Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
(for Lydia on an anniversary)

A half-dozen Little Necks
Clams on the half shell
Whetting the appetite
Eaten raw
A squeeze of lemon
And cocktail sauce
A perfect respite

Afternoon snack
With a bowl of clam chowder
Or a prelude to an entrée
Like trout almandine
With crabmeat stuffing
An ideal combination
For dinner any day

Supper after theatre
A lovely aperitif
With after theatre talk
A half-dozen Little-Necks
And a seafood soufflé
Impeccable repast
Before a homeward walk


- - -
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: Dorian J Sinnott

- -
You’re made of moonlight;
a celestial radiance that comes to me
in dreams where your beams
illuminate the dark corridors of my heart.

I once bathed in the soft glow,
watching meteors and stardust
erupt in your eyes;
galaxies return.

I want to sit on the brim of hourglasses,
watching the sand rain down in endless turntables,
flipping over and over—
lost in infinity.

Lost in the moonbeams
the moonlight
the radiance your spirit sings;
soft white specter adrift on a sea of stars.

But by daylight…
I mourn the darkness and fragility;
your face lost in the cosmos
of my mind—and the night sky.

I greet the Sun and
he tells me of his love:

the great and gentle Moon.
His beams—though harsh—
make me at peace
when I tell him of you.

And I weep at the thought
of being lightyears away—
lost and interstellar
amongst the blackness;
waiting

Waiting for twilight’s curtain
to fall on the stage of Earth;
for your crest to break the horizon—
igniting the skies in encore.

And the Sun told me
how he longed for his Moon;
how he would pray a million dead stars
for her to light up the night.

And I smiled—
and I said:

“But the Sun and Moon coexist
in the changing hues of sky.
In the day he shines
and drowns her heart out;

but every morning—

she can be seen nearby.

The Sun only sets
to give life to his Moon—
when all the Earth has gone still.
He gives up his light
and his pride
so her beams kindle, tranquil.”

And the Sun
with silent rays
felt a little warmer
while standing in his glow.

“And that’s why sunrise and sunset
are all the more beautiful,
breathtaking,
and sweet.
For in their banners
of radiant color across the heavens;
it’s where day and night—
where lovers—
meet.”

But still,
we wait for the Moon.


- - -
Dorian J. Sinnott is a graduate of Emerson College's Writing, Literature, and Publishing program, currently living in historic Kingston, NY with his two cats. When he's not writing, he enjoys English horseback riding, playing violin, and traveling to comic cons up and down the east coast. He is the social media editor for Coffin Bell Journal. Dorian's work has appeared in numerous magazines and journals, including: Crab Fat Literary Magazine, The Hungry Chimera, and Riggwelter.

Contributor: Jane Briganti

- -
Her heartbreak was posted for reading
he was there, poetically reciprocating
night and day, a button click away

Amity and love gave her fortitude
to cross the ocean and have credence
leaving behind a life, an ocean of strife

New horizons awaited her arrival
time elapsed like passing winds
skies of gray ultimately turned azure
not needing more, a poet she'd adore


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

Contributor: Milton P. Ehrlich

- -
I love the way you walk
and talk and never stop,
and love your smile and
when you call my name.
You are prim and proper
yet remain sensually alive,
and how I love your yawn
when I scratch your back,
and how you always dress
so your total outfit matches
as if you are on a runway
in a photo fashion show,
and how you wash my clothes
even when it’s not necessary,
but do prepare warm pajamas
in the winter and short ones
in the spring and summer,
and how you shine my shoes
and thanks a lot for trimming
the hair in my ears, and I love
how our bodies always meet
in fine dove-tailed fashion
like old pine floor boards,
and how you always hum
my favorite tunes and sing
and dance at the drop of a hat,
and eat like a bird all day long
and don’t eat meat and worry
about me when I cross a street,
and feed me great vegetable soup
with tarragon and rosemary,
and think of new original ideas
for your super-duper visionary art,
and have such a huge loving heart
that never fails to embrace me
and your kids and grandkids
and Sparky and Aretha,
and how brave you are
even when you’re scared
how you sailed across a bay
just to keep me company
how wonderful to know you,
who knows about everything
and doesn’t forget anything,
and how you can tell if an omen
is really an omen and you have
such great intuition to know
what I’m feeling before I know it,
and who to trust and who to avoid
and did I mention how I love it
when you talk in your sleep
and give such good massages
whenever I can’t fall asleep,
and how much I love your hands
and fingernails which are never
painted red or purple like others
and how cute your little feet are
and how much I love each toe
especially your delicate pinky,
not to mention your mighty bosoms
and buns of steel that never wither
and how much I love you for loving
snails and being afraid of snakes,
and always worrying when I drive
that I won’t hit the brakes,
and did I mention how much I love
your charm and friendly curiosity
about everyone you meet on the street,
and how wonderful it is that you are
always taking pictures of this and that
and how brilliant you are making art
and also that I never heard you fart,
not even once, a Guinness Book of Records,
and that you don’t love real money
but hide it in your knipple, crunched up
in a ball, just green bits of paper to you.
I love you for loving my sense of direction
and fertilizing your eggs for you to hatch
3 amazing kids and 6 wonderful grandkids,
and I love you for not being afraid
of leaving your body and when you do
please be sure to take me with you.
Thank you very much for spending
so many splendid years with plain old me
providing us with a nest of Le Mariage Parfait!


- - -
Milton P. Ehrlich Ph.D. is an 87- year-old psychologist and a veteran of the Korean War. He has published many poems in periodicals such as the London Grip, Arc Poetry Magazine, Descant Literary Magazine, Wisconsin Review, Red Wheelbarrow, Christian Science Monitor, and the New York Times.

Contributor: John Grey

- -
The shard of pottery holds the answer.
Or could it be the splinter of glass.
They linger after the lifetimes,
are buried looser and nearer
than bones.

Just dig in the soil a little
or get down on your knees,
peek behind the refrigerator.
Look, there’s something in the garden,
glinting from moonlight.

They have stories to tell,
of your ghosts,
back when they were living.

So listen in with your fingers,
feel the sharpness,
the finish, the lightness;
a fragment of utility,
a whole of majesty.


- - -
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in That, Dunes Review, Poetry East and North Dakota Quarterly with work upcoming in Haight-Ashbury Literary Journal, Thin Air, Dalhousie Review and failbetter.

Contributor: Mark Tulin

- -
Patiently, we wait for the door to unlock
like well-behaved school children,
hoping the man who just went in,
the one who ate the big cinnamon bun
didn’t use the entire roll of paper
and did a number one instead of two
for the benefit of us all.

Unfortunately, we have a lot of down time
waiting in the restroom line,
sphincter’s squeezed tight,
mind searching for answers
to fill the endless void.
Our hope steadily fading
while maintaining the faith to carry on.


- - -
Mark has two upcoming books entitled “Awkward Grace,” and “The Asthmatic Kid and Other Stories.

Contributor: donnarkevic

- -
I think it is sometime
after Fascism, maybe,
or sometime after
the Beatles broke up.

I think it is complex
as my daughter, graduating
from mere dawn
to supernova.

It is sexy
as a black miniskirt or Bikini
Atoll just before
an atomic explosion.

It is the price of Guernica,
the absence of color,
the eclipse of the Sun
record: “Old Black Joe.”

Modernity is brief as a birth-
day candle, a wedding
bouquet, a eulogy
for the death of God.


- - -
Retired, I find myself looking back to see what is left standing and what remains to be built. So, I keep writing. I invite you to read one that still stands.

Contributor: Steven K. Smith

- -
We met in the usual way,
over drinks and cheese,
you – dark ale and cheddar,
me – Chardonnay and brie.
In the following weeks we
shared walks through old London,
sunset at a Jamaican beach,
and hours chatting together,
and finally, made love
all through a December's night,
you – in Boston,
me – en Paris,
neither of us caring about
the data transfer fees.

Then you asked to "really" meet me,
as if you hadn't already,
like you wanted to touch me
the way Neanderthals did,
sharing the same air and germs.
I cried all through the next week
for thinking I had loved you,
and you were such a creep.


- - -
Writer, musician, renaissance festival performer, and struggling gardener who LIKES dandelions. Some work published in Pudding Magazine, and Plum Tree Tavern.

Contributor: Sheshu Babu

- -
We were travelling in different directions
When we first shook hands
With some apprehension
Starkly exposing our contention
On various issues regarding life
Their endless strife

Our mentality was unknown
Our beliefs were unknown
Our philosophy was unknown
To each other, goals were unknown

But something held us together
As we got to know each other better
Like Marx-Engels attraction
Or teacher-student bond of Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan

We agreed and fiercely disagreed
We, for days, intensely discussed:
We parted our ways with anger and spite
But met again, forgetting all that unpleasant sight

After years of acquaintance
And our struggle for existence
We, in our tumultuous journey, learnt a lot
That taught us to tackle differences with skill and tact

Recognizing differences of opinion is sportsmanship;
Accepting differences of opinion is relationship;
Understanding differences of opinion is statesmanship;
Complimenting each other even in difference of opinion is friendship!

Now, each other's character is well known,
Our strengths and weakness are well known,
Our goals are similar and approach well known,
Our sacrifice for the cause of friendship, to each other, is well known.


- - -

Contributor: John Ogden


We put stone to soil
your father and I
With tools old and heavy sweat
we cut the earth
we bleed our waters
into furrowed lines
furrowed brows
furrows of seed
that turn sweat and sun and earth
into gold
into grain
into future and food
for the future's children
and all the others
who will put stone to soil
long after we fall
like wheat
like chaff
rising once again
again and again
never long in the sun
never long
on the other side
of the dirt.


- - -
John Ogden was conceived of a government form and a passing mailbox. He lives somewhere out in the woods of a rural land more akin to the fantasy realms of literature than real life, and his favorite dirt bikes will always be the broken ones.