Afternoon of October 17, 2024

 

chronologically displaced the now of her body

~Vijay Prasad

A Bare Leaf

All the ants have our backs.

The giants without speech wouldn’t

Dare squash us now.

~Dominik Slusarczyk

Harsh words follow tears

Objects fly smashing down hard

A fly on the wall

~Jiel Narvekar

our yule log

flames consume

the 1990s

~John J. Dunphy

A Man Called Toothbrush

bristles

at the thought

of death

ignorant

of the fact

Sylvia Plath

would never

write a poem

about him

~dan smith

late-night thoughts

scratching at the walls

of my skull

~Nalini Shetty

news cycle—

we chew the same fears

again and again

~Nalini Shetty

chasing a buzz

through tangled wires—

still no spark

~Nalini Shetty

country cemetery

a tombstone epitaph

crumbling into brevity

~John J. Dunphy

for years she paints pictures

writes prose and poems

invisible

~Susan Pope

the kettle whistles

mouth dry

she whispers his name

~Susan Pope

Magician

 

Make magic with me.

If we wish hard

Enough we can

Summon rabbits

Wearing tuxedos.

The rabbits will

Know what we

Should conjure next.

~Dominik Slusarczyk

The Light

 

There is a light

Right at the

Bottom.

Sometimes I

See it when

I’m sleeping.

It talks to me:

It says we feel

The same pain.

~Dominik Slusarczyk

spilled ink

pooling between pages—

the moon half-full

~Nalini Shetty

eyelash on my thumb

I make a wish—

the wind takes it first

~Nalini Shetty

stale cereal

a spoonful of routine

to start the day

~Nalini Shetty

country-by-country—

one dream jumps

around the forest

~Ernesto P. Santiago

writer’s block . . .

I shake the jar really hard

to free the fireflies

~Ernesto P. Santiago

We Were Led Past Prickly Bushes

 

I never pretended to know.

I only pretended the

Lights shone when they did not.

 

I needed to see another

Stream sauntering across stones.

 

Those who know don’t

Know they know.

~Dominik Slusarczyk