2016 — The Monarch Review — Page 4
Perry (Porter) Paints
Thursday, June 9, 2016 15:14 — 0 Comments
I was assigned to write about the Seattle hip-hop duo, Sleep Steady, for the Seattle Times a few weeks back. And one of the last lines in the piece reference’s rapper Perry Porter’s freelance art – which I found out later were vibrant and dynamic images of the human face and form. Immediately, I wanted to show his work here on The Monarch. So, let’s get to it! Just for fun, peep Sleep Steady’s video here to listen to while sorting through the images.
ALMAGEST (an excerpt from the novel Najma) – Danny Sherrard
Thursday, May 26, 2016 12:18 — 0 Comments
I didn’t hear about the skeleton they found on the moon until three days after they found it, which is a little late to receive that kind of news. I was at the bar Almagest (where I get most my news anyway) and two people sitting down the counter were talking about it with an iPad in front of them. The closest one to me was saying that he thought it was a hoax to distract us from the fact that we’re at war. The further one down, who was bald, said, Maybe, but what if it is something else? I […]
Raft of Dead Monkeys and the Complete History of Seattle
Monday, May 23, 2016 13:10 — 0 Comments
On June 8 at 7 p.m., Seattle’s Northwest Film Forum will premier a documentary that could very well blow your mind. The film is called The Complete History of Seattle and, primarily, it revolves around a band called Raft of Dead Monkeys. With a title like The Complete History of Seattle, you might think it would be a boring historical summary of some people digging trenches, constructing a highway at some point, and some old white men claiming ownership over everything. While this isn’t what the movie is about, explicitly, it is maybe metaphorically about. Some young guys have started […]
Three Poems – Krys Malcolm Belc
Monday, May 23, 2016 13:06 — 1 Comment
seven and a half years in philly. for seven years now philadelphia drivers have been trying to kill me. at first i thought it was cause i was a queer. i would walk hand in hand with anna and they’d be born suddenly, bruised pontiacs, new cadillacs, jeeps, minivans, breathless metal missionaries. on 45th street i’d look helplessly into the coffee shop across from my apartment for a witness. everyone looked down. then i had a round-faced, solemn baby. drivers still had my number. he had my wife’s eyes and they still tried to mash him like potatoes. we left […]
Three Songs To The Head vol. 41
Saturday, May 14, 2016 12:19 — 0 Comments
Hello and welcome back to Three Songs to the Head where we share three songs that moved us, three songs we love, three songs we can’t get out of our heads! Today, we’re featuring King Khazm, Goodbye Heart and Mississippi Jones. Enjoy! The productive bleakness that leaps out of the new video for “Dear Diary” from Seattle rapper King Khazm is heart-wrenching and fresh. In this video, the artist doesn’t pull punches, doesn’t hide from the onlooking audience. Instead, images of suicide, a black shroud and Khazm’s frail, bare body in the dirt stir us. He delivers his lyrics with ferocity. In […]
The Alchemy of Haris Durrani’s Spiritual Sci-Fi – Ahsan Butt
Tuesday, May 10, 2016 14:45 — 1 Comment
A time-traveling conquistador, who is the devil, h(a)unts the eccentric uncle of a half-Dominican, half-Pakistani, American Muslim kid, “Joeâ€â€”real name, Jihad—who is left wondering what’s real and what’s halal in a cynical, post-9/11 New York. This hints at only some of what Haris A. Durrani is up to in his 116 page debut, Technologies of the Self. The story is structured around Uncle Tomas’ fragmented accounts of his confrontations with the devil—Santiago. As family members take turns sounding off about the credibility of the crass and incorrigible—old and lonely—Tomas, Joe’s own reality and memories begin to hum to Tomas’ frequency. […]
The Carpenter-Poet – Nate Brantingham
Monday, May 2, 2016 10:40 — 3 Comments
His hands are huge— tools and boards, sheetrock and girders have roughed his hands with thick calluses. He has built houses and refurbished stores. Half of Pike Place Market has seen his hands on the walls. Before it opens, he knocks on a roll-up door, muffling the smells of a bakery. The door opens barely a foot and a cinnamon roll appears. This man will return the next day as he has always done. Again he is told to come back tomorrow and the cycle continues. But those too-thick hands, I know they hold books during lunch break, some written […]
Three Poems – Taylor Hamann
Monday, April 25, 2016 12:43 — 1 Comment
Sunrise I grew a mountain lily in the palm of my hand while you were sleeping, your toothbrush still tightly wrapped in that duffel bag, your boots by the door. But I held life as it bloomed under the shade of my body, my naked spine turned towards the sun. Mannequin You bought your left hand five blocks east of the train station, stitching it to your wrist, needle poking through soft flesh and braiding your veins like licorice. I think your right foot is from that greasy pawn shop downtown. You can trust me, you said, then […]
More Than A Thousand And One: The Many Faces Behind The Faceless Howler
Thursday, April 14, 2016 16:52 — 14 Comments
One of the greatest misconceptions among Lovecraft fans is that his creation, Nyarlathotep, has only a thousand forms. The idea stems from the novella Dreamquest Of Unknown Kadath, in which Nyarlathotep appears as a Pharaoh, giving the story’s protagonist a warning, “pray to all space that you may never meet me in my thousand other forms.” What readers tend to overlook is the key word “other” i.e. that in addition to the slender Pharaoh there are also a thousand others… for a grand total of a thousand and one. I went on a dream-quest of my own, looking for the illusive one, […]
Three Poems – Jacqueline Morse
Tuesday, April 5, 2016 11:42 — 3 Comments
Frost Flowers “Welcome to nowhere,†they tell you. Here the regret runs in rivers, deep like the wounds we bear. Here sorrow grows beside graves, lilac covered eulogies never given and you hold your apologies in your arms. They tell you to plant, so you dig. With your hands in the cold dirt, your fingernails weather the work. Past the roots of other people’s grief, you lay down your discrepancies, your, I’m sorry I never cried. You pat the fresh dirt over them. Maybe in a better world, I’m a better daughter. You let the air bite your dry skin. […]
What am I?
Bioluminescent eye
That sees by the shine
Of its own light. Lies
Blind me. I am the seventh human sense
And my stepchild,
Consequence;
Scientists can't find me.
Januswise I make us men;
Glamour
Was my image then—
Remind me:
The awful fall up off all fours
From the forest
To the hours…
Tick, Tock: Divine me.
-- Richard Kenney
