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Ode d'Royal Real poetry still thrives in distant corner of cyberspace By Andrea Perkins AS A FAILED poet-turned-grumpy journalist/wannabe novelist, I loathe most poetry magazines. I do not loathe them because they refuse to publish my precious poems. Oh no. I'm far too brilliant even to submit anything to those highfalutin' editors who would probably just steal my ideas anyway. Rather, I despise poetry journals because most of them are engaged in the robotlike massacring of American poetry. They do this by (a) publishing relentlessly pretentious and meaningless "language" poems or (b) publishing relentlessly dry narrative poems that are really just short stories with line breaks and stanzas. Prinsess Tarta Literary Magazine, based in cyberspace at www.prinsesstarta.net, is a lone beacon in the night, shining a long-awaited light not only on a rare breed of poetry, but on short stories, creative nonfiction, visual art and other less easily delineated categories as well. Prinsess Tarta is a refuge for writers who feel out of place in today's frostbitten literary world. Plus, it's full of cool icons and graphics. Here's a taste of the kind of poetry Prinsess Tarta is helping to keep alive: "You were alive in the mood of the earth/as in a strange season/and from your door/you could trace the architecture of ruined highways." That's by cult hero Glenn Parker and sure beats anything you'll find in APR. [ Santa Cruz Week | MetroActive Central | Archives ]