Open this poem/love letter from our Editor in Chief Tommaso Cartia sent to all the lovers out there celebrating this St. Valentine’s Day 2021 in all of its love’s forms.
Me & You, A Sunday Morning of February 2021
It is not a Holiday Until Billie caresses this Sunday With the sweet roughness Of her “Body & Soul” Outside the window Winter solmizates A snow’s symphony A concert of ice and lights Embracing and salvific. The world is violently shaking Sneezing blood, death, and confusion We are prisoners of our hugging desire But today you are with me “Body & Soul” Suspended In this house of red brick walls Warming and fragrant Like freshly baked bread A house full of music and future Of candles lit up to our dreams. We are a reassuring parcel To be opened next Christmas A lovers’ music box That plays this fragmented present With new harmonies Audacious, adventurous, experimental. Visions of us getting out of the house Unmasked Hand in hand To go embrace of little wriggles of happiness Our friends tonight at dinner. A connection of loving sense Some wine, some laughs Some singing, some foolishness A melting of bodies, voices, sensations A glimpse into eternity And then the present, the ordinary The dreams of the trip we plan for next summer More dreams … “I can’t wait to go to her concert…” “…she is great, though she’ll never be like Billie…” “promise we’ll see each other next week, good night!” … Later the love, me and you at home The love Unmasked And the tomorrow gets trepidant with trivialities Once again The necessity of living as much as possible Before nothing will be, again, impossible. Me and you, Billie Holiday, and a Sunday morning of February 2021 Outside the window The pandemic is sour Flaking down Even more violently than this snow’s tempest But it will subside, will melt, and settle Flash up once again and for all And be swollen by the darkness of time. It will leave us dry, rested, rejuvenated Full of love for the days ahead.
Me, you, Billie Holiday, and a Sunday morning of February 2022.
ON-Editorial New Year’s 2020. A letter and a poem from our Editor in Chief Tommaso Cartia
I am the empire at the end of the decadence. Prophet of a world that has stopped being prophetical. Milan. Italy. Someday, some night, in 2002. I woke up in the middle of that night, with a virulent urgency, with a trepidatious feeling. With those words on my mind. I wrote them down, quickly, and they suddenly opened a breach into my consciousness. An engulfing stream derailed my perception of space and time and I traveled.
I traveled through a feeling, I traveled across the sentiment of a world in turmoil, of an entire collectivity languishing. Those sudden travels are little miracles; on rare occasions, benevolent muses grant writers access to extraordinary emotional vehicles. At that time, I was “growing pains” because I was an adolescent and there was plenty to be mad at in the world in my “roaring twenties”. But that night, those excruciating roars were not shouting out my insecurities in front of the mirror or the feeling of being perceived as an ambiguous character always somewhat on the outside, out of place everywhere. That night was the face of the world and its distortions, grotesquely staring at me from the pieces of a fragmented mirror.
Since September 2001, the world itself was feeling ambiguous, precarious, on the outside, out of place everywhere. The world was turning into a fearful adolescent, certain only of its paradoxical uncertainty. We are all familiar with that feeling because it happened to us. We are all familiar with that feeling because it is happening to us. It began when the first minuscule ember of those crumbling towers started filling the air and our consciousness with a vicious nebula of unclarity. And by the time those towers reached ground zero, we all reached ground zero. Our end, or our beginning? The people of my generation who didn’t experience apocalyptic disruptive events like wars, pestilences, or natural calamities, suddenly knew what it felt like to be a fragile ember in the vastity of an unknown universe.
So that night, something that was dormant, something that I was blocking from my mind in my naive attempt to believe that “everything will be alright,” erupted with the force of a world quivering to come to life. A new cycle was beginning, but we were stuck at our ground zero, a step behind the past, not yet a step ahead into the future. And yet a 0 looks like a circle, and the circle is an infinite perfect shape. Our end, or our beginning? And in between, what’s in between? It is maybe what the astrophysics tend to call liminal times, and the people of faith purgatory times? It is definitely a time of purges when all of the infections need to be spurted out of our systems, all of the wounds stitched and disinfected, all of our mental and spiritual clutter, dismantled.
If that was the beginning of a new cycle and that new cycle started with purgatory mode, are we at the end of this purgatory?. 2002/2020, looks like some sort of cryptic symbolism that could satisfy the many conspiracy theorists out there. This pandemic, the fragility of our ecosystems, the autarchic leaderships, the rampant inequities and iniquities all around the globe, the corruption, the violence, the constant danger, this indefatigable feeling of fatigue and tremendous uncertainty… and so on and so inescapably forth… is this the acme, the tip of the iceberg, the final act, the extreme ablution of all of the viral infections we need to free ourselves from?
I would hope a benevolent muse comes back to grant me access to a piece of prophetic truth. The French poet Paul Verlaine was definitely granted a grand truth when he wrote in his poem”Langueur” (Languishing) of 1883, “I am the Empire at the end of the Decadence,” a lyric that was inspired by the collapse of the Roman Empire addressing the collapse of his own era, and that later inspired my feeling of collapsing of our era in 2002. Three eras, the same languishing, decadent feeling; is this enough to satisfy the category of “prophetic truth”? If we dive into the recurrent liminal cycles of human history, do we find there an answer to our dangling present? Because after a liminal cycle, a golden era always arises and did arise. And maybe that benevolent muse came to me one time and for all during this 10 years of purgatory time in which we are living. And so envisioning the prescient beginning of our golden era, I let that adolescent of 2002 in his “roaring twenties” respond to my anxiety of this current 2020 and give me hope, and possibly give it to the reader, that purgatory mode is about to collapse. If this is ground zero all over again, let’s turn it into an infinite circle of enlightenment.
AMEN 2002/2020
by Tommaso Cartia
KNOWLEDGE LEADS TO FREEDOM FREEDOM LEADS TO SOLITUDE.
There is just freedom of reprinted thoughts, of partisan words of non-debatable debates. There is a vile terrorism bombarding the unknown a wall of obscurantism feverishly patched up every day not to let a drop of truth shine through. It is there where from a crack on the wall a glimpse of light filters that I dive inebriated by the quench of Truth soaked up in a rainstorm of Mystery a sweet prisoner of Knowledge of Reason, of Love. I’m a researcher of liquefying principles archeologist and funambulist over the cut of this wall conceptual space I travel, I abandon. I try to escape this towering inferno this cold war’s flying arsenals these weapons of mass distractions this incessant restoration of walls of dogmatism.
I am the empire at the end of the decadence prophet of a world that has stopped being prophetical I know I can still burn my body can still be put at stake my words can be put at stake at the ground zero of our involution on disheartening altars where the web-masters preach the way and humiliate differences and sacrifice intellects. Can the freedom in my words sound like pain and punishment? Can I be extinguished Can I be banished and vanished inside of this mass that needs to be leaven bulked and fed and poisoned with apathetic resignation?
From the inside of this mass’ wall Let’s continue to conduct heat Let’s continue to conduct Knowledge Let’s continue to conduct Love Let’s push for a change of status Let us be
FREE
Free to say that we can’t change, choose, control, or recolor the skin we are born in, and the sexuality we are born with. That we can’t believe in imposed absolute dogmas that are in fact nothing but relative. Let us have the freedom to discover our own sense of the Absolute, instead of that being cut, edit, banalized, and repackaged for us on plastic bibles. And let us have access to all the books and grant back to the messiahs their historical sense. Let us overturn the hegemony of autarchic patriarchs and let’s land powers also in women’s and in multicolored hands. Let us rephrase this inaccurate paradox:
… we are all equals …
… let the different be equals to the equals and the equals to the different …
I pray, that the act of Love would be granted and permitted to everybody. I pray, for the end of racial and sexual crusades and of cultural exterminations. I pray, for the Truth, not to be hidden behind beautiful lies. I pray to Know, I pray to Love, I pray to Breathe, I pray to Live.
AMEN.
About the Author
THE STORYTELLER WHO CONNECTS THE DOTS OF ARTS & CULTURE
Tommaso Cartiais a NYC-based writer, journalist, published author, media specialist, and publicist with a decade of experience in media communications, publishing, and the entertainment business, in the US as well as in Italy. Co-Founder and Editor in Chief of Creative Pois-On, Tommaso is the mind and the pen behind Storytelier,the editorial project by Creative Pois-On. He has a successful track record in designing brilliant interviews that narrate beautiful stories. Among the celebrities, he had the chance to interview, Writer Erica Jong, Writer Michael Cunningham, Actress Gina Lollobrigida, and Valeria Golino, Director Michael Apted, to name a few. He is also the founder of the editorial project The Digital Poet – To Live Dreams, To Dream Of Lives and author of the lyrical memoirReincarnazione Sentimentale, Italy, 2014.
The video-poem “Jupiter Rising” is read by the author and shot around various locations in NYC. PERSONAL TRAINING is now available on Amazon and Kindle. Please enjoy here below both the video and the poem.
Jupiter Rising
Steady as my glass that just fell off of the table—
don’t worry it wasn’t full—
and what phase of the moon are we in now?
which tide just got pulled?
Today I felt all bitter and fucked up
like a poem by Dorothy Parker
brittle on the outside
but fragile at the core
They say Jupiter is visible tonight
but I can’t see it through all this rain
On 9th Avenue the boys are cruising one another
and they’re all starting to look the same.
So Jupiter is rising high
in the cloudy sky tonight
Michaelangelo must have spilled his paints again
leaving us this pearly drop of light.
Today I felt like a Henry James heroine
crafty and unfulfilled
dreaming of a perfect match
in a rudely imperfect world.
In my back pocket I have a business card
from—I think his name was Ed?
He works in technology
but I didn’t hear a word he said.
I was only thinking how the way he held his glass was sort of like
the way you held my wrist in the movie theatre
stroking up and down as if I might break
stroking up and down as if I might purr.
Tonight I felt like a French film star
leaving by the back door
I’d tell you la raison porquoi
but then again, what for?
Can you see Jupiter from where you sleep?
Can you see it from his bed?
In my back pocket I have a business card
—I’m sure his name was Ed.
Today I felt like a ballad by Adele
all bittersweet and corny
distraught and crying out your name
yet deep down just plain horny.
Jupiter is visible again tonight
impersonating a star
like a drag queen on a good night
think we could get there by car?
And how long before it twirls around?
Blinking its big red eye
How long before it rolls back over?
to a completely different sky.
About the Author
Writer David James Parr was born on a cul-de-sac in suburban Ohio and grew up on a farm in rural Pennsylvania, where he learned how to spell “cul-de-sac” and to mispronounce “rural”, respectively. He is the author of the novelsViolet Peaks and Beauty Marks, as well as the collection How To Survive Overwhelming Loss & Loneliness in 5 Easy Steps: Stories. His title story How To Survive Overwhelming Loss & Loneliness in 5 Easy Steps was chosen by Michael Cunningham (The Hours) as one of the Top 10 Stories in The Tennessee Williams Fiction contest, and is included in the anthology The Best Gay Stories of 2017. David’s story Mata Hari was also selected in 2015 as one of the winners of The Tennessee Williams Fiction contest. David’s plays Slap & Tickle, Albee Damned and Pluto Is Listening have been produced all across the U.S. including Chicago, Dallas, New York, Provincetown and St. Petersburg, and his play Mimi at The 44th Parallel was a Top 10 Finalist in The Austin Film Festival’s 2019 Playwriting Competition. His fiction has appeared in Saints + Sinners, Mosaic and Feminisms. His playEleanor Rigby Is Waiting was made into a film which premiered at the 2019 Manhattan Film Festival, winning Best Independent Feature.
Don’t hold a grudge. Mold one instead, into the form of non-fat erotic, neurotic and quixotic poetry and exercise tips by our Staff Writer and Contributor, Award-Winning Author and Playwright, David James Parr. February is gone but Love & Eroticism are still in the air. This March, Creative Pois-On is “On Stage”, exploring the storytelling of Broadway and the theater, but also of all of the passion, the courage, and the fearlessness that it takes to go on the stage of our own life, conquering the demons of any stage fright, to live as the protagonists of the most truthful idea that we have of ourselves. And that’s what “Personal Training: poetry & exercise tips”, does. With this brand-new poetry collection, David James Parr takes us behind the scenes of the creation of the man and the artist he is today, in the middle of the most feral and yet lovingly human ‘stage fright’ of his earlier years in New York City. A coming of age story, from the warm-up to the toughest training that it takes to get rid of the life that we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.
Enjoy these excerpts from the book – and to read more please CLICK HERE
“The Warm-Up”
“Here it comes all hips and zipper Here he comes all Jack-the-Ripper
Stand upright Feet shoulder-width apart Don’t think of his shoulders Nor their width
Keep arms at sides Don’t think of his arms Nor his sides
Reach up towards sky Arching back Don’t think of his back Nor its arch
Here he comes all torso and swagger Here he comes All cloak and dagger
Hold position for 60 seconds Breathing normally Don’t think of his breathing Nor what was once normal”
“Like Woolf and Plath and Hemingway”
“One by one we all run away like Woolf and Plath and Hemingway.
Some leave notes, some leave crumbs, some dots to connect one by one.
You can read between the lines but first you have to plant the vines, and hear the words: “You’re mine.”
You’re told you’re in a quiet mood, you’re told to change your attitude, then you hear this word: unglued.
And then comes that day when you realize: You may. Like Woolf and Plath and Hemingway.
To run away may seem a child’s game, to such a death you can attach your name, and look what happens: instant fame.
But are they forgotten with the book? Downward all eyes would look, when realizing what they took.
To disappear, a fleeting thought. Would you like forever just to rot? Um, well, no Maybe not.
Still their brains I’d like to pick away. Can’t we all just have brunch Sunday? Woolf and Plath and Hemingway.
Is it that we’ve all been fooled? Did they give all they should? Or was it only what they could?
You wake again, and yes, the sky. Another night has passed on by, his arm around you: a total lie.
The quiet begs you to stay. Should you leave? Who can say? Not Woolf nor Plath nor Hemingway.
Your eyes thirst for sleep, you want the silence, you want the deep, the dark, the stillness there you’ll keep.
He announces that it’s morning time If you trust his eyes, you might be fine. Again, he whispers: “You are mine.”
Like this, you keep it all at bay. It’s been set on time delay. Like Woolf and Plath and Hemingway.”
Writer David James Parr was born on a cul-de-sac in suburban Ohio and grew up on a farm in rural Pennsylvania, where he learned how to spell “cul-de-sac” and to mispronounce “rural”, respectively. He is the author of the novelsViolet Peaks and Beauty Marks, as well as the collection How To Survive Overwhelming Loss & Loneliness in 5 Easy Steps: Stories. His title story How To Survive Overwhelming Loss & Loneliness in 5 Easy Steps was chosen by Michael Cunningham (The Hours) as one of the Top 10 Stories in The Tennessee Williams Fiction contest, and is included in the anthology The Best Gay Stories of 2017. David’s story Mata Hari was also selected in 2015 as one of the winners of The Tennessee Williams Fiction contest. David’s plays Slap & Tickle, Albee Damned and Pluto Is Listening have been produced all across the U.S. including Chicago, Dallas, New York, Provincetown and St. Petersburg, and his play Mimi at The 44th Parallel was a Top 10 Finalist in The Austin Film Festival’s 2019 Playwriting Competition. His fiction has appeared in Saints + Sinners, Mosaic and Feminisms. His playEleanor Rigby Is Waiting was made into a film which premiered at the 2019 Manhattan Film Festival, winning Best Independent Feature.
Please stalk David further at: Facebook: David James Parr Fiction Instagram: DavidJamesParr Twitter: @ParrFiction
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