Alan Squire Publishing

A Small Press With Big Ideas

Non-Volatile Memory "How are you doing today, Essie?" I hear as I power on.   My response is automatic.  "All systems are satisfactory."  I review my memory caches, noting a gap.  I'd been in standby mode for thirteen hours.  I am seated at your desk. Out the window, hundreds of floors below, the city tessellates in a collection of glittering rooftops.  Your name is written on the many diplomas that hang behind your chair.  I read it over and over again like a mantra:  Dr. Nikole Obano.  Dr. Nikole Obano.  Dr. Nikole Obano.  … [Read more...]

The Crisis Is a Border Asterisms of migrants approach in bands, they proclaim, stretching out like constellations that haven't been discovered yet, or are considered too early in the process to be named.   Folks, we have always accosted grafts of land like this: Whoever holds it-by force turned into indelible tradition-gets to justify what happens to it. Yet after, say,   Kristellnacht, which Jew knew to leave first? When was the exact never again? What collections of omens or actions solidify into   policy, precisely timed as quartz wristwatches sewn into hems, straps of gold for … [Read more...]

We Pretend Britney Spears Is a Hurricane Repel a tide of staccato questions. It doesn't matter if you answer, or how. The countermeasure legato of your southern drawl. Left with uncontainable larvae of once-facts, the draw is the razor that gnaws at the time signature of you until you become half and half again, until the truth becomes an untidy   army of lies that marches back to shore as a storm surge, winging to land like moths to wool, their collective wind wrapping around the eye of a cyclone whose trajectory is uncertain but has the strength of so many hungry mouths. A flood … [Read more...]

What It Takes The sun does not rise easily. A whole planet must spin on its axis-take with it warring countries, pull culture clashes and opposing ideologies round and round-to make    these days begin. The colors, not simple either-all splotches of red and orange and another hue so hard to name I might call it bravery-bold enough to smear the sky.   There's a reason such audacious colors strip the heavens of nightly blue elegance. Boldness requires space and freedom and takes it all upon morning.   Do you have what it takes? You must, for you're a girl and no one will … [Read more...]

Embroidered Sleeves She loves how the night sky promises nothing.   It just falls as powder falls, as much by accident    as by design. Her embroidered sleeves   envy crows that smoke cigars in old cartoons.   She sometimes wishes that someone cared enough   to portray her completely wrong.   She loves how the night sky promises nothing.   It just falls as powder falls, as much by accident    as by design. Her embroidered sleeves   envy crows that smoke cigars in old cartoons.   She sometimes wishes that someone cared … [Read more...]

ACROSS THE STREET: MARCH, 2020 Across the street, the girls have begun yelling at each other. They are each dramatic in their own right. The oldest one is twelve and a regional theater star with a Los Angeles agent. Her little sister has a perpetual pout and has sung the Star-Spangled Banner at the opening of our local baseball games. But now, they are yelling. They hate each other. They hate their parents. They have been home from school for ten days in a row without friends over for distraction. They have a set of grandparents in Los Angeles they cannot visit because they might … [Read more...]

How to Save Your Marriage Before the Elevator Reaches the Hotel Lobby 15th Floor: Wait for an empty elevator. Push all the buttons so it stops at every floor to give yourself time to think on the way down. 14th Floor: When a woman gets on and sees the buttons all lit up, blame it on a bunch of obnoxious kids playing on the elevator: "Ridiculous." Think of your own kids and wonder if you should've left your panties on. 13th Floor: When the woman tries to chat with you, avoid this by staring intently at your phone's lock screen, a picture of your happy family. Wonder what they're doing … [Read more...]

"Do not miss Red Riviera" New Review Praises David Downie's Latest The Part-Time Parisian's new review of Red Riviera praises the tactfully drawn history and landscape of Italy's coast in Downie's new thriller. David Downie made his career as a travel writer, penning famous and popular guides to European cities like Paris and Amsterdam. Not only is he obsessed with traveling, but like any writer he is as much a researcher as a chronicler. For this reason, the Italian Riviera (his current home), feels unique and alive in Red Riviera. In their review of the new thriller, The … [Read more...]

Lục bát for Early Winter November again, And the soft ice had been returned  By a low sun. I'd learned  Nothing: the same street turned early To dark; the man bitter From glasses of pearly Champagne I'd egged Him to buy. The lamps begged Off their halos, cold, pegged me for That inevitable worn- Out shame. Tell me, what more could I Have asked of love but my Intimacy with blame? November again, And the soft ice had been returned  By a low sun. I'd learned  Nothing: the same street turned early To dark; the man bitter From glasses of pearly Champagne I'd egged Him to buy. The lamps … [Read more...]

DULCET TONES ON PLUTO I go to Pluto. Imagination  faster than any rocket.   387 degrees below zero.     We bring beach blankets.   And stars, psychedelic popcorn!   They resist being counted,  dislike getting herded  into an equation.     A soothing night settles around us.   Five moons fluff our pillows.   I go to Pluto. Imagination  faster than any rocket.   387 degrees below zero.     We bring beach blankets.   And stars, psychedelic popcorn!   They resist being counted,  dislike getting herded  into an equation.     A soothing night settles around us.   Five moons … [Read more...]

On Eating Walleye Pike at the St. Paul Grill These are FARMED, Grandpa, something you could never have imagined  as you sat patiently chewing on the stump of a cold cigar, straw fishing hat squished down over your bald head, "There's Old Man Diamond,"  Daddy would tease, as you sat waiting for  the solitary-as-you-were walleye pike as he   swirled at the bottom of Big Floyd Lake.   They cooked it in PECANS AND MAPLE SYRUP, Grandma, a taste you could never imagine, as you stood aproned, the red gingham curtains behind you and that old toilet that ran all the time as background … [Read more...]

Houses You send me another one, at work, mid-morning,  pixels flying through the ether to form pictures of a life five feet closer to perfect: emails that link to dream house after dream house, each one more virtuous than the next, at the beach, in the city, hidden in towns we've never heard of. You don't tire of looking because what if it exists- that single spectacular find-like an undiscovered planet in an infant universe spinning miles from the skittish dogs next door, the cops stopped across the street again, and the bleary-eyed woman, cigarette alight,  whose … [Read more...]

Carrying a Friend "Carrying a Friend" originally appeared in Bone & Ink Press / Shut Down Strangers & Hot Rod Angels: an anthology inspired by the music of Bruce Springsteen. The thing is the guy, I don't know, I thought I could trust the guy. He was older, seemed like he knew the ropes. I had seen him coming out of that place where they hung out. Salerno's. It's a Starbucks now but back then it was the place, these made guys coming and going all day, younger ones standing around outside feeling at their waistbands every time someone they didn't know got within a block. The … [Read more...]

TV Segment on Grace Cavalieri Takes Home Two Silver Tellys Hartford Cable Network strikes Telly silver with their featured segment on Maryland's favorite poet laureate. Grace Cavalieri's segment on Harford County TV is officially a smash hit, taking home two silver tellys at the annual Telly Awards- the competition's top prize. The short was awarded highest honors in two categories: Videography/Cinematography and Television:Documentary. Grace and her poetry appear alongside other award winners and nominees from TV networks like Aljazeera, ESPN, and PBS. This sort of media recognition is … [Read more...]

Keeping up with Reuben Jackson: Bon Appetit, COMP, Friday Night Jazz and more! Three New Poems by Reuben Jackson Appear in COMP Journal Friday Night Jazz Archived by the AAPB Reuben Jackson's long-running and wildly popular Friday Night Jazz! has been collected and archived by the American Archive of Public Broadcasting (a collaboration between the Library of Congress and WGBH Educational Foundation). You can listen here to all 17 3-hour long shows which first appeared on Vermont Public Radio. The remaining 128 shows can be found at the archives. From AAPB: … [Read more...]

"Persuasive" Woman Drinking Absinthe explores "Illicit Love" in New Review from Compulsive Reader Charles Rammelkamp delivers a witty and erudite review of Katherine E. Young's opus. In his new review of Katherine E. Young's Woman Drinking Absinthe, Charles Rammelkamp delivers a write-up worthy of its subject. With careful erudition, and no lack of wit, he mines Katherine's beautiful and heartbreaking poesy about "illicit love" for words of affirmation. "Love, indeed, is the overarching theme of this remarkable collection," writes Charles. And he shows how this recurring theme speaks … [Read more...]

7 Upbeat Poems to Celebrate Poem in Your Pocket Day (with printable PDFs) Check out these seven upbeat and whimsical poems from ASP authors; print one out for Poem in Your Pocket Day! What is Poem in Your Pocket Day? Poem in Your Pocket Day was created by the Office of the Mayor of New York City in 2002 in partnership with the New York Department of Cultural Affairs and Education. Its goal is to reintroduce poetry, a traditionally performative art, into social situations and normal everyday life. As such, PIYPD marks the end of National Poetry Month, bringing the lessons of the month … [Read more...]

"Our Favorite Things": Katherine E. Young and Natalya Sukhonos Discuss New Poetry Collections Russophone-connected writers Young and Sukhonos present alternating interviews in this fascinating piece from literary blog, Punctured Lines. Watch or read this alternating interview between poet and translator Katherine E. Young and Natalya Sukhonos both of which release new collections of original poetry this year. The interview is published by literary blog Punctured Lines. Young's Woman Drinking Absinthe was launched last Saturday and has since been garnering rave reviews across the web. WDA … [Read more...]

Reuben Jackson Joins WPFW's "The Sound of Surprise" Jazz expert, Reuben Jackson, takes his expertise to the beloved DC jazz standby. Beginning May 1st, Reuben will begin as host of DC radio channel WPFW's "The Sound of Surprise." The show runs from 4 to 6pm and Reuben will be alternating every other Sunday with the program's creator, Larry Appelbaum. WPFW (89.3) has been serving the DC metropolitan area since 1977 as a standout talk and jazz station. Entirely listener supported, WPFW does not play commercials. Reuben Jackson is a poet, raconteur, and former archivist of the … [Read more...]

A Book and Its Cover: Rose Solari Reviews Two New Collections of Poetry for WIRoB Terri Ellen Cross Davis and Dan Beachy-Quick's new collections get the Rose Solari treatment in a new review which ties subject matter to cover design. Rose Solari's latest review column for Washington Independent Review of Books tackles two stellar new collections by established small-press poets, Terry Ellen Cross Davis and Dan Beachy-Quick. As with all her reviews, Rose uses a common theme to link the subject matter of the books she is reviewing. This month, she explores how the cover design is … [Read more...]