Map Literary: A Journal of Contemporary Writing and Art
  • Home
    • Masthead
    • Submissions
    • Rachel Wetzsteon Chapbook Award
    • In Print
    • Subscribe
    • Links
    • WPU MFA
    • Internship Opportunity
  • Poetry
    • David Dodd Lee
    • Isabelle Doyle
    • Kathleen Heil
    • Leonard Kress
    • Lauren Tess
    • Cesca Janece Waterfield
    • Billy Cancel Poetry
    • Scott Minar
    • Greg Glazner
    • Bruce McRae
    • Maureen Thorson
  • Fiction
    • Christopher Linforth, "Zia"
    • Marlene Olin, "Wanna Ride?"
    • Jenessa Abrams, "You Never Wish That Upon Anyone"
    • Rebecca Berg, "My Father's Daughter"
    • Kevin Sterne, "Wisconsin's American Zoo (WAZOO) Invites You to Pet the Meese"
    • Eros Livieratos, "On Feeling"
    • James William Gardner, "Lowcountry Boil"
    • Guy Biederman, "Sociale"
    • Sean Trolinder, "MLA Citation Gone Wild"
    • Rebecca Hannigan, "Little"
    • Halsted M. Bernard, "Your Hands"
    • Justin Meckes, "The Gash"
    • Reb Livingston, from "Bombyonder"
    • Craig Foltz, "Without Stigma"
    • On Experimental Fiction
  • Nonfiction
    • W.F. Lantry, "The Strange Beauty of the Unfamiliar"
    • Michael Roloff, "Accretion"
    • Andrew Sunshine, "John Hancock's John Hancock"
    • Jay Merill "Cherry Red"
    • JM Farkas, "First Mindedness, Second Language"
    • Elizabeth Levine, "Gay Geography"
    • John Bliss, "Keep the Change"
    • Miranda Royse, "Disgusting Woman"
    • Elena Botts, "Ode to Oceans"
    • Diane Payne, "3 micro memoirs"
    • Luc Sante, "Flesh and Bone"
    • Isobel O'Hare, "Failure: A Love Letter"
    • Melissa Wiley, "Barbed Wire Fence"
    • Ashley Wilkinson, "fractional distillation"
    • Lori Hawks, "The Fix"
  • Art
    • Mario Loprete
    • Jean Wolff
    • Toti O'Brien
    • Maria DeGuzman
    • Geoffrey Detrani
    • Keith Moul
    • Annabelle Schafer
    • Robin Schwartz
    • Billy Cancel
    • The Scientist
    • Tim J. Myers
    • Derek Owens
    • Leonel Piraino
    • Matthew Rose
    • Jacob Spriggs
    • Koji Nagai
    • Kristin Allmer
    • Limor Sadot
    • Ark Codex
    • Dahlia Elsayed
    • Yuji Hiratsuka, "Beet Meets Meat"
    • Kasey Ramirez, "Edifice"
  • Archives
    • 2018 >
      • Poetry 2018 >
        • Carlos Hiraldo
        • Martin Ott
        • Karyn Anne Petracca
        • Donald Illich
        • James Reidel
        • Dennis Hinrichsen
      • Fiction 2018 >
        • Rebecca Pyle, "Winter Solstice"
        • Martin Rutley, "Job Offer on Seventh Heaven"
        • Matthew Baker, "Superhighway"
        • Matthew Serback, "How to Make a Boulder"
        • Pavle Radonic, "The Laboratory"
        • Arkor Kolubah, "A Touch of Comfort"
      • Nonfiction 2018 >
        • Scott Wordsman reviews Petter Lindgren
        • Alexander Clark, "Postdiluvian"
    • 2017 >
      • Fiction 2017 >
        • Kathryn Holzman, "Eating Meat"
        • Kaitlyn Burd, "Nature with You in It"
        • Katie Young Foster, "Promotion"
        • William Cordeiro, "Selections from Whispering Gallery"
        • Alexandra Renwick, "The Life of an Artifact in Duodecadal Glances"
        • Lizzi Wolf, "My Brother's Therapist"
      • Poetry 2017 >
        • Keith Mark Gaboury
        • Mark Decarteret
        • Douglas Piccinnini
        • Matthew McBride
        • Jim Daniels
        • Sally Ashton
        • Raymond Farr
      • Nonfiction 2017 >
        • Charlie Moses, "Dear Friend"
        • Pamela Woolford, "This Is What Happened"
        • Jennifer Martelli, "Phobiacompendia"
    • 2016 >
      • Fiction 2016 >
        • Loie Merritt, "The Edge of the Sea is a Strange and Beautiful Place"
        • Mitchell Grabois, "i"
        • Kelle Groom, "25 Reasons to Attend the Gala"
        • Mike Shepley, "Killing Symbols"
        • Jody Azzouni, "Owning Things"
        • Dan Gutstein, "Like Airplanes and Stars"
        • Kate Imbach, "Diamondland"
      • Poetry 2016 >
        • Jeff Alessandrelli
        • Daniel Coudriet
        • Peter Leight
        • John Wells
        • Jenna Cardinale
        • Isabelle Shepherd
        • Michael Robins
        • Will Walker
        • Bridget Sprouls
        • Allan Johnston
        • Hugh Behm-Steinberg
        • Caroline Knox
        • David Dodd Lee
        • John Deming
        • David McLoghlin
    • 2015 >
      • Poetry 2015 >
        • Adam Clay
        • Kyle Hemmings
        • Matthew Henriksen
        • Megan Kaminski
        • Emily Kendal Frey
        • Noelle Kocot
        • Katy Lederer
        • John Lowther
        • Nathaniel Sverloff
        • Franz Werfel -- James Reidel
      • Fiction 2015 >
        • Erin Bedford, "Riesenrad"
        • James Braziel, "Jick's Chevrolet"
        • James Braziel, "Vittate"
        • Adrian Class, "Or Flights"
        • Erica L. Kaufman, "It Buried Us"
        • Nolan Liebert, "Gravity of Hearts"
        • Heather Noland, "Cosmic Slump"
        • Tom Whalen, "In the Cathedral"
      • Nonfiction 2015 >
        • Rebecca Cook, "What the Hammer Said When the Hammer Hit the Girl"
        • Margot Kelley, "Companion Species"
    • Fall 2014 >
      • Poetry Fall 2014 >
        • Stephanie Anderson
        • John Buckley and Martin Ott
        • Vanessa Couto Johnson
        • John Estes
        • Anne Gorrick
        • Henry Israeli
        • Keegan Lester
        • John Loughlin
        • Douglas Luman
        • Danielle Mitchell
        • Alexandria Peary
        • Marcus Slease
        • Georg Trakl / James Reidel
      • Fiction Fall 2014 >
        • Matt Rowan, "Dog's Best Friend"
        • Kelli Anne Noftle, "Before She Was Olive"
        • Chris Okum, "Ratatat"
        • Jon Fried, "Cashing In"
        • Lisa C. Taylor, "Visible Wounds"
        • Sarah Kahn, "Break"
        • Rebekah Morton, "Big Sis"
      • Nonfiction Fall 2014 >
        • Stephen Benz, "Night Then Morning: Elko, Nevada"
        • Joseph C. Jiuliani, "Of Stealing and of Being Stolen"
        • Lindsay Chudzik, "Jailface"
        • Robert D. Vivian, "Just After Rain"
    • Spring 2014 >
      • Poetry Spring 2014 >
        • Simeon Berry
        • Molly Brodak
        • Wyn Cooper
        • Brian Foley
        • Tim Kahl
        • Caroline Knox
        • Rob MacDonald
        • Benjamin Paloff
      • Fiction Spring 2014 >
        • Gareth David Anderson, "Cupcake"
        • Halsted M. Bernard, "Your Hands"
        • Patrick Cole, "Pick-up Lines"
        • Joshua Graber, "This Fine Experience"
        • Lola Grace, "Natural Birth"
        • Robert E. Tanner, "Non-Disclosure Disagreement"
      • Art Spring 2014
    • 2012 & 2013
  • Pedagogy
Picture

SIMON PERCHIK

*
Attack and this hillside
shows its teeth :each stone
drips with saliva

and even the glaze
can't tell the difference
-- you dig till the sun

enters at last
staggering the way each evening
is burned to the ground

laid bare in the smoke
all stones smell when struck
one against the other

and the dirt dragged away
still struggling
--you only want to share

though your hands won't dry
and each year less room
--you dig as if each hole

is filled with shoreline
could be held back
rebuilt from waves

from valleys and mountain streams
that whiten these stones
with cheeks and emptiness.


*
Still warm and the paint
darkening the way all walls
grieve --in just an hour

another coat though the floor
will cool first
lose its hold and the ground

--you're careful not to touch
where the corpse is listening
comforted with skin and bones

and gloss --over and over
that sing-along-song
where no one weeps

or remembers the words
and you let the roller drip
kept silent for so long.


*
It must welcome this light
sent up, banished and the sun
overflowing still can't wait

till morning --you will open the door
for something you're not sure, make room
the way a tree rests its branches

higher and higher and the room
kept empty for evenings
on their way back, bone-tired

hollowed out, barren, cold
and the door take in
the darkness :the dying down

and the slow, climbing turn
for which there is no word
no sound or below.


*
And though the rain has left
tired waiting for the slow descent
become your shadow reaching out

when no one looks --to lure it back
takes deception! you cover the windows
with silk and drop by drop the walls

stay damp while the sky
loses itself in your arms
--it's not your usual clouds

and you jump, afraid you'll drown
one hand held out, the other
kept empty for rain and the floor

making its way back --it works
--your shadow already lifting you
feet first, on your toes

as if it sees the sky surrounded
by other skies, in bits
and this dark place you hide.


*
As if the pump for the well
is carving her shoulders out
and the invisible stone

you will hold when it dries
broken up among the ruins
though some rocks

still squeeze one hand
too tight and the faucet
cover you with a place

that can not rest
--what you grip will be this cup
left over from the first death

no longer noon but a cramp
for which there is no potion
only her lips falling from the sky

almost empty, worn down
clings to the ground
as minutes, hours, evenings

--for years one hand
closing over the other
already a shadow

half grass, half thirst
half some vague hovering
inside your throat

--mouthful by mouthful only cold water
at last in the open
pulled up and still falling.





Simon Perchik

Picture
Simon Perchik is an attorney whose poems have appeared in Partisan Review, The Nation, The New Yorker, and elsewhere. For more information, including free e-books, his essay titled “Magic, Illusion and Other Realities” and a complete bibliography, please visit his website at www.simonperchik.com.


published by
The Department of English
College of Humanities & Social Sciences
The William Paterson University of New Jersey
Copyright  © 2012-2020 Map Literary
Map Literary

Promote Your Page Too
Free E-Subscription
Callaloo: African Arts
On Innovative Fiction
Huizache: Latino Lit
Veterans Writing
Asian Writers
Picture