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Origami Microchap
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Poem(s) |
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| On the Run with Dick and Jane |
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Click title to open microchap
Cover by Jan K
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First we’ll take Manhattan
Watch the sun act guilty when you smile,
listen to the river cough and remember.
I can hold a suicide in the palm of my hand,
predict the future in broken glass.
Doesn’t it make you want to forget
who we might have been.
We get inked at Skin Kitchen Tattoo Studio
I make a fist to the needle-buzz
smell rain in your hair
as my arm burns.
Someday you will forget
my name. I will not remember
the curve of your breast.
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New Orleans
I’ll burrow under
the neon blanket
of Bourbon Street
collapse with you
into a crease in the horizon.
I love this city on sullen nights
summer’s death
spent with you.
good-bye kiss
I want to get stoned and blame it on the shape
of the moon. I want to drive in circles, make up
names for all the places we leave behind.
You take off your dress, the wind scatters
light across my bed. I’m hundreds of miles
from nowhere, too afraid to whisper your name.
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Battery Park
A dragon-fly nips at the heels of the moon.
The moon, being pious, scatters your breath
across the street like fire.
Let’s head west, pin our past to mile markers,
build a cherry-red house on the flatland,
bury our future in a shallow grave.
Ybor City
The ocean is not big enough. I aspire to the sky,
imagine the asphalt beneath the wheels can tell
us this journey’s end.
You ask me to follow the spring wind,
want me to listen for signs, but I am lost
in the murmur of cigarettes and dust.
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Alex Stolis © 2022
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Postcards from
The Knife-Thrower's Wife
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Click above title to download microchap
Cover collage by JK
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August 1 - St. John, N.B. Canada
I keep all your letters in a cigar box under our
bed next to grandmother’s wedding dress. This is
a city of ghosts of bars of brown pastures. You
send me postcards from all the places I’ll never
go. They are on a map I do not own. I am left
with ink on fingers, smudges of black on white
on an unpunctuated loss. Truth is something
only paper can be witness to. I'll never wear that
dress. Instead, I'll meet you where the earth is
covered in blues and greens.
August 2 - Woodstock, N.B. Canada
I’m a girl on a dragon-fly on the back of a horse
heading straight into the wind under an
unbreakable sky. You are not here. You are
made-up words in an invented language
spoken in whispers. I remember every detail of
the world we created from scratch. I remember
that day the moon eclipsed the sun and for a
moment the earth turned cold. The sky turned
deep green no stars in sight. You wrote me
of a dream you had; lost, afraid and miles away
from home. You heard the low beat of wings.
You felt the steady pound of hooves and I readied
myself for flight
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August 3 - Edmundston, N.B. Canada
Disregard my last letter. If you have not yet received
it bury it away when you do. I’ve tried to stop loving
you. It’s easier than I thought. Miles and time only
sharpen every memory. You would no longer
recognize the land but the sky is the same. I look up
at your moon and your stars. Imagine a blanket
of quiet descends on us. I close my eyes, can almost
hear nothing. I’m an experiment in exile. We don’t
ever really lie. We believe and then find out later
we were wrong.
August 4 - Riviere-du-Loup, Que. Canada
There are two edges to the knife we used to
comfort and to cut and to corner each other.
t then and still I refuse ’ I know now what I didn
to flinch. I have always demanded more from
sunsets. My breath no longer belongs to this
world but to the red plains, white sand of the
land you roam. It lives in the thick hair and loud
whisper of the women you bed. I cannot
forgive a sin that has not yet been committed.
I will not shield myself from a sun that burns
the earth a deep brown. For this moment I will
forget. Your name. The bitter edge of this
letter. The shy moon and haughty stars. This
knife that waits to be honed.
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August 6 - Cornwall, Ont. Canada
Thought I saw you yesterday. A glimpse inside a
t ’ shadow, a drop of blood on my tongue. It wasn
you. The thoughts continued to linger. On my skin.
In the seam of my dress. The one I made
before you left. They cling to me, a new
language, collection of words I have to relearn.
How to form my mouth. To breathe. How to inhale
the vowels, exhale meaning. To reach you. Never
becoming fluent. Nights are a refuge from the
scent and sound of you. It dulls the edge of
anticipation, the longing. Even more than that.
The knowing. I have become Penelope. With no
kingdom to barter, no dowry. With nothing left
to unravel.
August 8 - Peterboro, Ont. Canada
The dead are envious. Not because we breathe
above the earth or because our veins are filled
with life. Time does not touch us. We have no
dates carved into stone. No ending to rewrite
or narrative to regret. We are now. We are sky
that tumbles to earth, clouds spilled into rivers
flowing into endless oceans. That last time we
promised each other everything I became dizzy
with remembering, felt your fingers on my face.
The earth beneath us trembled. The dead never
loved us enough to tell us anything true.
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Alex Stois © 2019
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Postcards from the
Knife-Thrower
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Click title to download microchap
Cover from web
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April 7-15 Los Angeles, CA
She puts on her bathing suit, her back to me
my back to the sun the physics of us in relation
to the ocean in relation to the sand underneath
our feet in relation to the smell of burnt drift-
wood beating against our skin.
April 23 Bakersfield, CA
We’re bottomed out flat, talking about Elijah,
the end times and imminent ruination of man.
She swings her leg, straddles her chair all
Marlene Dietrich, fiercely invulnerable; un-
touchable. The last moon wanes out of each,
we’re left thirsty, insatiable; lusting for
winter’s light.
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April 26 Modesto, CA
The sky is only broad enough for one God
and we are deep, we’re a lone shallow dive
away from the edge. She wants to be blind
folded, pinned to the earth. Blade pressed
into thigh, want against need, desire beside
death; our sin, a pinprick of lightning.
April 27 Santa Cruz, CA
Simple dissonance between balance and air;
no science or empirical evidence, no practice
tests, no fear. There is harsh steel, the crumble
of sawdust underfoot, hushed silk. From afar
it seems there is nothing to it, vagaries of light
and sound, leftover litanies; bones and scraps
for the unbelievers.
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April 28 Monterey, CA
Before we were taken up by a whirlwind, before
we brought fire down from the sky, every day
eyed, - was an incantation. Now, we’re all sharp
and clear over the edge. The bleeding’s stopped
and we’re left with visions. We are stray dogs.
bowled, empty. We’re the incorruptibles, - Dust
we preach to the dead, call
it prayer.
April 29 Watsonville, CA
It is drunk, it is noise, it is a choir of angels
singing of Elijah and the devil dancing at the
gates of Eden. You carry it well sister, you
hide the simple truth in the rumble of your
body. It’s getting late; let me fall asleep in
the shadows on your naked white throat,
wake to the scent of inevitability on your
lips.
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Alex Stolis © 2017
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Dead Letter Office, Vol. II
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Click title to download PDF microchap
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Unsent Letter #6
Dear J,
You told me your husband wished you were more
practical. I wanted to accidently run into him;
tell him I was envious. Convince him you’re perfect.
We were everywhere. We were overflowing,
abandoned. I promised to not count the days,
but they were right there: full fresh days; a bawdy
yellow field; a dark sitting room, the backseat of a
car while it rained. There were wide highways;
clean, flat and endless. When I stopped counting
it was long enough to end it all. You’re patient;
all ready to take the long road. I’m unforgivable;
writing my way into nothing.
Love,.
Unsent Letter #7
Dear J,
I love edges. Anything that can take me down another city
block, around corners; into the permanent. The air is lousy
with shouts from irritated cars. It’s all breakable; you tell
me joy is the number 8, always doubling back on itself.
There is a catch in your voice; you would rather be home,
digging in the garden until the sensation of floating ebbs
into a drop of rain. I want to plan a full color escape, feel
the brush of your hand against my cheek. Until everything
is simple math: minus me; plus you; divide us both in two.
Love,
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Unsent Letter #8
Dear J,
Remember the night we stole your father’s car? The
halo-glow of the porch light illuminated our crime.
You slid across the long bench seat, told me to drive.
Drive to nowhere; drive over the edge of the earth;
watch the look on God’s face as we crack the horizon.
I remember crickets singing louder the further we went;
the hum of wind through wing windows. There was
clean static from AM radio; your hand on mine. I wake,
three four five times a night and you’re invisible;
a shadow; a heart-shaped moth watching
over me as I fall to sleep.
Love,
Unsent letter #9
Dear J,
Not sure what is left to write. I’ve told you about the
birds that nest in winter; the simple pearl of water
that glides down my window; an unpainted bridge
over Lester Park Creek that reminds me of that
summer. We cannot forget what we don’t remember;
cannot let it go again. Next time will be forever.
This morning the moon was a dim light wrapped
in gauze. We are separated; not by distance,
not time but circumstance. We will carry each
other; two butterflies frozen still on pink petals.
Handwritten notes folded in our pockets; everything
we’ll ever need.
Love,
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Unsent Letter #10
Dear J,
I want you to forget you love me. Forget how trees
scallop the sky, the way the horizon shuns the stars.
I want you to bury the words you gave to me.
The ones that belong to the soft rush of wind
through pussy willows. Pack away the quiet
adjectives you use to describe the sound of morning;
forget it all. I’ll write you from another continent,
bare and thirsty words; underfed and worthless
words. I’ll write of broken promises; made up prayers
from lost lovers. I’ll tell you about paper wings, ashes;
a wet moon awash on the shore.
Love,
Unsent Letter #11
Dear J,
I’m looking outside my window 5:30AM; the only
one here; not ready to work. Its quiet; the quiet
roar of a world that’s still and within itself.
You tell me you are flying out in five days;
England then Portugal. I wonder what love
feels like after a distance; after silence turns
into a rush of wind. Later this year I’ll be
in London; funny how we end up in the same places
but never at the same time. Send me a card,
a cheap souvenir. I’ll fold it into a talisman;
every crease a reminder of where I’ve been.
Love,
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Alex Stolis © 2013
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Dead Letter Office
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Click title to download PDF microchap
For J
…so you can carry me in your pocket
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Unsent Letter #1
Dear ,
There’s a mallard and his mate, outside my window.
The rose bushes have been uprooted; ready to
be replaced. Across the street the police are in
the process of arresting a woman. Her husband
[boyfriend] leans against the building like he’s
seen it all before. It’s difficult. I think I’m ruined.
I’ll take my chances in slivers; not brave enough
to flat out ask and too smart [afraid] to blow it
all by being honest. If you were here I couldn’t
fake it. But you’re not. You are a handwritten
letter; an untold story.
Tomorrow, the landscapers will be back.
Love,
Unsent Letter #2
Dear.
Now, there is nothing but dirt. They took
the trees, bushes; even part of the sidewalk.
The police are gone. The flashing red and
blue a quiet promise of their return. I want
to tell you stories. I want to find one more
way to turn the truth. I want to be subversive.
I’ll confess my crimes. I’ll take my chances;
tell you what you think you already know.
I do plan to post this bundle of letters.
Maybe I’ll redact them. As if they were sent from
a war zone or some Eastern Bloc country;
before the wall came down.
Love,
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Unsent Letter #3
Dear ,
Every day I stop at the park. Same time,
except on Thursdays [I’m a little late].
I lean against the car and wait. Sometimes
I’ll walk the path. Once I sat under
a maple; watched a robin collect twigs
for a nest. One day there will be nothing
left to breathe; a few moments here,
a question or two there. I notice the same
people: an older woman sits on the bench
], facing west [always leaves at 4:30
a young boy and girl, [the beginnings of a
crush]. Sometimes, I wonder if they recognize
me; know what I’m waiting for.
Love,
Unsent Letter #4
Dear,
I think about carefully writing letters then
leaving them in random places:
Dear Subway Passenger,
Dear Passer-By,
Let me tell you about my lover. She’s beautiful
in that way sadness has of rounding out
edges. She likes to go barefoot; better to feel
the arth tremble, she says. She worries about
sun when it rains. Likes to sit in her grand- the
chair; best seat in the house when it mother’s
byes and - She believes in long good thunders.
open spaces. Last thing she told me was how -
wide words seemed to come alive, when written
by hand.
Love,
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Unsent Letter #5
Dear ,
Every day I stop at the park. Same time,
except on Thursdays [I’m a little late].
I lean against the car and wait. Sometimes
I’ll walk the path. Once I sat under
a maple; watched a robin collect twigs
for a nest. One day there will be nothing
left to breathe; a few moments here,
a question or two there. I notice the same
people: an older woman sits on the bench
], facing west [always leaves at 4:30
a young boy and girl, [the beginnings of a
crush]. Sometimes, I wonder if they recognize
me; know what I’m waiting for.
Love,
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Alex Stolis © 2012
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A Cabal of Angels, Part 2
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Click itle to download PDF microchap
…and a cabal of angels with finger cymbals
chanted his name in code, we shook our fists
at the punishing rain;
and we called upon the author to explain.
Nick Cave
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Tabbris; Angel of Self Determination
What will be left after you are truly gone:
the frayed end of a thread
from your sweater;
bare bulb flickering in the closet;
a dog-eared book
with a coffee stained cover?
There is no past. I’ll pick now to remember
what it was like; the scent of rosewater
and wood smoke,
the rumble of wings against sky as I watch
you tie back your hair. There is no such thing
as forgiveness or second chances.
I’d rather drink to sin; picture you at the end
of the bar, hair shorn, legs crossed high
ready to start a revolution.
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Alex Stolis © 2012
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Cassiel; Angel of Temperance
She was from Key West; I liked the way it sounded
all bohemian and Hemingway; shotguns and giant
blue marlin. It suited her mood: heavy, humid,
like swimming through a perspiring sun.
Before this flood she worked as a waitress.
Cool Joe tended bar.
Bomb martinis, tits & legs - It was all H
& whispering palms. She never trusted him,
his too sharp switchblade smile
but she had a plan, bulletproof and straight.
he’d say, We’re a generation of cunts
twisting another lemon rind
round another rim. She could hear the crack
of ice, feel the rush of rivers and the cold
snap of February’s wind.
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Rampel; Angel of Endurance
We were American lo-fi, civil and disobedient.
We were brave. The sky was fallow.
She’d been gone for weeks.
We sat in her car on St Anthony Main;
before everything became gentrified.
Moments later she suggested we go
to her place. On the sofa, her dog licked
my face. She laughed, unbuttoned my pants.
It was fall; no, spring.
No, I can’t remember.
Afterwards, we didn’t shower.
She wanted to keep the scent of my skin.
She was impatient;
no, maybe sad.
I really don’t remember.
Maybe I wasn’t there.
Maybe it’s a story
she tells to keep me away.
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Monday's Child
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Click title to download PDF micr
Cover Art: Julia Klatt-Singer
www.juliaklattsinger.com
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Monday's child is fair of face
I recognize you everywhere: you are a little
bird, your bright wings, a melancholy quiver
that wakes the sky from a deep cloud sleep.
We walk to the river, after the flood; count
star trains. I play with the buttons on your coat.
You bite my lip, speak of moonlit crows, white
hot vigils; mourning and hymns. I tell you stories:
my first car, bench seat and wing windows; a girl
without a name, hiked skirt, black heels; a shared
flask of schnapps. I climb to the top of the hill
overlooking the water; throw stones at the devil.
Tuesday's child is full of grace
Her hands folded, as if in prayer; a neon shadow
crosses the bed, we’re a blur of drink and smoke
and promises. It’s a safe bet the river will flood
soon; the bars will empty and the all night girls will
pretend to run from the all night boys; someone
gets lucky someone gets lonely; someone always
pays. I will not fuck us over, won’t recreate heaven
and earth. You are a confession, a sacrament,
keeper of faith; hands clasped as if in prayer.
Tonight the sky holds salvation. The difference
between what’s lost and what’s holy no longer
matters.
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Wednesday's child is full of woe
It was the first day of spring; like any other day
but flatter; a tight-chested-wait-for-the-shoe-to-
drop day. We tried to be good, tried to placate the
part time gods. Parked cars heat up on Main Street.
She’s newly minted in her halter top, sling backs
and black tights; that buzz should be over by now.
I watch the sun fight shadows on the downtown
skyline; can’t keep anything, can’t imagine words
anymore without you in them. You play piano:
soft, low; a prayer, a processional song for saints
and the forgotten. I have to say everything twice;
make sure I believe.
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Thursday's child has far to go
That night I got arrested was star
and dry; a blood moon wrapped in white
gauze. She had my coat. She had to walk
home. It was the last time I made her cry;
she loved me. We are armed and unmanned;
too shy to have a childhood worth remembering.
That great lake swallowed us whole; drowned
our handsome voice. Our past lies in a city in
a far off land across an ocean buried in a hill.
You’re in Chicago; New York; you’re a winter’s
up dialogue on the curb; - kiss. We’re a made
a secret waiting to be shared.
Friday's child is loving and giving
We were immortal and invisible; under
influenced and loaded. We surfed the rain
on Superior Street; broke bottles and jumped
smart and motored - fences. We became whip
up. She saw me from a high windowed palace.
She was a distracted miracle, a ripened star;
another one more chance. That summer is
distant, obscure; we climbed stones and buried
sins. You put my hand on your heart to keep it
warm. The sky is a wheat field, fertile and rich;
we are home. In the scent of lilies, the crunch
of leaves, we become an element that lives
between water and fire.
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Alex Stolis © 2012
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A Cabal of Angels
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Click above title to download PDF microchap
because you are the Angel of Beauty
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Uzziel; Angel of Faith
Open the door. It’s a balcony room;
its solid sea top to bottom, I never know
when you’ll show up.
Wildwood dreams and parked cars;
somewhere a bird, what kind I can’t tell
but you’re in a hurry.
Don’t wait; now, the coffee’s boiled over.
You have a husband, children
and a dog; the buzz of a room service bell.
Here’s the [our] last leg.
The television is blurred; jai alai on sound off.
Two dollar bets and torn tickets.
We’re mobile.
We’re Crown Vic’ed and convertible.
I love you.
I love you. Don’t forget
your wrap.
It’s getting cold.
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Colopatiron; Angel of Liberation
We talk about ghosts while the moon
possums in the sky. It is still;
the kind of stillness before a thunderstorm
or a car crash.
We’re sitting on the swings; the playground
overlooks the baseball diamond. Colored paper
and matches confetti the infield; shreds from spent
bottle-rockets and firecrackers.
Longneck Budweiser’s mark first second third
base and home. The only light left
is a lone firefly. You’ve dyed your hair;
skin, white as cuttlefish bones.
Tell me your first wish was the smoothest
stone ever skipped across water;
how you felt yourself drown
in each ripple and wave.
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Raphael; Angel of Healing
You imagine blackbirds flying a straight line
over flat land, wonder aloud how love feels
when it’s new and raw,
before the sharp edge of regret cuts it down.
Afternoon drifts into evening drifts into dream.
You sew a scarecrow,
use your father’s Sunday coat and pants.
You say a straw man holds on to loneliness
like a talisman; put your hand on my heart.
Later, in a narrow bed; one thin sheet,
an uncased pillow, I make the sign
of the cross
on the skin between your ribs.
You listen for the distant sound
of beating wings.
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Alex Stolis © 2012
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Alex Stolis lives in Minneapolis; he has had poems published in numerous journals. Recent chapbooks include Justice for all, published by Conversation Paperpress (UK) based on the last words of Texas Death Row inmates. Also, Without Dorothy, There is No Going Home from ELJ Publications. Other releases include an e-chapbook, From an iPod found in Canal Park; Duluth, MN, from Right Hand Pointing and Left of the Dial from corrupt press. The full length collection, Postcards from the Knife Thrower, was runner up for the Moon City Poetry Prize in 2017. His chapbook, Perspectives on a Crime Scene, was recently released by Grey Border books and a full length collection, Pop. 1280 was published in 2021 by Cyberwit.net.