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The Myology of Mose.

July 1, 2019 by Exangel

by Brendan Hamilton.

Collage poem composed from a 19th century joke book and a myology guide to ravens

a spree wouldn’t be a spree if Mose wasn’t thar
having completely and carefully plucked the Sun
Mose spits in your bowl
and the soup does not hiss

open the mouth to its full extent
pry ponderous jaws
where small and slender tendon
surrounds the periphery of the ear-conch
a triangular form, found at a tavern
covers the mandibular articulation
in which fashion imprisons men’s necks
O Syksey! don’t you cry

raise the feathers of the chest
where a body can get rich
see, if Music were the food of Love
Mose be a fellow whose mother
weaned him on Salt Fish
some dirt-face boy in Canal street
nothing but his boots to shelter him
–Guns and Bludgeons–
a plucky Dragoon
counterfeiting the flexor
the large quill-butts of the pinion, or tail
long as a pumpkin vine

carry an incision through the shore
Mose and his ship-load of mintdrops
are volunteers of the Machine
one flocking cosmopolitan family of birds
drain the rivers dry
an old chap in Hackensack
Lennox is flummoxed he getteth a sight
fibres of muscle pass directly o’er worldly pelf
the humerus being raised by its contraction
Pistols and Bowie Knives, Red Shirts and big Hats
a marked tendency to ossify Dame Justice
the forearm of the Raven bends

a beautiful pair of muscles exist in the Raven
upon which Mose has bestowed
a suitable name
spelling out Lize in the Golden Sands, with a diamond period
it depresses the humerus

reflect the flap, the skin laid open
Goslings, Gold, and Glory
parafornalie of vertebral economy
everybody here knows Mose
eyes big as sarsers
Mose exerts the Sun’s
forked fibres O yes he did
toward the radial margin
his tendinous head could lick any man
laps cool punch, blackstrap,
brandy smash and cobbler
over cartilaginous plate
–graceless wagabone!
a man’s foot cut off by a shadow
horny sheath of the bill
but nothing to put up the spout


Sources:

The Ball of Yarn. New York: Cozans, 1854.

Shufeldt, Robert W. The Myology of the Raven (Corvus Corax Sinuatus): a Guide to the Study
of the Muscular System in Birds. London and New York: MacMillan, 1890.

Filed Under: EAP: The Magazine, Summer 2019: Eternity or Bust.

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In This Issue.

  • Who Was Dorothy?
  • Those Evil Spirits.
  • The Screaming Baboon.
  • Her.
  • A Tale of Persistence.
  • A Conversation with Steve Hugh Westenra.
  • Person Number Twelve.
  • Dream Shapes.
  • Cannon Beach.
  • The Muse.
  • Spring.
  • The Greatness that was Greece.
  • 1966, NYC; nothing like it.
  • Sun Shower.
  • The Withering Weight of Being Perceived.
  • Broken Clock.
  • Confession.
  • Francis Coppola’s Apocalypse.
  • Sometimes you die, I mean that people do.
  • True (from “My Life with Dogs”).
  • Fragmentary musings on birds and bees.
  • 12 Baking Essentials to Always Have in Your Poetry.
  • Broad Street.
  • A Death in Alexandria.
  • My Forked Tongue.
  • Swan Lake.
  • Long Division.
  • Singing against the muses.
  • Aphorisms from “What Remains to Be Said”.

In The News.

That cult classic pirate/sci fi mash up GREENBEARD, by Richard James Bentley, is now a rollicking audiobook, available from Audible.com. Narrated and acted by Colby Elliott of Last Word Audio, you’ll be overwhelmed by the riches and hilarity within.

“Captain Sylvestre de Greybagges is your typical seventeenth-century Cambridge-educated lawyer turned Caribbean pirate, as comfortable debating the virtues of William Shakespeare, Isaac Newton, and compound interest as he is wielding a cutlass, needling archrival Henry Morgan, and parsing rum-soaked gossip for his next target. When a pepper monger’s loose tongue lets out a rumor about a fleet loaded with silver, the Captain sets sail only to find himself in a close encounter of a very different kind.

After escaping with his sanity barely intact and his beard transformed an alarming bright green, Greybagges rallies The Ark de Triomphe crew for a revenge-fueled, thrill-a-minute adventure to the ends of the earth and beyond.

This frolicsome tale of skullduggery, jiggery-pokery, and chicanery upon Ye High Seas is brimming with hilarious puns, masterful historical allusions, and nonstop literary hijinks. Including sly references to Thomas Pynchon, Treasure Island, 1940s cinema, and notable historical figures, this mélange of delights will captivate readers with its rollicking adventure, rich descriptions of food and fashion, and learned asides into scientific, philosophical, and colonial history.”

THE SUPERGIRLS is back, revised and updated!

supergirls-take-1

In The News.

Newport Public Library hosted a three part Zoom series on Visionary Fiction, led by Tod.  

And we love them for it, too.

The first discussion was a lively blast. You can watch it here. The second, Looking Back to Look Forward can be seen here.

The third was the best of all. Visions of the Future, with a cast of characters including poets, audiobook artists, historians, Starhawk, and Mary Shelley. Among others. Link is here.

In the News.

SNOTTY SAVES THE DAY is now an audiobook, narrated by Last Word Audio’s mellifluous Colby Elliott. It launched May 10th, but for a limited time, you can listen for free with an Audible trial membership. So what are you waiting for? Start listening to the wonders of how Arcadia was born from the worst section of the worst neighborhood in the worst empire of all the worlds since the universe began.

In The News.

If you love audio books, don’t miss the new release of REPORT TO MEGALOPOLIS, by Tod Davies, narrated by Colby Elliott of Last Word Audio. The tortured Aspern Grayling tries to rise above the truth of his own story, fighting with reality every step of the way, and Colby’s voice is the perfect match for our modern day Dr. Frankenstein.

In The News.

Mike Madrid dishes on Miss Fury to the BBC . . .

Tod on the Importance of Visionary Fiction

Check out this video of “Beyond Utopia: The Importance of Fantasy,” Tod’s recent talk at the tenth World-Ecology Research Network Conference, June 2019, in San Francisco. She covers everything from Wind in the Willows to the work of Kim Stanley Robinson, with a look at The History of Arcadia along the way. As usual, she’s going on about how visionary fiction has an important place in the formation of a world we want and need to have.

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