Joan McNerney - One Poem

July

Waters creep over my feet.
Should I stand shivering
or go swim? Lose my footprint?

Off I run, falling over myself,
a mug of salty cider. This
wave an insecure bed. Seaweed
pillow. Carried by moon to
an abyss.

The floor of my mansion is
not tidy. I shall have sponges
for lunch. Ride with seahorses
perhaps.

On the far shore, my lover
smiles, kiss of surf.

Wynne Huddleston - Three Poems

Where Eyes are Clouds that Weep

My car kidnaps me, takes
me there—to the last
graveyard where the tombstones read,
Joy and Hope,
where my eyes are clouds that weep
upon grass that will never
again be green, and the cut
flowers there will never
fall to seed.
I tiptoe back
to the car; careful not to wake
Despair who lies
in wait in the ashy forest just beyond
the cemetery gate with your choice
of pills or
shiny revolver.

Crushed

How I wish that I had drown the little bird
as soon as it had hatched…
No, I should have taken the egg before it was born,

before I spent hours keeping it

warm against my heart;
before I watched it beat its head

through the protective shell;

before I watched its wet down fluff into feathers
on capable wings that took it up, up so high,
soaring excitedly into the blue, blue sky;

before you shot it down. Yes, I should have

crushed the shell into shards,
stomped it into the ground,

while the bird was still
just an idea, just yellow slime.

Persimmon Road

I did not want to go down
this dreary dirt road, harboring
ruts and a rickety bridge
that floods. When I dream
of you I’m stuck in safe
familiarity—my hands cuffed

to you, to keep me
from drowning. You pluck
a persimmon from the dying
tree and force me to swallow it
whole— the bitter skin,
the sweetness underneath,
the little fork and knife,
hiding. In the dream
we’re in my car, and always

you drive. But soon I throw up
the knife and use it to unlock
the handcuffs. The slippery road is
overrun with water; so I carefully
step onto fallen limbs
lying in the ditch, and try

to balance. It’s difficult, but
I am still walking
when the dream ends.
I think
I make it over the bridge,
and I am pretty sure
I do it with my own two feet.

Diane Webster - Two Poems

GATHERINGS

Gatherings of people watch
sand hill cranes land
at Fruitgrowers Reservoir
each evening to rest
and wade into shallow cattails
until morning ascension
circling, circling upward
until all gather together
in a disappearing gray
wave of feathers
still heard in fading trill
of sand hill cranes,
and people whisper
like in church.

AFTER WONDERINGS

Why do earthworms
dry on the sidewalk
after a rainstorm
but never after
the sprinkling system
re-hides itself in the lawn?

Maureen Kingston - One Poem

Everyman’s Dilemma

Son of a ringmaster,
cousin to a clown,

the acrobat’s nephew:
an ideal pedigree.

Still he refuses
to join the act.

The only non-
performer

in the family.
I tell him it’s easy

being a team player.
Smile, bellow, bow

and the applause
will surely follow.

A simple equation,
really; even the fleas

understand. What’s
wrong with my son?

Julianna Buckmiller - One Poem

Mute Words

You and I speak without words:

our bodies contort into the characters

the alphabet lost long ago.

Our skin shivers in pitches too shrill

for human ears,

and we grin,

knowing that only we

can speak this way.

A lingered graze with shivered fingertips,

a biting eye contact only broken by rushed blinks--

I giggle, while you smile and nod:

“I’m so happy I’m here,

with you,

I’m so happy I’m here,

I’m so happy.”

You find comfort in my silence,

I find chaos in your safety,

but neither of us has the vocal cords to say.

My mind re-writes the same line from long ago:

‘It’s as if we’ve lost our voices

in our quests to find ourselves.’

From a bird’s eye view, our limbs are entangled in the form of

a typeface question mark;

concentric symbols running across the page

with impossible urgency:

but you and I,

we’re too lost in our questions

to lift our eyes from the ground,

for even just a second.

Will we ever know the truth in anything?

I can’t really say,

I can't really say.

Kevin Heaton - One Poem

Threshold of a Dream

Cataracts draw milk cream curtains
across his eyes concealing lucid

saline pools seasoned with hindsight
and dream residue. They spillway

into bottomless furrow trenches
retracing the errors of his life,

irrigating hoary stubble, and wrinkling
the crumpled leaves of an ancient

scroll; one page yet unscribed.
Gnarled, arthritic fingers unfurl

musings long ago folded into a pensive
hope chest, and pin them to a quickened

heartbeat. Iridescent rainbow beams
knit kestrel wings to shadow bones;

piercing a tattered veil, revealing
the limpid essence of immortality.

Richard Hartwell - One Poem

Fog

wooly white mammoths

shadows within the ground fog

dripping humpbacked sheep

Anita McQueen - Three Poems

TOO MANY NIGHTS

Too many nights
in solitude

feeling
the emptiness

us loners
alone

vivid dreams
at fingertips

leaving moisture
on our lips.

LOVE TRAIN

Ride me like I'm the last train to Heaven.
Tickle my belly.  Pat my forehead.
Gaze out my windows and see
the New Land.

Ride me...
Ride me...
We'll never run out of track.

THE HIP TOUR

Going on
the hip tour

strutting
summer in my steps

I shame
those teasers

with a flutter
of my green eyes
growing wings to Malibu

landing in a backyard
of some rich Wilt
I'll deceive
until he proves himself
a gem.

Russell Streur - One Poem

The Advice of Li Po’s Ghost

We have cash in hand
For Turkish figs
Black pepper
And Medjool dates

The moon at wax
Through the window
Is always free

And the price of night
Is never due
Until the morning

When Li Po’s ghost
Whispers in our ears
‘Never say no
To wine.’

Stephen Willams - Three Poems

LOST LOVE

Lost love
running down my leg
into a puddle,
a lake,
a sea drowning me.

OLD MEMORIES

Old memories
constantly nibbling
at the edges of my mind...

I wish to return.

TRAPPED

Trapped in aging
skin,
muscle,
bone...
I ache to fly....

Ron Koppelberger - One Poem

Sweet Sanctity

Remedies of discovery and vigilance,

An arrow in ascending melancholy

And balanced spectacle,

A trapping in torn vestures of charm,

Descried by the touch of loves sweet sanctity

And passions arrival, the flourishing bond of devoted

Security and care for the ancient arts

Of affection, a tear in gentle waves

Of sufferance and radiant will.

Diane Webster - Two Poems

A MATTER OF SWARMS

Swarms of gnats

encircle the parked car

while bird watchers muse

and applaud, ooh and ah

like Fourth of July fireworks

as hundreds of sand hill cranes

fly away into Colorado’s blue sky.

A MOMENT OF YOUTH

Old man shuffles

his walker and dog

up the hill.

Scream, “Mush!”

and slap that leash

across canine hinny

and ride that walker

like a silver-streaking sled

sliding over sidewalk cement

all the way to the top

never minding blown-off hat

lying in the gutter with leaves.

Whoop and holler

all the way to the front door.

“Whew. We made it, pal,”

and the dog wags its tail.

Joan McNerney - Two Poems

I Believe in Trees

Those silent citadels
standing against long
nights of wind and cold.

Broken willow bramble
scratches a pale sky after
yesterday’s ice storm.

Each spring small buds
blossom as bugs and
butterflies orbit boughs.

Green new leaf fits
your hand so perfectly.
The future lies in your palm.

Birds reciting litany in woods.
Each rainfall the forest
grows taller, more verdant.

Summer afternoons…trees
sashay in sunshine showing
off their emerald gowns.

Winds sway maple branches.
Leaves drop like butterflies
falling to the warm earth.

Red yellow brown carpets
of crunchy foliage spread
over roads welcoming us.

When the Moon is New

Groping through darkness
knocking everything down.
Down into enormous night
where thoughts unravel.

Memories moan past us as
shadows quiver across walls.
We lie pinned to bed sheets
like captive butterflies.

Dry butterflies...our throats
are brittle, eyes turning
from light. Sore arms reach
for anything soft to hold.

Remembering seasons gone by.
So many lost promises.
This huge moment surrounding us.
Wide awake we wait for the new day.

Jessica Otto - One Poem

Lupercalia

Winter is as ignorant as it has always been.
What sky we have is clouded gray.
The river that cuts through the city has frozen.

Last year my mother ran down
to the dock, threw
her hair onto the ice and
let her brain crystallize.  My sister cracked
open her skull and crunched
her nickel plated stuffing
as she would cotton candy.  She thought
the round tumors of rose quarts
nestled there would
make her fertile
since the preacher’s flogging didn’t.

Today I will burn a salt cake
at the slum’s edge,
behind the power plant.

You can come along if you want,
suck at the teats of some rabid wolf
with me.  There are so many three
headed mothers who ate their
little ones in the famine.  Screw
prudency, soon we’ll all be running
around on eight legs braying insanities
at the spot where the corn husk moon used to be.

S.P. Flannery - Three Poems

Attack

Boar tusks pierce
the abdominal wall
to spear the organs inside,
remove discarded flesh,
the rest left behind
to perish under the sun,
but the smooth inner coils
still have life, pulse on
those competitive blades
until constriction flips
the male beast on its back,
lying near a rotting log,
sounds of dogs in the distance
become closer to lost parts
that are retrieved to reunite
with the whole child,
a funeral pyre lights next to
the roast that will feed
those who grieve and keen.

The Pianist

When I press the keys,
those white and black wooden
blocks, no song echoes out,
I wail and pound, but
my fingers cannot create
notes strung together to
please the ears.
I have the same bones,
muscles, and tendons;
they are not clubs
or hammers to deafen
the tunes produced when
the cords are struck,
but he must have something,
whether from nature or nurture,
to be able to glide above
those keys without touching,
a dance of digits
few see because they
sit transfixed, transported
from their theater seats
into a world of auroras
curved along the black and white
remembered stars of closed eye lids.

The Hill Mound

Rain beads on the weathered blocks
of stone hauled up the raised knoll
built to give a noble view
now covered in creeks of mud.

Three teams tow with hand-spun rope
while ground slides under damp shoes
made from fallen hart-beasts' hide,
gifts from their life stricken sire.

He died in the autumn war,
in defense of the clan's herd;
lithic points rest in his chest,
shards carved by a banished son.

The ash they entomb when snow
covers the eastward glazed mound.
Three drawn spirals direct his
energy towards hidden planes.

                      *

We circle the eroded hill
to capture an image for
books to pass amongst our friends
of sights found on calendars.

Even with our modern tools,
the builders remain unknown
to everyone but those who
dwell between shade realms shrouded.

Karina Longo - One Poem

Water and Other Fluids

Sometimes it's clear, sometimes it's thick -
Colour of nothing, colour of drunken insanity
Taste of the world - taste of no words
Rivers and showers - of gold and iron
It's only water, it's not wine anymore
Go on, move on - someday we might find home
But now you're alone
 
Sometimes it's obvious, sometimes you shiver inside
Colour of rainbows and wonders, colour of beige and denies
Writing 'love' on your fists
The baby doesn't know what it means
Ink; black, red or blue -
They don't go through the soul
It's just the superficial skin

Saliva in our mouths
Sweat in our bodies
Liquid from me, liquid from you,

I only want to know the truth -
No lies, no broken promises, no excuses
Clear as water, not dirty like other fluids.

Peter Magliocco - One Poem

The Defiling

Rain revolves around me as I jog
over the precipice of hillsides.
Somewhere in the German forests
I watch the depot workers arrive

each morning to begin work,
molding the natural edifice
into a thousand barked sentinels
of sap & shadow, still resilient

to their touch from rooted ages
falling rain bleeds life into.
What my booted feet tramp over
in a luxury of motion we caress

rich soil preparing its saturation,
for whatever humanity defiles,
the way I once did a lover's skin
so endlessly fecund beneath me.

Joseph Farley - One Poem

US

the US government

is no longer about

the people

it is not about

the US

it is about

“us”

but that “us”

does not include

us

that “us”

is only for “them”

and “them” is

a series of names

on a secret list,

written in gold and oil

Gary Beck - One Poem

One Summer

The sounds of summer,
the little legs
running field to field
that fall, roll,
dirty knees smiling.
O evening,
clouds like tarnished nickels
smoking home to bed,
the last bugle from a nearby camp,
voices whispering,
kiss, parting…. Promise.
The night falls a sudden ballerina
landing in grace
on love’s wet earth.

Laury A. Egan - Two Poems

Grace

Grace is in your hands, strong and slender.
I watched them while you were writing,
as the cool lake wrapped air around us;
I watched them in gesture, in repose,
in the kitchen, grasping a wooden spoon.
I watched and knew they were his to hold,
not mine, and yet I hope. My touch
is lighter than the lightest whisper.

A Woman Like You

A woman like you will know
    the word that precisely unlocks the trick of my heart,
    the phrase I’ve yearned to write.
A woman like you will know
    the invisible road for us to follow, sifting present,
    finding future, while I light the space around us.
A woman like you will know
    how to imagine each touch without it happening,
    who will sense my presence on a breeze.

A woman like you will know
   that joy springs from sadness like reds
    and yellows against gray skies.
A woman like you will know
    how to translate who I am, where I am,
    even when I am unsure or have strayed beyond reach.
A woman like you will know
    my love, profoundly so, as I will know your love,
    profoundly so, and that I am a woman like you.

Laila Abdulmalik - One Poem

Reflection

The deep water fails to wash the sins off my face

Indenting on my dignity,

          plastic spoons used as pistols.

I twirl my sock monkey as the wind chaps my ears

I can't see my reflection

          or myself.

C.B. Anderson - Two Poems

Age-Creep

I laugh at grief
And grief laughs back at me.
On bended knee
I beg relief,
But all I see
Are shadows in the night.

Time is a thief,
And I come off as trite
For saying so.
A while ago
My hair turned white
As freshly fallen snow.

Lakeside Property

The wind blows harmlessly on every hill,
But when it falls upon a placid lake
There's hell to pay for any kayak or
Canoe in open water.  Heaven's sake
Is not a telling factor -- with a will
All of its own, wind batters my back door.

Hal O'Leary - One Poem

SPRING HAS SPRUNG

The time has come, and spring has sprung.
Soft earth below, blue skies above,
The time is now, and we are young.
What better time to fall in love.

Soft earth below, blue skies above,
What more could anyone desire
What better time to be in love,
Our heads awhirl, our hearts afire?

What more could anyone desire? 
The future is at our command.
Our heads awhirl, our hearts afire.
So here, my dear, your wedding band.

The future is at our command,
I'm yours to honor and obey.
So here, my dear, your wedding band.
I'm yours forever, come what may.

I'm yours to honor and obey.
The time is now, and we are young.
I'm yours forever, come what may.
The time has come and spring has sprung.

Dave Schwartz - Three Poems

Things Spring Into Bloom

Things spring into bloom
By crawling from the ground
Yet I've not seen it yet
You've not been around
they say that it is seeds
Which when planted start to grow
Well, I've been planting ostrich seeds
And they do not ever show

I Shake My Head

I shake my head and lose my thoughts
They fall abbot and leave me dead
Oh, I'm not dead for sure
It's just that I forgot
Now pleased tell me true
aren't you being a bit silly
if you ask what I am doing
I forgot you silly Billy

I’m So Sad About You

I’m so sad about you
I can’t live without you
With everything I do
I just want to be with you
I’m so sad without you
I can’t be glad about you 
With everything I do
I just hope to remember you

Russell Streur - Three Poems

THE INVENTION OF RAIN

She was there

A very long time

Until it finally

Came to her.

When the noise faded

She dusted the place

Pulled oceans

Out of rock

And cooled her heels

In cyanic water.

Then one day

She danced

And the skies

Opened.

THE ELEMENT OF FLESH

Fingers

Until

Space

Echoes

Leaned

Reached

Spilled

Under

Pressing

Lips melting

Flooded

A long moment

Gone

Over the edge.

PORTRAIT OF A WOMAN ON RUE TOULOUSE

Purple saxophone

Loose ends of the moon

Water rising

In cobalt and petroleum

I paint you nude tonight

In oak and neon gold

Spanish moss 

Between your legs

The trace of lilac on your lips

Chocolate of your breasts

Ochre and sienna of your skin

Your carmine tongue

Broken glass and rain

On Rue Toulouse.

Ben Nardolilli - Three Poems

Played By

Anything free is diluted,
Anything given away is clear
Of substance, of essence,
If it floats or if it cannot fly,
Anything worth paying for
Sinks right to the bottom.

So pay just a little bit, enough
So that they cannot call it
A loss for their gain,
No evidence of generosity
On either side’s behalf,
Pay to keep it away from free.

Springtime Reformation

You have gone out with a coat
To enjoy the sun, believing
Those layers and the heat
Would help remind you it burns
Far away and makes you hot,
Friend, remove your coat,
There is heat enough without it,
And open your eyes, the sun
Is still high, bright, and beautiful.

Why Do You Weep For Him?

Why do you weep for him, why
Between the talk of heaven do you cry?
Sisters, brothers, ladies and gentlemen,
All of you agree he has moved on,
Feels no more pain, rests eternally
In a better world than ours,
Wherever that might be, yet
Your eyes make the air taste
Like the air on the shore, so bitter,
Where is the song for dancing?
Where are the colors of the rainbow
That your clothes ignore to make shadows?
You all know he can feel no more,
His sorrows are gone forever,
Why do you take that yoke upon yourselves?
Oh familiar ones, ones who knew him
As well as I, we should know better,
Did he live his life as an overture
To such wailing, to such beating of breasts?
Why do we weep for him, he lived,
Passed on, is in a sweeter garden,
My jealousy  is enough to make me cry.

iDrew - Three Poems

iSick

i hate you for the emptiness

when you’re not here

and when you are

you give me trembles

and a shortness of breath

help me please

i seem to be in distress

i hate you for my racing pulse

loss of appetite

i’ve weakness in the knees

and a wonderful unnecessary

feeling

in my nether-region

someone tell me please

what’s happening

i think

i’m being assassinated

with kisses

all my heart beats

have been stolen

i think i need a doctor

and possibly the cops

some one call an emergency vicar

i need to pray

that these feelings

never stop

iE

when i’m electric

separated from

time

on my own little moon

weightless

in a glitter milky way

of a thousand

thousand  

laser lights 

and nothing else exists

except there are beats

and tunes

orbiting

my big love theory

of how my heart

is the sun

in this is my universe

in verse with bass

and drum

i suddenly realise

in a thousand

thousand

star-lit gleams of heaven

i don’t want to go home

without you tonight

iBreathe

the very breath of your hands

as i close my eyes

exhales to linger

longingly

where i am wet

and i feel your weight

press dreams into me

slow

and oh so

delib

er

ate

as the very length of you translates into 

pas

si

on

inside me you are radiant

inside me you are beautiful

inside me you are oxygen

Michael Brownstein - One Poem

RACISM

(for Linda Panky, Elmer Johnson, Leonard, Rachid, Greg, etc. etc. etc. who may have contributed great things if it hadn't been for racism)

The flow of my life a beaver's dam
thick with mud and muddied breath,
muddy graft and the mud of corruption,
corruption of language, corruption of use.
Death is always an inconvenience,
the dialysis machine filling itself with souls,
blood pressure rising, falling, rising.
On the best of days she is too old to vote;
on the worst, too young to abandon ship.
Once she published a newspaper article
bylined everything good with this world
so much to begin, so little left at the end.

Ron Koppelberger - One Poem

Ragweed

The damp earth owing the sun in heated

Tendrils of mystery, by the lines of green luscious

Moss and lichens of dew drop moisture,

A sprig of ragweed gone to seed and birthing the breath

Of wild dance in the soul of those

Who feel the dreams of weedy fortune.

Amy Huffman - Three Poems

The Poem of Pure Reality

A life reduced to boxes,

cartons,

bags.

It’s too small.

Too insignificant.

It should fill trucks and trailers.

No.

Think bigger.

Oceans and caverns.

And universes.

And if you’re lucky.

Really lucky.

It will fill the biggest space.

The vast darkness.

One moment

suspended in the mind.

A memory.

A Cocktail Combo

Red sequins or clean white cotton --

a choice fit

to torture a king.

But in a city

that bleeds night

lined in rhinestoned feathers,

there is no need

two tails

and a diamond leash

cannot meet.

Packed in Ice or Salt

Rambling.

My pen is running.

Like a wheel without a road.

The motion is empty.

Useless.

And exhausting.

But it doesn’t stop.

My third eye will not sleep.

Though it has been blind for years.

And silence has not been stretched

into a bandage

big enough to hold it closed.

Yet my nails are busy.

Bleeding on their own.

They have forgotten

they are useless.

That empathy is not the stain

they drag across the sky.

Put me back.

Inside a box, I am happy.

Confined and naked.

Between walls that are dying

to bear the scars

of this pain.

Harry Calhoun - Three Poems

Rain and the ability to cope

Sitting here waiting for the predicted rain.

It’s early enough in the afternoon for hope.

I like rain sometimes, especially when

it’s too bonechilling to go outside. It calms me

and helps me concentrate on the here, the now,

the trivial. That’s important sometimes.

After all, I have the quirky card you sent

on our first anniversary close by. With a duck

on the cover, our inside joke. It will remain inside

as I do, daunted by the rain. Or maybe dependent

on the rain, lulling me softly away from thoughts

of sunny days spent sitting quietly on the deck with you.

Pneumonia and rejection

I dream amethysts blooming in the night sky.

Purple on black, canvas of bruise

so slow to show its true colors. Even the beautiful

seems extraneous and unreachable.

I’m starting to catch my breath

in this slow recovery but I can’t catch up

with what it is to be without her.

I never wanted any of this, disease

or dispossession. For now, I’ll think

of amethysts and the impenetrable dark

and hold on to whatever remains

of this bruise of a dream.

Out of the comfort zone

A strange life broken out

as if from underwater

leans into a wind

that even you staving off hurricanes

find unusual. A drink or two

never hurt anybody,

but you have to find your way

slashing the waves

sober until this phase is over.

The view would astonish

if you could find courage

and strength to see it,

without fear crawling under you

like a sea snake, nestling up to you

like a rabid dog. You gulp a breath or two

before drowning, glance

at your reserves and it looks

like what you have left

is hell in a suitcase.