2012-2013
2011-2012
"My city's song"
by Arianne Lapidus
My city yells its fury,
its confusion, its delight.
Chaos that croons a song of blind ambition
of tainted love and broken dreams.
Gunshots and rattling tracks
tap out the drumbeat
matching the pitter-patter of 8 million voices
who sing the harmonies of my city’s song.
My city sweats while it sings
a primal fever sweat that shakes its twisted limbs.
And in the enflamed melody,
lives a violent vocal dance.
My city’s song seems harsh and cruel,
grime coats all its chords.
No clear sparkle in its faded tune,
It croaks out flats and sharps.
But,
my city’s song is beautiful,
despite its shrieks and screams.
it oozes out the sounds of love and joy.
It howls and it moans its heart.
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"My Horizon"
As I march rhythmically,
My feet against the cold hard pavement,
The leaves of fall being crushed beneath them.
Cool crisp air and hymns of the day to follow, dread.
I blink up and gaze upon my horizon,
Filled with everlasting beauty and infinite color,
A forever fleeting yet always returning
Sunrise.
The orange hue of the sun
Changes the way I see.
Blocked by the monstrosity of uniformity,
I see like everyone else.
But I March on to a different rhythm,
Toward my endless painting of utter simplicity.
My moment of microcosmic revelation.
And I go around the monstrosities
Instituted by them, and me.
With always more to come.
To finally gaze upon my horizon,
Still unintentionally looking back.
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"One in a Crowd"
by Arianne Lapidus
One in a sea of muddled faces,
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"Jazz Bar"
by Uri Rosenshine
Up on 117th there's a bar
where a man can loosen his tie over a drink
The doorframe sags
and it ain't got no name
A sunken man watches the doorway like a blind dog
The lights are dim
and the walls are stained with gin
On a Thursday night
the bowler hats and the cigarettes
and the drunkards and the suits
Come to lounge on shot glass rims
And in August the small room swells with heat and sweat
Four clumsy men sit at the lit end
and by 10 they spit a sloppy tune
Jazz has a stink
A kind of sweet stink
A pepper stink
The saxophone
makes a primal groan
Like an undersexed coyote
A long slow wallop
Seductive and angry
and slow
The drummer drops a lazy beat
It comes from some sodden beer-soaked place in his heart
It drags its feet in an ancient tap dance
A lady in muted red
steps to the silver mic
with a tired vitality
Her voice is deep and hoarse
It plows like an old workhorse
She caresses the drunken hearts
of the men leaning over their stools
She sings to them of youthful love
She sings to them of living easy
That drum taps a sweet sloppy beat
that dances slow and steady out the door
and spills with the light onto a cobbled Harlem street
That jazz walks a drunken walk all the way home
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by Julia Delmedico
Muddied bare feet on the hot powdered precipice
They play with sticks and stones
Shifting them indifferent to if their only remains will be bones
Shift Shift
Play Play
The basics of human interaction
Held gazes
Hesitation
They looked over the vanishing point of their vast horizon
Over the vegetation
Trees entangled in their roots
Unaware of their impending doom
From those on the hot powdered precipice
They tossed those sticks around
One peering over the shoulder of the other
Held gazes
Hesitation
Muddied bare feet on the hot powdered precipice
Their soft steps
soon to
boom boom boom
They looked over the concrete
Bright lights so crisp clean
One over the shoulder of the other
Tossing joysticks on glowing surfaces
Fluorescent lights bright in their biotic eyes
Same movement from the hot powdered precipice
Shift shift
Play play
Held gazes
Hesitation
Divided by barren walls
Replaced by a paradigm shift and swings of the pendulum dictating the fourth dimension
Same eye coordination
Same temptation
Divided by the smooth surfaces and electromagnetic wires
Glowing lights and biotic eyes
Same movement from the precipice
Same eye coordination
Same temptation
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"Across the Bench"
by Martina Cox
Across the bench
He keeps down low
His head to stare at feet,
Naked on the subway floor
Exposure none to speak.
Although only to him does he know
The secrets that he keeps-
What he really is, what he really has done,
While all others stare at his feet.
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“Desire”
is a soft rope caught around my neck that lovingly pulls me
towards
her.
The sun shines in her eyes
but the moon shines back,
producing muted beams of mystery
and shadows of the truth.
I almost want to love her
because I love to want her
because kisses down her neck
send
shivers down my spine.
Her subtleties are so
enticing,
clues to a puzzle
whose solution is only a hint.
One longer strand of hair,
one questioning look,
one nail chewed down to its fingertip,
leads me to no conclusion, but
leaves me with electricity that
numbs my nerves and mind.
Her aqua eyes a puddle
in whose muddled waters lie
reflections of the future
all thrown together into one abstract image
in which I see
Her smile
Her fire
Her lips
and me.
by Daniel Wittenberg
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