New piece: "⭢clean_slide"

'He’d seen her around, on the ship. She liked to sing as she worked, soldering the panels. It was an old song, low and sad, from before the war. '

stygian-muse.com/%e2%ad%a2cle...

The sun is low but its heat remains,

radiating from the flagstones

into the humid air—

a visitor from the tropics—

sweat pooling

in the small of my back

while many false suns

shimmer on the dark stone,

cast from the mirrored blue surface

of an office building.

stygian-muse.com/the-west/

New poem: "Final Instructions"

'I wake.

The traffic noise

bleeds through the walls

and the sun, low in the sky,

sinks behind buildings.

Bangkok.'

stygian-muse.com/final-instru...

New poem: "Side Effects"

'The screen shows a box of medication

above lines of small script.

The voice says “Azartane. Side effects may include dizziness, nausea, confusion, and semantics.”'

stygian-muse.com/side-effects/

New poem: "Ritual"

'The bowl is filled with ash.

The ash holds the incense.

The incense turns to ash.

Your ashen hair.'

stygian-muse.com/ritual/

Terminal Reflection - counter/field In the quiet of a late terminal, small movements and reflections no longer align as they should.

New poem: "Terminal Reflection"

'I move along the quiet concourse

toward the darkened food court,

the terrazzo floor catching a faint sheen

under the after-hours lighting.'

stygian-muse.com/terminal-ref...

The clinical register holds as long as it can, until the unfiltered voice breaks through.

Sine Qua Non - counter/field In the quiet machinery of a hospital room, breath becomes the only measure that matters. Monitors, pressure, oxygen, and a single circle of light hold the body in place while language begins to break ...

New poem: "Sine Qua Non"

'It is the reason the lungs

heave, why the heart

squeezes a turbulence into the arteries,

what the brain bends itself

toward, and craves

above all else,

the sine qua non of life

and thought.'

stygian-muse.com/sine-qua-non/

I feel the same. There is a place for intensity as well as precision in writing poetry. it depends on the piece you're writing, I suppose.

Thanks for sharing this; it’s always interesting to hear where people are reading from.

The aim for this piece was to let observation taper into unease without announcing the transition.

stygian-muse.com/basement-lev...

New Poem: "Basement Level Two"

'My footsteps echo before

the drone absorbs them, and

they are gone.'

stygian-muse.com/basement-lev...

Links in bio

I wrote this one by stacking menace onto stillness until it moved.

stygian-muse.com/the-last-bus/

It's funny how titles can echo differently for people. Thanks for sharing this: dreams pick strange moments to speak. And don't worry, I won't get on the bus!

Thanks!! I like it too.

New Poem: "The Last Bus"

'Something in me

contracts and

the dark along the edges

of light seems wider.'

stygian-muse.com/the-last-bus/

#poetry #stillness #night

counter/field: poems, prose, and observations.

One unexpected thing about running a poetry blog is seeing where readers appear from. Yesterday it was Ukraine. Today it was Costa Rica. Poems travel in odd ways.

Thanks, Michael; I'm glad you liked it!

On Attention: Vale Ellen Bryant Voigt - counter/field “Ruthless attention,” Voigt called it — the discipline to see what is there and what is not. Whether describing a difficult scene or a troubling interior state, she believed accuracy itself could be a...

New reflection: On Attention — Vale Ellen Bryant Voigt.
A short essay on precision, discipline, and what syntax can teach about seeing.

stygian-muse.com/on-attention...

#poetry #craft #EllenBryantVoigt #writing

Field Notes between Storms - counter/field If you enjoyed ‘After the Storm’, you might like Day-Possum, Morning River Notes, or A Tiny Deity. They all involve observation and a positive emotional turn. Here’s something I wrote as a craft exerc...

New post: "Field Notes Between Storms"
It contains a new poem: 'Goanna' (no, it's not about goannas, but there's one in it). Also, there are a couple of links, and a subscriber update.
#poetry #update #collage
stygian-muse.com/field-notes-...

Thanks, Robin!

Hey, thanks, Pedro. That storm had a bit of swagger and menace, I have to say. Cheers!

Cheers, Brad! I checked your blog out and liked it. Thanks for the repost!

After the Storm - counter/field A poem set in the afternoon heat, where humidity climbs and the sky darkens. A bank of pewter cloud muscles across the horizon from the south. Wind rises through the square as a man begins strange ges...

A new poem: "After the Storm"

'The sky is released and changed. An orange haze rises

from the horizon to blend with the delicate violet-blue

of now-quiescent clouds and a single crow flies south

to north.'

#poetry #stillness #ritual

Read the full poem here: stygian-muse.com/after-the-st...

The Oars, Forgotten - counter/field An observational poem: rowers adrift mid-river, oars forgotten, a magpie watching in the afternoon stillness.

Here's a quiet poem from the archive: "The Oars, Forgotten".

'The grass is rough underfoot as I sit in

an old lawn chair by the river. Birdsong

swells: mynahs, harsh crows, and the peep,

peep of a river-bird I cannot see.'

#poetry #stillness #observation

stygian-muse.com/the-oars-for...

Yeah man pretty amazing movie on many levels. Let us not forget Chappie while were at it.

Hey man, I've seen your reposts and I think it's me who should be doing the thanking. But you know what they say: never mind the bollocks.

I revisited a local spot of great sadness recently and took notes. Twice. I now have one good line and a resonant metaphor that I don't know what to do with. I'm unsure whether that place haunts me or if it's actually the other way around.

#poetry #writing

The Beforetimes - counter/field In the cooking room, the kettle begins to sing, and her voice answers — calling a name I no longer trust belongs to me.

After stillness comes strangeness.

'I heard her in the next room but

when I walked in, she

wasn’t there there

were only echoes.'

Poem: "The Beforetimes"

#poetry #poetrycommunity #stillness #surreal
stygian-muse.com/the-beforeti...

Indeed! She's a very good girl.