visual art
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Privilege – Ali
privilege as sharp cheddar cheese bright orange almost everyone can see special category and status ingredients of all sorts so special it is mixed and matched in fine dining eat at places that came with cushion toilet seats Dolores Heights, Marina or Pacific Heights filling food fabulous delights $24.99 a plate easy peasy mac’n cheese…
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you (me, us) – Eddy Funkhouser
I just learned about you but you’ve become my shadow your assault in the image of mine influenced by my experience I was unaware of your existence but your ordeals were mine before they were yours not to be possessive— as much as I don’t want to share the trauma, I’m here to share the…
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Getting Out – Helen Head
Finding friendship in the woods of North Carolina Safety I stood at the water pump. Everyone else had their lunch in hand, sitting or squatting on old wooden logs. I looked down at my red plastic shoes labeled 37 and in a moment they were off and I was sprinting away as fast as my…
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Renaming This Life – Anita Kline
This is not a march she says. This is a walk, each step a prayer. Her words a kind reminder in the voice of the ancestors who knew the earth as Mother, the sky as Father. This re-emerging language of native friends who spot a sinuous cloud crossing the face of Grandmother Moon and call…
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For Kindness – Kati Spitz
To know having You must first have lost Walked past the grocery store carts full of food While counting the pennies in your pocket To buy eggs you hope will keep everyone full for the rest of the week To appreciate a Thanksgiving table Piled high with green bean casserole First you must Have gone…
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Unrequited Heart Athletics – Helen Dannenberg
O.K. Heart It’s time to shape up It’s over now, ended Stop hurting Stop aching Let Ms. Brain earn her keep and Direct the show Let go dependence Loosen need away Figure out how to tame the Fanged lion of loneliness Heart Keep that bopping beat While Ms. Brain gets organized Skin Cells Try Amnesia…
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Libertad – Eric Imperiale
This night, like every night, Angelina stands at her kitchen table in the light of a bare bulb, cutting leftover bread into small squares. Her long black hair is neatly wrapped in a bun, like a little hat on the top of her head. A silver cross, hanging from the brown leather neck, glimmers with…
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Rousted at Civic Center – Thomas A. E. Hesketh
Rousted at Civic Center As leaves from fallen lives Delivered from their thought trees Gracing the morning moist sidewalks of despair Between the monuments of culture: Civic Center’s Main Library And the Asian Art Museum, alike solemn Bastions of the tax base Encamped against the barrier wall Itself holding stacks of books in and the…
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Popcorn – William Petersen
One night after work I asked her if she wanted to go for a drink. I hadn’t slept with her yet but it was looking pretty likely. But nothing had to happen, I liked her well enough just to hang out. While we were in the bar she recognized a waiter she used to work…
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swamp monster – Eddy Funkhouser
when it happens in 2009 you wonder you wonder if it was quite right quite appropriate quite consensual being drunk being reckless not physically resisting you must have consented you tamp it all way down bury the monster with mounds of sex (definitely consensual sex) (definitely bad sex) the legality changes in 2013 the federal…
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