Bill Freind

Catalogue of the Emperor’s Attic

Haloed raconteurs, stainless. Dozens of amiable screenwriters.
The missing climactic gun battles, a harkening of Polaroids.
Thousand island dressing.
Spats, an autobiography of John Phillips Souza. Glockenspiels.
Reststops with futuristic architecture on obscure highways.
Boxes of supporting roles.
Grass, valleys, milkmaids, dirndls, PR firms, refrigerator magnets from the feed store.
That which could be redeemed in the dropping.
Rose food.
Sports legends.
Blueprints for a Sno-Cone franchise.
Sketch comics.
An angrying of clapboards by the diptych.
A Magic 8-Ball. Need machines.
Daytraders in the luxury boxes, any spliffing the controls to say no one.
A variety of negative impacts. God and unused maps. Putatives. Nostalgia bags.


Bill Freind lives in South Jersey and his work has appeared in Jacket, Combo, Lipstick Eleven, and others. His chapbook An Anthology was published by housepress [sic] in 1999.

Mark Yakich

[from PORNOCRACIES]



* * *



I feel like biting somebody


Against the bedpost
I know a lot of people like myself

Who like myself sometimes
But it's hopeless to

Split affairs into hair
Colors I'm always thinking about

The next porn and not
The porn I'm with

If I think about it
I would say that that

Is the key to my psychology
The perfect insertion

Can't be just one insertion
Everyone has lots of insertions

Inside of him or her
But I've never been

Inside of anyone
If you know what I mean

Then explain it
Back to me please



* * *



All day and a night


I'd like to yank down my pantalones
But what's the use of abusing

You when there's no give and take
Possible for the race of

White pages I know
If I want affection

I should go to the bank
And stand underneath the cameras

If I want a good meal with friends
I should call up mother and ask her

To watch TV with me long distance
Which isn't sad

It's technological
And even since she died I don't

Believe in life or death
Sentences or these words either



* * *



Hope lied about where it came from


Tee he he what else
Is in me but queer song

In the morning I eat a lot
Of apples with their tags still on

In the afternoon I might
Steal a leaf from the neighbor's

Tree and in the night
I might climb onto the garage

Roof to get a better view
Of the neighbor he has a lot

Of friends who bring him gifts
And sometimes they play

Loud music and sometimes
They sing and I sing

And sometimes sometimes
Separates the idea

Of dying from death
If and only if I'm able

To lie daily I'm able
To kill something that isn't me

Before it kills me
This is terrible that

I have to make such rhetorical
Turns sometimes that

Turn can turn into a tune
But not a very good one

The good ones move me
And that's a shame

Because I'm moved to sing



Mark Yakich is the reality behind markyakich.com.

Donald Illich

The Watch Counter

None of the clocks beneath the glass cases
show the same times. They're minutes off,

hours behind, seconds too late to witness
the correct number that's winning the race,

running ahead of thin, colored hands on
designer watches, jumping up and down

on black digital lights unable to keep up.
The salesman could spend all day fixing

the pieces, but then when would he think
about his wasted life, selling measurers

of his weeks waiting for customers to buy,
not just look; for women to show for dates

when they say they will, not cancel them;
for friends to call nights when he needs

to hear a voice, not slowly drift away,
so years add up without even a word.

Inside the display his ticking continues,
with each device only right once a day,

when the clerk puts on his brown jacket,
fishes out keys from his deep pockets,

and walks past automotive supplies,
electronics, and cosmetics to the exit

where the moon taps him on the shoulder,
and the stars tell him it's time to leave.


Donald Illich has published poems in The Iowa Review, Fourteen Hills, and New Zoo Poetry Review. He has poems forthcoming in several journals, including Passages North, Nimrod, LIT, The Sulphur River Literary Review, CrossConnect Magazine, Xavier Review, and Cold Mountain Review. He works as a writer in Rockville, Maryland. "The Watch Counter" is part of a series titled "Mall".