Morning of October 22, 2025

 













  dad’s Rube Goldberg



t                  i                  g                

          h                 n

                  

                   a       

         

m                j                  g

           a                 i


~Barrie Levine




upon reflection

lack of mirrors

a major clue


~dan smith




back in the US, back in the US

security sweeps the benches

with mirrors


~Bruce H. Feingold




his favorite philosopher Hobbes

~dan smith




caged in bone a heart under cardiac arrest


~John Hawkhead




a thread of hatred in the anagram


~John Hawkhead




downfall how quickly it happens


~Roberta Beach Jacobson




Team


Not I

or you

but

some

body

trying

to turn

us all

into

meat.


~Chad Parenteau




leaving out

a few years

my CV


~Roberta Beach Jacobson




departed melody

of the empty casket

whispers the night


~Elliot Diamond




black widow

knitting ghost yarn


~Elliot Diamond




the universe

eternally in motion

my restlessness


~Tejendra Sherchan

 

 

Afternoon of October 20, 2025

 


Mudslide Rainbows

~dan smith




postmortem . . .
 
she never cared enough

to haunt me now

~Kelly Sauvage Moyer




morning coffee ~

my bluebird

back from yonder

~Kelly Sauvage Moyer




end of TIME

issues

keep coming


~Nicholas De Marino




rubbery

leathery

Halloween masky

~Nicholas De Marino




The mask


The mask never tells a lie.

~Partha Sarkar




The house burned down.

Now I am free to feel the wind.

It is cold.

~Noah Berlatsky




pumpkin piƱata

crushing the skull

of an orange devil

~Stephanie Zepherelli




string quartet

the swirling crescendo

of weed wackers

~Stephanie Zepherelli




purple phase

the taste of lavender

ice cream

~Stephanie Zepherelli




staring 

down 

snow 

globe 

she 

stops 

time

~Stephanie Zepherelli




caterpillars

tight roping –

missile fragments

~Elliot Diamond




A Weighted Body


I didn't always do the best I could.

Sometimes I did the worst.

I just didn't know it then.

Didn't make many mistakes just a few

major ones. The epigenetic

cell destroying kind that ripple

outward like a weighted body

dumped in a well. A soul eating

malignancy so unforgiving.

This is what passes for apology.

~dan smith




pogostuck-

social media electorate

super silly us

~dan smith




shapeshifting at night

to shine in the sky

asters

~Pegah Rahmati Nezhad




he cried when the monsters sang 'Happy Birthday'

~Patrick Sweeney




mom would've told them

to stick out their lying tongues

~Patrick Sweeney




wait here, he's telling the cigarette ash in the potato salad story

~Patrick Sweeney




he's going on about Archimedes again

to six kids on twelve elbows


~Patrick Sweeney




he knew he moved his lips when reading

and he knew what Hemingway said about it


~Patrick Sweeney




I dream of a poem so small

only fairies can find the beginning


~Karen A VandenBos




cicada

exoskeleton

out of body experience


~Karen A VandenBos




the moonlight gave him paws


~dan smith




zombie wedding everyone has cold feet


~
dan smith

 

  



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Morning of October 15, 2025


Crime Scene

Clay Head ~Alf B. Meier & Photo ~Roberta Beach Jacobson




In the sky without a ladder


~Nicoletta Ignatti




photographer

captures a field of daisies

reflected

in the eyes of

a jumping spider

~Tejendra Sherchan




I fight

losing battles against

the cockroaches

~Tejendra Sherchan




year’s end

the low drone

of bone cold


~John Pappas




bare branches forgetting the names of

~John Pappas




morning coffee

I gas up

the hearse

~John Pappas




moonset the hollow of bird bones

~John Pappas




Perpetual Mediocrity


aging ex-beauty queens with 

facemask perma-grooves

digging deep into ReeL Parisian 

Louis Vuitton while the 

plain janes look on sporting 

perpetually tormented 

expressions so very twisted 

by all they’ll never have/be.

~Scott Holstad




Gag Realz


playing repeating records --

dancing terror tunes -- 

ain’t been more irrelevant --

Kakfa never saw AI coming –

he'd have punted Josephine //

~Scott Holstad




Rocketing


Camelback whispers 

warnings of dried heat 

exhaustion at 12:30 am, 

desert blooming where 

skying palms reign

and cacti lie waiting

~Scott Holstad




a perfect time of the season

for the return of The Zombies

~Patrick Sweeney




a new tattoo

everyone reading

her shoulder

~Patrick Sweeney




every kid in the class was a haiku master

~Patrick Sweeney




juror number 8 has another question

~Patrick Sweeney




she's the mathematician

who refused to carry

the zero

~Patrick Sweeney




far from the jaguar dream

wild men speak to me on the street

~Patrick Sweeney




birdcage bars

a trapped hummingbird

wearing gang-red

~Richard L. Matta




Peace Photography


no need to check the levels

we are all one light

step out of the shadows

whirl around the sun

dance with the unity

every particle

every wave

speaks I AM

says step out

and dance

~dan smith




On the Memory of Mr. Gibson Signing His Album Cover


the stoned idleness

fills La Cave

to far reaches of empty mind

Bob Gibson's ringing guitar

a distant temple bell

pealing away the mist of time

~dan smith




near-death experience

I borrow a life

from my cat

~thomas david




zoom meeting

even the camera

struggles to focus

~thomas david




haiku bingo

all I need

is cicada

~thomas david




mating for life the salt and pepper shakers

~thomas david




across the river

across memories

the old cottage

still stands

~Nisha Raviprasad




paunch of 

a pauper....

paucity of 

patty

pay dirt.

~Partha Sarkar




Dead


Does the dead remain lifelong dead?


~Partha Sarkar




cherry blossoms

mysterious as before

the old sewing machine

~Boryana Boteva




Innovation in the arts is mostly marketing.

This is a new idea.

Please share.

~Noah Berlatsky

 

 

New Journal: smols

https://smolspoetryjournal.blogspot.com/