Offcourse Literary Journal
https://www.albany.edu/offcourse
http://offcourse.org
ISSN 1556-4975 


Five New Poems by David Kowalczyk.

 

 

Cepaceous

This word will pinch your nostrils.
It smiles like a cheap perfume.
It can frequently be found
day-dreaming about nuclear physics.
It has the face of a dying Republican.
It can dissect frogs with its eyes.
Its parents are Pierre Trudeau and Janis Joplin.
It bursts into tears while reading The New York Times.

 

 

Codswallop

 

This wonderful mutation of a word
is impeccably mad. 
It smiles like a moonbat.
Wild dreams orbit its skull.
Its eyes have slid out of their sockets.

“The dove must die before
the wolf is born,” it tells the children it meets.
“What is that supposed to mean?”  they reply.
“If you have to ask, you’ll never understand,”
codswallop whispers cavalierly.

Codswallop is the only child
of Sid Vicious and Jane Eyre.
It calls The Great Red Spot of Jupiter home.

 

 

Ort

 

This short and stooped word
has the snout of a malignant magirist.
Its brain is held together by
a slender slip of silver duct tape.
Its liver squirms like
an octopus in the Sahara.

Its heart is in a big glass jar
filled with urine, on display at
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.
Its parents are Maynard G. Krebs
and Little Orphan Annie.

 

 

Sarabande

 

This word grows more beautiful
with each breath it takes.
Its parents are Butch Cassidy
and Joan of Arc.
Left to its own devices, it
will eat paella for breakfast,
lunch, and dinner.

Its eyes are pure electricity.
They will slap your face.
Gently.

It has lips of burnt sienna.
Its smile is the Statue of Liberty.
Its heart is a bouquet
of Queen Anne’s lace.

Its soul is a happy star.

 

 

Sybaritic

 

This word has simple eyes,
and a simple heart.
It is swimming in ouzo.
It is a pine grove breeze,
and peonies about
to burst into bloom.
Ever since forever, it
has had long golden braids.

This word whistles at the stars.
Its smile is a hot rustle of roses.
It grows euphoric whenever
it watches “The Truman Show.”
Hearing or reading this word
is like having cold plums
fall upon your forearms.

Its parents are Billy the Kid
and Billie Holiday.

 

 

 

David Kowalczyk lives in the small cannery town of Oakfield, New York.  His poetry and fiction have appeared in seven anthologies and over one hundred magazines and journals scattered across the globe from Canada to Wales to Turkey to India. His most "accessible" anthologies (in terms of being able to find them in libraries) are "Bless Me, Father:  Stories of Catholic Childhood", edited by Amber Coverdale Sumrall and Patrice Vecchione, Plume Books, New York, 1994, and "Hunger Enough:  Living Spiritually in a Consumer Society", edited by Nita Penfold, Pudding House, Columbus, Ohio, 2004).  Other more obscure anthologies include "Still Waters" by Penhaligon Page, Wales, 1999, "Waging Words for Peace", Niagara River Press, Buffalo, 2004, and "The Maynard Anthology", Toronto, 2008. David's body of poetry can be viewed at www.poemhunter.com by typing in the name "David Kowalczyk" and clicking on the option, "search by poet".  Feel free to contact him at [email protected] .

David's work has appeared in Offcourse Issue 35, Six Poems

 David Kowalczyk

 

 

 

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