South Chicago Night

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Contributor: Michael Lee Johnson

- -
Night is drifters,
sugar rats, streetwalkers, pickpockets, pimps,
insects, Lake Michigan perch,
neon signs blinking half the bulbs
burned out.


- - -
MICHAEL LEE JOHNSON lived ten years in Canada during the Vietnam era: now known as the Itasca, IL poet. Today he is a poet, freelance writer, photographer who experiments with poetography (blending poetry with photography), and small business owner in Itasca, Illinois, who has been published in more than 750 small press magazines in 26 countries, he edits 7 poetry sites. Michael is the author of The Lost American: From Exile to Freedom (136 pages book), several chapbooks of poetry, including From Which Place the Morning Rises and Challenge of Night and Day, and Chicago Poems. He also has over 69 poetry videos on YouTube.

Flight of the Butterfly

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Contributor: Lori Wyman

- -
The butterfly floats beyond the billowy clouds,
carried away by the whistling wind.

The orange sun above shines down upon God’s creation,
illuminating her dusty wings in a rainbow of color.

She gracefully flutters upon the shadows of the earth,
spreading her sweetness and light.

She breathes in humanity and becomes a quiver of fluorescence.


- - -
I'm 53 years old and I live in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I love to write and am in the process of publishing a manuscript that I've just finished and have been writing for 30 years. I live with my best friend and adore my two Siamese cats. I work as a Sales Representative at Petsmart stores.

On the Birthday of My Beloved

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Contributor: Richard Cody

- -

To think that you were born in a world such as this.



You, whose luminous eyes

shame the blue of Spring’s fairest skies;

whose blushing lips were made to speak of naught but love,

and to kiss.



You are too fine a thing –

too rare, too divine a human being

for this sordid time and place.



But is God not also here

in this world of man’s creation?



Let all scientific argument fall to the side,

the atheist has clearly never seen your face.

God is not a question with an answer to hide.



God is there in the lines of your bones,

the gleam of your eyes, the sweet elation

which even the thought of you imparts.



Your presence, a balm to this sore world,

is, I find, a vexation to the poet in me –

for your Holy beauty and grace of mind

surpass all my meager arts.



What a blessed man must I be

to love and be loved by thee.



- for Sarah -


- - -
Richard Cody, a native Californian, is a writer of poetry and fiction. He believes in love at first sight, and that love is the answer to any question.

Lemon Underwear

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Contributor: Donal Mahoney

- -
The New Morse Hotel
Chicago, circa 1970


What if after Browne has gone
one of us discovers who Browne was,
leads the rally to his room before
the maid has time to broom the webs,
retrieve from underneath the bed
the sweat-stiff socks, the lemon underwear?

What if before he leaves Browne scrawls
across the dresser’s dust: “I have leased
new quarters and have gone to them.
Don’t give the clothes you find here to the poor.
Don’t burn the books. Beware the next
who rents this room, who leaves it only after dark,

who screams if the maid knocks once
to ask if she may clean. When he arrives
have four men bear him, belly down, downstairs.
Tell them: 'Pitch him out across the lawn!
Let him land in a lake of sun.
Let him drown there.' ”


- - -
Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, Missouri.

Pops

| Filed under

Contributor: Sabrina M Gutierrez

- -
I wish things had turned out differently.
I wish I had all these stories to tell my friends
about how when I was little,
you and I did this—
or you and I went here
or there,
or how we did everything together.
I wish you were here
to terrify all the new boys that come and go in my life.
My childhood I spent tormented
by the way you sat across the dinner table
and felt miles and miles away from me.
So you hadn’t been much of a dad,
but at least you had given me
one hell of an imagination.
Constantly envisioning
what life would be like
without a mother that cried herself to sleep
or a father who knew how to show love to his family.


- - -
Sabrina Gutierrez is the founder of a small, non-profit organization that hopes to aid families all across the globe through the use of a small, online store and a single micro-lending account. In her free time, Sabrina enjoys reading, shopping for new vinyl, and spending long hours in her city's local coffee shops.

HOME TOWN

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Contributor: John Kropf

- -
No one is left in my home town
My people are gone.

But my memories are there
right where I left them
residing in streets, schools, and fields.

I could revive the spirit of the place
but what would that matter now?

My route is now reversed
what was once a destination
became the home town
and the old home town
is just another destination among many.

I still drive the Ohio Turnpike
and near Exit Seven
there’s an urgent sensation of memory
tugging from across the dark fields to the north.

But I keep going
and hoping for new roots
in my new home town.


- - -
Minor misguided visionary playing with words.

DESTINATION

| Filed under

Contributor: Richard Schnap

- -
I usually have trouble finding it
Close to the entrance up a gentle slope

That faces a small pool ringed by trees
Where flocks of sparrows gather in the spring.

There I look down at the weathered stones
With the empty space reserved for me

As the songs of the birds break the silence
That here in this place seems the greatest of all.

Then a soft wind caresses my cheek
As I search for a sign of what is to come

Finding a fallen yellow leaf
On the bed of earth that will someday be mine.

And as I wonder what meaning it has
I listen to the tolling of a distant bell

Turning to watch the birds take flight
Like tiny angels answering a call.


- - -
Richard Schnap is a poet, songwriter and collagist living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. His poems have most recently appeared locally, nationally and overseas in a variety of print and online publications.

Upward Mobility

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Contributor: Richard Hartwell

- -
Masses of humanity,
bubbling crust of society’s
foundation and bedrock
on which elitism tramples.

Smoldering anger
created by hypocrisy,
stench of semantics
used to control others.

Heed the admonition:
adversity can be a teacher,
with a whip and a club,
or a kiss and a prayer.

Socially unchained, literally,
life lessons are unchanged;
learned helplessness is still
too universal to ignore.

You have become grasping,
gasping, gripping the Western fact –
your aspirations are worthwhile,
if you just stay in my shadow.

Animal perseverance –
human hunger for survival.


- - -
Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school (remember the hormonally-challenged?) English teacher living in Southern California. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large and the instant contains eternity.

A Fig-Wearing Pig's Cottage

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Contributor: Richard Beckham II

- -
The cottage, draped by waterfalls, leaped to the cliff
That ebbed beyond its prime; like skeleton-rock-stars.

Marooned from the ground, the Longhouse floated
On top of laced sunbeams, which the Crows founded.

Ragged fig leaves waltzed as the snake watched
The cottage crumble from decadence.

The Longhouse gave a quiet chuckle,
And the Crows moved on without a sense of loss.

A bearded skeleton wakes up early
To brush its teeth and play tag with the past.

A puzzled pig wonders why bones don’t stay buried
When they have wings attached that need no ON/OFF switch.

And all this time a mute owl longed to say,
“Who, Who gave Crows power over the Pigs’ hour?”


- - -
Richard Beckham II lives with his wife in Seattle, where he also paints with oils.

Bad Things Happened

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Contributor: Holly Day

- -
We could feel the spirits only when we sat by the
walls. There was something left behind by those who sat
just there, under His eyes, in the back row of hard, wooden pews
the fear of God. There was such an obvious difference between where
the good Christians and the bad Christians sat in that place.

They were as powerful as they were exotic, the ghosts
of terror, His omniscience, the flapping of stained sheets
just out of sight. Their eyes bent spades into old train cars
huddled shadows in the rusty quiet, dreams of wheels turning.

I wanted so badly to stand in the room as a light
to take a small bit of their pain into me and survive it all
next time. There are bodies in the lake out back
that need to be counted. My visions can wait
but He will never come.


- - -
Holly Day was born in Hereford, Texas, “The Town Without a Toothache.” She and her family currently live in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where she teaches writing classes at the Loft Literary Center. Her published books include the nonfiction books Music Theory for Dummies, Music Composition for Dummies, and Guitar All-in-One for Dummies, and the poetry books “Late-Night Reading for Hardworking Construction Men” (The Moon Publishing) and “The Smell of Snow” (ELJ Publications).

My Spirit Shines

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Contributor: Gary Thomas Hubbard

- -
Notes of music like feelings of hope
Lift up my spirits and helps me to cope
Bass clef and trebles I've heard a few
Smiling at Bach is nothing new

*

Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, and more
I purchased their records at the local store
As I was learning to play each classical note
My spirit did shine you might say it would float

*

Lost my collection that was a piece of my soul
Traveled through life but wasn't quite whole
Then a friend unexpectedly returned my old crate
I smiled and giggled this really was great

*

Life doesn't always hand us whats right
But as I listen to music late in the night
From a Hero's symphony that helps my spirit grow
To Heavenly Harmonies that help me to know

*

That the things that are important we never regret
Sometimes they are people that we long ago met
Wading through all the troubling stuff
Finding some peace sometimes is enough

*

As I listen to the classics' heavenly sigh
I begin understand I really know why
We are put in this place and given a choice
It is so I can choose music as my happy voice


- - -
I'm a Jack-of-all-Trades. Born and raised in Ohio I now live in Florida. I'm a father and a Paw-Paw that makes life good!

In Memphis On Business

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Contributor: Donal Mahoney

- -
this belle like a feather
floats table to table
bearing menus and water,

stunning this Yankee
in Memphis on business
whose host swears the South

has many more like her.
Up North, the Yank says,
young ladies like her bump tables,

slop coffee in saucers.
No wonder this Yankee
in Memphis on business

smiles when again
this belle like a feather
floats table to table

bearing menus and water
as if she were certain
the earth isn’t there

and the sky and the air
are highway enough for a belle
bearing menus and water.


- - -
Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, Missouri.

Jasper

| Filed under

Contributor: Michael Lee Johnson

- -
Old Irving Park,
Chicago neighborhood
Jasper lives in a garret
no bigger than a single, bed.
Jasper, 69, smokes
Lucky Strike non-filtered cigarettes.
He dips Oreo cookies in skim milk.
Six months ago
the state revoked
his driver’s license-
between the onset
of macular degeneration,
gas at $4.65 a gallon,
and late stage emphysema,
life for Jasper has stalled out
in the middle lane
like his middle month
social security check, it is gone.
There is nothing academic about Jasper’s life.
Today the mailbox journey is down
the spiraling stairwell, midway,
he leans against the wall.
Deep breathes from his oxygen tank.
Life is annoying with plastic tubes up his nose.
Relief, back in the attic, without the tank,
the Chicago Cubs are playing on the radio.

Enjoyment at last, Jasper leans back in his La-Z-Boy recliner.
He reaches for a new pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes.
Jasper grabs a cool Budweiser beer from his mini-fridge.


- - -
MICHAEL LEE JOHNSON lived ten years in Canada during the Vietnam era: now known as the Itasca, IL poet. Today he is a poet, freelance writer, photographer who experiments with poetography (blending poetry with photography), and small business owner in Itasca, Illinois, who has been published in more than 750 small press magazines in 26 countries, he edits 7 poetry sites. Michael is the author of The Lost American: From Exile to Freedom (136 pages book), several chapbooks of poetry, including From Which Place the Morning Rises and Challenge of Night and Day, and Chicago Poems. He also has over 69 poetry videos on YouTube.

Rothko Looking Back At Us

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Contributor: Jonathan Beale

- -
Too vast and even too bold
A desert too huge to lose
And obviously lost completely.
The colours clear as water
A poignant life. And as necessary
One can view the point
One can feel the point in one’s side;
Some awaiting some action -
The blood flowing with water
This simple eye in the world
Stretched ever outward. Ever outward
The world is upside down
Never back to front. It looks one-way
And then tomorrow grows in its tiny way
Taken to be given. So life is.

The orange. The red. The vision
As a ‘50’s road movie - retold
…Some young actor; broken
Some writer- whose raw judgments - him,
Or controlled lusts above his head
A time in which a freedom
Roamed around…
For a while, the sanctuary of cigarettes
Beer and greasy food and life – a sort of life.
Passion that now seems unsafe.
We’re as lush as a tropical garden
A life with colorful birds.
The age that grew - lost - finds a simple solace
The emotion taken is shared and life is given
Taken at the time now. Rightly

The dream state number one
The caught artist within the vortex
A drowned state and lost soul
As the eyes swirl and look up
And look up until they drop
A strange aridity covers the flesh
Gauze unrevealing the idea
Leaving enough hidden.
The final trip - californication?
The restaurants’ in New York
Blatantly bare. Now Iconography
Undersigned scarcely unmade up
The deep eyes plundering a life
Through an eye for art maybe
Taken from the mesh.

Against the back of white
The merging emotion unrounded
Just existing as…
The face values in mitigation
Every icon that you are and were
And could become
Life was too huge
And in some ways just
Too - small - not enough
The artists hunger:
To relay his world:
As he sees fit, and as he sees….
His eyes energy - as I watch
Against my morning screen
Taken from life - returned to.


- - -
Jonathan Beale is a poet, occasional book reviewer, and has to work for a living until the Fates give him a winning lottery line. He has been published in many journals in England and America such as Decanto, The Screech Owl, Danse Macabre, et al. He is currently working on a volume for Hammer and Anvil.

Even a Weed Can Have a Flower

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Contributor: Gary Thomas Hubbard

- -
Will it be these or will it be those
Should I plant a weed or a rose?
In the end we just water and feed
All we can do is plant the seed

*

Sometimes in the roughest ground will appear
Special blooms that we will always hold dear
Weeds are like roses they can grow anywhere
But unlike a weed the rose needs more care

*

Always handle either with a pair of gloves
Choose the rose as the one everyone loves
Pull out the weed and toss it to the side
Even though we know it has beauty to hide

*

It will still grow and bloom in the end
We still pick the rose to a love one to send
The rose has thorns like the dagger of a thief
But still the weed will give you more grief

*

Any bouquet of roses is like a loved one's squeeze
And a bunch of Ragweed will only make you sneeze
The rose has more beauty right from the start
But give the weed a chance and it may grab your heart!


- - -
Married, father of two and a Grandpa. Born and raised in Ohio. Now I live in Florida.

Dear Darien

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Contributor: Shaquana Adams

- -
In this memory you picked me
up from my parents house.

Your scent filled the car
and your hand filled my hand.

Evermore,
I sat and looked at you
and thought “I should savor
this moment”.
You laughed and said those words.

Realizing we skipped a step,
you stopped at a stop sign, leaned over,
and kissed me.


- - -
Shaquana Adams is an internationally published poet with a fondness for the color purple. She is quiet on the outside but goofy on the inside and writes because the best thing about writing is that she can say what she needs to say. It is an awesome experience.

Loss

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Contributor: Holly Day

- -
I look for it everywhere, the magic
I used to see around me. I carefully check
beneath cushions before I vacuum
approach dark, spiderwebbed corners with gentle hands
lie awake to the sound of the house settling
the mice scampering in the attic, holding my breath
hoping that it’s there.

I watch my daughter playing in the yard
singing to earthworms and dancing with toads
and I know she sees all the magical things
I’m missing. I join in on her games
make fairy houses out of mud and broken seashells

share stories of how wonderful it would be
if we were frogs or fairies ourselves
and I can tell she believes
we could be those things of we really wanted to be
that being just what we are is some sort of choice
I can tell she believe this
and I wish I could, too.


- - -
Holly Day was born in Hereford, Texas, “The Town Without a Toothache.” She and her family currently live in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where she teaches writing classes at the Loft Literary Center. Her published books include the nonfiction books Music Theory for Dummies, Music Composition for Dummies, and Guitar All-in-One for Dummies, and the poetry books “Late-Night Reading for Hardworking Construction Men” (The Moon Publishing) and “The Smell of Snow” (ELJ Publications).

Dark Meadows

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Contributor: Gary Thomas Hubbard

- -
Dark meadows that lie under a starlight sky
Small creatures rustle bushes as they scurry by
Stepping softly so as not to disturb the ground
Both afraid to and not to turn around

*

Moving slowly along the edge of the woods
Imagining shadows wearing shadowy hoods
Feeling alone with the darkness pressing down
Creepy thoughts following me like a demented clown

*

Muffled voices I'm sure I heard in the night
Screech owl screaming something isn't right
Swallowing my fear to just turn around
I trip over something and fall to the ground

*

I'm sure I heard a low growl from behind that tree
I think I see red eyes glowing what can it be
As fear grips me all along my spine
I tell myself "be calm, it will all be fine"

*

Something touches me lightly on my cheek
I'm really too afraid to turn even to peek
Tree branches rustled by a breeze's caress
All I want to do is run and hide I must confess

*

Fearful things imagined on a starlight night
Real creatures or not something ain't right
So if you find yourself walking across scary ground
Run like hell and don't turn around!


- - -
I'm a Jack-of-all-Trades. Born and raised in Ohio I now live in Florida. I'm a father and a Paw-Paw that makes life good!

Sated

| Filed under

Contributor: Cristine A. Gruber

- -
I hear him every
morning at 2:00am, another
restless soul who simply cannot sleep.

We both feed on the
nourishment we seek during
these quiet hours when normalcy sleeps.

He walks the halls,
pausing before every closed door,
listening for the steady sound of deep breathing,

souls lost in slumber,
before he moves on to his final
destination, his true middle of the night calling,

the hunk of ham in the refrigerator,
a tall glass of milk to wash it down.
My room being closest to the kitchen,

I hear the scrape of the silverware
against the porcelain of the plate.
Little does he know I’m awake as well,

feeding myself to fulfillment
in the privacy of my room, my feast
consisting first of a warm appetizer of Collins,

to be followed by an enticing
entrée of Laux, and then topped off
with a delectable dessert of both Kooser and Dunn,

a favorable feast indeed,
for I cannot rest until I am completely
sated, deliriously delighted, wondrously full.

I would offer
to share my banquet
with he who walks the halls

looking for his own late-hour
nourishment, but I gather my meal
of choice would no more gratify him

then his would satisfy me.
Thus, finally ready to retire as the
clock approaches the three o’clock hour,

I hear my friend as he sighs
and ascends the stairs at last,
sufficiently sated, ready for repose.


- - -
Cristine A. Gruber has had work published in numerous magazines, including: North American Review, Writer’s Digest, Writers’ Journal, Ceremony: A Journal of Poetry and Other Arts, Coal City Review, The Endicott Review, Eunoia Review, The Homestead Review, The Iconoclast, Iodine Poetry Journal, Kind of a Hurricane Press: Something’s Brewing Anthology, Labour of Love, Miller’s Pond, The Old Red Kimono, OnTheBus, The Penwood Review, Poem, Poesy, The Poet’s Haven, Ship of Fools, Silver Wings, The Stray Branch, The Storyteller Magazine, Thema, The Tule Review, and Westward Quarterly. She has been a featured poet in Writer’s Digest for National Poetry Month.
Cristine studied English, Philosophy, and World Religions at California Baptist University in Riverside, California. Her first full-length collection of poetry, Lifeline, was released by Infinity Publishing and is available from Amazon.com.

Spring Sunshine

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Contributor: Lori Wyman

- -
The delicately carved petal of the peach rose
sits in the sun casting its shadow upon
the newly blossoming bud of a yellow orchid.
The bloom of the orange, red and white hibiscus
springs up through the fence
lighting up the flower bed with its array of color.
The green and white-striped ground covering
and hostas spread their dewy freshness
on the flowers above.

The honey-dipped jonquils and the yellow-tipped daisies
stand tall beneath the majestic spruce trees
and God’s artistry and splendor are all in its glory.


- - -
I'm 53 years old and I live in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I love to write and am in the process of publishing a manuscript that I've just finished and have been writing for 30 years. I live with my best friend and adore my two Siamese cats. I work as a Sales Representative at Petsmart stores.

Study in Fidelity

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Contributor: Donal Mahoney

- -
Breaking news:
Woman in a Cadillac
tries to run over
the husband
she claims is
a serial philanderer
and misses by inches.
She puts the car
in reverse
and roars over
another man
out for a walk
with his mistress.
The man dies
at the scene.
No word on whether
charges will be filed
or whether the widow
will testify on behalf
of the driver.
The women say
they're involved
in a long-term
relationship
both husbands
were aware of.
Details at ten.


- - -
Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, Missouri.

Parking

| Filed under

Contributor: J.K. Durick

- -
You probably remember learning to parallel park
That stumbling block beginning to drive, passing
The driver’s test, twist, turn, then straighten out,
Or the time you found that place two city blocks
Away from your cousin’s wedding reception and
Spent the whole time worrying about leaving it
Your second largest investment out there where
Likely thieves and/or vandals circled in, planning;
You discover that that’s what parking is all about
Following signs, seeking, finding, taking a chance,
We find a place for ourselves, a snug fit, or ample
We must take this time to fit in with all the others
Check the mirror, twist a bit in our seat, this way
Then that, in reverse things go by much too fast
And then we’re there by the curb, lessons learned
Then carried out; we measure and mark our place
In the world, step out, lock up, and secretly pray
That the inevitable in all this doesn’t include us
The parking ticket, the passing scrape, or scratch
An empty space, a missing car, the long walk home.


- - -
J. K. Durick is a writing teacher at the Community College of Vermont and an online writing tutor. His recent poems have appeared in Shot Glass Journal, Black Mirror, Third Wednesday, Thrush Poetry Journal, and Madswirl.

Memories of Winnipeg And Crazy Eight Bar

| Filed under

Contributor: Michael Lee Johnson

- -
I am drunk, isolated,
and horny,
I stumble into "The Crazy Eight
Bar" and it was not my lucky charmed night.
Flirting with Indian women, delusional
with my white ass superiority,
I am doing card tricks,
end up getting my guts
rib cage kicked out.
Métis Indians circle me in a corner
no facial war paint on
no Indian war bonnets on.
I am down eating floor dust of native history,
and the steel needle toe boots
keep coming up fast, heavy into my ribcage.
One-half lung is out, the other half collapsed.
I am seeing vision of Jesus Christ.
I am crawling to my car half-dead, barely breathing.
Collapsed lungs, head lying on that steering wheel
somehow, find the nearest hospital.
I spit blood. I puke Apple Jack wine on surgeons.
My tan suit jacket is ruined; I piss my white pants.
Life is shaded like purple summer daisies.
So I learned, when a stranger is in strange town
find a place where your color fits your face,
never cheat at cards.


- - -
MICHAEL LEE JOHNSON lived ten years in Canada during the Vietnam era: now known as the Itasca, IL poet. Today he is a poet, freelance writer, photographer who experiments with poetography (blending poetry with photography), and small business owner in Itasca, Illinois, who has been published in more than 750 small press magazines in 26 countries, he edits 7 poetry sites. Michael is the author of The Lost American: From Exile to Freedom (136 pages book), several chapbooks of poetry, including From Which Place the Morning Rises and Challenge of Night and Day, and Chicago Poems. He also has over 69 poetry videos on YouTube.

Nosedive

| Filed under

Contributor: Paul Tristram

- -
Onto the pavement I fall
returning its cold touch.
My shoulders fell forward
the weight was too much.
I crawl into an alleyway
and hide behind some bins.
Once more a crash landing
once more the enemy wins.


- - -
Paul Tristram is a Welsh writer who has poems, short stories, sketches and photography published in many publications around the world, he yearns to tattoo porcelain bridesmaids instead of digging empty graves for innocence at midnight, this too may pass, yet.

Shred, Gouge, Fly

| Filed under

Contributor: Steve Isaak

- -
“Why do you shred
your early story versions?”
she asks.

I shake my head,
because I can’t explain
how I’m destroying
past selves,
some better, most not,
and decades,
when I, explosive,
squandered opportunities
& hearts.

Time was kinder,
more abundant, then,
not a returning magpie flock,
each flesh-gouging beak
a fast-passing day,
each wing flap an echo breeze
of Winter’s gelid breath,
while I write, edit,
try to be better,
do more
for her, she who balanced me.


- - -
Steve Isaak, a.k.a. Nikki Isaak and Chuck Lovepoe, is the author of several poetry anthologies.

The Devil Knows How to Row

| Filed under

Contributor: Amy Burns

- -
She, with upturned palms,
Laid herself to crying in that cradle.
The tears, viscose, did not wet her face but
Vulcanized her yoke;
Buoyed, only then did she set off rowing.
Going nowhere fast, she hammered the waves,
There was no besting her belligerence:
An internal friction heated her lungs,
Staved breathlessness and broke casks and spilled dark
Liquor until there was no more to spill.
She stopped rowing.
Only then did we catch on.
We took up the oars, left her dry,
Free to mourn tomorrow.


- - -
Amy Burns is the Managing Editor of Mulberry Fork Review. She has recently returned to Alabama from the UK where she completed a PhD at the University of Glasgow. Amy is working on her second novel.

The Song, Sunrise-Sunset, Should be Playing on the Jukebox (but it isn't)

| Filed under

Contributor: David Macpherson

- -
Walking in, the bar is packed
Filled with hangers-on from a Sunday afternoon
Baby shower. People settling tabs, talking about
The Future, and those who will be there
When it finally arrives. Which is how talk is in these things.
But soon the place begins to lighten, to empty.
Several of these people are going to a
Memorial Ceremony for a young woman,
and former bar patron, who passed away too soon,
As is the way for this. I order a drink
And watch this turnstile of obligation.
The people attempt to remove their smiles
Replacing them with a more appropriate expression.
The beer is cold and sweet.
Which is the way for this as well.


- - -

Brief Season

| Filed under

Contributor: Richard Schnap

- -
The years pass unstoppably by
Like buses behind schedule
Like young girls escaping their childhoods
Like dead leaves lost in the wind

While I watch from a seat by my window
The passengers late for appointments
The lonely in search of their soul mates
The world as a race against time

And I look around my white-walled room
At a vase of plastic flowers
At a crystal ball collecting dust
At a guitar with out-of-tune strings

That someday will be someone else’s
To gather in their empty hands
To hold as they make them their own
To keep until they too fly away


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Richard Schnap is a poet, songwriter and collagist living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. His poems have most recently appeared locally, nationally and overseas in a variety of print and online publications.

Brother Tortoise, Brother Hare

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Contributor: David Calbert

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He plays violin under my bed
One floor below
Sharp notes stab through the gauze of sleep
Lancing cotton dreams stuffed in my ears

I’ve slept through the school day
Again
Repelled by healthy hours
Seduced in sheets of smoky indulgence

He’s coiled like a brass string
Squeezing the air from his lungs
The sleep from his eyes

Treatment is prescribed
In phrases made effervescent by
Constant cough drops that numb the tongue
His hands shake

It’s true, I launch into the night
A bottle rocket
Propelled by fizzing hangovers
And chalky gunpowder
Breaking the word “Tomorrow”
Between my teeth again and again
Like gin soaked ice cubes

His fingers crisscross sometimes
Small snakes waging war with
Jointed bodies
Fighting for hours

He plays the violin
Slowly
Climbing chromatic scales with sweet agony
Drawing out the years in steady metronome
He gets better
The strings stop shrieking

I lay in a bed of good intentions
And think about all the things I’ll do
Tomorrow


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David Calbert lives in California. He writes fiction, essay, the occasional poem, and is still trying to find his place. He also tends to drink whiskey and talk about bad ideas for horror movies.

Hospice

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Contributor: Donal Mahoney

- -
Listen, Dad,
Mom's dead, but
you can dance
with her again.

She's waiting
in the sky, behind
a star, humming
to the music.

You and Mom
can waltz around
the moon forever.
She may even sing

that song you like.
I'll comb your hair,
shine your shoes
and press your old tuxedo.

There's no rush.
You know Mom.
She'd never dance
with anyone but you.


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Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, Missouri.

Fear of Failure

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Contributor: Lori Wyman

- -
I hear echoes from the wild beckoning me to come out and play,
and whispers in the night from such sweet sounds somewhere far away.
I call to the gentle stillness of the land that can’t be heard,
I dare not to speak but hear, “Don’t you say a word.”
This silent beauty that breathes my name,
speaks to me through Mother Nature’s game.
The gift of peace that from the Earth abounds,
is but for a chosen few who don’t speak a sound.
“Only the wise,” the bird does say,
“hear my cries of my young and my prey.
I know the deaf and the blind you see,
they’re too busy hurrying to care about me.
So I sing my song to the quiet and in part,”
“and our songs in the night,” Mother natures whispers,
“are for those who listen with their heart.”


- - -
I'm 53 years old and I live in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I love to write and am in the process of publishing a manuscript that I've just finished and have been writing for 30 years. I live with my best friend and adore my two Siamese cats. I work as a Sales Representative at Petsmart stores.

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