swifts  &  s l o w s · a quarterly of crisscrossings

Clabsd Plums & others
John M. Bennett & C. Mehrl Bennett

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Face Keys

My face is swollen before dawn
Soon I will be born in a shoe
I will sleep until the afterbirth
Walks off with the morning dew

My first word, found in a pocket
Was my tsal word, backsdrow;
“Step this sway”, they said,
Then said silence & opened my ears

Finding a vase under the chair
Was losing a face under the stare
I tied flowers to the chair for a hat
I grew fingers in my hair for a cat

Your faucet rose bled down my leg
Filling the pockets of my knees
Emptying my arms of bones
I replaced them all with bloody keys

Clabsd Plums

Foldno chumb clabsd
Heep slabnor trodt EK

UK Trotsky folds chimps
US Posts hanging chads

Drungk slold en habbner clungk
Sodo flamber splots, maest teng

Leopards drinking in the harbor
Are losing their spots, without pAIN

Blingks nand glore ¡o gloire et plumes!
Usse an tard if chains of clocks

Egor blanks at glorious plums,
Causing a delay q;st ack shay dwgk

Foot Slap

(slap a flap) feel the grain
Your hand’s a ghost again
Hidden in pocket but thumb

Was gun & dripping faucet
Left a trail for police
A salad on the path atl least

Hunger lines my jawbone
Flaking in the smoky wind
Leather shoes dry on the line

Your foot was chewn away
So walk upside down on hands
Or tongue you split 3 ways

“It’s not a race”, said the turtle
But it is an ecar (last nor low)
My left ear chaws the silence

Right you’ve knotted shoe and ear
Store your gun under his shell
The light is grey & your mouth hell

Punch at the Door?

No – Police!
FAN MOOM
insults hail hand roping
hand hand of the other
laff a gory snout barrel

Blond fan for long spleen
GUTS IN A SPOON
bet choice
bit his yard
dings grappling

…vast start…
STARING a FACT
blue flag
grin & fart

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John M. Bennett has published over 400 books and chapbooks of poetry and other materials. He has published, exhibited and performed his word art worldwide in thousands of publications and venues. He was editor and publisher of LOST AND FOUND TIMES (1975-2005), and is Founding Curator of the Avant Writing Collection at The Ohio State University Libraries. Richard Kostelanetz has called him “the seminal American poet of my generation”. His work, publications, and papers are collected in several major institutions, including Washington University (St. Louis), SUNY Buffalo, The Ohio State University, The Museum of Modern Art, and other major libraries. His PhD (UCLA 1970) is in Latin American Literature. His latest books are Select Poems, Poetry Hotel Press/Luna Bisonte Prods, 2016; The World of Burning, Luna Bisonte Prods, 2017; Poemas visuales, con movimientos con ruidos con combinaciones (with Osvaldo Cibils), Deep White Sound, 2017; Olas Cursis, Luna Bisonte Prods, 2018, Sesos Extremos, Luna Bisonte Prods, 2018; Dropped in the Dark Box, Luna Bisonte Prods, 2019; Leg Mist, Luna Bisonte Prods, 2019; and OJIJETE, Luna Bisonte Prods, 2020. He is co-editor, with Geoffrey D. Smith, of two works by William S. Burroughs: Everything Lost: The Latin American Notebook of William S. Burroughs; and William S. Burroughs’ “The Revised Boy Scout Manual”: An Electronic Revolution; both published by The Ohio State University Press.
John M. Bennett Poetry→

C. Mehrl Bennett is an artist living in Columbus OH with poet spouse, John M. Bennett, whom she met via the mailart network. Her media includes junk assemblings, digital art, collage/drawing/painting, poetry, visual poetry, short songs, performance events, mailart (handmade books, artistamp sheets & rubberstamp carving, flux related ephemera, archiving, network activities), video and audio recordings. She is book designer/ associate editor (with JMB) of publishing imprint Luna Bisonte Prods.
lulu.com/spotlight/lunabisonteprods
cmehrlbennett.wordpress.com/