Mark Cunningham

[specimen]

The golden age: the infant yawned and immediately fell over. For twenty years, I've been afraid of having an in-grown toenail, and I've never had one; fear itself is a preventative. Fuse, indicating an explosion any second now. Her solipsism was more interesting than mine. The darkest room in the darkest night: still you can tell where the curtain is open.

[specimen]

The light in the living room was late winter; in the kitchen it was spring. He said his sister used to be Scottish. The universe is a system of non-simultaneous events: I check the towel to see if I’m bleeding. He edged up, edged up, then didn't go when the light turned green.

[specimen]

First day of open windows: if "an inch of music is an inch and a half of dust," I just swept nearly a foot of Mozart off the wood floor. The teacher said "When people lower their voice as I'm doing now, what is being said is usually very, very important," and someone in the back called "louder!" The horse's winter coat was plush as a velvet painting.

[specimen]

I kept repeating "I can do it" until my throat got sore and I couldn't talk any more. The subtitles translated "Ay, Chihuahua," but not the lyrics of the song. The child guessed again at the answer and I told her she was getting colder and she started to shiver.

Mark Cunningham's poems are in recent or forthcoming issues of Practice, BlazeVox, and Dusie. Tarpaulin Sky Press will be bringing out his book tentatively titled Body Language, while Otoliths will be bringing out a book titled 80 Beetles.