14 Wednesday Nov 2018
Posted in poetry
eclipse
when the sun disappears
we dance in its umbra
embracing lightless silence
where mockingbirds dare not fly
darkness belongs to bodies
we plant kisses like seeds
and if one star
carves its absence like a scar
then you and i are healing
in the wound
08 Monday Jan 2018
Posted in science fiction
Tags
1958, fried eggs, Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, meteor, Moon, outer space, planets, topps, trading cards, vintage space art
Space travel ain’t what it used to be! Technology, design, and planetary knowledge have evolved since these beautiful Topps trading cards came out in 1958. But if you are like me and easily amused by vintage space art, these cards are worth checking out.
Below is a slideshow featuring a few dozen of my favorites. You can find a complete collection, including scans of the text on the back of the cards, at http://www1.coe.neu.edu/~dan/tsc/go.html
Meteor Peril! Isn’t space travel exciting?! The only thing that could make it more fun is fried eggs.
09 Saturday Dec 2017
Tags
audiobook, free verse, inner planets, planets, poems, poetry, self publishing, writing
An hour-long reading of fifty original poems selected from Anything Sounds Like a Symphony, Animal Inside You, and Never See the Night, along with two previously uncollected poems, all narrated by the author. This audiobook is now available on Audible, Amazon, and iTunes. Ebook editions are available through Kindle and Smashwords and many other major ebook retailers. A paperback edition is available on Amazon so you can read along!
28 Sunday May 2017
gravity
the moon burns for the ocean
when no one else can see the sun
he cares nothing for what her tides erode
with violent patience
nor the animals lost
in her limitless depth
he only wants her
closer
they hold each other
across unchartable distance
never touching
but never pulled apart
This poem appears in the collection Inner Planets: 50 Poems by Matthew Howard. Available in paperback, Kindle, and audiobook.
30 Sunday Apr 2017
Posted in poetry
Tags
jupiter
you make me laugh until we tumble
into this drift like asteroids
coaxed by gravity
to surround this jovial hydrogen bastard
who disturbs the belt
with his frivolous storms
laughter heals and lifts us past the pain
your tears on my shoulder and fictions
we dream together
love me for an hour then leave
traces of your orbit and clues you give
astronomers
to the sadness of the inner planets
where life only made them realize
they’re small
i will never let them touch you
with telescopes and equations
i will erase their blackboards and crush their lenses
until all they know is mystery like a fool
i would keep you to myself
though your brightness burns for everyone
annihilation comes easily
rejuvenation takes more effort
or none at all
one word
one touch
will inspire
This poem appears in the collection Inner Planets: 50 Poems by Matthew Howard. Available in paperback, Kindle, and audiobook.
Hear this poem read by Judy Cullen. Then go discover her work!
23 Sunday Apr 2017
Tags
mercury
when you no longer hate the sun for shining
or curse it for bringing life
to our cold blue speck
when you run out of things to say
i will hold your heart in my hand
so you may count the petals of every flower
every hand that held another holds us
ache for me when i am gone
then realize i never leave you
write our manifesto and burn it
our buried chest of golden coins
will grow to a garden of stars
love it for me as if it is our child
my place is with you
we paint the stars together
when no one else is breathing
the moon hides below the horizon
our neighbors rise from beds
like corpses from their graves
unable to recall the songs
the mockingbird performed at 4 a.m.
the wind whistled down the asphalt
haunted only by coyotes
my modern mercury’s caduceus
is a radio tower pulsing
between realms like dreams
the serpents of his staff
become iron girders riveted to the sky
broadcasting love and fury
to the sons and daughters of lightning
spanning the globe under incandescent shelter
from midnight’s prehistoric treachery
clarity
communication
the courier’s gift
signals the dawn
This poem appears in the collection Inner Planets: 50 Poems by Matthew Howard. Available in paperback, Kindle, and audiobook.
19 Wednesday Apr 2017
Posted in poetry
mars
you and i have unfinished business
you taught me destruction
a skill for leaving trails
of unmarked graves and broken spears
your path leads nowhere but down
stone is your only element
you bask in the sun for millennia
and only learn what it means to burn
you serve neither love nor justice
but conquest as its own reward
its prize a thread of wounds and ash
what words could you offer for redemption
how dare you speak them
over the eulogy of rain
and falling earth
18 Tuesday Apr 2017
Posted in poetry
Tags
neptune
you wait when light abandons you
to a frozen ammonia tempest
forgiveness lives here no more
what becomes the sea without the sun
what tide is borne without the moon
to bear it
silent you drifted for centuries
while after you dreams dared not venture
and no one sang at all
holst named you the mystic
but what knowledge awaits
your desolation
the astronomer forsakes the city
for the unlit barrens
to see farther
past the realm of noise and mirth
and the din of blinding light
distraction
busy with nothing
he discovers
what lies
beyond
This poem appears in the collection Inner Planets: 50 Poems by Matthew Howard. Available in paperback, Kindle, and audiobook.
Holst originally composed The Planets for two pianos, except for Neptune, which was an organ solo. Peter Sykes’ nine-minute organ transcription of Neptune captures a depth of tonality and emotion that surely would have pleased the composer.
08 Saturday Apr 2017
Posted in poetry
Frontier
Luna, our beloved crescent,
you swell until you are full enough
to hang heavy against the horizon
like the breast of a pregnant woman.
You will be the first we settle,
our laboratory to test survival
on other stones that fill the sky and
telescopes. How could we resist touching you?
Will you shudder with pleasure
beneath our fingertips, or recoil
at the machines and metallic intrusions,
the rivets and girders of our civilization?
You have been our goddess
since before the dawn of history.
Now we will bring you atmosphere
and mark you with our scent.
We have always been inseparable.
Now we will be close.
This poem appears in the collection Inner Planets: 50 Poems by Matthew Howard. Available in paperback, Kindle, and audiobook.
07 Friday Apr 2017
Posted in poetry
Tags
animal inside you, gustav holst, planets, poems, poetry, Venus
Venus
Second daughter of the sun,
Holst imagined peace in your embrace.
Without a moon of your own
you thirsted for the man
to caress your cloudy tresses
with cellos and rapture.
But without his fantasy
he could never survive your
pressure, such peerless heat
dripping sulfurous sweat.
Volcanoes erupt and
recarve your surface again
and again until they render you
unrecognizable.
Yet Gustav dreamed of you,
and in the lies one’s mind
spins while sleeping
he saw you not as you are
but as he wished you to be:
tender, resplendent, radiant.
30 Monday Dec 2013
Posted in art studio
Much less mystery would surround this sculpture if anyone felt like working in its corporate office building this time of year. Google searches yielded nothing. Calling random offices at that location yielded nothing. Maybe in 2014 we can find out more about it.
If you want to take a crack at it, the address is 4450 N. 12th St. in Phoenix, AZ. And if you want to visit it in person, look how close the bus stop is!
We dig the concentric rings that seem like a nod to both atomic science and astronomy, and the way it makes the landscaping much more interesting. We built a little model of it in our 3-D software, and put it in the queue of subjects we’d like to draw or paint.
23 Monday Dec 2013
Posted in art studio
01 Sunday Dec 2013
Posted in first issue, superhero
Tags
John Byrne’s establishing shot of the evil planet Apokalips may well be the high water mark for Legends. The series attempted to simplify and reintroduce some characters in the wake of DC’s continuity-destroying Crisis on Infinite Earths. Other than kick off what many fans remember as a cool run for the Suicide Squad, the series won’t be remembered for much. But, we will always remember this stunning planet, seething with electric and cosmic energy, bathed in a wash of interstellar light effects, its complex surface suggesting massive structure with tiny lines. From a student’s perspective, this panel abounds with art lessons. Welcome to the John Byrne Academy of Awesome!
Collector’s Guide:
– From Legends #1; DC, 1986;
13 Saturday Jul 2013
Posted in art studio
20 Thursday Sep 2012
Posted in science fiction
Tags
Adam Strange, DC Archive Edition Adam Strange, golden age, Planet and the Pendulum, planets, Showcase, Showcase 17
Here’s the second Adam Strange story from his first appearance in Showcase #17 (1958, DC Comics.) That’s right: two complete stories in one little comic book. Didn’t anybody tell Gardner Fox about writing decompressed story arcs for the trades?
It’s not like you’re going to find this issue in the bargain bin, Martians. Even in so-called “Good” grade (which we all know means ‘good enough to house train your puppy’) it’s going to be a couple hundred bucks. Much more reasonable is the DC Comics Archive Edition Adam Strange hardcover from 2004. That’s more like $25, with white pages, and a better coloring job. If that doesn’t charge your Zeta Beam, we don’t know what will!
Mars Will Send No More 