Dimitra told writing.ie “We are fans of poetry that is vibrant and visceral; sensual and surreal. This is the idea behind The Pickled Body: to showcase poetry and art that is full of duende. We aim to present the work in ways that are both familiar, and new – enticing even – to the reader. As an on-line entity, The Pickled Body is set up like a traditional magazine – click and flip. To supplement the on-line magazine, we also produce postcards featuring the work of poets and artists showcased in each issue.
As poets and editors, we are interested in engaging with and pushing the boundaries of how people interact with poetry – without intruding on what is, at the very core of poetry, a very personal and intimate relationship between the reader and the work. For the launch of the inaugural issue The Red Shoes, the postcards were hung from the ceiling so as to give audience members a feeling of ‘stepping into’ the work – adding a small touch of the surreal to the poetry reading. We will continue to play with the senses in future issues – presenting work from the surreal to the sensual and points in between, poems that not only sound as good as they look, but taste as good as they feel.”
The theme for Issue 1.2 is Amuse Bouche. As with Issue 1.1, we will have a featured visual artist. We are also planning a feature to showcase an interesting collaboration between the literary and culinary arts. We can’t say too much about that at this point, as we still need to confirm participants, but we would be happy to follow-up once we have more details to share (sometime in early February). In the meantime, here are the full details relating to the call for submissions:
Call for Submissions: Issue 1.2 – Amuse-Bouche
An amuse-bouche is a single, bite-sized hors d’œuvre. Often complemented by a particular wine, amuse-bouches both prepare the guest for the meal and offer a glimpse into the chef’s approach to the art of cuisine.
Poetry too, lives in the mouth. It comes alive the moment it possesses the tongue.
Take for example a bite of Neruda: ‘I want to eat your skin like a whole almond’. Or taste the words of Cohen: ‘…my mouth on the dew of your thighs’. Savour the sound of Plath: ‘They hunted the stones, taciturn and separate/The mouth-hole crying their locations./Drunk as a foetus/I suck at the paps of darkness.’ Spit out Bolano: ‘First, he came inside me,/then he came in my mouth, and the third time, barely/a thread of water, a short fishing line, between my breasts”. Let Lorca bite back: “But hurry, let’s entwine ourselves as one, our mouth broken, our soul bitten by love, so time discovers us safely destroyed”
For Issue 1.2 “Amuse-Bouche”, The Pickled Body seeks poetry that pushes the tongue to action. To fill the mouth with words until it has no choice but to speak them. Send us something delicious: poems that balance on the knife’s edge, or yield to the spoon as it cracks the burnt sugar layer of crème brûlée; poetry that is holier than the Last Supper, and with more duende than a leg of jamon Iberico.
Amuse our bouches.
Give us something on the verge of gluttony – but that doesn’t bite off more than it can chew. Send up to three of your best to thepickledbody@gmail.com. Please include “Amuse Bouche” in the subject line. Poems must not have been published elsewhere, and should be included in your email as an attachment (word doc/pdf file).
Deadline for submissions: January 31, 2014
For more information on The Pickled Body, as well as photos of the Red Shoes launch, check out: www.thepickledbody.com
About the founder editors:
Patrick Chapman
Patrick Chapman is the author of six poetry collections, the latest of which is A Promiscuity of Spines: New & Selected Poems (Salmon, 2012). His second collection of fiction is The Negative Cutter (Arlen House, 2014). He wrote the award-winning film Burning the Bed, the Doctor Who audio adventure Fear of the Daleks and many episodes of Garth & Bev and Wildernuts for television. Twice a finalist in the Hennessy Literary Award, he is also a Pushcart nominee.
Dimitra Xidous
Dimitra Xidous’ poems have been published in literary journals in Canada, Ireland and the US, including Room, Penduline and The Weary Blues. She was shortlisted for the Bridport Prize (2013), ‘Over the Edge’ Emerging New Writer Award (2013); and was long-listed for the Montreal International Poetry Competition (2011). Most recently her work was included in the New Planet Cabaret Anthology and is forthcoming in Colony and The Penny Dreadful. She will be the featured poet in the Spring 2014 issue of The Stinging Fly. She curates The Ash Sessions, a poetry and music showcase at Nick’s Coffee Company, Ranelagh, Dublin. She is co-curator of Baring Our Ashes, a collaboration between The Ash Sessions and Bare Hands Poetry. Her debut collection Keeping Bees is forthcoming from Doire Press (Spring 2014).