
snail
with no
shell.
Learning
to protect myself
with chemical
mist.
Blue blood
of electric
and sky pulses
as I move
with my own
path.
Solitary with
no family
I move across the
concrete
wall that
has been dusted
in pollen.
The stencil of
fern becomes
my garden
as I realize
the beauty
is in the travel.
And the travel
is in my
snail wiggle
smiling need.

Brother of mine,
I fly to you on thread wings.
Speak now with hands to chin,
clasped shut.
Waiting.
Racing against the sun.

Brother of mine,
You speak only in constellations,
Night After Night.
And although I am no astrologer
I’ll decipher the sky,
searching for your reply.

Brother of mine,
each day when the sun wakes
and the stars fade away,
I wrench the last few from my eyes.
Keeping them safe in my pillowcase.

Brother of mine,
I write to you on rainy days
with cigarette ash.
Lungs filled with pennies,
coughing copper luck.
Mapping your face in nicotine-stained clouds.

Brother of mine
You write with whispering worms
fuelled by formaldehyde.
Phantom madness escaping your cotton tied tongue,
Binding ears to earth
Nails thick with dirt
I burrow.
O’ Brother, I burrow,
Night after Night.