And who knows? We know that great literary movers and shakers frequent this site. This could be your shot at the glamorous life of a poet!

Edited to add: Heck, why stop at poetry? You may have noticed the occasional duck flying through the header every minute or two. The way that’s done, I can load and play pretty much anything anyone out there puts together. It shouldn’t be too intrusive, of course, but with one simple tweak to your animation I can put it in the random list. Whether you’ve been thinking about learning a little Flash or you kick Flash’s ass, here’s a great chance to strut your stuff.

What could POSSIBLY be cooler than that? Nothing, that’s what!

I met a guy once, a big guy his skin black his teeth white his eyes red his laugh came from deep in his belly, and “who the hell are you?” he asked me.

Enter cigarettes with extra printing on them, negative things that you conquer by burning them. You can buy the regular pack with random messages or you can custom-order with your own personal nemeses. Sure the custom ones would cost a lot more, but that alone might provide incentive to cut back, while making the occasional smoke a poetic act. There must be a brand of cigarette that markets to the black-beret crowd that would make a killing off this.

Plus, it would be a kick to write the ill-fortunes.

There are words in my head
“fifty-six” I said just now
out loud, for no apparent reason
“Marconi”
“samurai”
“bivalve”
They are sounds, nothing more
disconnected
They bang about up there
ugly tourists

If I smoked
I’d write each word on a cigarette
and burn it
hear it crackle as I inhaled
watch the paper glow and draw back
“transcendent”
“ninteen”
“maybe”
the numbers most of all must go

Breakfast!

If things look wacky it means either the style sheet is cached and didn’t update (usually reloading the page will fix this) or it means you’re using Internet Explorer.

There have been a couple of multi-verse submissions I’m still trying to figure out how to get into the rotation, and a couple that don’t physically fit in the space. I’ll think of something.

Addendum: Currently there are four guest poets for whom I have no image. If you don’t like the placeholder I gave you, send me something else. Adam’s placeholder is a lemur, in case you can’t tell.

Currently I’m missing pictures of Melinda and Brian. I would love to put you up there, however, so please send me a picture of you that can be cropped square. I have put in suitable substitutes for the time being (heh, heh, heh…). Let me know if you find a mistake – I could easily have made a typo and the code currently assumes the order the browser will execute the JavaScript functions. If it executes in the wrong sequence I expect someone else’s picture will appear next to my explanatory haiku.

I also have figured out how to fit the limericks in the header more nicely, and I’ll get to that in the next couple of days – so bring on those 5-line poems!