almostrov

Jenny on Holiday – Quicksand Heart

What could water fear … if not the Smack of the rock, the Call of the sun? …To become the spit between a fascist’s lips …To cool a computer commanded to imagine tits Every AI prompt should have to start with “Dear Lord” — a reckoning for each request. …Dear Lord, write me an endingContinue reading “Jenny on Holiday – Quicksand Heart”

Snocaps – Snocaps

On the verge of discovery, a few dogs back, 2003, a laptop swallows its first mp3

Algernon Cadwallader – Trying Not to Have a Thought

wave goodbye with hands so dry, they could be a note in white wine

The Highwaymen – The Road Goes on Forever

You were keeping on the sunny side today, singing that the world is just a grass bouquet

Parts Work – Parts Work

Novels are the soccer of art

Soul II Soul – Club Classics Vol. 1

The porn that taught you the word “demure”The Facebook comment that revived that slur What difference is there Between the Internet and the Air?

Amy Irving – Always Will Be

Rain again at the ruin. Time fills every crack,a gas the sum of all other gasses.

crabapple – is it you

You could be stretching your calves but you’re clicking yourself to space one Google Street View increment at a time

Good Luck – Big Dreams, Mister

Suck it upLike a Kirby in a sandstorm Dutifully emptied Hose torn

Hüsker Dü – New Day Rising

Bell heather beckons the sheep closer What is there to see that isn’t Just chalk for the wind to smearAnd eraseAs water runs laps in four dimensions My outstretched hand seems to cast the sheep away

Dancer / Whisper Hiss – Split 12″

Sheets of robins stretch the sky Leaving sweat and seeds behind

Smudge – Manilow

My hair has never picked a side to part…and a freshly cleaned bathroom looks cleaner even in the dark

Hilken Mancini Band – Hilken Mancini Band

you stir your hot toddy with a sprig of spruce and argue the line between 2018 Billie Eilish and 2024 Beetlejuice

Carrie Nations – Be Still

Older scene brothers return As iffy scene uncles. Unclism spares none.

Hunger Anthem – Lift

Sunlight crashes off the moon then off your cheek You say the pain’s a little better this week

William Tyler – Goes West

Door guy fumbles his wrist bands, a drunk kid with downtown responsibility. We’ve all taken a turn defending what they let us defend.

Nicole Miglis – Myopia

Fresh cut on the fraser fir Severs ten years of earth from earth

Dianogah – Battle Champions

Wake to fall’s first full breeze and an inbox full of service fees

Flamingo Shadow – Shake for Fruit

Six years old in bed with chips Picked a fan blade and followed it

Thrush Hermit – Clayton Park

Magpie wielding a polished sword At once adored and misinformed

Trust Fund – Has it Been a While?

life is too short to wring the wrong necks to keep hives without honey to not go west

The Streets – Everything is Borrowed

Nation of stern parents spoils world- ‘s oldest brat

Raised as Wolves / Amends – Split 10″

I sweat the body electric, two steps out the door. I should’ve never gotten up off the floor.

The Cut Ups – The Nerves

Another show from another singer a decade past their NPR notoriety at least and another crowd of sweet and loud old hippies these are your showmates and this is the cost of falling in love with Bob Dylan at age 15 in 2004 but, hey, you’ve always been a lower-maintenance teacher’s pet and we allContinue reading “The Cut Ups – The Nerves”

Molly Nilsson – Un-American Activities

Oh the number of times I’ve driven you through Lands whose billboards Are hostile to you

Brian Wilson and Van Dyke Parks – Orange Crate Art

There’s always a crack to slip through: a Punisher tank top, a breast cancer ribbon tattoo

Owen – The Falls of Sioux

In what moment will I appear stupidest to my daughter, I wonder, standing in the end of the yard where the jasmine smell doesn’t reach

Freshkills – Creeps and Lovers

Who’s the richest person that thinks I’m their friend?

Itasca – Imitation of War

When the dawn breaksIs the pillow over your headOr the phone in front of your face?

Hot New Mexicans – It’s Called Leaning Back

robins huddleabove stoned housepainterquoting stoned homeowner

Kendl Winter – Banjo Mantras

There you sitat the edge of your bedscanning cable for tits.and on comesPenn and Teller: Bullshit

The 6ths – Wasps’ Nests

I guess I’d never questioned it until now, my proximity to the path of totality

Sally Anne Morgan – Carrying

Suitcases slept in the car Kid didn’t sleep at all First family drive at dawn

Gouge Away – , dies

Bottom-shelf sweetened condensed milk… Bottom-shelf cognac… Top-shelf thermos… Shake!!!

Car Colors – Old Death

I took a long drive. The first anniversary of the last night you were alive.

Cat Power – You are Free

Riverbank. Beach.Rest and let the water dothe running.

Empty Country – Empty Country II

Who keeps the zookeepers?

The Beautiful South – Superbi

Of course everything will be just fine– you started a new notebook and bought another bin.

Ryan Davis and the Roadhouse Band – Dancing on the Edge

Have yet to divide Still just reducing The fraction

A Mighty Wind – The Album

the d-beat singer at the outdoor show has to know

Mary Lattimore – Goodbye, Hotel Arkada

The most beautiful frames in film history: – Bruce Campbell exeunt Darkman – Patrick Ewing in The Exorcist 3

Fingers Cut Megamachine – Fingers Cut Megamachine

The disease passes As if it were nothing more major than hunger And your sweeter self returns

Lewsberg – Out and About

Bold of my therapist to expect change when their waiting room magazines remain the same

The Smiths – Ask

I’m a bar without a ledge to lean on, a splash of vodka on your lemon

Mitski – The Land is Inhospitable and So are We

Could a pumpkin rind protect a man?

One Hundred Dollars – Forest of Tears

I had been so lucky, and, I thought, as grateful as I could possibly be; But what is gratitude to The Bottomless Mystery?

Mary Jane Dunphe – Stage of Love

I’ve seen that actor’s face long enough that I love them.

The Band – Islands

You may not share my dream of a government-issued editor for each citizen, but your wrong.

Strawberry Runners – Strawberry Runners

Inquiring unfinished lives want to know: What contractor is gouging and ghosting on god?

T*Shirt – The Convincer

Craving burgers and alone time. Just me. And the burgermaker.

Who is She? – Goddess Energy

rise, accessorized in pug fur, and summon the nearest cheese

Frank Sinatra – Conducts Tone Poems of Color

heat advisory once more, my hair a shade of brown called Wookie Restored

Fiddlehead – Death is Nothing to Us

this fury’s almost nourishing, like olives ripening over and over

Jungle Brothers – Straight Out the Jungle

Like a bouquet, I’m dead in the drag of the living.

Daniel Westcott – Kissing and Danieling

Every bar I ever saw you play is closed. It’s a shame, I know. It’s a shame I know.

Madeline – Kissing and Dancing

closed my eyes and lost all my unsaved changes

Cory Branan – Gatlinburg

I remember the kitchen but not where we would’ve kept our wine and spirits

The Meters – Cabbage Alley

I’m a table in a kung Fu movie and you’re the 50th take. Can a spiderweb of splinters even break?

Jess Williamson – Time Ain’t Accidental

You wouldn’t think there’d be such a big difference between Decembers 2022 and 2023.

Little Anthony and the Imperials – I’m on the Outside (Looking In)

rain sure sounds invincible when it’s hitting on that tin but give it a couple hours and that roof’ll win again

Vulture Feather – Liminal Fields

Summer is a home invader Florida can’t kill.

Electrelane – No Shouts, No Calls

We leave you to the farm and will meet again when the blueberries return.

Gia Margaret – Romantic Piano

If this cold front doesn’t hit us, I’m done fucking for the year.

Honeyblood – Honeyblood

Did I reenact the teenage years of some schmuck from whatever town is the Coral Springs of San Marino?

Alex Lahey – The Answer is Always Yes

not being happy makes me so fucking angry

Derroll Adams – Feelin’ Fine

Use the roasted russet to mop up the mess of sweet potato duo.

Westerman – An Inbuilt Fault

Swings, slides, and wind chimes. Cross Main Street for a croissant and to watch traffic.

Madeline – The Slow Bang

Low toilet, loud fan. Why was there a red lightbulb in the bathroom of my grandma’s townhouse?

Country Westerns – Forgive the City

In the field behind the honors college dorm, the Stetson-wearing, Black-and-Mild-smoking virgin playing Travelling Willburys songs on his mandolin goes unnoticed.

The Evaporators – I’m Going to France

The takeout noodles travel better than me. Small sneaker, worried toe.

Josh Small – Reinventing Michael McDonald

Minnie Ripperton wrote “Loving You” in the next neighborhood over and shamefully, reader, there is no shrine.

The Cure – Disintegration

It’s starting to sink in that not everyone has the temperament of my honors student friends and I finishing a group project so we could play basketball in the driveway.

Jenny Conlee – Tides: Pieces For Accordion And Piano

The hawks don’t seem To mind the increase of bubble Activity in our backyard

Joel Plaskett – In Need of Medical Attention

The external hard drive full of MP3s Taking up an entire drawer May not be the jewel for posterity I’d hoped it would be

Sweet Dreams Nadine – Sweet Dreams Nadine

For years I mistook Those squeaky ducks For bats

Stephen Steinbrink – Arranged Waves

Your first trip to the beach You fell asleep in the car on the way there And woke up to a blustery parfait of gale, sand, and surf And it must’ve seemed familiar only to birth

Two Runner – Modern Cowboy

if we had more friends, we could pick more blueberries

All Dogs – Kicking Every Day

Unlike me, you could relax with the stolen wine.

Carolyn Mark – Open Season

the fêtes are full of frets when all the guests could be hosts

Dyke Drama – Tender Resignation

The landfills of love are overflowing, and my heart ain’t decomposing.

Treehorn – the Place Where I’m Calling From

On a hill in Jamaica Plain, I saw a band I’d never see again. And all the folks on that hill with me, Just as likely I’ll never see.

Lijadu Sisters – Horizon Unlimited

the fog out-blooms the azaleas on our way to school

Gina Birch – I Play My Bass Loud

I didn’t know how to be in a skate park Or watch a ska band Until I closed my eyes to listen And got made fun of

The Staples Singers / Curtis Mayfield – Let’s Do It Again

Every time I remember you Specks of resentment settle Like the thinnest snow, though thickly wet, At the fact that it’s only a memory

Rozi Plain – Prize

Been on the bench these beautiful days, meaning not participating, not on an actual bench, which would be nice.

Ashley Park – Nobody Broke Your Heart

All books should have a mirror on the inside back cover, as many baby books do, so you can glimpse yourself get lonelier.

Resting…

Yo La Tengo – Aselestine

What’s being woven with the cosmic cotton that appears to us as clouds and dust? I hope an oversized nightshirt, baseball sleeves, big enough for mankind’s knees.

John Convertino – Ragland

It doesn’t seem to be working out for you — using a violin to bow a cello — but I wasn’t around to see what else you tried

Janel Leppin – Ensemble Volcanic Ash

I can remember, as I grew taller, the feeling of my arms hugging higher and higher up your back, eventually over your shoulders, and now, just over. I love you. I love you.

Aaron Copland – He Got Game Motion Picture Soundtrack

you squeezed by me in the kitchen, beer imposing via your belly and your breath

Lara Rosseel – Hert

How long is the sky’s recovery after lightning? Because it takes my back a week to calm a spasm.

Lalo Schifrin – Mannix: Themes from the Original Score of the Paramount Television Show

you’d like to think it would take more than one punch to knock you out

Christine Fellows – Stuff We All Get

a week later, what’s the closest I can hope for…. …maybe a hot air balloon… to place me up amongst the last carbon you exhaled…

Donald Fagan – The Nightfly

Does numbness often arrive with guilt — like two new parents you never asked for?

Cassandra Jenkins & Suhail Yusuf Khan – Chale Jaana

and the next day, no less dead

Sea Level – Cats on the Coast

Clutching the water bottle you didn’t get to finish, hoping it was over before you had a chance to be scared

First National Yoga – Live

Performance from the First National Yoga book release show at the Wormhole in Gainesville FL on September 15, 2022. Filmed by Andrew Chadwick. Visuals by Magic Stylus. Other performers were Gustavo Rivera, AsleepZZZ, and Landforms, whose sets from that night are also available on the @ChadwickArchives YouTube channel.

Anna Butterss – Activities

We stop to watch the dance studio’s Revue under a tent On the soccer field Across from the church

Marlena Shaw – The Spice of Life

The night we realized our cat was dying, We made a stir-fry of zucchini, tomatoes, corn, and lima beans. It was a suffering succotash.

Caitlin Rose – CAZIMI

Wiping my daughter’s stuffy nose Is like reaching back in time To wipe my own Like old grapes on a new vine Like new eyes on mashed potatoes

Paul Baribeau – Grand Ledge

Reading in bed, weCrack our knuckles simultaneously —A jinx that earns one of us a soft punch to the gut

Franz Nicolay – New River

I wait in long lines for overpriced theater wine, but outside when we part, I’m certain any second the show’ll start

Siren Songs – demo 2011

I only ever found Lone Star beer in New England / I was lonely and paying double rent for the privilege

Pohgoh – du und ich

the burden of freedom is knowing we’ll have to try swing dancing again

Stanley Turrentine – Salt Song

White noise, blinds drawn, rocked to sleep to a Leonard Cohen song

Pony Camp – Pony Camp

wander until your hips horse me home at last

Fake Problems – How Far Our Bodies Go

In hell, phone screens never dim

Jeremy Ray & the Howdy Men – Above the Wreckage

During the hurricane We did our dancing In a doorframe

Levek – Look a Little Closer

like Ponce de Leon searching for lifelong coffee

Johanna Warren – Lessons for Mutants

There’s a fizz to the wine though I know it’s flat. My tongue’s usefulness cut in half.

Faces – A Nod’s As Good As a Wink… to a Blind Horse

racecar with a short muffler, handgun with a long silencer: a menu of American kindnesses

Shannen Moser – The Sun Still Seems to Move

How many years of treading water with white knuckles in an ocean with a bomb in each wave

Fuzzy – Fuzzy

Leave the office and walk from street food vendor to street food vendor throwing in an errand now and then

RL – Be True

You tell me you named your daughter Coraline because you love Tim Burton. Your ego is bound for a very peculiar death.

Palomar – Palomar III: Revenge of Palomar

To avoid plagiarism, you changed all your essay’s references to Lady Macbeth to Woman Macbeth.

Debut book available

Order Mike Ostrov’s First National Yoga, published by Sad Vacation Press!

Stella Donnelly – Flood

Every day since 2020, Distance and no guarantees. Your breath is drifting up to me, A Lazarus of normalcy.

Dikembe – Chicago Bowls

Most of the 90s actually happened in the 80s or the 2000s, like the New York you see in movies now mostly being Atlanta or Toronto.

The Mellos & Kaleo Jacobs – MJXSP

The 90s were like opening your mouth and having nothing to say — like a VHS box for a movie that was such a sure-fire hit they never even bothered to make it.

Ghost Shirt – Ghost Shirt

What’s the longest 2 fish in an fish tank will pretend to not notice each other?

Tony Shhnow – Reflexions

We shush our dishwasher like librarians. In one of the infinite universes it may wake the baby. And God forbid that universe is ours.

The Karl Hendricks Trio – For a While, It was Funny

I want to live long enough to seeThe president read a speech off their phoneLike an open mic poet without a printer

Wrecking Crew – Sedale Threat

Select the play-by-play announcers of your life: Steve “Snapper” Jones and a sandhill crane.

Sleepy Vikings – They Will Find You Here

Rolling the credits on your life, unsure if this has been the cold open or the whole feature.

Josienne Clarke – I Promised You Light

Facebook says my high-school crush is born-again exhausted, meanwhile I sleep in tongues

Ahmad Jamal – Jamal at the Penthouse

I nickname you pupik,which the internet says means bellybutton.But the internet is no Bubbie.

Florist – Florist

I’ll love you ’tilthe red storm of Jupiteris near enough to be named.

Phillip Glass – Mishima

At least this year our magnolia fought back a fungus, blossoms intermittent like patient fireworks

Flanger Magazine – After the Bend

Between moss strands in that finch nest is all that’s left of the syllabus I assigned myself.

The Blow – Brand New Abyss

You were wearing that grease all over town, I guess, and my shoulder was, for your slick brow, just the latest stop.

football, etc. – Visions

need a rest from trying and failing to rest

All Girl Summer Fun Band – Looking Into It

vacation was over before it began, schedule is short one long weekend

Now in convenient book form!!!

The short poetry published here can now take up real human space in your hands and on your bookshelves thanks to this beautiful collection, First National Yoga, published by Sad Vacation Press. Sad Vacation is a radical press operating out of Río Piedras, Puerto Rico, that has published writers including Salvador Villanueva, GK Bird, andContinue reading “Now in convenient book form!!!”

Katie Bejsiuk – The Woman on the Moon

By the time you feel better I’m a wreck in your wake Trading hangovers like yawns

The Shirley Scott Trio – Skylark

Never felt more neckless than under threat of your necklace.

Perennial – In the Midnight Hour

We no longer refer to our hugs as trips to the gun show. Deferentially, we now feed each other’s 24-inch pythons.

The Softies – It’s Love

Dead frog, tiara of flies, this heat will make crackers of us all

Grace Ives – Janky Star

ashes to ashes, bit to bit — can’t skip death like a a hip-hop album skit

Gaze – Shake the Pounce

Oyster cracker. Clams casino. Every moment is a handshake between us coming in and us going out.

Cal Folger Day – Piece-dye

study the arc of that girl lifting off her toboggan, put yourself between her and a birch in a Rochester I could never visit

Luke Doucet & the White Falcon – Blood’s Too Rich

Left alone so long that I’m the city’s problem — an invasive tree, some shade, no personality.

Ann Wilson – Fierce Bliss

A fear so stupid, shared by so few, but that casts such a long and deadly shadow — as if, say, all the people who’s favorite film is Farce of the Penguins had the right to smother my children’s children’s children and then pay senators to yell at me about it.