SurVision Magazine
An
international online magazine that
publishes Surrealist poetry
in English.
Issue Six
F.J. BERGMANN
Lesser Eternity
Yesterday afternoon lasted forever, or so
it seemed. The sea became a thick jelly.
We cut it into cubes and built quivering blue
contraptions, but they refused to take us where
we wanted to go. Our vestigial desires abandoned us
to more painful ruminations. When we looked into
the large end of the telescope, they instantly shrank
to electrified needles. The clouds dimpled
and went dark. Our offspring were gone
in a heartbeat. Thud-thud.
The Apostrophe Thief
At first, I just got sick of of seeing it's
as the possessive. Then, in the middle of the night,
mysterious gaps appeared on neighborhood mailboxes
that said The Roger's. I'd go through the newspaper
and put big red circles around misplaced punctuation.
As I saw grammatical and spelling errors proliferating,
taking dumbing-down to a new level of incompetence,
I became more inclusive: misused flares and flairs,
compliments and complements. Principals listing
there principle goals on PTA meeting handouts.
Alrite. Congradulations. I took felt-tip markers
to doctors' waiting-rooms and corrected magazines
assiduously while waiting for diagnoses. Other errors
became evident as well; I had to intervene.
Entire billboards advertising cigarettes went blank
except for the brand and the Surgeon General's warning.
Certain political candidates' campaigns were transformed
into nothing more than injunctions to Vote or Make.
Coins said only We Trust. All that was left
of the Patriot Act were pronouns, prepositions,
and a few words with their apostrophes correctly placed.
In the Can
It's sorta like this, or so they say.
Don't look at them cross-eyed, though;
that really flutters their shirttails.
Long yellow ones, yup. Sometimes
they'll sneak out on the roof at night
and signal. With a lot of stuff
we can't hear or see, what else.
Well, I did try to warn you but
by the time I got around to it
you were already half-eaten.
I figured temporal revision was no use
at that point, so I got out the ketchup
and the Thai peanut sauce.
You wouldn't believe what they did
to our nice white tablecloth.
You might say I took risks,
but you might also say I know how
to manipulate those little creeps,
great big fangs or not. Make 'em
lemonade where a sun don't shine.
When life hands you it. Edification.
Whatsit. Thing. Know what I mean.
F. J. Bergmann is from Wisconsin. She edits poetry for mobiusmagazine.com Her work appears in Abyss & Apex, Analog, Asimov's, etc. Her chapbook, A Catalogue of the Further Suns, won the 2017 Gold Line Press poetry chapbook contest and the 2018 SFPA Elgin Chapbook Award.
