late harvest
plucking resentments
straight
from the vine
~Kelly Moyer
dusk shadows —
the lingering taste
of
disappointments
~Amoolya Kamalnath
Ode
to a Comet
No fixed star in heaven glows so bright.
Ice and dust, dirty snowball tracing elliptical
paths. Slow moving herald of doom or
delight, cloud tails flaring. Hard, crispy outside
and cold, soft inside, like fried iced cream.
Unpredictable as attraction. You hairy star,
you fiery space beast causing meteor showers,
causing trouble, leaving trails of
galactic
debris. Strange, lovely sight.
~Beth Sherman
Sputter
The onshore breeze picked up the ash
& carried it to the mountains.
This new normal
will be the death of us who bleed & consume.
No big thing
children forget how to be silly
we
forget the rest.
~Les Wicks
lingering thoughts —
between hair follicles
lice
and nits
~Amoolya Kamalnath
early morning
sees a sleepy yawn
and whoosh
walking in
through an open mouth
an
itchy mosquito
~Rupa Anand
Freddy
Flea
Freddy Flea flounced on fresh fruit
landing face forward on a fork
Somehow he learned to fly away
and
the frightened fruit was saved
~Madeleine Vinluan
bad poetry
i return as
a
cave fish
~Terri L. French
semantics
taking her tisket
to
task
~Kelly Moyer
a
violin
made of polystyrene,
a flute
made
of sugar.
~Richard Magahiz
the lamplight
serenades
a covey of moths
within
its corona
~Rupa Anand
total
eclipse of the moths
~Roberta Beach Jacobson
core
values wrapped in rot
~Terri L. French
morning after . . .
the last
of
the pork rinds
~Kelly Moyer
After
the Storm
The Ferris wheel landed in the ocean like a toy hurled by an angry
god. Now carp glide through the spokes, its cars rocking blindly.
Gawkers still peer at the ruins of mangled houses: splintered
frames, a toilet on its side, someone’s sagging bed frame. Where the bay
ravished the ocean, a carpet of sand. You think I’m exaggerating? Look at
the pictures. I made a scrapbook: Before and after. What doesn’t kill you etcetera
. . .
When the next hurricane comes, I’ll name it after you. No sea wall will be high
enough to withstand the waves. Try re-building the boardwalk with fake wood.
Try mending my heart with duct tape. At night, wild dune grass rustles and
the
moon kisses the highest chair on our wheel.
~Beth Sherman
recognizing
that the feet we're given are wrong for the task
~Richard Magahiz