Poem: Neutral Ground

photo credit: Trevor Logan, Jr.

Neutral Ground

On the corner of Carrollton and Willow,
waiting for a bus, the # 34,
to be exact,
I sat on the neutral ground grass,
translating ancient Greek,
oblivious to the hatred.

A red boy and his friends,
in a pick-up truck,
stopped at the traffic light;
he spewed something my way —
knocked on my skull and dropped
among a soggy tootsie roll wrapper,
a bottle cap —

Vroom, like a cartoon,
You fucking bitch
and I merely turned to acknowledge
with a grin
and a greeting.

Not to turn the other cheek,
but out of habit.

I smiled, caught a glance
and turned back to my paperback

                    Greig Roselli

                    New Orleans, Louisiana

PDF Copy for Printing

Fiction Excerpt: Copy of a Novel Theme

I can remember him simply. We were sitting in the sand pits near the river; it was hot that day. He had let his hands rest on a rotten log for too long and red ants had bitten him. I was lucky the neighbor had something to soothe the itch; still, a smiling satyr, although replete suburbanite, full of questions, insistent in his resolve to wrest from me the magnificent solutions, the impossible answers, the raison d’etre of a human life, because he heard me talking about the inexplicable haunting of a man found dead in his car — of asphyxiation; turned on the ignition and let the engine run, attached a pipe to the exhaust, went through the trunk and wrapped it around through the back seat. A jogger had found his corpse days later. No one had noticed him missing. They were used to his threats of death. Why did he do it? I don’t know; I guess he wanted to die in a peaceful place … It’s hard, I thought to myself, to talk to him about this, not because I know the facticity of death, but because I don’t want him — I turn to see him — to die;  so impossible for this stone smoothed boy pregnant with vim, with generosity and ardor, as if talking about decay will somehow mollify an already implacable course into the imaginary.

Pray for the dead man, I say; pray for his family and friends.  He didn’t want to die but he had no other way out.

Extracted from "A novel I have yet to write"

image credit: Greig Roselli

PDF Copy for Printing

Media Art: "Red Marks"

If you look closely at the image I call "Red Marks" there is a human figure to be found. The story is I took this photograph in a normal manner circa 2003 or 2004. I don't remember exactly. I took it with Kodak color film and when I processed the film I stored away in my memory bank. It's basically an image of a man sitting in a chair in a sitting room (you can barely make out the wooden Venetian blinds behind his head). We had been sitting and chatting after dinner one night. I am purposely not revealing who the man is in the photograph for the sake of privacy — and also because my gut says it is more interesting to think of the image without any identifying markers, except a red mark.  Fast forward to 2010 — I scanned the original photograph and then used Photoshop to make the above image. Presto. Primo. What do you think? Leave a note in the comment box below.

PDF Copy for Printing

Photograph: "Lipstick Red Bloody Mary"

The reddest Bloody Mary can be consumed at Outback Steakhouse. I have no idea what they put in this drink to make it lipstick red, but I feel like I'm kissing someone's ruby lips when I drink it.

PDF Copy for Printing

Poem: "Obsession"

Even though I call him my sun-tanned god;
As he laughs and skates on the waves,
I slaughter him in my mind,
A ghastly howl of the knife,
A trickle of the divine
To bring together in my mind
Some semblance of sex and death —

I do this, I think,
Because am I a neurotic? —
many would agree.

Only because they do not allow such cruel thoughts.

But it is the only way to rid him from the contours:
the image in my mind that sticks,
sublime

PDF Copy for Printing

image credit: Jerome Park Reservoir, New York City

Prose Poem: "to leave"

to unsettle from place is fearful: fear eats the soul; they say face your fears, but isn’t place a barrier between us and our fears; a comforting worn thing set as a wall; for who really faces fears; except maybe the emigrant; moving away — but the death in facing back, like lot’s wife and her salt, or orpheus looking back — and I feel shame, like salt, and I feel evaporated … all those nice things I have come to like, to feel, I will have to give up so I can touch my belly again;

PDF Copy for Printing

Why David Remnick is My Hero (But I Don't Want to Emulate Him)

David Remnick, the editor for the New Yorker, and latest biographer of the 44th president, gets up at 5:30 AM to write, goes to work at one of the most eloquent magazines in the country, and still has a few minutes to spend time with family, go back to work, look good, be friends with Malcolm Gladwell - and he commutes by subway. I wish I could be him - but then, I think, maybe not. I don't desire editorial glamour (I'm not a Tina Brown wannabe) but, at least God, please give me a Remnick brain! I wanna write 2,000 words effortlessly.

PDF Copy for Printing