Francis Raven


Source Falling

and if all you wanted
was hedges and yellow lines of roads

it would be fine in this cold house,
but, of course, you wanted

to share the sordid minutes of your childhood,
the falling plane, the other friend who died in the crash,

and I didn’t have any details
in the overstuffed carryon, save bricks

and doubt in the wooden nickels
and the Ajax that you use to scrub the sheets.

Design Relax

22, white shirt hanging
below blue zipper
and almost red hair.
        He might say something about his poems

                “I always start out with grand schemes for my poems,
                like a book written in the airport
                or at Macy’s or another one
                dedicated strangely enough to a girl
                I went out with in the fifth grade,
                but those schemes seem to fold
                and the best poems I’ve written are just
                those little notes and hidden reminders
                I’ve written to myself.”

or he might say nothing of this
and proceed to buy the new yellow copy of Brill’s Content,
read half of each article
and get his ass on the plane,
so that he could be picked up two hours later
by his girlfriend or maybe boyfriend
or by some other significance.
Yes, this is all perfectly imaginable.

Coffee after a Sunburned Morning at the Beach

There aren’t any public bathrooms
in this coffee house
in Santa Cruz.
What do they expect us to do
with all of that coffee?
And I am sure
that they have
an employee bathroom
in the back,
that’s not up to code
and smells.
But when I ask them
about the uncoded odorific pisshole
in back
they lie and cheat
about it
and ask me
if I’d like a refill.
And when I say
I don’t want one
unless they have a bathroom
they tell me
that I’ve sat
for the time
that a cup of coffee
buys me.
So, I walk next door
and jump into the bathroom
of a fancy hotel
which clearly says
it’s for customers only.
Luckily, next year,
they’re installing
seven portapotties
in Santa Cruz.



Francis Raven is an editorial assistant at the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism.  Broken Boulder press recently published two of his chapbooks called “Notestalk” and “Notationing.” Warnell.com published an electronic chapbook of his entitled Do Not Add Up. His poems have been published in Pindeldyboz, Monkey Bicycle, Mudlark, Pavement Saw, Poethia, Beehive, Gestalten, Untitled, The In Posse Review, The East Village, The New Colonist, and Taint, among others.  He has had essays and articles published in Clamor, In These Times, Fulcrum, Rain Taxi, The New Colonist, Taint, and Pavement Saw.