The 5-2 Crime Poetry Weekly Celebrates National Poetry Month
/Happy Friday the 13th!
My friend Gerald So runs an amazing poetry site that features original and unique works by many artists - with the lovely added touch of an audio recording of the week's poem. I highly recommend the site. Gerald has asked a few of us to pick our favorite poem from the 5-2, and share it with you.
Since I am so drawn to works about stalkers, this evocative poem by Nyla Alisia completely caught my eye. Look at how the words mingle love and lust. Look at the masterful presentation of the question: Is this wrong? Or is it right? Love allows for all sorts of peccadilloes. If this is a lover, these unknown caresses may be welcome.
But... if this is a stranger, consider the violation, the fear, the very hair-raising quality of these innocuous words, words often used in a very specific context: closer, touching, kiss. It shoots ice water into your veins, doesn't it? It is masterful use of confusion. You cringe, you want more. You fear for the subject's life, you wonder if she allows this behavior.
Good poetry creates questions, as well as guidance. It pulls your emotions every which way. With so many things to consider here, I'll leave you with a simple declarative statement. I love it!
ENTER THE SANDMAN: 31S LOVE AFFAIR
Dark glasses at night,
disguise the unblinking white,
hide well my lover's stare,
that follows you, everywhere.
Your lips move beyond my hearing,
but not for long,
I know it's me you're simply daring,
to just come ...closer,
like when I bend over,
while watching you sleeping.
Some call it peeping,
but what do they know of this?
Over and over,
breath sucked in from an almost kiss,
held inside me
as I stand in the shadows
touching
like this,
and this,
and this.
All night,
till early hours turn late,
the second hand races around the clock
as I wait,
watching till just moments before;
silver handled scissors snip
another lock of your hair,
another night's souvenir.
Then, out the window,
as your alarm clock rings,
I disappear
with only seconds to spare.
NYLA ALISIA is an award-winning poet, performance poetry artist and talk-radio personality. Her poem The Secret Of Me is nominated for the 2011 Pushcart Prize. Nyla is the founder and host of three international poetry radio programs, The SpeakEasy Cafe open-mic poetry radio show, Re-verse and The Inkwell. She teaches Writer's-Block Is Just An Urban Legend and Stop Pissing Off Your Muse, workshops for writers.
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The 5-2 Crime Poetry Weekly is edited by Gerald So. A member of the Academy of American Poets, his poems have appeared in Nerve Cowboy, Barbaric Yawp, Defenestration, Cherry Bleeds, Yellow Mama, Gutter Eloquence Magazine and other provocatively-named venues. He has served as Short Mystery Fiction Society president (2008-'10) and Thrilling Detective fiction editor (2001-'09). After learning how to preserve The Lineup's poetry in ebook form, he published an ebook of his own poetry, We Might Have.
Thriller Award–winner Ellison (Where All the Dead Lie) introduces Dr. Samantha Owens, Tennessee’s head medical examiner, in this scintillating first in a new forensic series. Sam, still reeling from the loss of her husband and young children in a flood two years earlier, receives a desperate phone call from Eleanor Donovan, the mother of a boy she dated at medical school in Georgetown, security consultant Eddie Donovan. Eddie, a former Army Ranger who served in Afghanistan, was shot dead in an apparent carjacking, but Eleanor, convinced her son wasn’t a random victim, implores Sam to come to Washington, D.C., to conduct a second autopsy. Once in D.C., obsessive-compulsive Sam must face the demons of Eddie’s memory and his widow’s resentment. Meanwhile, other former members of Eddie’s Ranger unit start turning up dead. The suspenseful plot takes many a twist and turn before reaching its startling conclusion. Agent: Scott Miller, Trident Media. (May)
