Island of Wak-Wak – förlag

Metamodern Morning Angst and Other Horrors combines speculative with general poetry starting with ghosts and hauntings; moving to loss, grief, sorrow and healing; morphing into metamorphosis and change; playing with Lovecraftian cosmic horror; and landing with a mix of eclectic speculative poems and musings.

Having a bad life? Read about one that's worse: liebestod, deep depression, mental illness, suicide, death, and miraculous resurrection (the ultimate happy ending). Feel better? The Ward at Twilight: Goth Poems skillfully blends two distinct literary traditions (stylish contemporary poetry and the vintage Gothic in American and British literature) for the blackest witch's brew of insightful reading pleasure.

This collection pays homage to the beverages we so love to wake up to, so love to enjoy throughout the day, in many ways, and that we so love to imbibe before bed. Sunny and funny poems are interspersed with more serious ones that provide a punch, because coffee helps us think deep thoughts. Yet we don't want to take ourselves too seriously. The book ends the collection with a couple poems full of gratitude for the day and the availability of caffeine, in its many forms.

This series of poems was inspired by an exploration of a country I've never seen but that was home to my ancestors, reading up on the folktales and traditions of people on the northern coast of the Netherlands (Friesland and Groningen specifically). It explores the ways that we create and interpret meaning through the lens of an impossible, floating village.

The Body Snatchers & Other Death Rituals is a poetic travelogue on the varied nature of end-of-life rituals and associated lore found throughout the world. In this collection, you'll find poems, prose pieces, ballads and folk songs, ranging from humorous to poignant, on the cultural common ground of death.

This is the premium hardcover edition with a dust jacket and a bookmark ribbon. The vision of Sublimation is to promote speculative poetry and art. This book combines the best works from Volume 1 of Sublimation and the finalists of the Sublimation Annual Contest. The themes for 2024 were "trauma," "awe," "we are monsters all," "every party needs a bard," and "living in another world." This book features poetry and art by L. Ward Abel, Ken Anderson, F. J. Bergmann, Frank Coffman, Christopher Collingwood, Harris Coverley, a.d., Tony Daly, Megan Diedericks, Louis Faber, Diane Funston, Annette Gagliardi, Akua Lezli Hope, Barbara E. Hunt, Scott E. Green & Herb Kauderer, Ngô Bình Anh Khoa, LindaAnn LoSchiavo, John C. Mannone, Danielle McMahon, Jamie-May Minjie, Ophelia Monet, Kurt Newton, Juan Perez, Irina Tall, Jack Tricarico Jonathan Chibuike Ukah, Lynn White, AJ Wilcox, River Wilde, Trevor Wright, and Jacelyn Yap. Life deserves to be filled with poetry.

Coffee Poems is a chapbook collection of sixteen poems that embraces coffee in a wide variety of application, though hardly exhaustive. This includes the origin of coffee, traditions, obsessions or rituals, common associations (and uncommon ones), a bit of science, mixology, metaphor, and others. The collection also presents a variety of forms in addition to the standard lineated free verse poems: prose poems, personal essay/didactic poem, Duplex Sonnet in prose poem format, Erasure poem (presented two ways), Fibonacci sequences poem, a poem whose genesis is from the "opposites game," and a Golden Shovel with a Cento epigram. Some poems have a backstory below the text. Whether you like your coffee swirled with a bit of cream or black and bitter, you will relish the offerings in this latest book brewed by John C. Mannone. From the stoops of the Columbian mountains, where the original Juan Valdez grew his coffee beans, to the monks of Ethiopia who, having been informed of the antics of goats that ate the coffee berry, then imbibed a liquid from those same berries and hence were able to remain awake through the long evening prayers, and on through history to the author's own cup steaming before him, the face of his long dead father looking back upon him from the "fluid folds of the dark pool," there is much to savor and to learn in this small collection. The poems are testaments to the magic and mysticism of the drink from a poet with his "fingers wrapping the . . . cup / as something holy." Mannone brings a lifetime of refining his palette and honing his use of language to produce a delightful collection of 16 poems, an apt bit of reading while you drink your first morning cup, or your final afternoon cup, of the "essential elixir." -Connie Jordan Green, author of Nameless as the Minnows Such an excellent variety of poems serving as brews of choice that bring out the best of each one for the discriminating connoisseur! Who among us coffee drinkers hasn't known moments of quiet worship in a layered awakening? Reading this collection is an education both in poetic forms and the magic power of the coffee bean. I guarantee you'll savor it as a keeper on your bookshelf. -Marge Simon, Grand Master poet, SF Poetry Association, and co-author of Cast from Darkness

The book title, referencing Mother Hubble, is really just a springboard into a pool filled with matter, including dark matter, holes in matter, ordinary human beings, and a little bit of everything else that matters. Beyond the poems, a series of notes explains something of where the poems come from but, of course, not all. --David C. Kopaska-Merkel, author of Unwelcome Guests and Risk Assessment. Reading Mother Hubble's Cupboard by Sandra Lindow is like sitting in the overlap of a dozen different planet's busy orbits watching them whizz by, except instead of planets they are physics, ecology, sensuality, folklore, and more. Oh, and also sometimes planets. The first section casts the Hubble Telescope as the titular Mother Hubble, and more than just a tool she's a character, a photographer documenting the mysteries of space with an artist's eye. The poetry balances the desire to look up and out and understand with the impulse look back towards the past to name and emotionally process our place in the universe - for example, the Royal Astronomy's Society nickname of the Unicorn Black Hole, not to mention dwarf stars, universal soup, universal trees and even metaphors new to Lindow's collection, like the universe as a Russian Matreshka doll. And as much as the book wanders far beyond our planet and our solar system and even further, Lindow still remembers to bring us home occasionally. As she says, "the great blue beast you ride...She's all you have. Ride/gently." --Amelia Gorman, Field Guide to Invasive Species of Minnesota

In The Tragedy of Photons, Tony Daly crafts a constellation of speculative poetry, in which tragedy meets transcendence at the speed of light. Daly's poems orbit themes of loss, resilience, absurdity, and wonder. These verses are both intimate and cosmic--anchored in human emotion and adrift in zero gravity. Whether elegizing forgotten android heroes, chronicling the heartbreak of planetary exiles, or capturing the last glimmer of light in a collapsing universe, this chapbook illuminates the beauty found in even the briefest glow. The Tragedy of Photons invites you to see the universe and yourself through a kaleidoscope of tragedy and light.

Each "pitch" of Two Strikes and I'm Out is a poetic dialog between an introverted poet and something extraordinary (a fly and a writing machine, respectively). The two series of poems explore the poet's introspection on writing and life. Whether you are an introvert, an extrovert or something in between, you'll discover insight from your own inner fly or poetry device. Just remember to refrain from swatting bugs or clicking that glowing off button.

In this intimate and evocative collection, Glenis Moore captures the quiet weight of memory, friendship, and aging. From long-lost loves to shared coffee and worn-out towels, For Paula and Rum Babas finds meaning in life's overlooked corners. With warmth and wry clarity, Moore invites us to cherish what lingers--and mourn what slips away.

In Moonlight Apocrypha, Kurt Newton guides us through a surreal and haunting landscape shaped by plague, isolation, and the slow, unraveling of civilization. These poems chronicle a world slipping into myth, where memory and madness blur. This collection captures the intimate absurdities and communal grief of an era defined by a virus and humanity's response to crisis, offering grim beauty, bitter humor, and unexpected tenderness for the summer we figuratively died. Delve into these verses to commiserate with your past self and glimpse the future you.

From the first pulse of mythic origin to the last drop of blood, The Coffin Chronicles redefines the vampire mythos through a haunting blend of poetry and prose. Megan Diedericks leads readers down moonlit corridors where love and monstrosity intertwine, flowers bleed, and the undead speak with heartbreak and hunger. Through the re-imagining of classic works, journal fragments, confessions, and darkly lyrical verse, this collection explores the thin, trembling line between the human and the monstrous, and what it means to live, die, and love in between. The Coffin Chronicles is a testament to empathy, immortality, and the seductive power of creatures of the night.

Deborah L. Davitt's To Love Unquietly oscillates between love and desire, life and death, oneness and severance. She masterfully weaves the various elements of relationships into a patchwork tapestry of poetry, which acts as a dark, dusty mirror showing what was, what could be, what could have been, and what is in its beautiful, cobwebbed truthfulness. When you look into this volume of poetry, which self will you see?

In Risk Assessment, David C. Kopaska-Merkel, a master at speculative senryu and haiku, illuminates the dangers and risks inherent in life through horrific, whimsical, and fantastic beams of light. His tight, terse language can be enjoyed popcorn-like by the handful or earnestly like an elegantly presented gourmet meal. Humorous, ardent, and keen, these tiny poems will produce smiles and insight. For readers who like their poetry strange, brief, and brilliant, Risk Assessment is a darkly delightful dive into the unknown. Once you start reading them, you will find these poems are well worth the risk.

This collection by veteran Lovecraftian poet DJ Tyrer opens the veil of reality revealing a cruel cosmos where ancient gods stir. The stars dreadfully align with each poem, leading not only the demise of humanity on earth but the end of the universe itself. Whispers throughout the book mock your unravelling sanity as madness rides the star-wind.

Award-winning poet Herb Kauderer has been visiting the Dreamers Mall in The Tank, a vast virtual world, for thirty-five years. Now those countless "shopping trips" have been gathered into one volume, Sleepless Nights in the Dreamers Mall, inviting readers to roam its ever-shifting corridors with shops for Halloween avatars, dragons, jewelry made from life itself, a bookstore featuring a virtual Joseph Conrad, and much more. Kauderer crafts a mosaic of lyrical stories with poems shimmering with humor, melancholy, and wonder. From an iron worker forging digital masterpieces "about the divide between the physical and the ethereal" to a brewmaster blending illusion and reality, these poems explore the deep longings culturally encoded in our shared virtual dreams. So take forty winks, and step inside the mall.

The various women of myth have long been tightly bound, their stories cropped, defined, and framed by the voices of heroic and poetic men. In The Women of Myth, M. Frost silences those voices to let the heroines, goddesses, and monsters of legend speak for themselves. Their histories and destinies echo through time, resonating with subtle harmonics that vibrate against the chaos of modern life. As you read, listen for the poems' sweet overtones vibrating in sync with your own melody.

In the myths of legend, the male gods often fill the room with their presence, leaving only a shadowed corner for the goddesses. In Over It, Gerri Leen stretches and molds that corner into an amphitheater, where Hera, Medusa, Eris, Bast, and others step forward at last. Their verses and songs, long yearning to be heard, now echo fiercely in our minds. Lyrical, unflinching, and alive with defiance, this chapbook is a recital of divine women who have had enough.

The Eldritch Prayers anthologies present contemporary interpretations of Lovecraftian themes. This inaugural anthology plunges headlong into cosmic horror with seventeen poets and three artists each revealing several works into the cleansing light for you to peruse.

The Eldritch Prayers anthologies present contemporary interpretations of Lovecraftian themes. This inaugural anthology plunges headlong into cosmic horror with seventeen poets and three artists each revealing several works into the cleansing light for you to peruse.