Art

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‘Childproofing’ by Stephanie Ellis Schlaifer, 2013 Augury Poetry Finalist

Photo by Dave Bledsoe, FreeVerse Photography

Childproofing

Stephanie Ellis Schlaifer

i.

My mother is reading a book

entitled The Fearful Child,

and in-between pages 57 & 58,

there is a tiny yellow sticky labeled STEPHANIE.

 

I am the section of the chapter subtitled

“Overactive Imagination, Underactive Reasoning.”

 

Apparently,

I am abnormal.

I have been

found out.

 

It is disappointing

to find that

I have not been mentioned in the forward.

 

Just the same,

my mother has penned me in.

 

The book was neatly blanketed

by A Special Issue

of Martha Stewart Living

lying underneath the nightstand

near the Better Homes and Gardens

Family Medical Guide.

 

One morning I found a kitchen knife

wedged between

the mattress and the box spring.

 

It is easier to be anthologized

than really in the dark.

 

I can make a doily from a tourniquet

from the queen Charisma sheets.

 

Somewhere there is an artist

commissioned to illustrate an erection,

trench mouth and Nasturtium;

harelips, epileptic,

Convallaria majalis,

pinworms and

 

an itchy anus,

common,

accidental death;

 

I like to read

what my mother is reading:

fragrant, wide flowers.

 

ii.

Occasionally, we have company

over. They ask, “Why

do you have babies

in the basement?

 

It is odd—

they scratch so at the door.”

 

My mother kept us there

when we were little.

I turned out okay.

 

I let the cats out.

 

Our two Maine Coons

live in a room

beneath the kitchen.  The basement, Stephanie.

A finished basement.

 

Correction: we keep our cats in the basement.

 

It is frightening

to go either up or down stairs.

They are beginning to sound

human—like us.

 

iii.

Something in the paint

becomes a hospital;

the leaded cream

embalms

a private bone

black molding

certifies against

the mirrors

and their nook,

hanging here

before the desk,

before the desk, the Askins’ window—

no one ever writes without a chair,

I ruined it I think, watering

the Bonsai, that someone

loved me for.

 

iv.

If you want to watch TV

you can watch

 

the news: people say

Southeast Atlanta

police say: a woman

 

in her home;

a man:

survived: her

husband is:

 

everyone

on the news is:

off JimmyCarterBoulevard;

sent to Grady

 

He was:

in the closet

for three days:

 

she hadn’t vacuumed;

he raped her:

I’d’ve heard:

 

:what the neighbors said

 

in a quiet:

 

brought in,

died.

 

Stephanie Ellis Schlaifer is originally from Atlanta, GA, and works as an artist and freelance editor in St. Louis, MO, where she co-curates the Observable Readings series. She has an MFA in poetry from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and her poems have appeared AGNI (forthcoming), Verse, Colorado Review, Chicago Review, Cimarron Review, Fence, and Verse Daily, among others. Stephanie is a compulsive baker and also very handy with a pitchfork. “Childproofing” previously appeared in Delmar.

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‘Wednesday’ by 2013 Poetry Finalist Tina Schumann

Photo by Dave Bledsoe, FreeVerse Photography

Wednesday

by Tina Schumann

Today I sat at my desk. Moved
a few books around. Thought of my demise.
Wrote a letter to a friend’s mother
thanking her for the Longfellow;
she’d heard I was a poet and naturally assumed.
I ate when my body said eat.
I drank water – cold and slick
it slipped down my throat.
I waited for the mailman
to walk up the steps. I heard his start
and stop, the lift and lowering
of the lid, the sharp turn of his boots
on dry leaves. I waited and he came.
I listened and he left. He and I
and the crows and the UPS man
and the kid down the street with the basketball
are all figures moved by instinct and need,
obligation, desire, and boredom. But I digress.
I picked the glass up, set the glass down,
stood up, walked the floor, looked out the window,
cursed the grass, and thought, thought, thought.
– never fully dormant, never fully engaged.
And all the while this is what the sign around my neck said:
If it rattles like a person than it is a person.

Tina Schumann’s work was a finalist in the National Poetry Series and Tupelo Press listed her full manuscript as a “remarkable work,” in their 2012 open submission period. Her chapbook “As If” (Split Oak Press) was awarded the Stephen Dunn Poetry Prize for 2010 and in 2011 her work received a Pushcart nomination. She holds an MFA from Pacific Lutheran University and her work has appeared in various publications and anthologies including The American Poetry Journal, Ascent, Cimarron Review, Crab Creek Review, Harpur Palate, PALABRA, PARABOLA, Poemeleon, Raven Chronicles, San Pedro River Review, The Midwest Quarterly, and The Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine.

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Augury Books’ Fiction Publication Will Be ‘The Family Cannon’ by Halina Duraj

Look for ‘The Family Cannon’ new from seller Augury Books

 

 

 

Photo by: Amanda Noyes

Hello friends and fellow lovers of the arts. We were amazed and overwhelmed by the quality of your work; an ardent and sincere thank you goes out to all of you who trusted us with your manuscripts.

Halina Duraj

We are pleased to announce that we have selected Halina Duraj’s The Family Cannon as our inaugural short story collection.

Halina Duraj’s stories have appeared in The Sun, The Harvard Review, Fiction, Witness, and other journals and have been recommended for PEN/O’Henry and Pushcart prizes. In 2012, she was a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award finalist and a writer-in-residence at Hedgebrook. She has an MA in creative writing from the University of California, Davis, and a PhD in creative writing from the University of Utah, where she served as a fiction co-editor for Quarterly West. Halina teaches literature and fiction writing at the University of San Diego.

We would also like to recognize the short story collections of our six finalists:

Adam Weinstein — From the New Technical Manual of Use

Hall Cary — Delaware and Other Places of Mind

Dan Moreau — A Tour of North American Ruins

Ellen Campbell — Contents Under Pressure

Sara Lippmann — Doll Palace

Eleanor Swanson — Exiles and Expatriates

Thank you to our finalists and everyone who submitted during our reading period. Please help us welcome Halina aboard at Augury Books.  Leave a comment, follow this blog, or simply “Like”!

—Augury Books

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More From 2012 Editors’ Prize Finalist Nicholas Hite

Photo by: Dave Bledsoe of FreeVerse Poetry

His name really is Paul

Paul,

you were

a courtesy,

like hotel pillowmints

from God’s right hand:

like Jesus Christ

were a beautiful Hispanic maid.

&Paul,

you will recall

there was a period of time

in which I was

afraid of staircases and elevators;

for six months I lived my life horizontally;

I wish that time had been now

and that it had been you instead of me.

Paul,

the last time

you came home,

I hugged you

and for a moment,

I could feel the size of you.

I contained the entirety of your smallness.

________________________________________________________________________________________

Augury Introduces: Nicholas Hite is a 28-year-old attorney living in New Orleans with his vegan boyfriend, their blue-eyed dog, and a pet crawfish.

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VIDA Interview: Augury Founder Kate Angus on Aesthetic Diversity

Photo by Dave Bledsoe, FreeVerse Photography

Just in time for the end of our reading period (5 days left, folks!), our own Kate Angus talks to VIDA’s Melinda Wilson about the issue of diversity and bias in the literary arts while also addressing the principles that have shaped Augury since its inception. Here’s a little teaser from the interview:

What we want more than anything is to publish more titles—the more books we can send out into the world, the greater statistical likelihood that they will reflect the multiplicity of personal experience and aesthetic range that we are interested in. —Kate Angus

Read the whole interview in VIDA’s Editor’s Corner here: http://www.vidaweb.org/editors-corner-10-kate-angus-for-augury-books

In the meantime, it is NOT TOO LATE send us your poetry manuscripts or short fiction collections on Augury’s Submissions Page. Get in under the wire before our reading period closes at 11:59 p.m., June 30, 2013.

Enjoy!

—Augury Books

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Another by Augury Finalist Nicholas Hite: "Not an oubliette but similar"

Photo by: Dave Bledsoe, FreeVerse Photography

Photo by: Dave Bledsoe, FreeVerse Photography

 

Not an oubliette but similar

 

The times the men of the family used to

go deep sea fishing in the Gulf

& the other times they went

camping on small islands in Minnesota:

the times that I grew fiercely aware of my penis

& what it was supposed to mean

between my legs there flaccid like a wet sock

but I knew from talk around campfires with cousins

that it was to one day fatten, to become a sizeable portion of me.

I learned to carry it like a promise to myself;

later, like a promise I wanted to break,

like a hard carnivorous curse demanding

the meat of other people. To break.

Trading my virginity for his on Tuesday,

2002, as if we were going to remember each other

forever. When he didn’t bleed I felt cheated

& I stopped eating meat because

to want blood, it’s too much.

Let me love someone without perforating them.

Let me be that hole that they fall into.

___________________________________________________________________________________________

Augury Introduces: Nicholas Hite is a 28-year-old attorney living in New Orleans with his vegan boyfriend, their blue-eyed dog, and a pet crawfish.

DON’T FORGET: Augury’s reading period is still open for another 10 days! Find out how to submit here.

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Augury Books Is on Amazon — Order Your Favorites in a Flash

Photo by Amanda Noyes

In the interest of making ordering as effortless as possible, we are happy to announce that all five of our beautiful titles are now available on Amazon. Browse below to find the links to your favorite Augury poetry books and get to clicking. More functionality to come shortly! In the meantime, we still offer other ways to order. Get details anytime on our Orders Page.

While we’re here chatting, remember that Augury Books’ reading period is open for another 15 days only. Read our guidelines and send us your manuscripts here!

 

FIND AUGURY’S BOOKS ON AMAZON:

 

Buy Mantic on Amazon!

 

Buy Soldier Quick with Rain on Amazon!

 

Buy The Book of Lost Things on Amazon!

 

Buy Family of Many Enzos on Amazon!

 

Buy To Mend Small Children on Amazon!

 

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Look Who We Discovered: A Poem by Nicholas Hite, 2012 Editors Prize Finalist

Photo by: Dave Bledsoe of FreeVerse Photography

A place of solidarity

The music of

there being

nothing else to say.

 

The lamplight is gold

in a way that only a joke

about doom could be gold.

 

Need can be so heavy.

 

“Oh,” he says.

“So you did meet Diane.

You met her at the wedding.”

Diane could right now be at a cocktail

party and things would

be the same.

I like however her hair

 

which is a mess of curls,

a toppled something.

 

There is a grammar and a syntax

to the aftermath. It consists of

certain configurations of the neck and shoulders;

of a way of moving which belies

how eager grief is for its own end;

a parse chainlink of circumlocution –

of where do you go and how is

the weather there; of wondering

if being the first to drink will make

you seem desperate and a target

for other mourners. Okay, we are

all hurting but not in your way;

 

in ways that are myriad and perverse,

like the spindle legs of the spider.

 

“Diane had never met him,”

he says, “but she is sure that

he was a good man. I’ve told her

as much myself.” The telling was a sham,

as were the casket and the eulogy; as is

the lamplight and the wanting to not need.

 

But there is this gravity of loss

in a way that suggests both heaviness

and attraction; the falling down and for.

Like when I forgot how to be hungry

for three months: those were

a good three months and I loved mirrors,

loved standing sideways in front of

them alone and pulling up my shirt

to watch what was once a beerbelly

wither; my ribcage a series of

enunciated erasure marks.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Augury Introduces: Nicholas Hite is a 28-year-old attorney living in New Orleans with his vegan boyfriend, their blue-eyed dog, and a pet crawfish.

DON’T FORGET: Augury’s reading period is currently OPEN through June 30, 2013, for poetry and short story books. Find out how to submit here.

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Halfway Point For Augury Books’ 2013 Reading Period

Photo by: Dave Bledsoe of FreeVerse Photography

We’re halfway there, friends, in our reading period for poetry books and short story collections. Many thanks to those of you who have already sent us your manuscripts. If you’re still cracking, no worries — you have another full month (until June 30, 2013) to get those poetry books and short story collections together to submit to Augury.

A few words about what we’re looking for: We gravitate toward pieces that are expertly written and keep us intrigued. We are not particular when it comes to content, as we have fallen in love with work from many different traditions and on many different topics, as well as work that defies tradition and “topics.”

We do, however, want to fall in love with it, so it should justify that kind of devotion. If you have fallen in love with it, we consider that a great place to start.

Now you know. Tell your friends, loved ones and acquaintances. We’ll be seeing you all within the next month!

For exact guidelines and to submit your manuscript, click here.

—Augury Books

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PHOTOS: Launch Party Loveliness

Thanks to all of you who made Augury Books’ launch party on Monday night a huge success. Here are a few highlights from the wonderful readings offered by Maureen Alsop, author of Mantic, and David Joel Friedman, author of Soldier Quick with Rain and the winner of our 2012 Editors Prize. Thanks also to Mark Connell and Botanica Bar, and our fabulous photographer, Dave Bledsoe of FreeVerse Photography. To order the new titles by Alsop and Friedman, click here.