Tag: Poem
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Naturalization (a cento after Snighda Korala: Fragments on Naturalization)
Malus Sieversii, your tiny apple seeds spread long before I came. The Silk Road away from you tumid with less blood, grief. Ad Domestica,the pale veil of a whole life waiting—before that. (Malus sieversii is a wild apple native to the mountains of Central Asia in southern Kazakhstan. It has recently been shown to be…
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The Death of Cinema
Some day the warblers will come and the birders will wander through the undergrowth, run across the ticket booth covered in briars,the rusty saplings of the speaker posts.Somewhere in the thickets they will find the popcorn stand, where they once bought a two buck bucket big enough to last a double feature of Godzilla/Mothra.They can…
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The City Bus ‘Ever Rolls
She looks down from the sea of umbrellas boarding the bus in a heavy black spasm. that’s barely held back. The city’s lightning reflects in her windshield, echoes in the rear view mirror, prisms in the silver shadow of the tires. For now, she’s relaxed, almost peaceful, maybe near sleep, at least for this dead…
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Earth Mama: Feeling the Pain of Child Separation
Premise via Wikipedia A pregnant single mother, with two children in foster care, embraces her Bay Area community as she fights to reclaim her family. Review: Earth Mama is a drama about Motherhood: wanting children, having children, fighting to keep them- and if you are black, poor, make occasional poor decisions, losing them to the…
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War Pony: Never Ever Going Off the Reservation
Storyline via IMDB: The interlocking stories of two young Oglala Lakota men growing up on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Review: The eventually intertwining stories in Riley Keough’s and Gina Gammell’s War Pony have a heavy Reservation Dogs feel. War Pony has a more grim, grimy and tragic feel. The Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota,…
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Skinamarink: Stumbling Badly in the Childhood Dark
Storyline via IMDB: Two children wake up in the middle of the night to find their father is missing, and all the windows and doors in their home have vanished. To cope with the strange situation, the two bring pillows and blankets to the living room and settle into a quiet slumber party. They play…
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River Wild: A Feral Thriller
Storyline via Wikipedia; Estranged brother and sister Gray and Joey, embark on a whitewater rafting trip amongst tourists with their childhood friend named Trevor. Along the river, the events quickly turn from exciting to terrifying, as the group finds themselves trapped alongside a killer who is intent to sabotage the trip while keeping secrets from…
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TNMT: Mutant Mayhem— Oozing Growing Charisma
Storyline via Rotten Tomatoes: After years of being sheltered from the human world, the Turtle brothers set out to win the hearts of New Yorkers and be accepted as normal teenagers. Their new friend, April O’Neil, helps them take on a mysterious crime syndicate, but they soon get in over their heads when an army…
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Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3: A Nice Send Off for the Old Team and Good Setup for the New Guardians
Storyline via Rotten Tomatoes: In Marvel Studios “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” our beloved band of misfits are looking a bit different these days. Peter Quill, still reeling from the loss of Gamora, must rally his team around him to defend the universe along with protecting one of their own. A mission that, if…
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Perfectly Good Food
“It’s perfectly good food,” Wei’s mugin (mother) would say to her. “Waste not, want not,” she added to her mantra. The chop suey of existence was her muse, art.Today was her love letter to the dumpling, an ode to starch: a cheddar cheese scallion pierogi with a soy sauce/duck sauce/hot mustard packet drizzle culled from…
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Jesus Revolution: Getting to God by Eliminating Your Inner Charles Manson
Storyline via Wikipedia: Based on the autobiographical book of the same name co-written by Greg Laurie, the film follows Laurie (Joel Courtney), Christian hippie Lonnie Frisbee (Jonathan Roumie), and pastor Chuck Smith(Kelsey Grammer) as they take part in the Jesus movement in California during the late 1960s. Review: Jesus Revolution is a mostly faithful depiction…
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Blackberry: The Road to the iPhone is Paved with Blackberries
Storyline via IMDB: A company that toppled global giants before succumbing to the ruthlessly competitive forces of Silicon Valley. This is not a conventional tale of modern business failure by fraud and greed. The rise and fall of BlackBerry reveals the dangerous speed at which innovators race along the information superhighway. Review: All on screen…
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Haunted Mansion : Spooks Come Out for a Singing Wake
Storyline via IMDB: A single mom named Gabbie hires a tour guide, a psychic, a priest and a historian to help exorcise her newly bought mansion after discovering it is inhabited by ghosts. Review: I doubt if even fans of the Haunted Mansion will like the latest cinema edition of the Disney Parks ride. This…
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Emily: Needs More Dickinson and Less Wuthering Heights
Storyline via IMDB: “Emily” imagines Emily Brontë’s own Gothic story that inspired her seminal novel, ‘Wuthering Heights.‘ Haunted by her mother’s death, Emily struggles within the confines of her family life and yearns for artistic and personal freedom, and so begins a journey to channel her creative potential into one of the greatest novels of…
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You Won’t Be Alone: Living in Witchery
Storyline via IMDB: In an isolated mountain village in 19th century Macedonia, a young girl is kidnapped and then transformed into a witch by an ancient spirit. Review: I love how the witch film You Won’t Be Alone moves lyrically, subconsciously between dream and nightmare, horror and fairy tale. Alone pares down its visuals to…
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An Old Garden
(After Richard Aldington’s Aux Vieux Jardin)Today I found an unknown garden in the woods.I do not know who carved this still pool fringedwith reeds amidst a forest browning for winter.Who decided to protect it from the tearing air,tended it to suckle water from dark clouds.All I know, it blooms with great delight, apartfrom the diverse…
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In the Midst of the Snowy Forest
(After Major Jackson https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/major-jackson#tab-poems)The shadows of pines on the snow cast their canvas.The Downy Woodpecker stabbing beak carves wordsthat my pen cannot equal into the January morning.Her chirping is filled with a feasting frenzy resolve for the beetle larvae beneath the bark.I look, but even with my wood-boring eyes I cannot interrogate beyond the known:…
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Book Club: The Next Chapter- Riffing on the Audio Version
Storyline via Rotten Tomatoes: The highly anticipated sequel follows our four best friends as they take their book club to Italy for the fun girls trip they never had. When things go off the rails and secrets are revealed, their relaxing vacation turns into a once-in-a-lifetime cross-country adventure. Review: In Book Club: The Next Chapter…
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Barbie: Living and Dreaming in the IRL highly Meta-Life
Storyline via IMDB: Barbie suffers a crisis that leads her to question her world and her existence. Review: There is a lot of feminism floating through Barbie. Some thoughts of death too— the perfect doll ruminating, fearing, crying about a mortal end. It turns out to be a rip in the Barbie-real world continuum, a…
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Of an Age: The Sweetness of Remember Your Name
Storyline via IMDB: In the summer of 1999, a 17-year-old Serbian-born Australian amateur ballroom dancer experiences an unexpected and intense 24-hour romance with a friend’s older brother. Review: I found the gay romance Of an Age (on Peacock) filled with subtle echoes of Call Me By Your Name. The age difference between the would be…
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They Cloned Tyrone: Trying not to Be a Copy of its Former Self.
Storyline via IMDB: A series of eerie events thrusts an unlikely trio (John Boyega, Jamie Foxx and Teyonah Parris) onto the trail of a nefarious government conspiracy in this pulpy mystery caper. Review: They Cloned Tyrone is a wanna be Jordan Peele film. The Glen neighborhood here is a future dystopia where every conspiracy theory…
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Oppenheimer: I Am Destroyer of Worlds
Storyline via Rotten Tomatoes: During World War II, Lt. Gen. Leslie Groves Jr. appoints physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer to work on the top-secret Manhattan Project. Oppenheimer and a team of scientists spend years developing and designing the atomic bomb. Their work comes to fruition on July 16, 1945, as they witness the world’s first nuclear…
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Close: Splitting Childhood into Joy and Grief
Storyline via IMDB: With summer drawing to a close, inseparable 13-year-old best friends Léo and Rémi idle away the rest of the holidays before school. It is as if the two bosom buddies share an unbreakable brotherly bond beyond their comprehension–in fact, nothing can ever come between them. However, when the boys’ cloudless friendship catches…
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Fathers and Sons: Walking the Broken Road
He took his boy along the path to show him all the things he killed.The rifles were left behind, not in the truck, but at home,secure in the gun case.He had his fill of all that.It’s been more than a yearsince he closed the shop and spent his golden momentsorganizing the nuts and bolts,the tools,…
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The Inspection: Going to the Very Corp
Storyline via IMDB: In Elegance Bratton’s inspirational and deeply moving retelling of his own story, a young, gay Black man, rejected by his mother and with few options for his future, decides to join the Marines, doing whatever it takes to succeed in a system that would cast him aside. But even as he battles…
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Bodies Bodies Bodies: Paranoia and Acting in a Dark House
Storyline via IMDB: Nervous about meeting the smug, wealthy friends of her rehabilitated girlfriend Sophie, timid newcomer Bee arrives late to a booze-addled, drug-fuelled hurricane party at bored David’s Georgian grey-stone manor house. As the storm rages outside, the party gets started, and the group of spoiled zoomers gathers around the host in the family…
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Nimona: F(r)ight the Power
Storyline via IMDB: When Ballister Boldheart (Riz Ahmed), a knight in a futuristic medieval world, is framed for a crime he didn’t commit, the only one who can help him prove his innocence is Nimona (Chloë Grace Moretz), a mischievous teen with a taste for mayhem – who also happens to be a shapeshifting creature…
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Mission Impossible; Dead Reckoning-Part One— See Tom Run and Run and Talk and Talk
Storyline via IMDB: Ethan Hunt and the IMF team must track down a terrifying new weapon that threatens all of humanity if it falls into the wrong hands. With control of the future and the fate of the world at stake, a deadly race around the globe begins. Confronted by a mysterious, all-powerful enemy, Ethan…
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The Evolution of Our Caress
from the cotyledon the leaf opens it first curveto the golden decay, the dispersing crumbling wind.from the abandoned shellstanding firm against the reclaiming wave the turtle claims its carapace.from the snail’s screamthe ear cupped itselfto hear what the tide strived to muffle. from beyond the foam the mother and child cuddle from the wind, the…
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The Out-Laws: Living With the Almost Bad In-Laws.
Summary via IMDB: A straight-laced bank manager about to marry the love of his life. When his bank is held up by infamous Ghost Bandits during his wedding week, he believes his future in-laws who just arrived in town, are the infamous Out-Laws. Review: I come to expect a pretty reliable formula for every Adam…
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65: That Extinction Meteor Can’t Come Fast Enough.
Storyline via IMDB: After a catastrophic crash, pilot Mills quickly discovers he’s actually stranded on an unknown planet. Now, with only one chance at rescue, Mills must make his way across an unknown terrain riddled with dangerous prehistoric creatures in an epic fight to survive. From the writers of A Quiet Place comes 65, a…
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The Lightening
It’s hardly remembered, this first lightening of a child—snip by snip each curl floating to the floor,causing an impatient rising from the high chairThe child wants wings. He’s evaporating in the air.Yet, the mother holds him down, cutting a heavy linkin the nape of his neck to tether him to her, the earth. “Hold my…
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Mothers and Daughters: A Bee in Her Bonnet
Amongst the leftovers she would sit in the old shed, with its corrugated tin roof and clapboard siding, feeling the heat come to her, a caress floating from the ground. She watched her mother delicatelyflour the last of the catfish. The shed use to be a playground but now it was a hideout- somewhere to…
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Epitaph as My Father’s Son
There is no house that is not my father’s.There are no fixed stars,just shaken bits of misery, tiny disasters tethered to hope.From the house he loved,I feel the slap of his inner pain,fist waves hitting the footers.It was easy for him to fight back,(he had to do it to get anywhere)harder for him to forgive…
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Rainy Day
Only the rain moves,nailing the houses into their own coffins. In childhood daysthe rain sailed down alleys.merrily sweeping motley papers, leaves,once, a tiny pink shoe—everything, to the sea, a rollicking circus calliope. Now the rain, the iron rain,lets the sky place itstombstones onevery single roof.
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Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny: Going into History
Summary via IMDB: Daredevil archaeologist Indiana Jones races against time to retrieve a legendary dial that can change the course of history. Accompanied by his goddaughter, he soon finds himself squaring off against Jürgen Voller, a former Nazi who works for NASA. Review: In Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, Professor Henry Jones must…
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Wildflower: Neuro-Divergent Parents in a Teen’s World
Summary via Wikipedia: The film centers on Bea, the daughter of two intellectually disabled parents Sharon and Derek. Bea is left comatose during her senior year in high school and the film explores aspects of her life, including a romantic relationship with fellow student Ethan, through flashbacks. Review: Wildflower (on Hulu) really doesn’t really advance…
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Blow Up My Life: Another Generic Drug
Storyline via Chattanooga Film Festival: Jason (JASON SELVIG), a disillusioned pharmaceutical employee, is fired after a drug-fueled social media post goes viral, but when he accidentally discovers a deadly opioid conspiracy hidden by his former boss (DAVRAM STIEFLER) he sets out to redeem himself. In this noir comedy-thriller set in the age of tech, Jason…
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Local Legends: Celebrating the Non-Legendary
Storyline via IMDB: The adventures of Matt Farley as he spends a few weeks preparing for a big comedy show in Manchester, NH. Review: Local Legends stars comedian/musician Matt Farley in a mockumentary about his everyday life. It’s a pretty shaggy dog story with bits of Woody Allen’s black and white phase sprinkled in. The…
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TRAP: Getting too Close and Yet too Far to See the Real Ashbury Park
Storyline via IMDB: Facing life in prison, a hood dreams of the violent streets that forged his identity, but cursed his soul. Review: TRAP, the debut film from Anthony Edward Curry, stands for The Real Ashbury Park, draws on the lives of kids Curry grew up with, to create an impressionistic liquid narrative that becomes…
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The Weird Kidz: Just So Off-Putting
Summary via Chattanooga Film Festival: THE WEIRD KIDZ is a horror-inflected creature feature and an ode to ’80s coming-of-age films and favorite late night cinema tales. When three pre-teen boys and an older brother and his girlfriend take off for a weekend campout, none of them could imagine the horrors (and laughs) awaiting them in…
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Sour Party: Sparkly Colored Farts
Summary via Chattanooga Film Festival: Gwen and James are two broke, self absorbed, emotionally stunted 30-somethings, eking their way through a meager LA existence. They’ve tried everything to get rich quick from cliche artistic endeavors and failed business startups to sex work, playing the victims all the way. When Gwen realizes she forgot her older…
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New Religion: Feeling Red Grief
Summary via IMDB: Miyabi lost her only daughter in an accident. After her daughter’s death, she got a divorce. She now works as a call girl and is living with her new boyfriend. One day, she meets a weird customer who asks her to let him take a picture of her spine. She does as…
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The Elderly: Parental Homicidal Tendencies Turn Real
Summary via IMDB: Octogenarian who enters into a state of dementia after the sudden suicide of his wife, sparking a series of paranormal events that will put his family’s lives at risk. Review: I admire filmmakers that stick to their vision no matter how weird and sordid it gets. In the Spanish horror film, The…
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Mrs. Booker on 8th Ave: Getting John Cassavettes Half Right
Summary via IMDB: Mrs. Booker on 8th Avenue follows Florence Booker (Daniella Alma) who feels increasingly isolated in her marriage in New York. A shared cigarette with an alluring line cook sparks an affair that causes the different layers of Florence’s life to unravel. Review: Filmed over ten days on the streets of Manhattan, Mrs.…
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King on Screen: King Directors Give Each Other Halos
Summary via IMDB: 1976, Brian de Palma directs Carrie, the first novel by Stephen King. Since, more than 50 directors adapted the master of horror’s books, in more than 80 films and series, making him now, the most adapted author still alive in the world . What’s so fascinating with him that the directors can’t…
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Brutal Season: Death of a Family’s Soul
Summary via IMDB: In 1948, the Trouths are facing no income and the hottest summer on record. When their estranged son inexplicably returns, the apartment is full again – but is it big enough for the gambling, trauma, and substantial life insurance policy that comes in his wake? Brutal Season is a throwback drama that…
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Hell Hath No Fury: Marriage Is So Deadly Funny
Storyline via IMDB: A husband and a wife separately and unknowingly plot to murder each other on the same fateful night. Review: Hell Hath No Fury is a murder comedy of errors. There are murders and infidelities and betrayals a plenty which all go merrily awry and right. One cohort dies with a knife blade…
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Polite Society: Committing to the Lunatic Vision of Adolescence
Storyline via IMDB: A merry mash up of sisterly affection, parental disappointment and bold action, Polite Society follows martial artist-in-training Ria Khan who believes she must save her older sister Lena from her impending marriage. After enlisting the help of her friends, Ria attempts to pull off the most ambitious of all wedding heists in…
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Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse- Lighting Refines Gold
Storyline via IMDB: Miles Morales returns for the next chapter of the Oscar®-winning Spider-Verse saga, an epic adventure that will transport Brooklyn’s full-time, friendly neighborhood Spider-Man across the Multiverse to join forces with Gwen Stacy and a new team of Spider-People to face off with a villain more powerful than anything they have ever encountered.…
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Elemental: Fire and Water Will Mix
Movie info via Rotten Tomatoes: Disney and Pixar’s “Elemental,” an all-new, original feature film set in Element City, where fire-, water-, land- and air-residents live together. The story introduces Ember, a tough, quick-witted and fiery young woman, whose friendship with a fun, sappy, go-with-the-flow guy named Wade challenges her beliefs about the world they live…
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Chevalier: The Cock Crows So Sweetly Off
Storyline via IMDB: An opulent historical drama, Chevalier shares the story of Joseph Bologne, a Black composer and brings to light on a brilliant Black composer and violinist whose legacy has been woefully violin virtuoso who was a part of the court of Marie Antoinette. Seeming to surmount racial barriers, Bolonge, who was bestowed with…
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The Flash: Going Way Way Back
Storyline via Rotten Tomatoes: Worlds collide in “The Flash” when Barry uses his superpowers to travel back in time in order to change the events of the past. But when his attempt to save his family inadvertently alters the future, Barry becomes trapped in a reality in which General Zod has returned, threatening annihilation, and…
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Flamin Hot: Cheetos Go Grande
Storyline via IMDB: In 1966 southern California, Richard Montañez grows up as a hardworking child with a strict father and supportive grandfather. He faces challenges in his youth and later becomes involved in a life of crime. However, when his wife Judy becomes pregnant, they decide to turn their lives around. Richard struggles to find…
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Magic Mike’s Last Dance: A Lap Dance With No Release
Storyline via IMDB: Magic” Mike Lane (Tatum) takes to the stage again after a lengthy hiatus, following a business deal that went bust, leaving him broke and taking bartender gigs in Florida. For what he hopes will be one last hurrah, Mike heads to London with a wealthy socialite (Hayek Pinault) who lures him with…
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Transformers: The Rise of the Beasts: They Shouldn’t Have Touched the Bumblebee
Plot via Rotten Tomatoes: Returning to the action and spectacle that have captured moviegoers around the world, Transformers: Rise of the Beasts will take audiences on a ’90s globetrotting adventure with the Autobots and introduce a whole new faction of Transformer — the Maximals — to the existing battle on earth between Autobots and Decepticons.…
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Mothers and Daughters: The Strawberry Smear
It may be hard to remember through all the broken plate moments that your daughter once looked you in the eye,that you were mermaids swimming in synchronicity in a clear blue ocean, that there was a time when her ideas would sprawl out of her head all over the homework, a big bang onto to…
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New Wave
I dangle my legs beneath the sea wall,the tingle of water making me aware of my existence between ocean and sky. Below, rainbow scales slip in and out,in perfect duplication of wavespounding, curling away from gabions.My feet follow the streamlineebbing away to the global mass just below the refracting sun.My hand fins, cutting S’s in…
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The Super Mario Bros Movie: Game On!
Plot via Rotten Tomatoes With help from Princess Peach, Mario gets ready to square off against the all-powerful Bowser to stop his plans from conquering the world. I’m not a gamer now. I don’t know and don’t care whether the graphics in The Super Mario Bros Movie are true to the games. The reviews from…
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Champions: Trading Farts for Hearts
Champions starring Woody Harrelson and a winning cast of intellectually disabled adults can be considered the more serious Dumb and Dumber. The Peter and Bobby Farrelly original featured protagonists with more hearts than smarts and lots of fart humor. The Bobby Farrelly directed, Champions amps up the heart, double downs on the smart-ass, and essentially…
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Statue
Inside this sculpted stone— the voice of a captured angel.“Why me?”, it cried to the sculptor and not to God-its lyric voice rustled from heaven’s memoryto be man’s inspired art.
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Sea-Son
The shells and scales will wash away.He has chosen to be a man.She will watch as the slick of him vanishesno longer swimming but walking away.He has chosen to be a man.In the cold crisp air her throats turns dry.She casts her whale song to the waves,but he can no longer hear it, feel it…
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What to Do with All the Love that Remains
The most beautiful thing is always the thing in front of you, my mother use to say. And she was a beauty, always smiling, a beauty markfollowing in front. To see such beauty was to die a little in the heart each day- Each day to give your heart away until there is noting left.Love…
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Juanito’s Dream
Juanito grew up with a velveteen rabbitin his hand and a gun by his side.On his sixth birthday his junkyard owning Dadgave him a clutch of rainbow balloons.He climbed the rusted skeleton of a Cadillac, held the beautiful Mylar to the sky and prayed to be taken to heaven.The answer was the sour tasting rain.On…
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Somewhere in Queens: Getting Beyond the Sticks
Plot via Rotten Tomatoes Leo Russo (Ray Romano) lives a simple life in Queens, New York with his wife Angela (Laurie Metcalf), their shy but talented son “Sticks” (Jacob Ward), and Leo’s close-knit network of Italian-American relatives and neighborhood friends. Happy enough working at the family construction business alongside his father (Tony Lo Bianco) and…
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Sam and Kate: Starring Their Real Life Kids
Info via Rotten Tomatoes: A life-affirming family dramedy starring Oscar®-winners Dustin Hoffman and Sissy Spacek, Sam & Kate takes place in a small town in the heart of the country. Hoffman plays Bill, the larger-than-life father to Sam (Jake Hoffman), who has returned home to take care of his ailing dad. While home, Sam falls…
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A Desert Story
The desert scorched their lips,broke the heart of their embrace-a pink blister on their foreheadsthe sun’s reminder on how impossible it will be to hold on to these knowings.He will be left standing alone in the swirl of shadows and dust,abandoned by the mountains,living only in the patina of dwellings turning to relics. She will…
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Flux Gourmet: A Burnt Offering
Plot via IMDB: Set at an institute devoted to culinary and alimentary performance, a collective finds themselves embroiled in power struggles, artistic vendettas, and gastrointestinal disorders. I know my wife loves to cook and I know she likes hearing the sounds of all that food prep: the chopping, dicing, oiling, boiling and sometimes the toiling.…
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80 for Brady: Making Me Hate Tom Brady Even More
Plot via IMDB: A group of friends made it their life-long mission to go to the Super Bowl and meet NFL superstar Tom Brady. I’m a Miami Dolphins fan and I unequivocally hate Tom Brady. I hate all the stupid Brady to the Dolphins rumors. I hate his greatness. I hate that he lives in…
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America Seen
The pictures of their dead childrenare strapped to the chain link of the ball field they played on.A bullet holed flag waves raggedly from the outfield,dawn’s light filtering every hole. The cowboy and his horse have long since bowed in grieffrom the red pitcher’s mound.The children in the tenementsjust behind, live in fear that the…
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Air: Game Changer
Plot via IMDB: Follows the history of shoe salesman Sonny Vaccaro, and how he led Nike in its pursuit of the greatest athlete in the history of basketball, Michael Jordan. Ben Affleck has proven that he can find drama in the details of negotiation. Air, a sports drama about how Nike not only developed the…
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Under the Tree of Knowledge
Let me lie here and knowwhy over this ground this apple tree makes a long shadowand a light sound.For a moment death will wait,but this tree will not,nor will it mourn for me when there is sweet birdsong all around.My sapling moment has passed, my winter comes and I have climbed and shaken every boughand…
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Answered and Unanswered Prayers
Many are the mothers who cry to Godfrom the release of woe for slain sons.How mother and child, prayed innocently with pure heart, to be spared violence’s plagueBut from the high placesthe prayers that are grantedis for power, power and gloryand honor forever- and nothing more.
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Talking Away
I use to think about grief,building loss on loss, sorrow on sorrow,into a silent groan in my bowelsof ever churning lamentsmourning for the comfort of dead faces.All the sorrow and lost infused my words. It leaked out to the white spaces betweenunwanted vowels and syllables : to the house gone, parts removed,friends lost, the broken…
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Rye Lane: Getting Past All the Ex-Misses
Plot via IMDB: Two youngsters reeling from bad breakups who connect over an eventful day in South-London. Rye Lane, streaming now on Hulu, is a romantic comedy that succeeds by breaking all the rules of the genre and dating. Don’t spend the date talking about your exes is the big one, especially if you want…
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A Good Person: The Addiction of Grief
Plot via IMDB: Follows Allison, whose life falls apart following her involvement in a fatal accident. Florence Pugh is one of the most versatile actors working today. In A Good Person, since her character doesn’t have to function as a self-actualization figure for a male love interest, Pugh is able to explore her character and…
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Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves: Dungeons, Dragons, Thieves, Oh My
Plot via IMDB: A charming thief and a band of unlikely adventurers embark on an epic quest to retrieve a lost relic, but things go dangerously awry when they run afoul of the wrong people. Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves serves up everything promised in the title and more. There are thieves. They are…
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Rivers of Tears
We cried when the surveyors came and broke up the land into lines unseen.What the prophet had said became true:this land will be taken from us.We cried the Tennessee, Ohio, Mississippi, Arkansas to overflowwith the waters of our sorrow, leaving behind trails of tears.We cried because you would not love it as we once loved…
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Opening Her White Parasol
With the push of a button, the delicate porcelain releases lace ribs from the handle- little dove wings- shading her dreams, memories of father, creating this object to protect her from the shriveling sun.
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Shazam: The Fury of the Gods- A Little too Much DC Universe
Plot via IMDB: The film continues the story of teenage Billy Batson who, upon reciting the magic word “SHAZAM!” is transformed into his adult Super Hero alter ego, Shazam In the sequel, Shazam: Fury of the Gods the superhero’s alter ego is the 17-year-old Billy Batson (Asher Angel), a foster child on the cusp of…
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The Magician’s Elephant: Soaring to Heights of Childhood Courage and Imagination
Plot via IMDB: The Magician’s Elephant follows Peter, who is searching for his long-lost sister. When he crosses paths with a fortune teller in the market square, he want to know, is his sister still alive? To get the answer, he must find a mysterious elephant and the magician who will conjure it, setting Peter…
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John Wick 4: Same John, Meaner Dog
Plot via IMDB: John Wick uncovers a path to defeating The High Table. But before he can earn his freedom, Wick must face off against a new enemy with powerful alliances across the globe and forces that turn old friends into foes. John Wick: Chapter Four like its predecessors is an endless kinetic display of…
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As They Made Us: A Different Kind of Big Bang
Plot via IMDB: A divorced mom tries to make peace with her dysfunctional family as she finds a second chance at love Actors trust actors. So Mayim Bialik, The Big Bang Theory and Jeopardy part time host, concentrated on putting together the best ensemble she could find for her directing debut, As They Made Us,…
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Knock at the Cabin: Shyamalan Gets Less Shocking Just More Twisty
Plot via IMDB; Wen, only seven years old, is vacationing with her two dads, Eric and Andrew, at a remote cabin. While catching grasshoppers, she is approached by a stranger named Leonard. Initially friendly, he explains that he needs Wen and her parents’ help to save the world. However, Wen becomes suspicious when three other…
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The Whale: A Lot of Emotional Blubber
Plot via IMDB: Idaho, 2016. Scarred by the profound wounds of grief and guilt, couchbound Charlie, an online writing instructor living with chronic obesity, now has a crystal-clear view of his secret intentions. And confined to his claustrophobic and musty apartment, the self-destructive shut-in has all the time in the world to contemplate the damaging…
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Nostalgia
They would feel it, every new moment- the echoes of who they use to be and what was once theirs-now dirty sheets caught in a dark tree.Everyday, the black river rolls by in blue remembranceand lilies float and drown in the burning stream.Here, the air hurts in the light of a browning sunand the stars…
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Wooden Boats on the Water
Under familiar stars the water blesses this wooden fleet.The carvers shavings fall away, oak leaves in the wavesdrifting behind, until only jug beams remain- the last swayof city lights, torches yielding to sky, night and moon-until only water remains- water waving forever.
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Poetry
It has been said, by someone wiser than me,that poetry is a wind from God.Than why do I find such beauty in the rhyme of dirt—Why do I listen to the lonely voicesof dead poets—Why do I want to excavate their bones,roll in them until they break—or burn them in the crematorium of my soulto…
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Violent Night: This Is One Die-Hardened Santa
Plot via IMDB: When a team of mercenaries breaks into a wealthy family compound on Christmas Eve, taking everyone inside hostage, the team isn’t prepared for a surprise combatant: Santa Claus is on the grounds, and he’s about to show why this Nick is no saint I’m one of those film fans that thinks Die…
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The Good Nurse: Meds and Murder on the Side
Plot via IMDB: Amy, a compassionate nurse and single mother struggling with a life-threatening heart condition, is stretched to her physical and emotional limits by the hard and demanding night shifts at the ICU. But help arrives when Charlie, a thoughtful and empathetic fellow nurse, starts at her unit. While sharing long nights at the…
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First Snow
This is the gift the world has given him: snow in hallows on roofs, branches, streets, the long white candle on the window, burning to dusk while snow fills up the city— all these white contours filling his life— starlight behind daylight wherever he gazes.
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Puss in Boots- The Last Wish: Knowing the Last Cat Life Is Not Really the Final Curtain Call
Plot via IMDB: Sadly, Puss in Boots, the undaunted Spanish lover and hero, is now down to the last of his nine lives, a decade after the events of Puss in Boots (2011). And as if that weren’t enough, the unstoppable bounty hunter known as The Big Bad Wolf is after him. To restore all…
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Night Cat
Mine, mimes the black cat putting out his paw to her darkness. Let’s walk in the wood, black eyes imply,the scent of shadows rising from him.The snow, the city, the night dissolves. Mornings to come he will purr to her face.She hears a word of fur and thinks it’s love.Nights, he will slip out like…
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Babylon: Unable to Get Past the Partying into the Art of Moviemaking
Plot via IMDB; An original epic set in 1920s Los Angeles led by Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie and Diego Calva, with an ensemble cast including Jovan Adepo, Li Jun Li and Jean Smart. A tale of outsized ambition and outrageous excess, it traces the rise and fall of multiple characters during an era of unbridled…
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We Have a Ghost: Going Beyond Spooky
Plot via IMDB: Seeking a fresh start in Chicago, the Presley family moves into a dusty fixer-upper they soon realize comes with a catch: a ghost in the attic named Ernest (David Harbour). Despite Ernest’s attempts at scaring teenage son Kevin (Jahi Winston), the detached, music-obsessed teen soon finds a kindred spirit in this trapped…
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Dust
I find it easier to collect dust than move it around from feathery place to place.Dust is history. It holds the flavors of myself.Dust contains my words.It sits on my mantle adding more specks every year,life upon life on death.I see God in its ashes—He is dust and Dust is everythingIt swirls in endless ribbons…
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Creed III: Rocky All the Way
Plot via IMDB: After dominating the boxing world, Adonis Creed (Michael B. Jordan) has been thriving in both his career and family life. When childhood friend and former boxing prodigy Damian (Jonathan Majors) resurfaces after serving a long sentence in prison, he is eager to prove that he deserves his shot in the ring. The…
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nocturne in pastels for hibakujumoku
they fall like a strange red bird in a old snare they fall like a strange pink koi in an old net like a shadow of a Cherry blossom on a stagnant pool like a dying pearl in the depths of the East China Sea like Akiko Futaba singing forever beneath her casement these hibakujumoku…
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Bardo: A False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths- Getting Caught in Self Deception’s Indulgent Purgatory
Plot via IMDB: Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths is an epic, visually stunning and immersive experience set against the intimate and moving journey of Silverio, a renowned Mexican journalist and documentary filmmaker living in Los Angeles, who, after being named the recipient of a prestigious international award, is compelled to return to…
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In the realm of twilight
the wind is dying in the umbral night all aroundthe small bridge becomes the canal’s umbrella weaving a shy blue garment for the waters,a silvery gown across the imponderable blue the moon glides free, an argent shadowthe rain dove purls a plaintive lay, drenching the darkening streets with a drowsy kissin these hours of tears