Author Archives: John Biscello

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About John Biscello

Originally from Brooklyn, NY, writer, poet, performer, and playwright, John Biscello, has lived in the high-desert grunge-wonderland of Taos, New Mexico since 2001. He is the author of four novels, Broken Land, a Brooklyn Tale, Raking the Dust, Nocturne Variations, and No Man’s Brooklyn; a collection of stories, Freeze Tag, two poetry collections, Arclight and Moonglow on Mercy Street; and a fable, The Jackdaw and the Doll, illustrated by Izumi Yokoyama. He also adapted classic fables, which were paired with the vintage illustrations of artist, Paul Bransom, for the collection: Once Upon a Time, Classic Fables Reimagined. His produced, full-length plays include: LOBSTERS ON ICE, ADAGIO FOR STRAYS, THE BEST MEDICINE, ZEITGEIST, U.S.A., and WEREWOLVES DON’T WALTZ.

Old and Young

Posted on September 12, 2025 by John Biscello

In the fairy tale the young girl slept for a long time and when she woke up she was old. She saw her old self in the mirror and was horrified, but also accepting. And a little in love. I … Continue reading →

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Others

Posted on September 12, 2025 by John Biscello

I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t hear myself in my head anymore. I was hearing someone else. This someone else was older, much older than me, and tired. Her words dragged, as if part of a funeral procession. Her voice … Continue reading →

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Because I Dreamed

Posted on September 10, 2025 by John Biscello

I never say the babies’ names, because there is danger in that. I know that their names spoken, details given, things brought too much into the light, means we can be found. Their ears own so much: text, air, radio-waves, … Continue reading →

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Fins

Posted on September 9, 2025 by John Biscello

The men I have given myself to are scorching a map onto my skin. I’d say it was a map of the underworld, but I don’t know if that’s altogether true. It seems too dramatic, too much like fantasy. And … Continue reading →

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Fable

Posted on September 8, 2025 by John Biscello

I have become moonless in my grief, a paled comparison. But to what? To who I used to be? What I expected to become? I feel as if I’ve been laid out an operating table, and Time, as a methodically … Continue reading →

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Clip

Posted on September 8, 2025 by John Biscello

In the short film released by the Civil Defense Department, a cheery reporter talks about the mannequins representing Mr. and Mrs. America. When the time for detonation comes, she, along with countless others, will gather six miles from Ground Zero, … Continue reading →

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Match

Posted on September 8, 2025 by John Biscello

In one of the Doomstown houses, scheduled to be destroyed by nuclear blast on May 5th, 1955, two mannequin women are lying in bed together. Who arranged these women? Who played matchmaker, and according to what script? Was this the … Continue reading →

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Godot in Vegas

Posted on September 8, 2025 by John Biscello

This just in: No one is waiting for Godot anymore. No one has the time or interest. Plus, no one knows who he, or Samuel Beckett is. The wastelands are even dryer, tubercular in their plot and scrape, and presently … Continue reading →

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Television Ghost

Posted on September 8, 2025 by John Biscello

The Television Ghost, considered one of TV’s first dramatic series (1931-1933), belongs to the spectral repository of lost media. Since television technology was in its infancy, the transmission projected a single static image—that of the “Ghost” draped in a white … Continue reading →

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Say What?

Posted on September 7, 2025 by John Biscello

Survival Town was created outside of Las Vegas for the express purposes of being destroyed. The town was populated by mannequin families, who were curated and arranged in homes to model and mimic middle-class American values, ideals, and leisure. Democracy, … Continue reading →

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