Evening of March 21, 2023

Libelous

The summer Sky told

the local newspaper

that she is my sister,

but I don’t eat

grapes for breakfast.

And, I’ve never been

anything . . .

akin to a proper noun.

~Kelly Moyer

Right on the Tip

No language is quick enough

to save a murdered thought—

you know how your word

dangles bleeding from a pole

when you need it in your jaws,

when you need it to be heard.

You have no way to get it

once it’s gone, no way

to pronounce it out loud

once it’s down and gone.

~Will Reger

writing

create, invent, make it

a little bent; real

but not too real,

fun but not humorous,

jokey but

serious

too

~Wayne F. Burke

fog 

trying to read my wife's 

handwriting 

~Devoshruti Mandal

At the Picnic

A bug is crawling down my neck 

With clicking claws and spikey beard. 

I must curtail its frenzied trek 

A bug is crawling down my neck.  

I jump and shout. How could a speck 

Of protein make me feel so weird? 

A bug is crawling down my neck 

With clicking claws and spikey beard. 

~LaVern Spencer McCarthy

wrestling the symphony of fingers and strings on a harp

~Devoshruti Mandal

the car

that blocks the ambulance

seeing red

~Bisshie

old prune juice

clearing the cupboards

and myself

~Patricia Hawkhead

black ink scribbles

deciphering the secrets

in his shadow

~Patricia Hawkhead

passengers of the wind

some almond petals

on the balcony

~Françoise Maurice

In Vain

Flies like fresh fruit, though past their best,

blood orange, rotten to the core;

yet fleas for flesh, as mashed in mess,

drinking vessels, capillaries,

their platelet dish, corpuscle quiz.

Old fools’ gold from prospectors’ hunch,

in vein, a seam of red from blue.

as stake their claim, rare, bloody hue.

Are chips laid down, accompanied,

salt in the wound to irritate?

~Stephen Kingsnorth

Pizza crumbs

From last night’s dinner with you

Memories

~Jennifer Gurney