Tag Archives: love

Turandot

Posted on April 8, 2024 by Mark Kerstetter

1 Aches and cries born in blood rise with the moon. Shouts and sobs give way to silent tears. Liù appears, faithful to a smile. Calàf knowing and not knowing her love in the moon’s silence, Unmoved by death or … Continue reading →

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Mystery Train

Posted on February 14, 2024 by Mark Kerstetter

How will I know you when I see you? Will you recite my rehearsed thoughts or will a caress be my shakedown? Desperation drives this train, a mind on departure and no known goal, ticketless out of the gate of … Continue reading →

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Robert Vaughan’s Askew

Posted on April 8, 2022 by Mark Kerstetter

ASKEW: not in a straight or level position: her hat was slightly askew | the door was hanging askew on one twisted hinge. wrong; awry: the plan went sadly askew | the judging was a bit askew. I probably know … Continue reading →

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The most interesting book I read this year

Posted on December 14, 2021 by Mark Kerstetter

was published in 1979: The Sadeian Woman by Angela Carter. I’ve been a fan of hers ever since I stumbled upon a copy of The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman in a used bookstore many years ago. The Sadeian … Continue reading →

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A New Reading of John Ashbery’s Three Poems

Posted on May 4, 2021 by Mark Kerstetter

A CLEAN COPY There are books that fall on you like a building. You’ve survived but you’ll never forget where you were standing when it happened. I was 25 when I read John Ashbery’s Three Poems, about to turn 26. … Continue reading →

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A Lacan villanelle

Posted on July 11, 2018 by Mark Kerstetter

There Is No Speech Without a Reply Language functions not to inform but evoke Like it or not, the symptom is a metaphor There is no speech without a reply Full speech is not a question of reality, but of … Continue reading →

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Falling in love with a poem

Posted on April 16, 2018 by Mark Kerstetter

Have you ever? And without being sure why (and half wishing not to know why)? I’m falling in love with a Frank O’Hara poem, untitled (unless you consider “Poem” a title), written circa 1950 when the poet was in his … Continue reading →

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Georges Bataille: Improvisation Within a Field of Contradictions

Posted on March 26, 2018 by Mark Kerstetter

…. two movements…. One’s in harmony with nature; the other questions it. We can’t do away with either. [109 Guilty by Georges Bataille]* “We do not have the right to wish for a single state. We have to desire to … Continue reading →

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Prayer for Tomorrow

Posted on December 6, 2017 by Mark Kerstetter

Monday morning, 9:30 your life will change —from Prayer for Tomorrow, the first poem of my chapbook, One Step: prayers and curses. On the 12th of this month it will be exactly one year ago. I was at work when … Continue reading →

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My Love and the Catfish

Posted on September 20, 2017 by Mark Kerstetter

Mirror, Crescent and Round Lakes, though little more than decorated retention ponds, made three, and Tampa Bay drew the fourth line: boxed in. Lake dwellers now, we walked block after block seeing everything house-shaped. I wondered, will I ever be … Continue reading →

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