Internet Sentences: 0003

"I must confess that it is with great hope, joy and enthusiasm to write you this mail and I believe by the faith that it must surely find you in good condition of health."

Source: Junk Mail

Ana Drahotusky Bruketa: 0018

Victoria Williams: 0153

I’m not a functional human being. I’m so much less than that, and in so being, am so much more.

Beards: 0029

Drawing One 1-2002 by Gary Cummiskey

Ana Drahotusky Bruketa: 0017

Victoria Williams: 0152

Opened an email from like 6 years ago. Someone had written to me: I love you. I was actually going to reply, here and now, I love you too. I ought to be ashamed of myself.

Beards: 0028

In The Stars by Gary Cummiskey

New Title From BlekSem, In Collaboration With Botsotso Publishing And Dye Hard Press: donga

donga is a selection of poetry, short fiction, interviews and essays from what was one of South Africa's first literary online journals (2000-2003).

With 32 contributors, donga contains work by writers such as Lionel Abrahams, Robert Berold, Lauren Beukes, Nadine Botha, Toast Coetzer, Gary Cummiskey, Graeme Feltham, Richard Fox, Stacy Hardy, Stephen Hofstatter, Aryan Kaganof, Bernat Kruger, Joan Meterlerkamp, Ike Mboneni Muila, Pravasan Pillay, Lesego Rampolokeng, Arja Salafranca, Kelwyn Sole, Ivan Vladislavic and Paul Wessels.

donga is edited by Alan Finlay and Paul Wessels, and is published by BlekSem, in collaboration with Botsotso Publishing and Dye Hard Press.

320 pages.

ISBN: 978-0-620-52779-8

For more information and direct orders, contact Alan Finlay at bleksembook@gmail.com. donga will soon retail at bookstores.

Ana Drahotusky Bruketa: 0016

Victoria Williams: 0151

He returned her stare for over an hour without blinking. She whispered: ‘Do you have rigor mortis?’ and waited keenly for an answer.

New From Tearoom Books: Loop: Issue 1

Open publication - Free publishing - More chapbook

Loop is a new writing zine published by the micro press Tearoom Books. It will be published predominantly as free e-chapbooks. The first issue comprises a selection of poetry. The poets include: Cathy Bryant, Barend Buitekamer, Gary Cummiskey, William Huyzers, Eva Jackson, Simon Jackson, Grace Kim, Anton Krueger, Joan McNerney, Nick Monks, Nashen Moodley, Kobus Moolman, Dashen Naicker, Seth Trent, and V.W. Williams.

The chapbook can be viewed by clicking on the window above. Alternatively, it can be downloaded HERE. The embed codes for platforms such as Blogger, Wordpress, MySpace, and Facebook can also be found after the link. Please write to tearoombooks@gmail.com if you have any difficulties.

Birdy Birdy by Gary Cummiskey

Beards: 0027

Ana Drahotusky Bruketa: 0015

Victoria Williams: 0150

All cardigans become oppressive after a while and make me feel like a person I don’t want to be. They get thicker, woollier; put more of a barrier between myself and the world and the skin of others. And if you think this is a metaphor, it’s not.

Forthcoming From Tearoom Books: Loop: Issue 1

New Publication From Dye Hard Press: There Are Two Birds At My Window by Allan Kolski Horwitz

There Are Two Birds At My Window is the latest collection by South African poet Allan Kolski Horwitz.

The poems in this new collection use many elements, touching equally on the “fire and flare of invention” as well as on “the springs of joy and convulsion.” Post-apartheid, neo-liberal South Africa subjects us to enormous pressures; the new society is gasping for air, and the way these contradictions play out in individual lives is uneven and often unexpected. This book bears poetic testimony to the maelstrom – the philosophic mixing with the symbolic, the lyrical with the agitational – being the fruits of a “situated and sensitive” consciousness.

Allan Kolski Horwitz grew up in Cape Town. Between 1974 and 1985 he lived in the Middle East, Europe and North America, returning to South Africa in 1986. Since then he has been based in Johannesburg. He is a member of the Botsotso Jesters poetry performance group and Botsotso Publishing.

Previous titles include his poetry collections We Jive Like This and Dirty Washing (with the Botsotso Jesters) and Saving Water, as well his short fiction collections Un/Common Ground and Out of The Wreckage.

Totals 156 pages, with illustrations by James de Villiers.

ISBN: 978-0-9870178-5-7

Will soon be available in bookstores countrywide at an estimated retail price of R130. If ordered directly from the publisher, the price is R100, including postage and packaging.

Over the Sea by Eva Jackson

The plugs are changed. It took me three days

To work out I could still charge phones on a two-prong

If nothing else.

The toilet haloes up with a different suspenseful gasp

And ends differently, low and quiet.

The rat is a rat, the yard

Scraped by roosters’ feet and a horde of men and a rim of bikes

And money on the question

Explains why we have heard this sound throughout the day

Crowing knows no limit, it is

Always rooster time.

Ana Drahotusky Bruketa: 0014

Victoria Williams: 0149

Passed an old man peeing in a garden this morning. I don't even think it was his garden. He was all surly like I was the one with the problem for looking.