PET POEM
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by
Janis Butler Holm
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The Montreal Review, August, 2010
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This poem wants to howl until you return. This poem wants to jump up and down as you open the door. This poem wants to wag its tail rambunctiously. This poem wants to make excited little moaning sounds until you talk back to it. This poem wants to stand on its hind legs and lick your chin. This poem wants to scamper beside you as you move into the kitchen. This poem wants to make you feel loved, loved, loved. This poem wants you to open the damn meat bag and put food in a dish. Now this poem wants you to get out of the way.
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Janis Butler Holm's
poems, fiction, and essays have appeared
in small-press, national, and international magazines.
In Canada, her works have been published in magazines, such as B after C, Filling Station, Front Magazine, Maisonneuve, Other Clutter, Rampike,
and Tessera. Holm's
favorite themes are race, class, gender, sexual preference, consumerism, and
American violence culture. |
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Illustration: Ellen Cornett. The American painter Ellen Cornett lives and works in Washington, DC area.
"Ellen Cornett paints visual questions. They emerge from the familiar- fairytales, old novels, poems - glowing in homemade pastels with titles like "Princess and the Pea" and "The Little Mermaid." They are mystical and magical, with a story within a story within a story. Something very intriguing is going on because, ultimately, with a clue here and a reminder there, these are pictures of us," says the Capitol Hill artist and writer Jim Magner.
"In "Pinocchia and Peter Rabbit," Pinocchia (played by Roxi) is tied with ropes to mimic marionette strings. Her pose suggests being held up or even confined by the strings. You can't tell whether Pinocchia is about to kick Peter Rabbit or whether the strings are holding her back. Perhaps Peter Rabbit has the advantage. He looks like he's a big piece of stale chocolate but he is actually make of concrete. He's a lawn ornament," Wade Carey writes in a review article entitled "Ellen Cornett's Disarming Juxtapositions."
Ellen Cornett's works can be purchased at Studio H Gallery (408 H Street NE second floor Washington, DC 20002). Cornett's website: www.ellencornett.com
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