Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    What the Night Demands
    What the Night Demands
    What the Night Demands
    Ebook87 pages33 minutes

    What the Night Demands

    By Miles Walser

    4/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Miles Walser unearths the concept of the binary in his long-awaited first poetry collection. While Walser's lionhearted deconstruction of gender tackles trans identity in a way no living poet has before, he also dismantles other alleged dichotomies such as loneliness and introversion, softness and rage, mathematics and art. He acknowledges the existence of all these 'opposites' and their place inside the author. Walser bares so much of his many-hued self that the reader can't help but turn inwards. The reader does not simply watch the author bloom in these poems but the open-minded reader is bound to bloom also.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWrite Bloody Publishing
    Release dateAug 22, 2014
    ISBN9781938912177
    What the Night Demands

    Related to What the Night Demands

    Related ebooks

    Poetry For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Devil Asks Why You Would Mouth The Word Pity

      Jul 1, 2022

      even in this abundance of dark? Even in this abundance of dark you have totake the stars on faith. Look: Under today’s dim sky there is a basket.In that basket there is a fish. Come night, you are the animal that will eat the best parts of it. And ye

      1 min read

    • Article

      Six Sonnets

      Jan 1, 2021

      Goldenrod, I could say, you know, everybody wants somethingfrom me, but, well, everybody wants something and nobody wantsnothing from me, goldenrod, towhead, beast. Goldenrod, you packthe meadows like gold-plated sardines. I have heart palpitationsbu

      3 min read

    • Article

      Must-Read Poetry: November 2020

      Nov 5, 2020

      Stop obsessively refreshing the New York Times's elections page, and check out these new books of poetry by Alice Quinn, Margaret Atwood, Yi Lei, Karina Borowicz, Valzhyna Mort, and Paul Celan. The post Must-Read Poetry: November 2020 appeared first

      6 min read

    • Article

      On Louise Glück

      Dec 1, 2021

      I WAS LYING in bed late at night, woeful, confused by another death, this one the death of a close friend; the losses had been mounting steadily, a bewildering number of losses, each one specific, difficult to accept, hard to overcome, and I must hav

      12 min read

    • Article

      Ishion Hutchinson

      Jun 8, 2021

      Tremor in his hands. He turns obsoleteleaves edged with thunder since the opening scene.What he sees he reads under croton shade,out in the sun. Restless peninsula,dog-eared, melting off into the blue.The blue breaks white as hallucination,more hagga

      3 min read

    • Article

      Three Poems

      Jan 1, 2022

      I’ve seen enough films where a character nickshimself shaving or maybe has a bread knife slip and the thinrun of blood is supposed to stand for some violence,for something he did and is desperateto cover up, but the truth will out—I’ve seen enough th

      2 min read

    • Article

      Two Poems

      Nov 1, 2021

      All I wantis a good night and coffee in the morningwithout conversation so I can considerhow my life— which made a new life—is still so incomplete. How can something smallmultiply to something large? Mathematics is a strange science.Prayer is an impo

      1 min read

    • Article

      Seven Poems

      Sep 1, 2021

      The dancersIn a terribly brightLight blue gauzeRetained the mystery Skating on a lakeBlue and iceAn illusionary timeWhere poetry feels inevitable The terrific clownWho lies insideEvery blue dressDoes he see me Always a starAlways a rootHorrible auras

      2 min read

    • Article

      Two Poems

      Jan 1, 2022

      Two Poems
      2 min read

    • Article

      Diaspora Sonnets

      Sep 1, 2022

      The old men drink their spritzers and gossipunder awnings. Red hued and blustery, like two roosters on the side of a road.Skyward they crane their necks and laugh, sometimes they wonder about kings and future kingsand how the muscles peer from their

      2 min read

    • Article

      Reactions

      Aug 17, 2022

      Reactions
      2 min read

    • Article

      from BLACK PASTORAL

      Nov 1, 2023

      somewheres, some lifetimes ago I have run so far, so long.There is nowhere I haven’t beenBut here, in this field, a bodyLength from the ragged brinkThat gives way to forest.I collapsed here, the thin, hard slipOf me whittled at both ends.I want badly

      4 min read

    • Article

      Five Poems

      Mar 1, 2022

      Five Poems
      5 min read

    • Article

      Two Poems

      Jan 1, 2022

      Maybe every choice is in some way false,like whether to wonder or worry,or feel alive or alone in Clevelandor Memphis or any standard double queentrying to unwrap a tiny hotel soap.There’s always another one waitingin the dish like a stale communion

      2 min read

    • Article

      Fifteen Poets on Revision

      Feb 27, 2018

      After 17 drafts over two weeks, Elizabeth Bishop’s poem “One Art” was completed on November 4, 1975. The poem began as notes, and evolved into a villanelle. She changed the title. She deleted words. She reached for possible rhymes. Brett Candlish Mil

      4 min read

    • Article

      Three Poems

      Mar 1, 2022

      i look like someonehealing from an accidentbecause i am someonehealing from an accidentthe book of actsscales falling from saul’s eyesremembering my capacityfor stillnesshow long can i sitwithout looking awaythe fear of god escapingi desperately need

      3 min read

    • Article

      Five Poems

      May 1, 2023

      Let’s be GodFor a moment, Shall we?That which invites Composition,That which is suspended From a great height,The presence Of approximationHeavy in the meadows, I’m not afraid,And yet My shroud vanishesIn these lines, I am so weptPast weeping, And wh

      1 min read

    • Article

      Four Poems

      Nov 1, 2021

      (Residue, cellophane, liquid amber, pearl resin on cardboard) Platinum blonde, with whiteboxes of Russianchocolates. Silver liquid glitter,lemon candle, crimsonleather 1970 Mercedessedan interior. Gum drops, fox fur, creamblouse with gold specksand t

      2 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for What the Night Demands

    4/5

    4 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      What the Night Demands - Miles Walser

      Clinic

      I.

      DEFINITIONS FROM THE PRACTICAL AMERICAN DICTIONARY

      Man (v):

      •To take. To build. To destroy. To love so hard you can’t open your fists.

      •To be. To be right. To be worthy. To be the reason the buddy system exists.

      •To own. To own everything. To own yourself.

      •To feel powerful. To not understand your power until a weaker thing tries to take some of it for themselves.

      •To make mistakes without shame. e.g. To fasten a volume knob to everything pretty and hide the remote control.

      To have control sitting in your pocket, resting against your thigh. To think control rests against your thigh.

      •To walk alone. To sleep with unlocked windows. To breathe deep, without worry.

      woman (adj):

      •to be defined by faults, e.g. a cavity waiting to be filled.

      •pliable, easy to break e.g. an ice cream cone smashed by a greedy grip.

      •helpless, especially without a set of instructions or owner. e.g. a fly trapped under a glass jar.

      BANG

      I learned how to talk about sex in my high school hallway,

      the locker room after gym, a dirty secret—

      gum stuck beneath a desk, a word etched in a bathroom stall.

      Sex was the ubiquitous celebrity—

      the rock star with so many monikers, you never knew what to call it.

      Teachers mumbled Intercourse,

      mothers whispered Making Love,

      but we stripped the training wheels from our own bikes

      and dared each other across traffic.

      Fuck. Nail. Bang.

      Sex is pressing your ear to the seashell of someone’s body,

      holding the hum of crest and crash.

      The way we speak massacres it

      into the business of shoplifted skin.

      Hit that. Get some. Take it.

      There are times when I am unsure if I am listening to a story

      about a night with a lover or a back-alley fistfight.

      Pin. Pound. Screw.

      We run through other people’s homes

      with muddy feet and baseball bats

      Grind. Smash. swinging at anything beautiful

      Get a piece. but we’re surprised

      when something shatters.

      Jump her bones.

      The first time you force your lover down,

      you will only be listening to instructions.

      Won’t understand softness, that an arching back

      should not snap into splinters.

      We are told names are as harmless

      as a playground bully, a dull blade,

      but you won’t know how to bloom your fist into an open palm.

      You will not hear the No.

      Call something the same name a few times,

      it will begin to answer to it.

      Fuck. Nail. Bang.

      Bang.

      Bang.

      GRACE

      Grace, you’re four years old?

      Grace, that’s old!

      Grace, look at that sunflower. Isn’t

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1