INITIAL PROMISES

by Stephen House

there were initial promises

from the Taliban

to form an inclusive government

 

there will be no women

in government

 

women playing sport

is not appropriate

 

women will be killed

if they commit adultery

 

LGBTQ people’s mere existence

means an automatic death sentence

 

LGBTQ Afghans are on the run

fearing they will be stoned to death

under Taliban law

 

Ahmadullah says

the Taliban beheaded his boyfriend

on the day they entered Kabul

Ahmadullah is in hiding

 

UN and US warn the Taliban

we are watching you

 

what will watching do?

 

there were initial promises

from the Taliban

to form an inclusive government

Stephen House has won many awards and nominations as a poet, playwright and actor. He’s received several international literature residencies from The Australia Council for the Arts and an Asia-link India residency. His chapbook real and unreal was published by ICOE Press. He’s published often and performs his acclaimed monologues widely.

ARIANA LEAVES A BAD TASTE IN OUR MOUTHS

by Michael Mark






That empty calorie confection
can lick my 12 hour factory job.
She can take the tip of her tongue
and taste the lonely dark of 3AM
alarms to get to the donut shop,
to mix the batter, to bake the donuts,
spread the icing that she licked and
did not buy. So another customer
tasted her spit. She can suck my middle-
class mortgage. And laugh because I’m
the sucker who has to work two jobs
to pay for it. I can’t walk away. She
can show up at a donut shop and bitch
about America’s obesity issues with all
the sincerity of imitation whipped cream.
She can eat her disgusting words on camera
in front of fat America. She can slip
her tongue in her dessert dancer of a boyfriend
then slide it over the sugary icing and leave
it tasting of arrogance, of pure meanness. That
customer who brought those donuts home
had to wonder why they stunk of revulsion. “I
asked for Boston Cream and got Rude Insolent
Post Teen.” She can flip that tongue so that simple,
happy, rainbow sprinkles smack of stupidity and
selfishness. That tongue can sell out stadiums.
And she can lie with that tongue that she really,
truly, honestly loves what the camera caught her
saying she hates. She can climb to #1 with that tongue.
And the rest of us, we can take a bite of what she leaves
us and pray for a little taste of forgiveness.


Michael Mark is a hospice volunteer and long distance walker. His poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Gargoyle Magazine, Lost Coast Review, Rattle, Ray’s Road Review, Spillway, Tar River Poetry, Sugar House Review, and other nice places. His poetry has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. 

EX-OLYMPIAN

by David Southward

PRETORIA, South Africa — Listening to the prosecution lay out its case against him at his murder trial over the past month, Oscar Pistorius could not keep silent, or still. He sobbed, prayed, threw up, buried his face in his hands and covered his ears, a response to the graphic and upsetting evidence, and, perhaps, to the grim reality of his own changed circumstances.
     But through all the testimony — about the lethally expanding bullets he kept in his gun; about the horrific wounds suffered by the victim, his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp; about his own mercurial temperament, obsession with firearms and irrationally jealous nature — Mr. Pistorius, the world’s most famous Paralympic athlete, has not spoken in his own defense.
     That will most likely change on Monday, when the case resumes after a weeklong recess and Mr. Pistorius is expected to take the stand. And though he has already provided the court with a written account of how, he says, he shot Ms. Steenkamp because he mistook her for an intruder, his testimony will be crucial as he tries to rebut the prosecution’s case: that he killed her in a violent rage as the two argued late into the night. --NY Times, April 2, 2014

Image source: M&G Live Blogs

Oscar Pistorius
bolts for the glorious
gold
on his boomerang heels.
Crowds at the starting line
gasp as Pretoria's
champion
gallantly kneels.

Off goes the pistol!
The crowd leaps, uproarious,
watching the sprinter
break free . . .
scarcely imagining
what a victorious
marksman
the sprinter could be.

Now that his haste
has occasioned the goriest
halt
to a Valentine's Day,
and he's mustered the sorriest
look that a boyfriend
of any dead girl
could display,

will Oscar explain
how he found it uxorious—-
heeding a woman's
appeals?
When the crowd stands aghast
at how feeble his story is,
Oscar may know
how she feels.


David Southward teaches in the Honors College at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.  His partner Geoff and dog Sammy patiently await his discovery by a wider audience.