Contributor: Arlene Antoinette

- -
i talk myself
down from a ledge
telling myself,
in mantra style,
everything will
be alright,
everything will
turn out okay.
simple sentiments
for a simple mind.
but my words
do not sink deep
enough
to take root
or
satisfy my
weakened psyche.
so once again
i’m holding on
for dear life
rehearsing
useless mantras
hoping for someone
to reach out a hand
and save me.


- - -
Arlene writes poetry, flash fiction and song lyrics. Additional work may be found @ Your Daily Poem, Foxglove Journal, Mojave Heart Review and Cagibi Magazine.

Contributor: Jane Briganti

- -
Tie a purple ribbon around my heart
promise me darling we'll never be apart

I love you more than you could know
with you I'm free, my spirit can grow

Speak to me, the way of romance
hold me close while we share a dance

Let's sit together and share our deepest dreams
nothing is impossible, nothing is what it seems

Celebrate the Universe and her power
She's brought us together; it's her finest hour

We have found an everlasting love
blessed are we by the Heavens above

Soulmates, separated for years by the seas
to each other's hearts we hold the keys

Our life together destined to begin
second chances at love are not a sin

Tie a purple ribbon around my heart
together, a masterpiece of loving art!


- - -
Jane Briganti's poems have appeared in Creations Magazine and in a variety of on-line publications. She lives and works in New York City.

Contributor: JD DeHart

- -
There is a mountain standing in
the middle
of my soul, waiting at the moment

I am met with a brush of the hand.

There is a hidden place in me
that no wind will root out, a palace
where trees enclose,

they stand guard, ice crystals
snap them, but a thousand more grow
back,

this mountain goes deep,
down to the world’s center,

down to the nexus of where
it all began.


- - -

Contributor: Yaniv T. Beltwunder

- -
I worry every time she goes under the knife.
She is young, healthy, fit
She is strong, eats right, no issues
But she was also a he
A woman rebuilding

And I worry that the doctors do not understand
I worry that for them, she is just a paycheck
Add a little there, take a little there
Don't care
About the woman they are rebuilding there.

And I worry that the doctors move without duty
I worry they eye her pink innards with greedy eyes
I worry about the stories
The nameless orphans
The rich in need of organs
And the trail of bloody money in between.


- - -

Contributor: Jenavyv Flowiers

- -
I reach out my hand to you
in a promise
in a hope

and you take it
you smile as you ascend the stairs
as you stop beside me
you, dressed in black
me, your emissary in white,
your guide to a future
we will build together

I reach out my hand to you
and you take it
and you let me guide you
to the curve of my belly
to cradle the life there
we will spend our whole lives loving
loving well.


- - -

Contributor: Jonah Polivoron

- -
When I cannot sleep
When even a nightmare will do
When even the cold sweat at waking
Means at least
I've had sleep

I go for a walk in the city
I cross streets and alleys
and places where shapes
crouch low in the shadows
and I pray
for those twisting streets
to carry me safely,
safely through the orchards of golden fruit
the breathing cars
the faces I've seen before
but cannot place
to the light
to the dawn
and the bleating of my alarm

and I wonder when I fell asleep
and I wonder if all those shadows
were nothing more than dreams.


- - -

Contributor: JD DeHart

- -
Believe in your story,
believe in your journey. These
words burn for a reason,

clamoring for release.

Some will say no. Some will
hold up hands and turn noses.

Talk still, speak.

When they turn you away
thirty times or three hundred,

remember the mountain inside
of you, be reminded that your story is
power,

speak, scribble, tell, and dream.


- - -

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
(for my friends in Santaland)

Prisoners of runaway elves
Hostages in Santaland
Christmas recapitulation

Drowning in Christmas cheer
Overdose of red and green
No more speculation

Halloween forgotten
Witches transformed to Santas
North Pole evacuation

Fifth Avenue parade
Start of the Christmas season
Without equivocation

Life-sized candy canes
Like gaggles of geese
Marching in toy formation

All for girls and boys
Good or bad – naughty or nice
During school vacation

Happiness abounds
Festive days and twinkling nights
After hour rumination

Santa in his sleigh
Annual round on Christmas Eve
World-wide culmination

Milk and cookie trays
Left for Santa
Children’s hopes and expectation

Toys and party games
Festive food and Christmas carols
Brightly colored tree sensation
Christmas realized
Spinning threads of joy and laughter
Happiness without hesitation

Annual reward
For all good boys and girls
Without fear or consternation

Children in their beds
Dreaming dreams remembered
Christmas season invitation


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, magazine articles and a screenplay His works are published in over twenty-five on-line journals, over twenty-five books and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin. He lives in New York with his dog, Daisy.

Contributor: Jane Briganti

- -
Swipe it
Chip it
Tap it
I hear it everywhere
What about cash?
Try it if you dare

Mumbles of annoyance
from those who cannot wait
Cash transactions
are considered out of date

Everything moving fast
and nothing slow
People rushing about
What do they really know

The allure of cash
The jingle of change
To modern consumers
seems all too strange

The value of money
is not the same
Just pick a card
A consumer's game

Bonus points and
Cash back scams
People falling victim
like slaughtered lambs

"Buy more stuff"
The message is clear
Charge it to your card
pay it off next year

Governmental plans
to keep the people poor
Give them what they want
and keep them buying more


- - -
Jane Briganti's poems have appeared in Creations Magazine and in a variety of on-line publications. She lives and works in New York City.

Contributor: Karren B. Shantwell

- -
He was the only one who could wrestle my beast
he was the only one who could subdue the hues
of red within me

He was the only one
who could bring me to the brink
and back again
again and again

Then "no" became "no more"
and I couldn't beat back
the needs within me
no matter how many stallions
I rode into the ground
just trying to get back the mind
so clear
I once enjoyed.


- - -

Contributor: John Grey

- -
The world I'm sure
started out as something else.
Maybe as a child's plaything.
Or the target in a shooting gallery.

In my day to day existence,
I see signs of it having been a bounce house
or a cuckoo poking out of a clock
on the hour.

I'm like an archaeologist in that regard.
What's that embedded in my life
if not evidence of a gigantic steam iron
or the biggest peanut that ever existed.

This is not a world
that got where it was
by starting out as a rawer,
more simplistic version of itself.

No, this is a world that was a diadem.
And a catalogue. And a gigantic black swan.
It was a much-kicked soccer ball.
It was a clown's red nose.

The trouble with geological science is
that it's hidebound by proof.
My discoveries are based on
the first thing that pops into my head.

The world was once an acorn.
It was this guy who goes into a bar.
A hawk. A revelation. A boom.
A dog biscuit. A recipe for pea soup.

The world got where it is
by being illogical.
There'd be no place for me in it
otherwise.


- - -
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in That, Dalhousie Review, Thin Air and North Dakota Quarterly with work upcoming in Qwerty, Chronogram and failbetter.

Contributor: Nahellenia Shawson

- -
I took you
Because I wanted you

I didn't want
What you left me with

She's five now.
Bleeding at the fires
Screaming joy at vacant stars

And you
You're warming another bed somewhere.
I'm sure of it.


- - -

Contributor: Travis J. Egann

- -
I sat in his chair
I looked out
Over everything he'd cared about
Pizza boxes, broken TV.
Empty bottles making music
On either side of the seat.

He'd had everything he'd ever wanted
He'd built an empire of simple pleasures
Piled the leavings like trophies
Lived in a sea of glorious filth.

I stood, but the seat stuck to me
And more
I found myself becoming him
I lost myself in his legacy
Until my chair rattled glassy music
Until they found me
Staring dead
Into the dead screen
Of a dead channel
Grinning
Like a lord of everything.


- - -

Contributor: Todd Mercer

- -
Do not fold, spindle, tear or mutilate
my belief in basic human goodness
if we have a chance to make decisions
on behalf of the public population.
Don’t set it ablaze, even if you’re
only following orders. Being an employee
doesn’t absolve one of moral weight.
Do not gas, bomb, flood or starve out
my core faith in other people. It’s well
and good that we believe empathy
can stage a comeback out there.
Don’t evict the central tenets
of a rusted idealist. A lover
of imperfect human beings,
who knows the score, who can see
the situation; but loves them anyway.


- - -
Todd Mercer was nominated for the Pushcart Prize in Fiction in 2019 and the Best of the Net in Poetry in 2018. Recent work appears in The Lake, Dunes Review and The Museum of Americana.

Contributor: Ryan Nadolny

- -
Inundated in constant obscurity
Sliver of a waxing crescent
Phasing out another cycle
Only to begin again

Black moon dark moon
No moon new moon

Incapable of creating the source
Borrowed luster, borrowed tour
Veiling the day, anxious to move
Waiting for dark to gleam

Black moon dark moon
No moon new moon

New position
Same sequence
Cultivating retreat
Shifting the daily rhythm

Black moon dark moon
No moon new moon


- - -
Husband to a brave and beautiful woman.
Father to 4 brilliant girls.
Writer, poet, home chef, gun enthusiast, and friend.

Contributor: Arlene Antoinette

- -
You won’t let yourself cry,
it’s not the right time. You
can’t say yes to letting go,
to breaking down, so let
me cry for you. Let me shed
my tears, hold your hand, comfort you.
Allow me to be the one to lose
control. Let me give in to sorrow;
ache for the miracle that never
manifested, rant against the
powerless doctors, inept testing,
ruthless insurance companies.
Let me call down vengeance on their heads
as I shed tears for the man you loved
who closed his eyes after six surgeries
and many empty promises of hope
that couldn’t put cancer in its place.
Let me cry your tears.


- - -
Arlene writes poetry, flash fiction and song lyrics. Additional work may be found @ Your Daily Poem, Foxglove Journal, Mojave Heart Review and Cagibi Magazine.

Contributor: Burt Z. Escalantes

- -
If you've never had sand
so deeply between your teeth
that it grinds them serrated

If you've never had oil
so deeply in your skin
that it stains your hands
like so much black blood

If you've never had every hair singed away
by the heat of burning cordite crimes
count yourself lucky

I've seen what humans can do
I've seen
we're all built for error
maybe not much else.


- - -

Contributor: Thomas T. Momenti

- -
You were my guiding light
you were my only light
you were the only constant star
I ever chose to follow

and I thought I might make that light my own
and I thought I might take you in my hands
and I thought you might never hurt me
but the burns I got for trying
prove to me otherwise.

We spent a year together
We spent a year of nights by the sea
And even on the cloudiest days
I looked for you
I found you
constant as any star
waiting high in the circumpolar sky

The cold nights without you
ice my hands like thoughts of the grave
the stars all spin crazily
spin on endlessly
and I can't get a grip on any of them.

I spin circles, searching for you
in the faces of a thousand constellations
but none of them are as constant
as you were
until your light
went out of my life
forever.


- - -

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
Heaven remembers
The fortitude
Wrought in time
That outlasts infinity
And gives strength
Through the simplest emotions
Guiding the pathways
Through forests primeval
Or oceans outlasting
The desert refined
By sand dunes of mem’ries
To hold and remember
Uncertain of context
But travel in light-years
And journeys forgotten
Remembered
Defined
By new journeys taken
And new hope abounding
The future forgiving
New moments sublime


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, articles and a screenplay His nearly one-hundred-fifty works are published in magazines, over twenty-five on-line journals, thirty books and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin. He lives in New York with his dog, Daisy. Visit him at www.brucelevine.com.

Contributor: Dave Ludford

- -
I have tattooed a grain of sand
It took a hundred years and so much blood ink
I'll carry on until I have an entire beach,
Throw each particle to wherever it should land
Then watch as waves wash my work away
Start again. Time isn't important to me.
So take a handful of sand, let it slip between your fingers
And read: 'Look towards the cliffs
Watch me point to where the land meets the sky, Dazzling horizon
Beware the coming storm
Thunder will boom with words you should hear
Lightning will herald a revelation.'
Take each grain and write a book of wisdom.


- - -
Dave Ludford is a poet and short story writer from Nuneaton, England. His works have appeared at a variety of locations in the US, UK & India. He is currently working on his first play.

Contributor: Ingrid Bruck

- -
solar wind mill sips
blood and feathers
from bone China cups

condos crowd the shore
sand hills under the gulf
no margin for birds

gray skies
drench a slate ocean
dead zone

birds fade from view
a flock counted on fingers


- - -
Ingrid Bruck is a retired library director who writes poems and grows wildflowers. Her first chapbook, Finding Stella Maris, was published this year.

Contributor: Melvia Faquitt

- -
I couldn't set the flowers on the stone.
something so delicate
has no place
with something so hard

That was the reason you left
That was the reason you threw me out
before I could wilt
on the cold skin
of your gray grave

Now I bloom
and you do too
in your way.

The flowers you push up
will have to be enough

I'm done leaving delicate things to die
on your gray grave.


- - -
Professor Faquitt has a passion for the theoretical side of the physics of black holes. Her favorite flowers are petunias, daisies and dandelions.

Contributor: Linda Imbler

- -
People I’ve known,
their faces remembered
only in deepest dreams,
a highway of human automobiles
speeding through my mind

Emotional yo-yos of memories
bounce like balls on a court.
Bringing smiles or tears,
but all have taught me something

The jigsaw puzzle of my life,
pieces falling into place,
and as the last part snaps in,
I will see the complete me,
ready to recall each moment
as something which helped build me.


- - -
Linda Imbler is an avid reader, classical guitar player, and a practitioner of both Yoga and Tai Chi. In, addition, she helps her husband, a Luthier, build acoustic guitars. Linda enjoys her 200-gallon saltwater reef tank. She believes that poetry truly adds to the beauty of the world.

Contributor: Bruce Mundhenke

- -
No longer greatly pleased by things
That I can touch,
Or I can hold,
I strive to see the unseen
In those things
That I am shown.
I long for something greater
Than past idols I have known.
I sense an end,
Or change is waiting,
Not far down the road.
I will watch,
And wait,
And hope,
To see what will unfold.


- - -
Bruce writes poetry and short fiction. He lives in a small town in Illinois with his wife and their dog and cat.

Contributor: Todd Mercer

- -
The removal aspect isn’t in his job description,
but a neighbor knocks at 3 a.m. and says
her mother passed over. Can the Sexton
lift the body and drive her to the funeral home?
The mother had asked in advance. She’d rather
be handled first by someone she knows well,
instead of mortuary assistants. A preference.
He agrees. They’re nice people, a long time
acquainted. At his age though the lift
is between difficult and a catastrophe.
But he manages. He supposes a person
is still hanging in there, if at least a couple people
think of them as capable and young. Perspective.
The deceased is delivered across town,
to the professionals. The Sexton’s prepared
to hoist her from his back seat, but two
towers of men step in. The funeral director
hands him a coffee. They take a minute
to talk, touch on highlights of local news.
If you’re up at 3 or 4, engaged in heavy lifting
when someone takes leave, further sleep
makes little sense. The Sexton stays
wide awake. He helps with granting wishes,
what he can, and then he has his day.


- - -
Todd Mercer was nominated for the Pushcart Prize in Fiction in 2019 and the Best of the Net in Poetry in 2018. Recent work appears in The Lake, Dunes Review and The Museum of Americana.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
The pale sky shown against
The purple linings of clouds
New formations emanating from the
Atmosphere of indeterminacy

Striated visions of light
Reflecting off pools of stagnant water
Held fast as if bent by a quartz crystal
Polished by years of buffeting wind

Ozone filtered air after a lightning storm
Relieving the stench of humidity
Festering through a nightmare
Of unspoken platitudes of speech

Golden arrows recovered from a quiver
Soaked by the rainstorms of earlier times
Narrow boundaries of earthen promontories
Holding the future in a Pyrex dish

Filling the motions of another dimension
Answering questions no longer defined

Harbingers of starlight pointing through shadows
Final evasion of an earlier rhyme
Lasting forever in an atomic incubator
Opening doorways of an earlier kind

Lightyears of travel to another dimension
Lingering entries in the journal of time
Forecast impression resolving the query
Hologram beings the last of mankind


- - -
Bruce Levine, a 2019 Pushcart Prize Poetry Nominee, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, articles and a screenplay. Nearly one-hundred-fifty of his works are published in over twenty-five on-line journals including Ariel Chart, Friday Flash Fiction, Literally Stories; over thirty print books including Poetry Quarterly, Haiku Journal, Dual Coast Magazine, and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His six eBooks are available from Amazon.com. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin. He lives in New York with his dog, Daisy. Visit him at www.brucelevine.com.

Contributor: Pranab Ghosh

- -
The gasp. The throb.
The ‘sad satiety’,
The pulsating age.
The end and
The beginning.

The river that had
Dried up. The mind
That had lost its way,
The body that was hungry.
The desire that ran amok.

The serpentine entrance
And the exit. Lust coiling around
The spine like a snake that
Has lost its venom and yet
Longed to bite, afraid of death.

The spirit devoured, the
Feelings betrayed, love
Held for a ransom, for a
Necessity unfulfilled,
Chained to an existence
That didn’t mean anything
To the lovers, only time
Manipulated for a cause
That was neither selfless
Nor humane, just bondage
Strengthened by the flesh
That craves for fulfillment
Of earthly pangs, degenerating
Into a soulless pleasure.

Love lies in chains;
Soul trapped and
Mind fluttering for
An escape route.

Sighs,
Throbs,
Gasps
Ejaculation
Exhaustion
Seed
Creation
Womb

And
Absolute
Vacuum!

An incomplete nothingness
A circle vicious, craving
For completion.


- - -
Pranab Ghosh is a journalist and poet. His poems have been published in several international magazines. His second book of poems Soul Searching and other Poems was published by a Toronto-based publishing house.

Contributor: Ryan Nadolny

- -
Party is done
Everyone has gone

It’s gonna be OK, it’s gonna be alright

Panic resides
Inside a little's mind

Go to sleep baby, I’ll kiss you goodnight

Tears and tantrums
Fears abandon

Don’t worry darlin’, I can make this right

Anxious separation
Nocturnal agitation

We’re through the woods, it’s getting bright

Mentally tripped
Emotionally unequipped

You’ve been so brave, we can see the light

Dreams catch her
Life unsure

It’s OK little one, you’ve shown great might

Let us pray
Better everyday

It’s OK to cry, I know your plight

Normalcy delayed
Confidence swayed

It’s OK to feel down, let me hold you tight

Fight like hell
Bust the shell

Smile gorgeous, there’s no more fright

Gaining strength
Despite the length

You’ve done great child, together we fight!

Forever dealing
A life worth healing


- - -
Husband to a brave and beautiful woman.
Father to 4 brilliant girls.
Writer, poet, home chef, gun enthusiast, and friend.

Contributor: Ingrid Bruck

- -
sunlight
chisels dull edges
off night

pink haze
uncaps morning
river and hills

green spills
flowers
on the bank

in the current
trees and clouds
melt

end of day~
emerald corn fields
dipped in gold

day’s
sharp edges
filed away

shadow-tail
wraps the tree
fog

sleeping
under a wet blanket
the full moon


- - -
Ingrid Bruck is a retired library director who writes poems and grows wildflowers. Her first chapbook, Finding Stella Maris, was published this year.

Contributor: Dave Ludford

- -
Regrets, tangled like seaweed
Around the anchor of his saddened heart
Despair deeper than fathomless oceans
For the golden blue-eyed child
He would never know or love, his son.
Despair that echoes around the valley for aeons
Blasting like canonfire against the silence
Then nothing: time shatters, splinters
Shards of emptiness shot to the heavens
Guilt like a lead weight pressing hard
Upon shoulders flexed and tensed
To burden everlasting misery.


- - -
Dave Ludford is a short story writer and poet from Nuneaton, England. His works have appeared at a variety of locations in the US, UK & India. He is currently working on his first play.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
A cold winter night
Bare trees against
A starless sky
A cold chill
Permeates the air
A residual of rain
Deer scamper
At a human approach
Streetlights reflect
On glossy pavement
A quiet time
A cold winter night


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, articles and a screenplay His nearly one-hundred-fifty works are published in magazines, over twenty-five on-line journals, thirty books and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin. He lives in New York with his dog, Daisy.

Contributor: Utari V. Caircannon

- -
I raised my daughter to carry a sword
I raised my daughter to laugh in the rain
I raised my daughter to be the thunder
I raised my daughter to be the flame

Then came the dawning
Her rise into the light
She became his sky full of stars
He became her night

I held her when she fell to earth
I held her while the wind whipped the trees
I held her through the storms
I helped her stand when storms gave way to breeze.

I raised my daughter to carry a sword
And again she laughs full-faced in the rain.
Again, she is the thunder,
Again, she is the flame.


- - -

Contributor: Arlene Antoinette

- -
There’s a chink forming in your brilliant armor,
as you fight those ferocious dragons. Don’t
become fearful as you continue on with your
quest. You don’t need to be perfect; you
just need to believe you can make a difference,
as I believe you will.


- - -
Arlene writes poetry, flash fiction and song lyrics. Additional work may be found @ Your Daily Poem, Foxglove Journal, Mojave Heart Review and Cagibi Magazine.

Contributor: Pranab Ghosh

- -
The darkness all around.
The benches, the cool
Evening air, the seated
Figures hugging each
Other’s soul and feeling
An unworldly comfort.

The dim light adding
To the darkness around;
The pangs, the sighs of the
Shadowy figures, the
Agony of being close to
Each other and the ecstasy,
Created by the illusion
That time indeed can
Stand still in the shade
Of the lonely casuarinas
Planted by the walkways
At equal distance, creating
A net of secrecy, underneath,
By the side and behind,
Where they lock lips
And forget the pangs
Of fleeting time that
Separates their souls
And their bodies, as they
Long for the park, which
They turn into their homes,
Without the limiting walls, and
The trees, as their nets,
To hide themselves from
The jealous stare of the
Civilization, where they can
Return, evening after evening
To find solace to their bruised
Existence that struggles to
Survive in the slowed-down
World, where prices, bills, taxes
Rise higher than the tallest
Building in the city, two blocks
Away and opposite to their
Lovely open-air studio apartment!


- - -
Pranab Ghosh is a journalist and poet. His poems have been published in several international magazines. His second book of poems Soul Searching and other Poems was published by a Toronto-based publishing house.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
The last ember of solitude
Racks my brain
The frozen stillness
As I walk my dog
In the frigid hour after midnight
At the end of January
Days pass with unearthly speed
As time enfolds the lovers
In its embrace
And light the way across the crevasse
Of uncertainty
Leading the way
Holding hands
Never-ending ribbons of golden thread
Wrapped in the silent clothes of ecstasy
As the frantic pace of civilization
Consumes the hours
Leaving only the last embers
To warm the souls
Of those who remember
Those who hold dear
A time when daydreams met reality
That lasted into eternity


- - -
Bruce Levine, a 2019 Pushcart Prize Poetry Nominee, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, articles and a screenplay. Nearly one-hundred-fifty of his works are published in over twenty-five on-line journals including Ariel Chart, Friday Flash Fiction, Literally Stories; over thirty print books including Poetry Quarterly, Haiku Journal, Dual Coast Magazine, and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His seven eBooks are available from Amazon.com. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin. He lives in New York with his dog, Daisy. Visit him at www.brucelevine.com.

Contributor: Billie Elizabeth Zehendler

- -
Why flies the owl? I think I know.
because it makes him happy
full of joy, like a vivid rainbow,
I watch and wish I could take wing
so easily.

The only other sound is the break,
of distant waves and birds awake
to sing the coming dawn
into being.

I would sing
if I too could take wing
lift freezing feet
from fetid soil
and see what lays beyond
the reddening rim of dawn.


- - -

Contributor: Gregory Z. Farelite

- -
My passion is an amber wave
I crave that liquid love
that gilt, gilt washing
the sloshing and the swashing
of time and mind
distilled in sweet bee brew
so strong it leaves me burning
burning for this, for words, for more
and the waves come and come
and I bottle it all for myself
sharing only scant sips with others
for fear I might one day go without
that liquid gold
and be beached dry without mead
without the me I am
when I drink myself
to the true side
of who I really want to be.


- - -
I run everywhere instead of walking; saves on gym bills and keeps the diets away.

Contributor: Wisen Erlach

- -
In a kingdom full of eucalypts
eagerly I looked for the vines
for the hickories beyond blooming
for the dogwoods twixt the pines
but the wild grapes had all gone barren
all I found was a handful of hardened blackberries
took home what I could not chew
only this and a sagging bayberry.


- - -

Contributor: Korven V. Keown

- -
On that day my soul grew splendid
corpulent and fetid
"Take the moonlight from out my heart"
I cried
as I threw my night upon the floor
lay waiting upon the morrow
and your gaze
and the causes, never willing
still they're killing
still they're killing
the us we loved
the me you needed
and all the wet pain
I twist within
and you between.


- - -
Korven is slow to trust other people, but gladly pens poetry for people he will never meet. He occasionally quotes his father.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
A special day
A wondrous day
A profound day
A day filled with happy moments
Of hope for the future
A day filled with sadness
And reflections of the past
Opening a window
Turning the key in the lock
That closes the door
And opens on the other side
Of the ocean
A chasm crossed physically
And metaphorically
A lifetime ahead
Filled with hope and dreams
Love and laughter
A special day
A wondrous day
A profound day


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, magazine articles and a screenplay His works are published in over twenty-five on-line journals, over twenty-five books and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin, and his wife Jane. He lives in New York with Jane and their dog, Daisy. Visit him at www.brucelevine.com.

Contributor: Lyla Sommersby


The only joy is hope
and hope is only ever momentary
each expectant pregnancy
ending only in stillbirth sorrow
the falling off the mountain
the broken leg
halfway up the peak
but you crawl
and you crawl
and you try to forget
all the pointless hours
all the blood and sweat
spilled freely
always freely
in the hope of promises
that fall apart
like dust in the hand

but again, you hope
again, you pick yourself up
and you find some way to accept it
until all that remains is a whisper,
the words:
I may not have gotten what was promised
but at least I'm still alive to try again.


- - -
I am a student in Miami, Florida. Painting is my other love. My first book, Sketches of Someone, is available through Thunderune Publishing.

Contributor: Bruce Mundhenke

- -
I watched for years,
As I grew old,
Saw life abounds,
And death surrounds,
Life and death dance daily,
To the music
Of this realm.
Love and fear
Are also here,
Both abound,
Both surround,
But love will
Rule the day.
Sow seeds of love
To reap harvests of joy,
Fear will pass away.


- - -
Bruce Mundhenke has published poetry and short fiction in many magazines in the US and the UK. He lives in a small town in Illinois with his wife and their dog and cat.

Contributor: Mark Tulin

- -
The sun shines on skateboard angels
where teenagers do figure eights
in oval parks near ocean waves,
sliding along the silver rails
doing backflips and somersaults
over lazy seagulls and narrow walls
while kicking up their spinning boards,
snatching victory in the jaws of disaster.

The faces of the skaters change,
but the sounds of the skatepark remain;
wheels grinding on swooping concrete,
boards colliding in midair,
skaters tumbling from a hard fall,
war stories told to neophytes,
counting bumps and bruises;
immune to it all.

When you’re a young California kid,
your hair’s as yellow as the sun
and your mind knows no fear;
you take chances on the sharp curves
and the edges of the sloping bends,
believing that everything you try
will work out in the end.


- - -
Mark is a former therapist who lives in California. He has a chapbook, Magical Yogis, and two upcoming books: Awkward Grace, and The Asthmatic Kid and Other Stories. He’s been featured in Fiction on the Web, Ariel Chart, Leaves of Ink, among others.

Contributor: Betal P.K. Pelario

- -
Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
Intervention is energetic,
And so are you.

I pin you to the floor
You kick me in the face
Your mother grabs your hands
Your father grabs the mace

The jacket is white
Your eyes are wide
The men wrap your arms
Nowhere to hide.

The needle goes deep
Not your preferable high
But it gets you in the truck
It keeps you alive.

Roses and red,
Violets are blue
We'll visit you on Sundays
Until I find someone new.


- - -

Contributor: Louie T. Clocksworth

- -
I saw the the love state of my nation laid waste,
how I mourned the freedom
the surrender to fascism
once again
as if it were the forties
as if it were the fifties
as if it were the eighteen-fifties
as if it were any period white-washed
in American history books
to make the normals of our nation look like the good guys
when just as often, we've been bullies.


- - -

Contributor: Cynthia Pitman

- -
I don’t think about you anymore.
Not about the first days
when I shyly took your offered hand
and walked with you
wherever you went.
Not about our first kisses,
sweet electric sparks
that shocked my heart.
Not about our late-night trysts,
the urgent touching,
the fierce yearning,
the heat.
Not about the inevitable waning days
of passion that chilled our fervor
and silenced our hearts.
Not about the break,
the crack,
the crevice,
the final breach.
Not about the later walks
without your hand to hold,
not about our ended endless kisses,
not about our distant frenzied trysts.
Not about any of it.
Not about you.
Never about you.
Not anymore.


- - -
I am a retired teacher with work published in Leaves of Ink, 3rd Wednesday (contest finalist), Vita Brevis, and others. My book, The White Room, is forthcoming.

Contributor: Vaunna Fostertagg

- -
Is it a sad soul that stalks a cheater?
is it a sadder soul that shakes loose
that severs soft skin where it presses
and holds
and leaves
for another
for other skin
because skin
is all that really matters
skin and the stain of sin
left in the wake
of lazy liaisons.


- - -
Florida native with a heart of gold, sometimes.

Contributor: Carrie Hooper

- -
Household Drums
When I was little,
Round containers
Made excellent drums.

I played
The oatmeal box drum,
The coffee can drum,
The butter drum,
And the peanut butter drum.

I discovered
Percussive possibilities
In everyday objects.


- - -
Carrie Hooper lives in Elmira, New York. She teaches voice and piano lessons, gives vocal concerts, teaches and learns languages, and writes poetry.

Contributor: Wyatt Mitchell

- -
I’m nothing in relation to me
A white picket fence dripping in sobriety
Painted four months clean
With two eyes too blind to see

A body dead inside the living
A soul that’s nothing more than giving
Is breathing considered sinning?
I’m bleeding but I’m still grinning

So empty I can’t cry for myself
My tainted heart upon a broken shelf
Sitting silent and all alone
One-of-a-kind and it can’t be cloned

A perfect pair of listening ears
Yet all I hear are internalised fears
A childhood filled with parental abandon
What trauma creates is far from canon

Scared to speak the thoughts I hold within
My mind’s a burden considered too maudlin
Tortured by all that I contain
When I die will my life still remain?

Biting my nails is far from my worst habit
The one I need to break is that which turns me rabid
Drinking of myself to see what has been seen
Eating my own flesh to stimulate self-healing

Holes in my skin become scars that are indenting
Bug bites are wounds with scabs that are impending
Performing minor surgeries with tweezers and a scalpel
But not everyone considers such masochism to be palatable

I hurt myself and I like the pain it takes
It reminds me of reality when I disassociate
Shamed for enjoying that which causes harm
Is infection reason for all my future alarm?

Bandages cover my legs and sleeves disguise my arms
I find I must admit that self-abuse has its charms
The taste of iron oxide pouring from my mouth
Skinning my lips in chunks for I am devout

Seeking alternative pleasure often bloody and obscene
Picking apart the pieces of me; an addiction most unhealthy
Drawn in by the desperate need to control what’s even real
Not noticing I’m a contributing factor to why I’m yet to heal

The desire to stop means nothing without commitment
Upon many things is ending dependency contingent
For relapse is not a single part of recovery
One cut or burn is a moment I’ve stopped loving me

Drowning in the epitome of my own insanity
Unable to tell the difference between what’s false and what’s me
Scared the lies I tell myself are those that I’m becoming
I look into the mirror and wonder if I’m coming or if I’m running

Tripped up by the love that’s in my shattered heart
Aiming to be passionate from an unexpected start
Never questioning these feelings that I was meant to have
Yet trembling at the thought of what could possibly go bad

What if giving all I’ve got doesn’t ever make it enough?
What if light is the darkness of which we’re meant to snuff?
What if God is, He who leads us to the Devil?
What if a converted spirit doesn’t put you on a saintly level?

What if screaming for help doesn’t mean that you’ll be heard?
What if preaching religious scripture doesn’t make it the lord’s word?
What if miracles and blessings aren’t necessarily holy?
What if my heart hurts because it’s limited by “If only”?

Scrounging for emotion; I’m pissed, numb, and on the verge of tears
Three days I’ve wanted to smoke and I’m not yet in the clear
Trying to suppress all recent addictive desire
Fighting my mind often leaves me drained and quite tired

Spending my nights and days tossing and turning my life away
Biding hours of my time just to regain what energies are rightfully mine
Sundown arises and I find strength to put on my human suit
Covering depression in various fabrics so no one has the slightest clue

A breakdown is coming; I can feel it in my eyes
The devil is inside me; my body is his disguise
Drowning the world in tears; I fall and then I rise


- - -

Contributor: Perry Gardbakken

- -
Alone
where even the silence echoes
where the black marks of high fires
scorch the painted stone
the prints of magic hands
pressed in paint for all to see

Alone
and I love it here
and I wish I felt as free
in every moment
as I do in the confines
of this stony hole.

Alone
and no one to find me if I fall
but I want it that way
I want my bones to lay in this cave
until even I
become one
with the Earth.


- - -
Perry saw twenty winters before he left the mountains. He writes in nature, sometimes while sitting in trees.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
Wind blowing the trees –
Waiting

Rain pelting the roofs –
Waiting

Warnings – fear – panic –
Waiting

False alarms and near death situations –
Waiting

Tree limbs, branches and twigs
Scatter the lawn now
Tearing asunder
A long standing dream

Follow the plan – follow the leader
Running to safety or so they believe
Storing up water – storing up food-stuffs
Counting the days they’ll all do without

Fixing the time, it can’t last forever
Praying they’ll all see the very next dawn
Watching the wind – moments of calmness
Gusts overtaking those moments of ease

Clouds overhead as dark as the night now
Following shadows cast off on their own
Ev’ryday fears amplified grandly
Leaving all thought and reason behind

Lightning and thunder – power lines bursting
Freezing the time in a moment of light
Tracing the tempest with photograph mem’ry
Timelines projecting the hurricane path

Watching the day creeping by slowly
Hours of watching and waiting to come
Watching a squirrel scamper up tree limbs
Looking for shelter from the eye of the storm


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, articles and a screenplay His nearly one-hundred-fifty works are published in magazines, over twenty-five on-line journals, thirty books and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin. He lives in New York with his dog, Daisy. Visit him at www.brucelevine.com.

Contributor: Lyla Sommersby


I, a leaf
from your book.
I, a sheaf
of inkspotted paper.
and I
I'm just one of your poems
now.

I saw your face
a reflection in a window
and I stopped to see
how you were
how you've fared
through all the years of silence.

but you're the same.

you've changed
only in one way:

you've forgotten me.

I remember what was
I remember
for both of us now.

and the shard in my soul has dulled
has softened enough
that I can see you
smiling with her
hear your kisses
romantic words
and not hurt
so deeply
inside.


- - -
I am a student in Miami, Florida. Painting is my other love. My first book, Sketches of Someone, is available through Thunderune Publishing.

Contributor: Bruce Mundhenke

- -
We lived through many changes,
Some hard times with strife,
We laughed and cried,
We loved and lived,
We knew pain and joy and sadness;
We took what we were given,
Enjoyed the good,
Endured the bad,
We thought both our due,
We made of them the best we could,
As we tended to the seasons
Of our life.


- - -
Bruce Mundhenke writes in Illinois, where he lives in a small town with his wife and their dog and cat.

Contributor: J. White Welchev


If I could escape this grind
if could slip the bonds
the linear of time
and unbind
all that I am
I'd gather the best days of my life
compress them to a single, endless moment
and live within it
forever.

But, then again
who's to say my now
is not as good as my then.
I have a different spouse,
different friends
different job
different likes

Where I am
doesn't feel like progress

Where I am
feels like a different me
a different everything

But then again,

The grass is always greener
on the other side of the fence
by the sewer pond
we crawled out of.


- - -

Contributor: Obellia Pitlex


My heart races
I miss you

I miss the way you watched me
I miss the look of love in your eyes
I miss
the way you undressed
the way you laid back
the way you showed your world to me
the way you arched at the touch of my breath
the way you tasted
the way you opened to me
and held me
until we both were lost
in the sway
until there was nothing left
but endless initiation
into cloudborne castles
of a future I thought would last forever
though you knew
secretly
the we I needed
was just a feather
in the drifting wind.


- - -
I build bits and suffer fools only because the pay is great.

Contributor: James Ashton Fiddlestone

- -
A smoke
a cup of coffee
something to cast the blizzard out
to warm the bones
to bring heat
into ragged fingers
for one
succulent
moment

We work the streets
we laugh, we share
what little we have
because half a cigarette
or a pinch of the good stuff
buys a story and a smile
when you need it most

and you need it most
in the winter.


- - -
The poetry of JAF has been featured in such street-zines as Cannery Retrograde, Stabat Pater and Zenmerica Plus.

Contributor: Cynthia Pitman

- -
The raven-black stallion,
tired of being saddled
with people and their problems,
broke from the barn
and headed straight for the hill.
The closer he got,
the faster he ran
and the more he sweated
until, at last, he reached the top.
There, in his own sweat,
he baked in the kiln of the noon sun,
becoming a hard, dark totem
of running free.


- - -
I am a retired teacher with work published in Leaves of Ink, 3rd Wednesday (contest finalist), Vita Brevis, and others. My book, The White Room, is forthcoming.

Contributor: Perry Gardbakken

- -
Bringing babies into being by the bunches
my Mormon cousins keep white skin in circulation
but we don't talk about that
just like we don't talk about the "Mark of Cain"
or the lack of lay-pastors
of colors deeper than Grecian

Leniency toward Leviticus
is always a popular option
except when it comes to acceptance
of all the gay cousins
massacred by black guns
in angry white hands.

In truth,
I've seen all I need to see
in the casinos that crowd against the Utah border
but my cousins keep on calling
saying "jack" this and "daniels" that
while I share my drinks with sinners
on a Saturday evening
knowing I won't be waking
to meet the "needs" of the ward
I've been assigned to.


- - -
Perry saw twenty winters before he left the mountains. He writes in nature, sometimes while sitting in trees.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
Living in an alternate universe
Ignoring pop culture
By choice
Searching and seeking another reality
Another voice
Unaware of mainstream hyperbole
Disdaining ideology
Disavowing hypocrisy
Technology
Longing for another era
Through socio-anthropology
Fearing the fate of society
Civilization
The human condition
And the disappearance
Of humanity
Portable souls in cell phones
Replacing perception
The golden age of the written word
Reduced to a hundred and forty characters
Life condensed to a text message
Social interaction forsaken
For a higher score of tech magic
Leaving the alternate universe
The only hope
Of sanity


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, articles and a screenplay His nearly one-hundred-fifty works are published in magazines, over twenty-five on-line journals, thirty books and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin. He lives in New York with his dog, Daisy. Visit him at www.brucelevine.com.

Contributor: John R. Parmensonne



Don't take it personally
we say

but we never take our own advice
never stop to think before we yell
before we beg for vengeance
try to find
ways to obliterate the inconvenient
leave scorched earth
where once
someone tried to help us
tried to do nice
and tripped
or fell
back into human ways
maybe snapped
under the strain
of too many red-faced anuses
clouding up the day
with self-important rage
while the leaves blow on
and autumn comes
and nothing but the scars
remains.


- - -
I live in a basement of my own regrets.

Contributor: Carrie Hooper

- -
To obtain our poetic license,
We do not need to complete an application,
Show multiple forms of identification,
And wait for a document
To arrive in the mail.

God gave us our poetic license
When He created us.
It gives us the freedom to choreograph
The rhythms, rhymes, and meters
Of our life dance.
It endows our voice
With silver toned songs
Accompanied by the harp strings
Of similes and metaphors.

With poetic license in hand,
Our playful contemplative souls
Find artistic pleasure
In versifying every wondrous moment.


- - -
Carrie Hooper lives in Elmira, New York. She teaches voice and piano lessons, gives vocal concerts, teaches and learns languages, and writes poetry.

Contributor: Maria-Theresa Zehendstrom


A wet release
likely illicit
carried you into being
and the whole world spun on around you
until the last wet breath
before the grave.

"But what more?"
you cry
for even the rushing waves
crushing pains
of life on earth
leave you longing for more
leave you clawing at the door
as death drags you into abyss
and nothing remains
nothing except the pain
left for someone else to endure.


- - -
Inspired by the writings of Herne, Norris and Moreno, I write the song that splashes from my hands when I pour my soul on paper.

Contribitor: Korra Abraham-Whatley


These bones
wind-blown
brittle as baskets
too long in the sun

These bones
the stories they tell
the hidden humours
in every hole, every condyle.

These bones
for those who listen
for the language of rustles,
for the dash of scratches
speaks more than any leaves of autumn ever could
speaks of trees yet to sprout
and winters distant yet
and white fields
where the only black is bone.


- - -
I live in a suitcase and enjoy writing poetry while watching the glittering lights of Los Angeles, Rome and Ontario.

Contributor: Vaunna Fostertagg

- -
I lost myself in a wall of meat
I lost myself in a vat of pain
I lost myself in life
blurred and burned
and twisted
and turned
and became
what you wanted of me
not the wind
not the feet
but the stolid mass
the meat that goes to work
the meat that makes the money
the meat that takes and buys
and dreams only meat dreams
inspired by meat shows
commercials for meat needs
imposed on meat me
instead of the wind I was
the snatch of song
the breath within
now squelched
now lost
a glimmer only caught
when meat me sags on the couch
through the sweaty, too-short days
of weekend's cocktail haze.


- - -
Florida native with a heart of gold, sometimes.

Contributor: H.L. Dowless

- -
When our time is said and done,
our moments on earth are through,
I shall relish those cheer filled days neath a shining sun,
and those hours lying close to you.

Know this single fact of being,
My love;
an eternity can feel like a fleeting moment,
My sweet dove,
when in company with one heaven sent.

Valhalle is only a stones throw away,
a hook cast into a spring time mill pond;
yet nothing puts more joy into a darkening day
than the sight of you approaching from a shimmering horizon far beyond.

I behold thy delicate face on stormy nights,
with blue fire flashing wildly again and again,
falling rain slashing so madly that it invites
a perception of childlike voices on the blustery wind.

I still lie in waiting inside our chateau bed chamber,
my dearest love,
patiently longing for thy glorious return;
even if ye be only a spectrum forever,
my sweet dove,
my passion still shall ne’er waver.

The flame of our love candle dances by our bedside,
eerie shadows quiver on the stone wall,
I often feel thy unseen presence at yuletide,
I long to follow you deep into that dreary hall.

With the flash of blue fire on the stormy twelfth striking,
the rumble of rolling thunder from beyond,
I behold thy delicate form in the bleakest darkness,
I sense a warm embrace from a heart so kind.

Why didst thou flee so far from me?
Why does there exist this gulf so deep and wide between us?
I mix crushed hemlock with the strong wine inside this chalice of silver that you see,
a single heavy drink therefrom shall be enough, I trust.


Then far from this authoritative collective world where I do not fit,
shall I forever flee,
Oh, so nice when this deed is soon done,
a place of adventure and true opportunity is where I need to be.
This great gulf that separates us shall then be no more,
you see,
and us twain can be together again underneath a celestial sun,
dwelling for all infinity in timeless paradise,
where secular imagination possesses not the ability to fathom a great pleasure there in store.


- - -
The author is an international ESL instructor. He has been a writer for over thirty years. He has numerous publications under his belt.

Contributor: Sheshu Babu

- -
Even before the sun rises
She rises
From her sleep
To peep
Into the dark kitchen
And find out what to cook and when

Who is she?

While the rice and porridge boil
She dresses for daily toil
In a machine-dominated factory
Mechanically churning out products
Fulfilling owner's set targets

Who is she?

While the faint rays of sun touch the earth
And birds chirp and children mirth
She speeds away nonchalantly to catch the bus.
If late for a minute, she has to bear the cuss
Words of the owner and his unnecessary fuss

Who is she?

Getting down and confirming her presence,
Immerses in her work 'til dark night 'lights' her sense
Before leaving, other workers surround
Elated that the day's work is over, they make noise and sound
She addresses them: "previous month's wages have not been paid
Tomorrow starts our protests 'til the matter is settled"

Who is she?

Returning late after the congregation
To the abode of male domination,
She completes her domestic chores
Sleeps forgetting wounds and sores
So as to wake up to another dawn
And continue life's journey like a swan.

She is an ordinary worker
She is a courageous protester
She is an aggressive activist
In a world of many a male supremacist
She is a Feminist!


- - -

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
The river of time
Flows through the essence
Of human existence
Forging canyons in the soul

Following a path
Of its own creation
Leaving silt in its wake
Stones along the shore

Rapids interrupt
Its meandering migration
As the current overtakes
Rocks scattered in the bed

Casting spray on daydreams
Leaving empty holes
Where the future
Would have been

The river holds the mem’ries
Of sailors long since gone
Waiting for new entries
Dragged against their will

Shadows from the trees
Quiver in the wind
Darkening the river’s path
Where sunshine should have been

Shallow pools created
As the river branches off
An oasis holding time
That the current ignored

Skipping stones on the surface
Thrown by people on the shore
Setting off vibrations
Concentric circles spreading out

Fastening forever
As the ripples disappear
Time alone remembers
The river that flows along

Leaving empty caverns
Cut in solid stone
That once had happy endings
Before the ebb and flow


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, articles and a screenplay His nearly one-hundred-fifty works are published in magazines, over twenty-five on-line journals, thirty books and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin. He lives in New York with his dog, Daisy. Visit him at www.brucelevine.com.

Contributor: Tyler Zahnke

- -
When I find myself alone,
A cheerful song I tend to sing.
When she decides to sing with me,
The bells of heaven start to ring.
We sing in peaceful harmony
The songs that come from deep inside.
And when our song has reached its end,
The gates of heaven open wide.
The light from heaven says our names.
We sing a song to welcome it.
It joins us in our song of love,
Assuring that our lives are lit.
The moon plays drums, the wind plays flute,
While Mars and Venus play guitars.
The asteroids play bass and keys,
To compliment the humming stars.
The orchestra up in the sky
Accompanies our song of peace.
The light says in a calming voice,
"Your song of love will never cease!"
The song of joy, the song of hope,
The song of everlasting mirth;
The heavens have enabled thee;
The greatest song on planet Earth.


- - -
I was born in 1997 in Grand Rapids, Michigan. I am a totally blind musician, writer and technology enthusiast. I believe that music is powerful, and that people should make music whenever possible.

Contributor: Cynthia Pitman

- -
Keep a tight rein on me.
Otherwise, I’ll kick and scream
and fight to unleash
what cannot be said,
what must stay hidden,
what dare not raise its head
and reveal itself to the world.
I keep it close.
I know what it can do,
what pain it can cause,
what chaos it can wreak.
I know that the unsaid
cannot be let loose
or I will stand accused,
denounced, ashamed.
Hold the reins.
The unsaid will pull and pull,
wanting to sound the alarm
to warn against me,
against the reality of me I keep inside –
not the unreality I keep on the outside
where I try and try
to stand quiet and still.


- - -
I am a retired teacher with work published in Leaves of Ink, 3rd Wednesday (contest finalist), Vita Brevis, and others. My book, The White Room, is forthcoming.

Contributor: Jack Dolvermorris

- -
If the apple fell into a pie
willingly
how far from the tree
would it be?

I fell into
everything I've lived with
I fell into
everyone I've lived through.

I fell and rolled
without a say
without volition
or salvation
just going with the flow
wherever it would go

Until you

I chose you
the apple of my eye
I chose you
and for the first time
since the fall
I didn't roll
I didn't roll on
or out
or away

I stayed

with you.


- - -

Contributor: Perry Gardbakken

- -
A basket of blessings
he offered me
in his passing
from life to life.

A basket of blessings
I turned into bridges
to carry my soles
from one life to the next.

A basket of blessings
I left for my son
when he walked into manhood
when he walked from life to life.


- - -
Perry saw twenty winters before he left the mountains. He writes in nature, sometimes while sitting in trees.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
I noted one day
The dearth of any Blue Jay
To come within my view
Nor Cardinals
That astonishing bird
Covered in a regal hue

Then as I watched
A Blue Jay came in sight
And landed on my balcony railing
For seconds few
And then it flew
Off without any warning

As it flew away
I did proclaim
Astonished as I was
As if on cue
Several more did fly near
More Blue Jays did appear

And then I asked
For a Cardinal to alight
One came directly into sight
And landed on the rail
But in seconds it did regale
Into lofty flight

I’ve been told with those red wings
A Cardinal is an angel
So when I asked to see that bird
My simple request seems to have been heard

Now I watch
For Blue Jays and for Cardinals
To come within my view
Each day I hope
The dearth be gone
And an angel comes anew


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, articles and a screenplay. Nearly one-hundred-fifty of his works are published in over twenty-five on-line journals including Ariel Chart, Literally Stories, Visitant, Foliate Oak Magazine; over thirty print books including Poetry Quarterly, Mused Literary Review, Dual Coast Magazine, and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His seven eBooks are available from Amazon.com. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin. He lives in New York with his dog, Daisy. Visit him at www.brucelevine.com.

Contributor: Vaunna Fostertagg

- -
Hell
is the woodchipper of busy work
of productive apathy
of the dead
herding the dead
denying grasping hands
with bureaucratic handwavium
go back to the back
of the back of the back
and start over
because what you've provided isn't right
and we'll need at least six weeks
to process your immediate needs
while we sit here dead
and dying
rotting at the same pace
as the system that the lawyers built
to keep layabouts from suing the system
into sweet oblivion
because someone lost something
somewhere
in hellish bureaucracy.


- - -
Florida native with a heart of gold, sometimes.

Contributor: Bruce Mundhenke

- -
Seemed like a long time
On the way,
From first steps
To a head of grey hair,
But looking back on my life now,
It never took long
To get there.
The excitement of youth,
Slowly gave way,
To an elder's
More thoughtful days.
The lust for things
Not so important,
Eventually faded away.
Knowing a little more than before,
But still lacking knowledge,
It seems...
Alive in the present moment,
Now no longer waiting in dreams.


- - -
Bruce Mundhenke has been everywhere except the electric chair and seen everything but the wind. He writes poetry and fiction and is learning to relax.

Contributor: Carrie Hooper

- -
When life's rainstorms
Drench the window of your soul,
The sun of God's presence
Continues to shine,
And He creates
A rainbow of hope
With the colors
Of endurance and renewal.


- - -
Carrie Hooper lives in Elmira, New York. She teaches voice and piano lessons, gives vocal concerts, teaches and learns languages, and writes poetry.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
The black lace of winter
Permeates the view
Barren trees at sunset
A panoply of sorrow
Recounted in a single verse
Monopolizing thoughts
That once were golden
Filled with brightly colored hues
A rainbow of mem’ries
Now erased by shadows
Encased in a shroud
Questions not yet answered
Yet terminating the sunrise
In a recurring pattern
Drifting on inexplicably
And only time can reveal
The future


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional and is published on and in numerous internet and print journals. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin.

Contributor: Cynthia Pitman

- -
O Seraph, stone of the gods,
how is it that you were torn
from the crag above and flushed
by the tallest of all waterfalls
to be lodged into the bottom
of the chosen river?
Though at the world’s peak,
you fell so hard that you sank
deep and deep and then beyond.
Did the rock of all ages
strike you from sight?
Or did you mine yourself
from the heights of glory
to join in the cacophony
of the rushing waters,
to be forced forever
into the rough bedrock
and be slowly shaped by eternity?


- - -
I am a retired teacher with work published in Leaves of Ink, 3rd Wednesday (contest finalist), Vita Brevis, and others. My book, The White Room, is forthcoming.

Contributor: Paweł Markiewicz

- -
Something of Hungary would give thanks to Austria for the historic-ontological suitableness, a weird-like spirit.

I was with my hound in front of the primordial oak
I harvested there tree glamorous-meek acorns
I have left behind the acorns in addition to a thermal spring
with the result that the water-bow is able to sheen
dainty sempiternity fulfilled in me
when my dog masticated subtle-propitious acorns
three glamour-like ghosts were freed
from these acorns yea with the brilliancy
there was the Erlking the King of the pixies
with the butterflies-King of a dreamy night
in the Erlking prevailed – the witchcraft
in the pixy-like King reposed – the dreamery
in the King of butterflies Your vanlet
a bewitched waking dream in the Erlking
a dreamier enchantment in pixylet-like King
I have dreamed with Kings over the day
that was more marvelous than a night-dream aforetime
and the King of butterflies wore magic
day-dream hex and also enthusiasm
as far as an angelical autumn-starlet
beguiled of meek ghost-moonlet
I will dream simplemindedly with the threes
with attractive magic-eons


- - -

Contributor: Michael Seeger

- -
Sunset’s glow fades
into the west
through hospital shades;
let go your last
earthly breath,

Dearest Mother,
beneath strange long hair.
Rise to some other
place somewhere—
entering death

your bony limbs
stretch out with a new
strength as light swims
through the blue
by-and-by

above, now below;
the here and now.
I want you to go.
You taught me how
to say goodbye.


- - -
Michael lives with his lovely wife, Catherine, and still-precocious 16 year-old daughter, Jenetta, in a house with a magnificent Maine Coon (Jill) and two high-spirited Chihuahuas (Coco and Blue). He is an educator (like his wife) residing in the Coachella Valley near Palm Springs, California. Some of his poems have appeared recently either published or included in print anthologies like the Lummox Press, Better Than Starbucks, and The Literary Hatchet.

Contributor: Tyler Zahnke

- -
As I drift off to sleep on a dark, cold night,
The voices slip into my dream.
I hear them on the mountaintop,
A most fantastic singing team.
They yodel in the sweetest way,
Commanding all the stars to shine.
Those yodeling voices on the peak
Have all agreed to form a line.
Those voices singing in the Alps
Have scared the sun into its tent.
Its lifelong fear of yodeling songs
Explains the reason why it went.
A dozen million years ago,
The sun would shine all day and night.
But when the yodelers first appeared,
Their voices scared the God of Light.
In the morn they went to bed,
The singing stopped, the sun shone bright.
But when the yodelers sang again,
The burning sun was filled with fright.
He hid back in his tent so cold,
Below that spooky mountain tune.
But then the stars who loved the song
Would join their cousin, Mister Moon.
On winter nights the yodelers sang
For longer than on warmer days.
As soon as all the singers stop,
The sun again emits its rays.
I was awakened from my dream
And stepped outside to face the sun,
Amazed at the fantastic things
These yodeling mountain folk have done.
For if these singers left the peak,
And chose to never sing again,
The sun would shine all day and night,
And never go back to its den.
The sun in North America
Has crickets as its only fear.
The same goes for the English sun,
Though in France it is not clear.
The great Swiss sun is brave and bold,
No insect scares this mighty beast.
But when those yodeling songs begin,
The great Swiss sun won't dare head east!


- - -
I was born in 1997 in Grand Rapids, Michigan. I am a totally blind musician, writer and technology enthusiast. I believe that music is powerful, and that people should make music whenever possible.

Contributor: Arlene Antoinette

- -
The cpap machine has overtaken
the spot where my pen and paper
once sat awaiting midnight scribbles
and shadows cast from silver moonlight.

Last night as inspiration hit me, I rolled
over and whispered a new poem into
my sleeping husband’s ear.

This morning, he remembers nothing.
He swears to the poetry gods that he
heard nothing, only felt cool air
blowing on his skin like a kiss
from chilled lips.

My darling begs my forgiveness, but I
can’t bring myself to forgive him
as I watch my Muse wave goodbye,
no longer willing to work in such
deplorable conditions.


- - -
Arlene writes poetry, flash fiction and song lyrics. More of her work may be found @ I am not a silent Poet, Tuck Magazine, Little Rose Magazine, London Grip, The Open Mouse and Literary Heist.

Contributor: Sheshu Babu

- -
Splendid flowers of fragrance
Have myriad attractive colors
If Truth is like a set of flowers
It has multiple unexplored odors

Different shapes of many a creature
Inhabit the vast territory of Nature
If Truth is a manifestation of Nature
It embodies every beautiful picture

Every Truth in the world
Abstract form with meanings multifaceted
Is mercurial and dialectic
Its composition oxymoronic

Nothing is Absolute
Truth is not astute
Its changes are sublime
And conform to situation, space and time.



- - -

Contributor: Mark Tulin

- -
I took my life for granted;
figured I’d never lose my balance; thought I could walk a tightrope
on a single toe.

I don’t need to take precautions or wear a life jacket
or even scream for help.
I'm special, that way;
nothing’s ever going to overpower me.

But the next thing I knew,
I was pulled by the undertow.
The planet reversed itself and I became a casualty, drowning in my ego.

They found me floating
like a piece of driftwood
from the shoreline to the sea.


- - -
Mark Tulin has an upcoming fiction collection, The Asthmatic Kid and Other Stories, and a poetry collection called Awkward Grace.

Contributor: H.L. Dowless

- -
The elegant chateau high on a hill,
what a magnificent sight to see,
where the Great Master held such a supreme will
during his fight for liberty.

He penned those cherished manumitting documents,
he advocated a redeeming battle with swords,
his words were spoken with such splendid elegance,
to this very day he is still adored!

Prior to the days of machinery,
since his grand estate was so expansive,
generating such a fabulous line of prosperity,
it could only be manned via human persistence.

The acreage was tended by burly men,
the kitchen controlled by factotum attendants.
The most gorgeous among them accommodated important clients,
offering lavish quarters and condiments.

Upon this illustrious homestead the most endowed vixen was chief,
while the Great Master was away.
From the weight of toil she had astonishing relief,
relishing in an insouciant stress free day.

When the months had passed
and the Great Master finally returned,
a heavy cloud of lust descended,
and for the allure of delicate flesh his entire body burned.

Since the Great Master held total power and abundance,
from all others this vixen abstained,
while ‘neath the estate shelter he remained;
yet when he was absent she allowed him to engineer the happenstance,
for his business accomplices to reap their riotous gains.

When the Great Master soon made his way back to his station at work,
this vixen retained an uninhibited liberty throughout home and berth,
making herself readily available to whom e'er afforded the most lavish accommodation,
whilst the talented champion labored to construct a new nation.

In our own day some national apostle spreads a provocative lie,
that this presumed innocent youthful harpy was compelled into an abominable service,
without any petition or inquiry;
yet were it not for these words the truth might remain buried for all perpetuity,
and the Great Master blamed for her gross indolence.


- - -
The author is an international ESL instructor. He has been a writer for over thirty years. He has numerous publishing credits underneath his belt.

Contributor: Cynthia Pitman

- -
Come with me to the center of time,
where caverns are carved from black onyx.
We can watch our reflections in envy
as they dance in the sheen of the dark walls.
Yours will lift mine and spin me around,
breathless, in the airless cave.
Mine will hold yours close, and closer still,
absent a heartbeat to keep time.
Together we can watch ourselves dance eternally
in the echoing cavern of love undone.


- - -
I am a retired teacher with work published in Leaves of Ink, 3rd Wednesday (contest finalist), Vita Brevis, and others. My book, The White Room, is forthcoming.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
Blistering weather withers
As cooler climes take over
Reflecting
Revealing the emptiness that surrounds
Pervading the hollowness that echoes
Like an empty cavern
Floating through a ravine of longing
Waiting
For the improvements that signal
Recuperation
Regaining the equanimity
Of our own circle of life
Holding fast to passions and fancies
Foibles and follies
Hopes and dreams
Fears and failures
Following the road to the precipice
Onward
Holding hands
Always reaching for the next plateau
Always seeking the unanswered question
And laughing
To cover up the unknown
The sham laughter of sorrow
To hide the tears
That flow too readily for propriety
Yet shrink with hope
Fleeting
And rise again
On a roller-coaster of fate


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional and is published on and in numerous internet and print journals. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin.

Contributor: Aakriti Bikash Kumar

- -
I, a captive clad in dark and light
I too, its captor of wicked might
The placid bars of this turning mind
Shroud the shrieks of my echoing plight

And mice of vices gnaw at the bread
Of my soul; those inmate vermin I dread
That crawl and creep up my feet
And fester and toy with my head

With shackles, pinned myself to the ground
Chastised myself, in a mind's solitary sound
With mice of vices and shackles of shame
A free man's mind and soul were bound

Yet, the bird beyond the bars calls and cries
With a voice from within; the darkness dies


- - -
Pursuing B.A. in History (Honors) at Maitreyi College, University of Delhi
Classical Literature Enthusiast and Aspiring Diplomat :)

Contributor: Vaunna Fostertagg

- -
I never drink, she said,
as she opened the closet
the most well-stocked bar I'd ever seen.

People give me gifts in this industry,
she said.
I do the same.

You regift? I asked.
When I can, she said.

She closed the door.
I wondered how many attorneys
kept such well-stocked larders
of gifts,
regifted endlessly

otherwise
never touched.


- - -
Florida native with a heart of gold, sometimes.

Contributor: Kendra R. Grosfelt

- -
Clocks are the shackles of civilization
never loosing enough time to do everything
that must be done
with utmost urgency.

Cancer is the rash of progress
a reaction to the pollutants of industry
and to stress
so much inescapable stress.

Death is the rest we all secretly crave
the blessing of the yawning grave
just a quick bliss, then gone
and then it's back to work again.

- - -

Contributor: Barry B. Belmont

- -
The painting she left
the painting I found
sitting vigil
on the thrift store shelves

I wondered what they thought
those who saw the date
the dedication on the back
of the piece

I wondered how many other weddings
generated their own ephemeral memorabilia
now only sitting vigil
on thrift store shelves


- - -

Contributor: Perry Gardbakken

- -
He says he wants to leave
wants to live in space
wants to live completely free
independent
of all this
of all this green
this blue and red and brown.

He says he wants to don a spacesuit
all decked out in red, white and blue.
he wants to stitch it all himself
of things he made himself
without waiting on anyone else
without being dependent

He says he wants to see the stars
while the rest of the world spins on
dark and blind
like crabs in a bucket
except him
all except him

He'll be independent
he'll exist without relying on anything
except himself

(and all the things that others helped him build.)


- - -
Perry saw twenty winters before he left the mountains. He writes in nature, sometimes while sitting in trees.

Contributor: Jane Briganti

- -
A place to call home
Familiar sights and scenery
that warm the eyes
or maybe
New possibilities
New places yet
to be discovered

Meeting new people
Exchanging smiles
Diversity, runs far and wide
Different voices
Changing customs

Where does one
belong?

A place called home
Somewhere, anywhere
one feels safe
Feeling they belong
without hesitation
without any second thoughts

Home is where the heart is
or so they say
Home is where you are
when you're not wishing
you were away!


- - -
A Native New Yorker, she believes poetry is the souls way of communicating with itself.

Contributor: Sheshu Babu

- -
Cut communications
Impose curfew for any number of days
Curb movement of every citizen
By militarization
Install barricades
Threatening public to stay indoors
Issue 'shoot on sight' orders

You feel
You have full control
On law and order
And silenced people

But,

You cannot stop wind
From blowing
And voices
Reaching every person

Sooner or later
Collective voices
Will emerge and challenge
All the obstacles
And break artificial silence


- - -

Contributor: Jack Dolvermorris

- -
A swirl of something southern
a wet splash of something eastward
my parents were a slosh of secrets
of lives lived to tide the urges
built in air conditioned hells
where nothing happened
(except in the mail room)
(except in the back of the family car)
(except in sagging hotels on business trips)
(except in the driveway
and in the bed
and on the floor
and in the kitchen.)

A swirl of something southern
a wet splash of something eastward
all that was needed
to keep the separation only simmering
the normalcy of every air conditioned hell
paid up with greasy checks
like gas
like air
in the end.


- - -

Contributor: Tarren Jordyn

- -
I sit at the intersection
of tasteless drama
and bureaucratic barbarism

I sit amidst the tangled wires
and try to sort the snot from the chaff
after the cream is gone
and the wheat is wasted
each stalk shot like an arrow
by a man in a suit
until none are left
until the suits are left
blindly milling
coughing awkwardly
with hands out
hoping
always hoping
for something more.


- - -

Contributor: Arlene Antoinette

- -
Little brother is in love with a woman
who will undoubtedly do him wrong.
She’s the kind of woman, fifty percent
of all broken-hearted country songs are
written about. Well, maybe seventy percent.

First, she’ll toy with his heart, steal his
money, and of course sleep with his best
friend (and most of the guys in the pool hall)
before the end of the month.

Little brother’s going to end up sitting in his
pickup truck with two six packs, drinking
himself into a stupor, trying to figure
out what he did wrong. I hope those bottles
last him through the night.

A week later, little brother’s going to buy
himself a banjo, no, maybe a second hand
six-string guitar (as it holds the residue
of hundreds of broken-hearted melodies).
He’ll strum those strings like he wished
he had strummed the chords of her icy heart.

Most likely I’ll visit him and listen as he pours
out his achy-breaky soul in song, a little off-key,
but heartfelt all the same. Too bad she won’t hear
a word of it, she’ll be shooting pool and flirting
it up with some pretty boy, down the street
at the bar we locals call, Win or Lose.


- - -
Arlene writes poetry, flash fiction and song lyrics. More of her work may be found @ I am not a silent Poet, Tuck Magazine, Little Rose Magazine, London Grip, The Open Mouse and Literary Heist.

Contributor: Madlynn Haber

- -
Fear lives in the body.
Fear hides in the body
deep in the muscles
fear stores itself away,
waiting, lurking, until
with the right trigger
it is released.

The muscles tighten or loosen,
contract somehow, then fear oozes out.
Catching a ride on some internal fluid,
fear starts to float all over.
Cheeks and ears redden,
the neck, top of the chest get rashy
when fear is floating by.
Chills in the spine. Excess water
in the eyes drips out,
not like tears so much
because it’s fear not sadness.
Slight tremors in the hands,
legs moving without direction.

There is too much to be afraid of now.
Too many people gunned down for no reason.
No place is safe when every place is vulnerable.
People are full of misplaced rage.
Angry for the wrong reasons,
directing it in the wrong places,
at the wrong people. Hateful speech,
words spoken that shouldn’t be said,
shouldn’t even be thought.
Not recognizing the sameness of all beings.
Seeing differences in an extreme.
Believing lies, made up stories that
entitle one group to have more,
to be more important, more pampered,
more cared for. Entitling some to be fed,
while others starve, some to be carefree
while others are chained.
Anger misdirected brings on fear,
greed overwhelms with fear.
Ignoring in ignorance the truth
that we are all the same.
Fear lives in the body.

The body breathes,
The body moves.
The body dances, stretches.
The body is nourished and heals.
The body makes love,
fills up again with goodness,
with delight, with pleasure,
with sensations that soothe,
ease and calm the spirit.
In tranquility fear goes back to hiding.
Fear quiets down. It stops screaming.
There is sleep. There is rest.
There is wholesome recovery
in the face of compassion, of understanding.
At least for a time, there is love.


- - -
Madlynn Haber has work in Anchor Magazine , Exit 13 Magazine, The Voices Project, The Jewish Writing Project, Quail Bell, Mused and Hevria.