Dear Mr. Logan,
My name is Rex Sexton and I am submitting the five poems below for your consideration for publication in "(A Brilliant) Record Magazine."
The following is my publishing history and statement about inspiration for my work.
I am an award winning artist exhibiting in Chicago and Philadelphia and my writing has that immediate and visual aspect. My novel “Desert Flower” was called “ … innovative and original …” by Large Print Review and “…so skillfully devious it could have been written by Heinrich von Kleist two centuries ago in Germany.” by Kirkus Discoveries. My short story “Holy Night” received the Critic’s Choice Award in the Eric Hoffer Award competition and was published in Best New Writing 2007. My poems have been published in reviews such as Mobius, Willow Review, Waterways and Edge, and my recent collection “The Time Hotel” was described by another Kirkus review as “… a deeply thought-provoking …compelling reading experience.” I paint and write expressions of humanity with the hope that I capture its dreams in the midst of adversity.
Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
Rex Sexton
NIGHT WITHOUT STARS
Listening to it in the darkness,
the lullaby of hopelessness,
played by staccato rain
across the Chi-town tenements,
gunfire and sirens tossed in
to make the rhythms of the night
even more disturbing,
I dream colors,
paint prayers,
across the blackboard of oblivion,
where all lessons of the street are learned,
without degrees,
and tattooed in the heart and mind
with graffiti signs.
SHADOW WORK
We jumble. The cops turn up.
They bumble. Whosh! Whosh!
I catch the El train – rooftops
interrupted by flashes of lightening.
Cold. Alone. Endless rain.
JUNKYARD DREAMS
all piled in a heap
and rusting amidst
the acid rains and the
tangled weeds of poverty,
where butterflies and sunny
skies and star-lit nights
seldom come to anyone.
PAPER MOON
The world dropped into night
as I flew my kite up and down
the school’s playground.
Lightening flared, thunder rumbled,
but I held on tight, spellbound as it
danced, fluttered with the black winds
in the stormy sky, until the rains came
and it tumbled.
STARCHED NAPKINS
Tea for two on the table,
she stands combing her tangled hair
in the room without a rocking chair.
“I am so glad that you are here.”
She says to the full length mirror.
All the doors are locked.
All the clocks have stopped.
But tea will be served with care
in fine China with silver ware.
