The Squeezed Juice of Midnight

(American dreamer; Star of Karuna; Moon of Pity; Ti Jean… . b silent & real)

Lime Street, 1 a.m.

strung between a lost train of thought

& the silence of an empty station,

tongue-tip worrying a lemon pip

in a wasted tooth, still tasting

the squeezed juice of midnight

I tease the notion that love’s a big deal after all.

When mister death

comes clawing at my threads

like a frisky leper

it’s the one thing he’ll be looking for.

As you wave at me & your ticket flutters

to the cold stone floor & limestone echoes steps

beneath the domes & tunnels as the train arrives

he’ll be the fella with the homeless rag

wheedling for nowt tonite, only waiting it out

for the chance to wrap us about his shoulders

like a widow’s ratty stole.

So walking each other home

beyond the wind’s music in the coffin groves

& the fidgety spirits of half-friends we’ve left

talking up theories in the speakeasy’s womb-glow,

fencing night’s dubious traps,

still in their cups, vibing off

their near unassailable delusions,

we’ll know that love’s a pretty good call

&the sky a benevolent madness

of hushed clouds rushing the just ice of stars.

Ade Jackson

Go rimbaud, go go rimbaud

O rimbaud, why did you leave me
for ivory traders, accountants
a dog that pissed in the street?

Maybe I too should go,
back to the suburbs
find some wife, some dog, some job
where words are just words
just a thing we use sometimes.

But when you’ve obtained the knives of the pen
by trial and error and bleeding,
you don’t give em up so easy.

Perhaps it’s a case of attrition,
slowly but slowly the knife turns blunt
and is placed one day in a drawer
maybe thrown away or forgotten
like a childhood fascination with burning matches
before you grew up and kept them for their proper use

Making you mouth move is a subtle art.
Sure, I make it look easy,
writing poems in waiting rooms,
forwarding letters to unknown addresses,
scribbling notes to imaginary gods.

You see I can’t seem to escape the feeling
that all these people want to tie down all these words
to useful meanings for times of need,
not matches casting shadows.

Kevin Millband

CINE-POEM

1.    EXT. IRISH SEA, NIGHT

Mid winter. Scathing
south-easterly gale. An exorcism
of colossal waves; a ship
emerging from swell

       screeching, wailing, rampant
        plucking of a rusting fiddle

an almighty thud:  violent
punch to the ferry's hull.

         Blackout.

        FADE INTO:  ampoules of colour; the lights
        of a distant rig.


2.     INT.  SHIP'S SALON,  NIGHT

A dog whines. Passengers
hunch over knees.  Last suppers
crump into sick-bags. Morbid
creaks from metal frames
         and the pitted floors
a momentary suspension

       what the  -

                      ship rears up
       behind closed hatches
      crockery crashes
                      the 'great ninth wave'
       rabid on portholes
                     the force nine gale
       fist-fucking the funnels.

V.O.    The grey wolf waits
     in the halls of the gods.



3.        EXT.  SEABED.  NIGHT

                   Silence as a lone crab
                   balances all the above
                    on its latticed back


NOTE TO DIRECTOR:   these three scenes
should be played out on a loop
in real time i.e.  seven and a half
hours of relentless misery  (which, though long
is still a lot shorter than Das Boot).

Janette Stowell

Johnny Cash

Hands move‘cross piano
Like old man in love
With piano

Johnny cash
  you popstar you,
Tell me of the west
you won
And the price
Down to last nickel
And dime store indian

Johnny cashed up for the night
His winnings
in desert shine
Of a sunbleached mirage.

Kevin Millband

casual causal overview

#1-----

September 2004 --had some jihadists on the cover.Only 40 or so were made, and spread about Liverpool in places forgotten and maybe bulldozed.

#2------

November 2004 -- an erased buddha for the cover.A series of Saint Poems started here.

#3------

June 2005 -- a schoolgirl in negative with geometeries for the cover.

#4------

November 2005 -- a face with thingies for the cover. At this point some poets outside the founding group were contacted, and gifted some poems.

#5------

February 2006 -- a grandmother's painting for the cover.Done in a rush for the first live event, took place in a lovely church that allowed the brisk sale of alcohols.#5's content showed an expansion in the poets featured, and the poems themselves showed similar movements into new territories.

(#6)-----------

an interesting absent issue, due to as-yet unexplained anomalies regarding arts council funding.

#7------

May 2007 -- a mussed up of prior things for the cover. This issue also commemorated a live event at the same lovely church.Also, a last meeting up for many of the founding poets.

Radio Transmission

It is Phill Jupitus on the BBC. He seems to have been in the News From Nowhere bookshop in Liverpool. At what time, we still don't know.