Morning of June 30, 2023

Fireworks

Did the founders

truly want

to frighten my dog?

~Noah Berlatsky

the immensities of a boy's lonely summer

~Patrick Sweeney

my best Fred Astaire for the long-life of a carpenter ant

~Patrick Sweeney

the scholars are arguing about Woodrow Wilson   I stayed out of it

~Patrick Sweeney

kindness of neighbors sharing our wildfires

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

all in favor

of plutocracy

the I’s have it

~Jerome Berglund

red ants

throwing bodies

at the menace 

~Jerome Berglund

false spring 

how they portray

Pugachev

~Jerome Berglund

magma—

the silent spew

of all

         hurts

~A.J. Anwar

Afterlife

I am dead

but not buried.

 

Going through

the motions

 

somewhere.

~Dan Provost

thickest makeup to show more clowns

~A.J. Anwar

a gulp of cold barley tea    there goes another cool customer

~Patrick Sweeney

enduring alone the Circus Maximus of the Nightly News

~Patrick Sweeney

Afternoon of June 28, 2023

waiting at the platform a fateful jump

~Eavonka Ettinger

balcony argument who’s the pushover now

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

wicked witch

melts into a green puddle

what a world

~Eavonka Ettinger

When the day is done

And the house has quieted

I miss you the most

~Jennifer Gurney

skid row

being fed a soup of

empty promises

~Eavonka Ettinger

From Beyond

 

It came from

over there

in the mirror.

 

Which is just the worst

when you’re over fifty.

~Noah Berlatsky

Fleabag

This dump is a fleapit, the dogs don’t stay here.

Dogs know to avoid getting flea-bitten.

This dive is down in the dumps, and so am I.

Diving into a pile of trash is more fun and has fewer fleas.

~Nolcha Fox / Julie A Dickson

even in a tutu a flea still a flea

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

all roads lead to roaming

~Eavonka Ettinger

Morning of June 27, 2023

Truth is a bird smashing into a window.

~Wolfgang Wright

Winged wonder

grabbing earrings,

fluttering up

to sit on wire,

daring me to

climb to heights

and use my cutters.

I refuse, I choose

to leave home

hoopless.

~Nolcha Fox

She giraffes her head

above the hedge,

listening to her neighbors.

They look her way,

she giraffes her neck,

as if she’s eating leaves.

~Nolcha Fox

tightrope walker

meets past and future

in the middle

~Stephanie Zepherelli

Death be not proud.

Death be not.

Death be.

Death.

~Noah Berlatsky

Dead

turtle in road

we stopped - she ran out

Too late, shell cracked

it was dead - moved to roadside

No rescue this time

just a gentle word - a quiet end

~Julie A Dickson

dough kneading

fold after fold

the layers of my thought

~Françoise Maurice

Gambling

I bet on myself

And I lost me

 

I bet on my job

And I lost it

 

I bet on my girl

And I lost her

 

So I bet on the world

And all was lost

~Wolfgang Wright

The Rice Effect

What makes you think i am human?

the nap post lunch when i was a child:

a portal to different versions of me—

I devoured them all, so here I am a woman

young and fit by imagination running wild

on a bowl of rice to set the kraken free.

~Lorelyn De la Cruz Arevalo

Extinction

Maybe the dodos were just tired of it all.

~Wolfgang Wright