Three Memory Poems

by the Editorial Staff of Uncanny Valley Magazine

Memory Tantrum and I'm Not Lost

by Alexis Faulkner

All of the facts

The equation, it adds up

When the sultan is discovered deep in the mind’s storage facility

Entertain the oldest thoughts about the ghost

That’s right, I found the ghost and it told me

A story in the East Village

Or perhaps it was Washington Square Park

These translucent spirits are always thugs

Watch your wallet

BLESS
by Chris Alarie

GOD BLESS FALSE MEMORIES

REVEAL UNTO US THE FALLACIES

AT THE SWEETENED, BEATING HEART OF

   PERCEPTION

   TIME

   EXPERIENCE

   EXISTENCE

ALL THE TIME

THAT WE ARE WRONG
WE ARE THANKFUL

open windows
by Douglas Slayton

i carried it around
for most of a year

i still think sometimes
of the nights i walked
through crowded streets
thinking of what might be

no ride was alone
there were no cold nights

when everything crashed
i sat on that street for hours
messing up traffic

Alexis Faulkner is Executive Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine. 
Chris Alarie is Senior Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.
Doug Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

Three Experience Poems

by the Editorial Staff of Uncanny Valley Magazine

How

by Chris Alarie


To be present

   in any one moment

To inhabit

   the spectre of the self

To live within

   the concept of linear time

To traverse the

   vast ocean of doubt

To accept the

   brute fact at the heart of existence

To know that

   anything is

To be present




Dream Trails

by Alexis Faulkner

Two feet touch the ground: awake

Snap around, peel off a piece of the night fuzz

Where I was, how ever it all fit together,

Sun-striped flag of beach weather or

The flakes of the snow peeling away from the sky

Floating into squint slice of my eye

Arms folded overhead and being cleaned

Take to patience and adjust, clear list, no fuss

A cloud of dust, the being was a cloud of moving pieces

Truth, in dreams, rare to reach them

This nightmare echoes, released in my shower

Fleece freaks within the hour

Dodging foreign objects at ground level, stuck in this hell

Faith writ final and reached not easy

Be walking around in the daytime, be slack

Movements patterned against black, though hardly as darkness

Still sleeping, not sparked yet

Watching neighbors, envied as zoetic  

Which thoughts have they to reach sudden presence


sentimentality is the best part of nostalgia

by Douglas Slayton


i only go so far

without looking back.

collecting all the years

as lines, up and down me.

there are small rocks

that rattle in my shoes

but start with planters

or construction work.

my movements slow,

when i wave from side

to side

like the sea at your feet

the day you realize

your own size.

i can't fill that space

that was my shape before.

Alexis Faulkner is Executive Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine. 
Chris Alarie is Senior Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.
Doug Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

Three Wine Poems

by the Editorial Staff of Uncanny Valley Magazine

In Wine Country

by Alexis Faulkner

Dead field in a land flash
Wine-beaten and weathered in the late season’s sun
Who begs most for the water cast
From the clouds on the one

Wish of these golden hills
Globe glass waiting for deep, rich liquid
Pride of the fair skinned and faith-filled
Hard to remember what last night we all did

Most of all the earth demands waiting
Manicure the offerings to be rows upon rows
Ask for peace from labor and with it patience bring
To me the wealth and then land once more to sew

One time a prayer for the worker
Seen waiting only for the work

Tele-(communications)-machus
by Chris Alarie

As Odysseus looked
Out at the wine dark sea
He checked his phone & sighed
It seems the one challenge
He could not overcome
Was simple loneliness
What a fucking loser

The Flat of the Knife
by Douglas Slayton

it was the view
i didn't appreciate
but watched everyone
revel near that cliff

there have been walks since
they are always longer

i have been standing in the mirror
still finding evidence

i sit still sometimes
when the air is cool
and the light is obscured

i reconsider constantly
the way it tasted sweet
it must have been thick
in your blood

it lingered
on my fingers for days
sticky and inconsistent
leading me to misconceptions

Alexis Faulkner is Executive Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine. 
Chris Alarie is Senior Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.
Doug Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

Three Blood Poems

by the Editorial Staff of Uncanny Valley Magazine

Super Blood Moon photo by Benjamin Stark

Blood
by Alexis Faulkner

Humans are mostly liquid

Had I longer planted myself

In a familiar landscape

My blood might have hardened

And kept me quiet and still

Tomorrow

In the evening

The moon fills with blood

Only then to hide in the Earth’s shadow

In New York

The sky will be cool and clear

And the moon will be bright

Barely bright enough to be another light in the landscape

That can hold our attention just long enough

To read its meaning

And carry on with the counting of our kingdom’s gloried pieces

Days passed that tomorrow

A new sense of blood pain

Feeling woven into the feminine landscape

Feeling forgotten and feeling tiny but not without a home

Warmed by the shared responsibility to keep our blood contained

Lifted by the shared passion to show off our wounds

Remembering the blood moon and the newness shown afterwards

Showered in the light of that big moon

I saw a distant path

And suddenly it appeared underneath me

To bridge the unknown with bold spirit

Would be to map my own blood onto dreams

And to chase life with new, bright bliss

Blood
by Chris Alarie

Our life's blood that sustains us
Will someday portend our doom
In Revelations, John writes,
"And there came a great earthquake
The sun became black as sackcloth
The full moon became like blood"

Individual bodies
We will die, we will bleed out
Lividity will set in
Blood will pool, coagulate
Red and blue, black and purple
Blood tells us that life ends

But blood, like death, connects us
With each other and also
With the creatures great and small
That populate existence
Warm and cold blooded, even
The stupid, stupid horses

12:35pm, August 27th
by Douglas Slayton

there is more of you inside
than there is me.
racing from my chest
to my fingers
but i still can't feel a thing.

i have known more doubt
than anything else.
swallowing smoke
with the sugar metabolizing,
my head is swimming
but i am sinking.

touch my arm the way you did,
again, and feel me run cold.

Alexis Faulkner is Executive Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine. 
Chris Alarie is Senior Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.
Doug Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

Three Cola Poems

by the Editorial Staff of Uncanny Valley Magazine


Salt , Sweet.
by Douglas Slayton

When I have had too much
I can't sleep. Shifting endlessly
through the night

but it fills me
until I sink again.

There is a bubble
moving with my blood.
Always expecting the worst
but left waiting.

I have had too much, again,
and think that if energy
can't be created or destroyed
all I should feel is infinity
inside of me


I'm a Motherfucking Champion & Nothing Can Stop Me
by Chris Alarie

Too high
to die

Winners never
Drink Pepsi

Coke
by Alexis Faulkner

Walk into the center of the city
Stop to stare at the unforgiving mass
Of people huddled around the taxis and the chocolate shop and all of the pixels
Daydream about when coming to
TIMES SQUARE was electric
Feel your first gulp of homesickness in weeks
When you see the cola sign
Think about the bay bridge
Grab a slice
Catch a train home


Alexis Faulkner is Executive Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine. 
Chris Alarie is Senior Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.
Doug Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

Three Pizza Poems

by the Editorial Staff of Uncanny Valley Magazine

Holy Trinity (Cheese, Crust, Sauce)
by Chris Alarie

I suspect that God
created Pizza
so that there'd be one
thing in this sad world
incapable of
disappointing us

A bone thrown our way
A sole island in
life's wretched ocean
Free of consequence
A lower limit
afforded to all

Given the choice
between pizza
and any of life's
eventual disappointments
a person whose
soul is intact
would choose pizza
every time


No Subject
by Douglas Slayton

I am at the bottom
and can't see up

I am standing still
and can't find the next step

I can't taste it anymore
but I am sitting in the dark
swallowing as fast as I can

if I fill it fast it can't keep growing


Pizza
by Alexis Faulkner

grease

slices soaked in all types of extra sauces and maybe olives 

pepperoni mushroom anchovy

tropical hambits and piña with your more 

adventure-driven buddies

grease again and 

extra cheese

sprinkled with cheese dust on top 

also garlic pesto basil 

thanks to Chicago and Brooklyn 

Blondies, Tony's and Little Star

I have too many people to thank

I'm running out of time 

I love you, earth pizza

I love you

Alexis Faulkner is Executive Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine. 
Chris Alarie is Senior Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.
Doug Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

Three Ice Cream Poems

by the Editorial Staff of Uncanny Valley Magazine

Paragraph City
by Douglas Slayton

When all of this is over,
I will be alone again on this curb,
colder than ever,
but I needed it more than anything.

Ice Cream Sandwich
by Chris Alarie

I saw a jogger
run toward me and just
for something to do

I stepped into him
deliberately
in a heap we fell

Clambered to the ground
arms, legs entangled
mess of confusion

"If I can't eat an
ice cream sandwich, what
the fuck is the point?!"

I shouted at him
bewildered he tried
to get up and run

But I held fast to
his ankle and he
had nowhere to go



Ice Cream
by Alexis Faulkner

Once upon a time  
A favorite friend of mine was very cold  
And very fickle about staying in a single shape 
As the heat was taking over my own format 
I'd find her always pleasant and always comforting 
And always willing to lend her charm 
To my sadness and my dramatic longing 
So sweet and so consistent 
So caring and so available 
And yet her older, colder sister has now taken over 
As my continuous daydream resident  
And my go to peacemaker  
I'm sorry, ice cream 
Were your spirit less fleeting  
Were your cascade more peaceful and confident 
Had you plagued my guilty palette with less force 
I could have kept you as my ice queen  
Snow is what I reach for  
Even in the sunshine of the summer season  
Even in my loneliest moment  
I am sure I could fade away in an instant 
If flakes formed a frozen lake  
For resting and ice fishing and snow angels 

Alexis Faulkner is Executive Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine. 
Chris Alarie is Senior Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.
Doug Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

Three Oakland Poems

by the Editorial Staff of Uncanny Valley Magazine

There Was Something I Just Thought Of (Sixth)

by Douglas Slayton

When it was late I'd stand under the lights

on the platform, waiting for the rattle

of the tracks, as the dark blue black of night

sinks my cover of yellow light crackle.

I miss the moon hanging over my bed,

when I had no where to be the next day.

I miss nights that were quiet in my head

and the bed wasn't mine but I could stay.

I wasn't scared of the streets I walked

knowing they'd be around in the morning.

I hate every night like the one we talked.

You're in my clothes, more with every washing.

I remember every night, they haunt me,

and how the last train was always empty.

Walk Home

by Chris Alarie

A shot sounds at a sideshow

And does not disrupt a thing

Danger is likely, life is lively

Catch a fade, go dumb, super hyphy

A crowd gathers at a warehouse

Tangle of noise & limbs & beer

Money for the touring bands, please

How strange that somebody lives here

Bobby & Huey

Huey & Officer Frey

Little Bobby Hutton

Huey & Tyrone Robinson

New Year's Eve, I walk home

From MacArthur BART, drunk

In the rain, the long way

Past Casper's Hot Dogs twice

Sick to my stomach of

Myself and everything

I buy some Gatorade

Watch The Simpsons 'til dawn

I live here, I am home

Is the bullet hole in the

Window of 'Lectric Washouse

Still there? I wonder, years later

Home

by Alexis Faulkner

Can take your heart at any time

Fashion it into a pretzel shield

And then squeeze all of the blood all over the shoes

Of your tribe

Oakland is a mess of palm trees

And basketball courts and friendly faces

Sometimes turned worried into that frantic well of loneliness and misdirection

It is the punks that press you back into shape

It is the hippies that make you know love

It is the lake that shows you dead catfish

Even the dying are happy to pass

At home

Ivy Drive

The stories I am missing show me that this was a young place

But parents shot at everything

Wrote it all down

My first memory, big shake and smashing the whole kitchen

My mom wrote it in October 1989

Garfield Avenue

The one lemons were three lemons and everyone stopped by to hustle up the tree while my family wasn’t looking

I put my black cat in the swing and Uboo never gave me hell

And Giamocha lent his tail to every occasion

Plum wine, we said, as fruit rained down over the roof

Too many rotten on the concrete

Rottweilers, neighbors and our own kept us all over that hood

Busted hydrants for summer

Winter

Winter was homeless there

Winter has no place in Oakland

My baby sister

My baby bunk beds

My Easter Bunny

My salad of nasturtiums

My friends in Diamond Heights

The school of Redwood Heights

The hills of Grandma lavender and her chemistry

Ever July planning on planting more bushes

A new millennium on Vernon Street

Junk

We had a lot of junk but I kept our books in the best order of the English alphabet And just stuffed the rest in the closet

There was a black cat there too who was sweet with luck

But less than the magic one

BART and the 57 kept late nights up later and long walks up that sunnyslope never felt less than Everest

I haven’t the best habits about keeping memories

Locked in order

I haven’t the best record of where

Shattuck Avenue

The concrete that touched my house touched a cherry plum tree and it broke apart

And threw me off my bike

Gave me the feeling that Oakland would never change

The city would flood and drain with fresh thousands and the streets

Would always be unpaved

This place was right near Ashby

The house had not only been for me

Psychedelic leave-behinds, sharpie skinhead cartoons, tchotchkes generations old

Every crusty creeper in Berkeley left vibes on Shattuck

Shattuck Avenue was a double exposure of holding hands

And spinning as hard as the wind ever blows

Overtop small shadows of dark leaves and flowers

Precious and brilliant and wanting a harder party and never looking back

In the end, we got robbed and I moved back to San Francisco

The best July was the roof on Alcatraz Avenue

First holiday stop: Berkeley Roses

But the view was no good and I’m glad we went back to base

The television volume broke my patience a thousand times over

But this time drowned completely by a campaign of flames

I loved every minute of that dangerous display

I wish memories were something final

I wish memories were easy to keep filed in your brain

And they were an exact representation of a time and place

But mostly they are shifting

Mostly they suit my best fantasy about my own life

All I want to remember

All I can remember

I remember being friends and being in Love with Oakland

Alexis Faulkner is Executive Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine. 
Chris Alarie is Senior Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.
Doug Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

Three San Francisco Poems

by the Editorial Staff of Uncanny Valley Magazine

Sorry, I Have A Thing. (Fifth)

by Douglas Slayton

Mornings or evening when they tear out streets

the routes change or disappear completely.

When the cold is close in the heavy sheets

the sound keeps me steady only briefly.

When I'm lost, there are always two ways home.

The day marches when time is all you need.

Beach lights dying, where I sink like a stone.

This is change not growth, I am no seed.

When we talk, I talk quickly, thoughtlessly.

I make the same decisions every time

everyone dissipates through the country.

Not feeling better, I'm holding the line.

The full moon is always a day early

or day late, nothing ends so easily.

Chris's Poem's Title

by Chris Alarie

A placeholder for

Chris's poem

About San Francisco

I hope it is good

But mostly I hope

It is finished

On time

Otherwise

We will have to

Publish the placeholder

San Francisco

by Alexis Faulkner

It is possible to have a good day everyday you are 

Alive in San Francisco

The air near the ocean is so fresh and damp

It's easy to breathe but hard to keep the clothes

In your closet from molding

The most beautiful intersections are the ones where

Two neighborhoods hold hands

Like Arguello and Fillmore and California and Broadway

It is so peaceful to feel always cold and watch the

Fog cover everything

It is so dangerous to take BART to see your friends

Play at the Sugar Mountain because you might

Miss the last train and the 800 is filled with

Zombies and also the warehouse isn't even near a train

It is so burrito to have eating in Dolores

Many people are leaving the city now

Some of them have moved to Los Angeles and New York City and Paris

It is a hard place to dream of and a sad place to

Leave behind

Alexis Faulkner is Executive Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine. 
Chris Alarie is Senior Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.
Doug Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.