Morning of October 4, 2023

 promises broken roads named for presidents

~John Pappas

what's left of me after right and wrong

~Deborah Karl-Brandt

utility of scarecrow as kigo

~Patrick Sweeney

the right side of my brain a rainy sycamore

~Patrick Sweeney

back home the memory of wind

~Mona Bedi

                                up

rollercoaster 

                                            and down

                                                                     these 

                                                                                       moods

~Stephanie Zepherelli

family graveyard

parts of me

already buried

~Mona Bedi

the peeling label

on the old beer bottle

death poem

~John Pappas

i can’t swim

don’t place me in water,

scatter me…no

place me under a tree

so I may hear birdsong

~Wanda Amos

death poem the empty aquarium’s hum

~John Pappas

getting through another day without satori

~Patrick Sweeney

it's not only me the psychiatrist’s visit

~Mona Bedi

clock-watchers in windowless rooms

~Patrick Sweeney

buffalo nickels    I'm stuck between numismatics on a train

~Patrick Sweeney

where brambles wind

spindles of brier and barb

our intertwined tongues

~John Hawkhead

summer heat

a fan cools

what's left of me

~Deborah Karl-Brandt

the loquacious defendant

gags upon receiving

a gag order

~John J. Dunphy

Morning of October 3, 2023

truth at times snow

~LeRoy Gorman

the raven is watching you      always watching you

~Tom Blessing

getting a lop-earned foothold shoe horn

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

drowning in memory autumn rain

~LeRoy Gorman

I can’t remember when I stopped remembering the scent of violets

~Joshua St. Claire

big

            boned

moon

            i

block

            the

last

            fatphobe

~Adele Nwankwo

republicanism

reminding me to renew

my birth control

~Adele Nwankwo

raking sand runes

with toy shovels

foretelling Wall Street

~Elliot Diamond

the viral myth

of a warty toad

lunar craters

~Elliot Diamond

that wheels-up moment–

when anything

is possible

~Jennifer Gurney

“Stand” Fast, Ketanji!

 

An angel afloat, kneeling in prayer in a pool of adversaries;

arms willing to embrace all in spite of stinging waters affronting her face.

 

Never flinching or turning away;

N’er a complaint  day-after-day

 

With silent authority

   she remains, called and purposed.

~Suzanne S. Austin-Hill

Barbie

Hollywood sign

turns pink

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

phosphenes

no I won’t listen

to what you have to say

~Joshua St. Claire

return to the office

everyone

is a different height

~Joshua St. Claire

he said "try this"

and got down on his knees

and was gone

~Tom Blessing

Evening of September 28, 2023

 

a bunch of rocks

in a jar

she names

each

one

This is Lucy.

~Kimberly Kuchar

first extraterrestrial film star

his handprints in cement show

all 12 fingers

~John J. Dunphy

floating his boat

as tea steeps

in a far-away universe

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

The week casts a long shadow.

It talks of rain and cats and dogs.

The week stops by the bar

for a long one, gin and tonic,

one drink, maybe two.

~Nolcha Fox

14-year-old hitchhiker

all his possessions

in a garbage bag

packed by

his parents

~John J. Dunphy

autumn evening

I look for hair colour

every now and then

~Bipasha Majumder (De)

fell asleep

in the sky

lightness of being

~Jennifer Gurney

Small lethargic fellow in the grass

late fall morning

not the season for a cold blooded baby

~Steve Van Allen

too much Deet wishing it was citronella finch legs stiff to the sky

~Elliot Diamond

little hamster,

what kind of secrets

do your cheeks hold?

~Kimberly Kuchar

Afternoon of September 25, 2023

your ashes

safe underground now

along with the dog's

~Penny Lowery

summer night —

old dog comes in

flea-ridden

~Penny Lowery

Ennui


My children tell me they are bored

and all my suggestions are boring, too.

They drape themselves on couch and chair,

in blankets swathed, both semi comatose,

in listless, languid, enfeebling enervation, torpor total.

Unlike my dog, no ball, no leash,

no squirrel will quicken them to life.

~Cecil Morris

Fire is smart.

It finds the cracks.

It knows things.

~Sarah Henry

moonless night

in the crystal rocky

stream

of consciousness

lost

in the stirring

of her wake

the water siren's

dream lives

~Lorelyn De la Cruz Arevalo

carp from the canal in the backyard sniffing lilacs moving day

~Joseph P. Wechselberger

stars

sky

earth

worm

earth

sky

stars

~Noah Berlatsky

that place between here and there where my father says goodbye

~Joseph P. Wechselberger

husband

brother uncle son grandson

this man

all he has to do is sign his name

to enlist for this new war

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

that memory of when I was small and dad my hero a moment of minnows

~Joseph P. Wechselberger

a fairy tails

an ugly duckling

in a deep dive mission

into the pond's abyss

to steal a kiss

from the frog prince

and undo the curse

of the fairy's tail

~Lorelyn De la Cruz Arevalo

sudden wind

our conversation

blows down the street

~Joseph P. Wechselberger

Dog Days


This morning

our late daughter

is dead again

but we don’t

mention it.

And after work,

when we come home,

her dog, gone too,

does not greet us

with its dance.

~Cecil Morris

Afternoon of September 23, 2023

 

public library

now banned from observing

Banned Books Week

~John J. Dunphy

the art of love

dipping a brush

in foggy water

~Sharon Ferrante

gazing in the river

I see my reflection

beside yours

~Jennifer Gurney

fork in the road

it’s been a decade

I’m still here

~Sharon Ferrante

all roads

lead somewhere

‘cept this

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

fiery finale

on the beach

sea inhales sun

~James Penha

I grafted myself

to the branches of a tree

was always a fruit

~Jean-Paul L. Garnier

cable guy checks the water meter loose wires

~Sharon Ferrante

robot overlords

the evolutionary

natural next step

~Jean-Paul L. Garnier

peace be with you

the driver says

my hair caught in the door

~Sharon Ferrante

school begins –

backpacks four times

the size of the bearers

~Maurizio Brancaleoni

bland bedtime stories

myth congeniality

not the least bit Grimm

~John H. Dromey

hokey-pokey

forgetting to turn myself

around

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

cultural appropriation

extraterrestrial tourist wears

cowboy clothes

~John J. Dunphy

Afternoon of September 22, 2023

 Baby Dalí

I do not have a hut

at the edge of the sea

nor a family

nor their ire;

but, I have the freedom

to dream the dreams

of a madman

in shabby thrifted attire.

~Kelly Moyer

on receiving a job promotion

boss asks, “do you own 

anything other than jeans?”

I laugh, then say “no”

~Tohm Bakelas

gloomy day

I sip my wine

your empty chair

~Françoise Maurice

a dried rose

inside Great Expectations

library dusk

~Debarati Sen

Paris.

What else can I add

to you?

Paris, just

Paris . . .

fuming on,

late summer leaves sagging with

exhaust.

~Yearner

 

Our Best of the Net 2024 Nominations

Keith Snow, Kelly Moyer, Lauren Scharhag,

Nolcha Fox, Patrick Sweeney, petro c.k.

~Five Fleas Itchy Poetry 

Celtic fire, ancestors' blessing.

~Carolyn Crossley

black walnuts crafting weaponry from sparrowsong

~Kelly Moyer

Dead Horse Jesus (Haiku)

Dead Horse Jesus could

rise again, but he knows the

beatings wouldn’t stop.

~Chad Parenteau

 

 

inflation rate

the stars whisper

in the autumn sky

~Françoise Maurice

I Imagine

a star dying

a check clearing

love off somewhere

of course enduring

~Yearner

The Lament

Your eyes are open;

yet, you can’t seem to see

the treetop babies

or the way the sun

glistens on the surface

of time.

But, I’ll be the last

so bold as to remind you

that a pear costs a dollar

less than a dime.

~Kelly Moyer

The Veil

the wheel of

the year turns

forever eternal

spirits pass — through

the thinning veil.

~Carolyn Crossley

One

nearly frozen

heavy raindrop slips

through a hole in the gutter

and hits me on the shoulder

sending a deep chill

through bone and organ

is it any wonder

I think of you?

~Yearner

tiger lilies —

I dared him

to love me

~Debarati Sen

the reality of the situation

big job promotion—

now I write haikus

on a higher salary

~Tohm Bakelas

Postcard from Saint-Rémy-de-Provence

baguette-shaped clouds

above the brûléed plain

dusted just now in lavender

light

~Yearner

 

Evening of September 21, 2023

along the border weeding out the vulnerable

~John Hawkhead

preaching hellfire and damnation nation

~John Hawkhead

storm coming wind sweeping everything awry

~Jennifer Gurney

god’s good earth in the killing fields

~John Hawkhead

deepening love in mathematical improbabilities

~John Hawkhead

I Can't Take This Anymore

That's what I tell myself

every morning.

But I still get up

and do it all over again.

Because sometimes

a man has no other choice.

~Gabriel Bates

thanks for talking me off the 'buffeted by wind and wave' ledge

~Amy Sweeney

he jumped off his great-grandfather’s famous bridge

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

 

I’m not great at being anybody.

~Noah Berlatsky

ebb tide reaching a new low

~Patricia Hawkhead