Maya's Micros
As a supplement to our main issue of The Closed Eye Open, we have an ongoing feature called Maya’s Micros. As the name suggests, it will be curated by contributing editor Maya Highland and will exclusively feature short form writing.
Since it can be a long wait between issues, we’ve decided to keep the creativity rolling by focusing on the littlest form of creative writing—micros. Whether you consider them micro-poems or micro-fictions, they are welcome here…as long as each individual piece is 108 or fewer. (Why 108, you may ask? Have fun speculating…)
We like the idea of saying a lot in a small space–the complexity of self-expression in balance with an economy of language. And of course, since they are short, they can be enjoyed within a few moments–perhaps a line or phrase sticking with you to carry along for a while.
We will update Maya’s Micros in small “batches” a few times per month in between our full issues.
If you like what you see and would like to get e-mail updates, please e-mail us at theclosedeyeopen@gmail.com.
Click here to submit your micros for publication.
Also, you may follow us on Instagram @theclosedeyeopen.
December 2024
Batch 079: 12/24/24
Avion Adams
Freud’s Dream
Freud’s dream in technicolor
The woman at the radiator sings gently
As something unrealized becomes
Rediscovered
Faith in that nothing was lost
and
only
lies
were
told
I’ve circled the circuit and found that
Everything had no lack and that
We put it into ourselves to
Understand and get it back so
Freud’s dream in Technicolor,
sixteen-millimeter film,
Mr. Frank Truscott at the saloon,
Drunken swoon,
Moonbeams bellow.
Jennifer Handy
Sweepings
the bear walks ever backward
sweeping up its tracks
the bear proceeds through time
then finds itself repeating,
forever in a loop
the bear is present absent present
sometimes only to others,
to itself a different bear
the bear contains itself
the bear contains itself, the world
the bear sweeps away the rest
Aaron Beck
Things people say
Vincent Casaregola
Response to Your Text
We are here,
not somewhere else—
there is nowhere else to be,
nothing else to say—
here, as always,
someone is missing,
someone else is looking,
attentively it seems,
still another one
just beginning to doze,
and, finally, someone
who remains unseen,
spying at each of us
from behind the crack
in the old, black-painted door.
Ludo Braca
The Grackle
In thought you looked past me
But not at me and I noticed
The allure of your silver-white eyes
Not exactly for the first time though
Perfect now as sunlight scimitars
Sliced sidelong through corneal shields
Revealing a window behind a door
Something so personal I turned my head
Averting my gaze in false politeness
While holding with relish an impression
Of your private life and so saw a lady
Grackle outside the glass pecking
At the entrance as if requesting
Service as a form of sanctuary
From the persistent circling
Of her metallic blue suitors
Contributor Information
Avion Adams is a poet hailing from the Midwest, USA. She enjoys painting, all things classic vintage Americana, especially jazz and ballroom dancing. She takes great interest in philosophy, phenomenology, psychology, cinema, and the arts in general. In her free time, she enjoys the outdoors with activities such as flower and fruit picking, as well as hiking. She cannot juggle, but she has always wanted to learn how. She tries a lot with fruit—lemons seem to work the best, but everything else has been
unsuccessful.
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Jennifer Handy explores sexuality, psychological trauma, mental illness, homelessness, severed family relationships, and environmental issues through poetry. She is the author of the environmental poetry chapbook California Burning (Bottlecap Press, 2024), and her poetry has been published in The Closed Eye Open, CommuterLit, Last Stanza Poetry Journal, and Loud Coffee Press.
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Aaron Beck is a trans poet and pianist living in Portland, Oregon, with his dog, Jack. Aaron is inspired by the poetry of Petrarch.
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Vincent Casaregola teaches American literature and film, creative writing, and rhetorical studies at Saint Louis University. He has published poetry in a number of journals, including 2River, The Bellevue Literary Review, Blood and Thunder, The Closed Eye Open, Dappled Things, The Examined Life, Lifelines, Natural Bridge, Please See Me, WLA, Work, and The Write Launch. He has also published creative nonfiction in New Letters and The North American Review. He has recently completed a book-length manuscript of poetry dealing with issues of medicine, illness, and loss (Vital Signs) that has been accepted by Finishing Line Press.
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Ludo Braca’s work has been featured in Medusa’s Laugh Press, Hare’s Paw Literary Review, Wingless Dreamer, Tiny Seed Journal, Cathexis Northwest Press, and more. He currently resides in Austin, Texas. For more information, visit ludobraca.com.
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December 2024
Batch 078: 12/6/24
John Brantingham
Thoughts on an Early Morning
Outside in the bluing dawn, no one is out but me and the satellites overhead and little creatures watching from the safety of bushes. I drag the trash can to the curb and think the satellites are far enough away that they might as well be stars. I’ll never touch one. By that logic the creatures watching me from their hiding spots are that far away too.
The trash truck turns the corner coming my way, but by then I’m in the shadows. The men do not see me as they work.
I’m as distant from them as the stars.
Beau Beausoleil
Close at Hand
(for Andrea)
This poem signifies a poem
that I am incapable of writing
for your Birthday
A poem that is much like
one of the luscious ripe
purple black plums
in the yellow bowl on the
kitchen table
A plum poem that threatens
to absorb all the light in the kitchen
A plum poem that patiently
waits to open its life
in your mouth
Maya van Leeuwaarde
Scrappy Doo
A family can be two = you + me + the cat + the ex-boyfriend + the girl who’s just a friend + your parents + my coworkers + the guy from the show we watch on tv + that book i want you to read + that time i tried to die at 18 + your ex-roommates (mine too) + someone I just met yesterday + the person that gets too handsy at a party + those friends you haven’t introduced me to + my neighbor’s dog named scrappy doo.
Ralph J. Long Jr.
Enough
It doesn’t matter that Honey Baked was sold out
on the day before Easter because the Bay Bridge
maze is moving at the speed limit and the clouds
over Oakland would have pleased Ansel Adams
and you are inhaling the wafting aroma of slowly
cooling baby back ribs in the back seat that will
carry over to the kitchen when they are reheated
in a low oven while you search for paper napkins
to mop up the sauce that you don’t need because
the pit master was a BBQ savant and weeks after
you suck the bones clean, you will savor this day.
Bill Friend
What News from Our Tottering State?
A feely bliss, a nook to snore. Pixel glory, threat art, the proofless splendor of catastrophe. Time to cut down on the guitar solos. Throw a shrug and sleep in the shed.
Contributor Information
John Brantingham is the recipient of a New York State Arts Council grant and was Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks’ first poet laureate. His work has been in hundreds of magazines and The Best Small Fictions 2016 and 2022. He has twenty-two books of poetry, nonfiction, and fiction.
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Beau Beausoleil is a poet and activist based in San Francisco, California. His two most recent poetry chapbooks are Poems For Ukraine (Barley Books U.K., 2023) and War News, a free ebook published by Agitate! Journal (2023).
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Maya van Leeuwaarde is a poet and art historian based in Seattle, WA. With a historical background rooted in indentured servitude that brought her family to the United States, van Leeuwaarde’s poetry often weaves together considerations of historical interactions and social desires, drawing inspiration from her own communicative confusions. When she’s not writing, van Leeuwaarde is an active participant in the Seattle art scene, working front desk at the local museum or catching a hardcore show at a nearby dive bar.
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Ralph J. Long Jr. has authored two chapbooks, Polaroids at a Yard Sale (Main Street Rag Press, 2021) and A Democracy Divided (Poetry Box, 2018). His work has appeared in the anthologies Ambrosia: A Conversation About Food and Simpsonistas: Volume 4, as well as in the publications Cloudbank, Common Ground Review, Peregrine, Stoneboat Literary Journal, Scriblerus, Sisyphus, South 85 Journal, Ursa Minor, and Zingara Poetry Review. He lives in Oakland, California.
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Bill Friend’s books include The Feast of St. Mary Mackillop (BlazeVox, forthcoming) and American Field Couches (BlazeVox 2011). His recent work has appeared in Noon: A Journal of the Short Poem, Otoliths, and Unlikely Stories.
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