VOICEMAIL POEMS - "Charms" by Joseph S. Pete

"Charms" by Joseph S. Pete

02/05/18 • 1 min

All soldiers believe Charms in their MREs are foul luck, bad juju, more than just a dark talisman, a virtual death sentence. Patrols have been called off if some dirtbag private straight out of basic tested fate by peeling open a pack of the generic Jolly Ranchers knockoffs that bring nothing but doom. Everyone on the FOB heard stories about how Charms were a malediction that summoned malefactors who felled soldiers with sniper fire, mortar blasts and IED ambushes. Marines supposedly even once threw Charms at the enemy in a firefight to even skewed, candy-altered odds. That's why you never ingest Charms. That's why you cast them away theatrically, make a real show of it. That's why you have to observe the whole superstition. We all choke down MREs. That's a universal experience. Some have Charms; some don't. It's all chance. It's purely random, who's charmed or cursed by fate. Likewise, it makes no sense who randomly gets killed, maimed, blown up, torn apart, out there, outside the wire. There's no rhyme or reason behind which soldiers go down, who gets battlefield crosses with helmets, rifles, boots and dog tags, who succumbs to PTSD, traumatic brain injury, moral injury, any war wound. Maybe some stale, rotten hard candy could make sense of it all. Maybe Charms are just imbued a significance they never earned in a senseless chaos devoid of any meaning, in an abysmal void that invites lore. --------------------------------------- SUPPORT US ON PATREON: http://patreon.com/voicemailpoems http://voicemailpoems.org/guidelines http://facebook.com/voicemailpoems http://twitter.com/voicemailpoems http://voicemailpoems.org/thepodcast

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"whelp" (after aziza barnes) by zach blackwood

my head is full of blood steamed like latte foam pressing open the seams in my skull, burning through folds in my brain like a shot luge. my head is the generating station in the delaware river, developed into luxury condos with beds that fill the whole homes. my head is a smoking suite with smoke stains in the corners of the ceilings and the ice cubes smell like the smoke stains and that is disappointing in an expected way. and i'm laying in my underwear in every single bed, rolling and sighing in the sheets and taking notes how do i feel here what did i do here how was the bounce maybe a man is there smelling sweaty or like flat champagne sticky about the nape and i like to feel wanted or at least i like to be paid what i told that feeling i wanted. or at the very least, i'm shoveling black sand into some deficit, punching out, and watching the direct deposit cartwheel in at 3am. i am trying to convince everyone that this is what i do, i lay in the beds and turn inputs to outputs and i go out with my friends when i feel like they miss me and i make wry jokes about my own self-worth and my lonesomeness and they laugh and i write about the things that they laugh about in language opaque enough that i don't even feel it anymore. and i am naked looking out a big window in a luxury condo where my spirit is hung on a bamboo hanger like a bathrobe. of course it is the 4am hour where nothing is provocative any more. i read a magazine article in some design rag about the fire hydrant pumping station across the river. without it, they'd never have built the station or turned the station into condos. the fire would have burned in the middle of the river and the lights would all ball-gag themselves. i feel very bad for the factory. does he like to gorge himself in big sucks and swallows from the river just so that people can tap it from hundreds of holes miles away? --------------------------------------- SUPPORT US ON PATREON: http://patreon.com/voicemailpoems http://voicemailpoems.org/guidelines http://facebook.com/voicemailpoems http://twitter.com/voicemailpoems http://voicemailpoems.org/thepodcast

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"HI, I'M OVULATING" by Elysia Lucinda Smith

My mother calls them phases and maybe that's an accurate representation because they're lunar, edges of something, the kind of scrambling you do drunk in the dark. It's a lot of being drunk in the dark. I'm dying to discover myself and finally be cool. I'm smoking. I'm smoking hot. I'm a smoking gun. I went out one night and suffered through talking because I just wanted someone-anyone!- to fucking kiss me. The next day, I booty called Colin and took Jay home and kissed Emily and thought about kissing Jessica and I know I'm not falling in love with anyone but maybe just falling in love with touch? What is it when I dry hump the rug and watch porn and drink all the Elderflower Liquor in the cabinet? What is it when I let you make a home in the back of my throat? The thing is: I've got it all figured. Finally something to pass off as the truth. I'm just wrapped up in movement, in fingers wet hot small of my back smell like fir needles poking out of the snow. Touch me and touch you and it's a special thing. It's the only thing you fucking have. Do you hear me? --------------------------------------- SUPPORT US ON PATREON: http://patreon.com/voicemailpoems http://voicemailpoems.org/guidelines http://facebook.com/voicemailpoems http://twitter.com/voicemailpoems http://voicemailpoems.org/thepodcast