Unshod Quills

On the theme of the last word

MOON’S TAKE ON VENUS

I was imagining her – small, elfish
in a white gown transforming

into black snakes while she twirled
and swung suddenly a flaming lasso.

With such power, it was obvious
she wanted me to see her this way,

what some might call Apocalypse
but I call Sunday night.

THE GREAT ESCAPE

That Big Dipper’s always dumping space

on my abode, I see it

when I give beer back to the gods

to a soundtrack of gargling soprano frogs.

I give it first to the peach tree

then the apricot and cherry trees

saving the apple and plum trees for last.

By now the gods are drunk enough to rob.

Author Biography

Jason Mashak (b.1973) is a Michigan native who lived also in Georgia, Tennessee, and Oregon. After earning degrees at Portland State University, he moved to Prague, where he writes occasionally, edits routinely, and teaches his daughters everything he can. His first book – Salty as a Lip – is to be reissued in late 2012. Jason reports a second book is in motion.

On Somewhere Never Traveled, Gladly Beyond

Postscript to “Places”

(for Karolina Majkowska and her students)

Imagine a small boy lying
on the deep-shag carpet of his living
or rather his parents’ living or rather
the bank’s living room floor.

He is looking at, studying, a map,
thinking what it must be like to live
someplace else. After hearing
his grandpa say a Danish prayer,
his great-grandmother coughing out German,
his other Bohunk and Polack elders,
he realizes, young, he is of the world
and not of a country or race.

The boy soon tires of pronouncing
his name for Anglophiles — he knows it
doesn’t fit the language he was born to master.

Later, he gets a spinning globe
to accentuate his maps, plays a game
holding his finger on it as it spins
and wherever it stops is where he’ll go someday.
Cartography is therapy, he thinks, and so he begins
to listen — to really listen — to from
where came who and what and why.

In time, he’ll write a poem titled “Places.”

Author Biography

Jason Mashak (b.1973) lived in Michigan, Georgia, Tennessee, and Oregon before moving in 2006 to Prague, Czech Republic. He has two mostly Slovak daughters with whom he derives much inspiration. His first book of poems, Salty as a Lip, was anointed Most Poetic Book for Haters of Poetry in 2010 by Black Heart Magazine. An expanded, 2nd edition of the book is forthcoming by Haggard & Halloo (Austin, TX) sometime in 2011. Mashak’s writing can be found in numerous journals and anthologies, including a few in Czech translation.

AMERICAN HISTORY (EXCERPT)

On the first Thanksgiving, the Aztecs
gave the Quakers turquoise-studded Turkish hens
and forgot to tell them not to bite
down
hard

Author Biography

Jason Mashak has been a guest on Planet Earth for 38 human years. He lives in Prague, Czech Republic, in a houseful of Slovak women.

Jason Mashak, formerly of Portland, Oregon, but currently of Prague, reflects on the theme of “When We Two Parted.”

MEMORY OF THE IMAGINATION

I remember when we used to suck face
Just thinking about it I lit my match
Before taking out a cigarette

You were like one
The way your smell stayed on my fingers
Your taste on my tongue

We sucked face for hours
Sucked away the minutes with our faces
In cafes and stairways, parks, passages, and pubs
Our faces were never unsucked

I remember like it was yesterday
And the day before and the days before that
Even after we parted

It was like our faces went on sucking without us
Sometimes we’d eat, drink, bathe or fuck between sucks
Our tongues part of everything

When the smoke clears, you remain
Nowhere to be found

Author Biography

Jason Mashak (b.1973) is a Michigan native who lived in Georgia, Tennessee, and Oregon before a strategic self-exile to Prague, Czech Republic, in 2006. Father of two small mostly Slovak daughters, he devotes his time to daddyhood and writes primarily during his daily work commute. Haggard & Halloo (Austin, TX) published Mashak’s first book of poems, Salty as a Lip, in 2010 (the 1st edition sold out, an expanded 2nd edition is forthcoming). His writing can be found in numerous journals and anthologies, including a few in Czech translation.