Afternoon of August 26, 2026

  

error 404 —

the bird’s nest

in the satellite dish

~Jacek Margolak

zoom call —

my cat’s tail

presenting

~Jacek Margolak

delivery notice —

the box

already empty

~Jacek Margolak

don't make me the punchline,

i'm not here to be your joke.

~linda m. crate 

i'm a moonflower

but the world only

remembers sunflowers.

~linda m. crate

don't miss me now

my ghost is meant

to haunt you.

~linda m. crate

 

waiting for sweetness candlelight reverberates mirrored surfaces

~Sarah Mahina Calvello 

war plans another generation at risk

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

A moment is all we are flickering candle 

~Sarah Mahina Calvello 

 

decoys,

in shoes that don't fit

~Patrick Sweeney

once he thought he could figure out the whole shebang

and secretly, he still thought he might...

~Patrick Sweeney

A sky of dizzy stars everything colliding 

~Sarah Mahina Calvello 

he decided to spare them the martyrdom of his company

~Patrick Sweeney

still smoldering nests

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

the speech after the speech after another shooting

~Patrick Sweeney

all the world's 

a stage

recess

~Jennifer Gurney

to be

or not to be

hospice

~Jennifer Gurney

Afternoon of August 14, 2026

 

 

 

 

bare bodkin fair point

~Jerome Berglund

don't 

wanna know 

but need to 

~Jerome Berglund

 

in a fair and 

comely shape

peacock tarantula 

~Jerome Berglund

 

solar eclipse dark shadows on my wall 

~Bernadette O'Reilly 

mathematics

one way the universe

converses with me

~Tejendra Sherchan

got no time 

to learn about wolves in the forest 

picking us off

~Jerome Berglund

universal monsters

nothing more dangerous 

than the likable ones 

~Jerome Berglund

each car honk

a vote of support

for our signs

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

elegant is the dance of want,

sliced air, 

cupped hand with a steel bowl - 

the beggar tosses his coins 

pity leaps up, twirls, dives back to his bowl 

the dance of the overstretched hand synced 

with the music of hunger 

from belly to bowl

~Allen David Simon

sunflowers

as far as the eye can see

war dead

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

you and i…

could be an unknown face

but in same equation 

~Kamrun Nahar

 

 

vagabond phantoms the best at being unseen in moonlight 

~Sarah Mahina Calvello

gnat not just one

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

turning the page don’t skip the messy chapters

~Sarah Mahina Calvello

 

Afternoon of August 11, 2026

 

Wind Chimes

~Michael Lee Johnson 

The wind chimes,

silver-tongued

on the balcony today,

different sounds—

cool, metallic laughter—

in all different directions.

My thoughts chase

after them

~Michael Lee Johnson

graveside service

blowing across the cemetery

a dropped tissue

~John J. Dunphy

swallowing fear a biscuit afraid for the throat

~Peter Jastermsky

 

this could be anything what she meant by unfocused

~Peter Jastermsky

Cat Story Problem

Shave the cat.

From the fur make another cat.

The cat eats the fur.

The cat coughs it up.

The cat eats the hairball.

How many cats do you have?

One cat around all the cats.

You have to shave it to find out.

~Noah Berlatsky

X-Files

the need to believe

in humanity

~Joanna Ashwell

three wishes

from the Genie

rain becoming prayer

~Joanna Ashwell

 

forgetting my own name

no box check

for an eclipse

~Joanna Ashwell

I couldn't stop being me, so I left the room, the town, and the country

~Patrick Sweeney

we're the family that talks all at once

about six different things

in three languages

~Patrick Sweeney

high above my supervisor's imperatives, 

I'm racing a gray squirrel across the power line

~Patrick Sweeney

my dentist Theseus

got lost in the labyrinth

of my mouth, with

out a thread of dental floss

to guide him home

~Oliver Kleyer

made up 

of the star-stuff 

cosmos within me 

~Tejendra Sherchan

Bridging the gap

 

feeling the winds sway

as I hold on by a thread

there is no reprieve -

how long can I bridge the gap 

before it all falls apart

~Joanne Macias  

funeral rites

we wonder why the fisherman

never throws them back

~John Hawkhead

 

squirming maggots

the dictator’s soul goes

its separate ways

 

~John Hawkhead

release of UFO files

drone light shows

before they existed


~Douglas J. Lanzo

calm down a little we’re all in a rush pouring more coffee

~Sarah Mahina Calvello  

rose-colored reality in the rose garden 

~Sarah Mahina Calvello 

clock ticking shape of kimono tea under the moon 

~Sarah Mahina Calvello 

ice-cream vendor

his name

a tax haven

marchand de glaces

son nom

un paradis fiscal

~Marie Derley

 

before it falls—

a beaver hears

the tree

~Kimberly Kuchar

I got nothin…

a mason jar empty 

of fireflies 

~Sharon Ferrante

Revolution

Is a revolution in the end a good mother? 

~Partha Sarkar

banyan roots —

a tale that started

eons ago

~Mona Bedi

sea washed rocks what life makes of us


~Mona Bedi

window seat I enter the clouds 


~Mona Bedi

 

old age the length of an empty day

~Mona Bedi  

 

 

Afternoon of August 7, 2026

 

if you want to know ask the two-toed sloth

~Richard Magahiz

who cancelled this sky,

chained the rain?

must've been us

~Richard Magahiz

 

  

endless

 

throughout the day

a bird strived

to measure the sky

 

throughout the night

the horizon continued to droop

as a dream in the nest

~O.P. Jha

Darkness is only light without witnesses.

~Manasa Reddy

moon?

or a porthole in the ship

of night

~Anne Fox

Big Choices

 

Will the cat

sit on my lap?

 

yes

no

 

no

yes

 

yes and no and

?

 

There’s a lot of indecision

in a cat.

~Noah Berlatsky

IDIOCRACY

it’s only confusing

if you think

about it

in front of a mirror

~S. T. Eleu

cobweb–

my father’s coat

still fits

~Elliot Diamond

pro…

   cras…

       ti…

           na…

               tion…

~Jennifer Gurney

stagnant water

I can’t decide

what to do

~Marie C Lecrivain

creativity

finding a good solution

for a fake problem

~Oscar Luparia

 

looking down the hourglass here we go again
 

~Sarah Mahina Calvello

Venus flytrap

looking for love

in all the wrong places

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

War of the Worlds

series of faux news posts

Facebook panics

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

 

Afternoon of August 3, 2026

 

Rem

Is the word 

I couldn’t remember 

because I didn't sleep enough.

~Keith Snow

deadline the cat on my keyboard

~Joshua St. Claire

devolving

into dactyls 

mountains of the moon

~Joshua St. Claire

Muppet theater box seats

I’ve become

a grumpy old codger

~Randy Brooks

Fierce Pelicans

 

Five white pelicans

stand on a rock

in the river

looking like

they’re holding

down an alligator

hoping it will

drown.

~Diane Webster

no road signs 

for travelers

on the skyroad

~Ingrid Bruck

Metaphor

 

This is that.

The poem is a hat

Squash it flat and it’s a hole

which in falls this.

And that.

~Noah Berlatsky

Alone, Remembering

how you once whispered

a thousand names for darkness,

leaving out your own.


~Silvatiicus Riddle

 

Late Fees

Strange librarian,

she dealt in books from other worlds––

fines paid in stardust.

~Silvatiicus Riddle

four-letter word 

for intercourse

talk

~John Hawkhead

border crossings

does a boundary separate 

or join?

~M. R. Pelletier 

One day

One day...

The vibration brings hope and despair simultaneously. 

~Partha Sarkar 

vine-pruning... 

words, words

words

~Maya Daneva

oppressive heat 

the coolness

of this chemo infusion

~Maya Daneva

Agentic Black Hole

 

spaghettification of humanity

it's not eminent domain, it's infinite progress


~Nicholas De Marino

robo-therapist my coping mechanism


~Nicholas De Marino

it's the perpendicular universes

                   you

                  gotta

                  watch

                    out

                     for

~Nicholas De Marino

his final

anthology appearance

graveyard shadows

~John Pappas

 

 

Where to Submit Your Work:

Always open: Red Eft Review

https://redeftreview.blogspot.com/p/submission-archives.html

Open August 1-15: Post-Ku

Mini poems on a postcard!

https://post-ku.com/submit/

Always open: smols poetry journal

Poems up to five words!

smolspoetryjournal.blogspot.com

Always open: The New Verse News

Poems about world news!

https://newversenews.blogspot.com/