Afternoon of August 16, 2024


Marriage Material

~Kelly Moyer

Photography available here




there's always a cat

looking back

at earth

~Melissa Dennison




midnight

blowing of the goat horn

dogs barking lingers on

~Tejendra Sherchan




clear skies

a cloud dog

chases a bone

~Melissa Dennison




children kept in storage

practice their smiles

~Martha Ellen




dissociative disorder

a fancy term for playing dead

~Martha Ellen




Too much caffeine

On the surface, but what’s

Past the surface

~Sarah Mahina Calvello




closer

to my second childhood

than  my    first

~Melissa Dennison




sultry night —

the salt rim melts

into a dirty martini

~Rupa Anand




weeper movie

the only dry eyes

in the theater

on an android

lacking tear ducts

~John J. Dunphy




escape speed a soul leaves the fontanelle

~John Hawkhead



snow on bamboo whispers from a different understanding

~John Hawkhead




climate crisis

we kick the melting can

down the road

~Melissa Dennison





Poet in Empty Bottle

~Michael Lee Johnson

Afternoon of August 12, 2024

Life Skills

~Kelly Moyer

Photography available here

 


"we came from there"

I tell

our neighbors' children

while gesturing toward

the night sky

~John J. Dunphy




a falling star

our daughter shouts

'boom!'

~John J. Dunphy




looking up

Orion's belt

I am home

~Jennifer Gurney




school science fair

all the other exhibits

swallowed up by

our son's entry

a black hole

~John J. Dunphy




derelict starship

ran out of food first

set phasers on broil

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel




clear night sky

the planets we pretend

not to see

~Roberta Beach Jacobson




Not Miss Fluffy

 

No, Dearest. Sometimes,”

O'Keeffe insisted to Stieglitz

peering over her shoulder

at the canvas, “a pink tulip

is no more than a pink tulip.


Focus.”

~James Penha



 

the illusion

of happily ever

after

opening the

final decree

~Jennifer Gurney




in the old trunk

his ex was somewhat

the worse for wear

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel




pushing

new educational concepts

through an olive press

~Roberta Beach Jacobson




Martian flu

this stomach bug runs its course

then chews its way out

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel




dispirited

the tumbledown saloon

gave up its ghost

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel




evolution reenactment

my wife and I crawl

from ocean to beach

~John J. Dunphy

 

Afternoon of August 11, 2024

 

 

the comfort

of this island of one

sultry summer

~Mona Bedi




rocking the empty cradle a refugee’s blank eyes

~Mona Bedi




unfinished poem the night turns into a raven

~Mona Bedi




all the sad poets

scratching their way

toward the realization

that they've already arrived

home

in their notebooks

~Scott F. Parker




early morning at my desk

with enough coffee for now

returning myself

to myself

the only way i know how

~Scott F. Parker




final exam


if consciousness

is the cage

to which the only key

is consciousness


solve for

consciousness

solve

for yourself

~Scott F. Parker




ancestral home

granny’s hairpin

opens the door

~R. Suresh Babu




evolution can be seen as a ladder

unfortunately

some choose to climb down


flock of grey people

waiting room at the Hospital Heart Center

~Steve Van Allen




no shooting stars...

my wishes

go back immediately

~Nicoletta Ignatti




Dolls

inflatable hot air balloons

They long to fly very high

but bitten by mosquitoes

they sag

~Nicoletta Ignatti




Fair is foul, and foul is fair”


'Fair is foul, and foul is fair

Hover through the fog and filthy air'

Come nearer the wanderings of the Weird Sisters.


The curtain-An eclipse in the air.



protests here. Protests yonder.


(guided or diverted?)


The eagle: It does not matter

whether the womb gropes to a perfect abode of peace.

~Partha Sarka




sleeping in . . .

one career stumble closer

to packing up

~Roberta Beach Jacobson




under

lap cat

laptop

~Roberta Beach Jacobson




Five years, cat,

and I have never hurt you.

Could you sit on my lap now?

~Noah Berlatsky

 

 


 

 

 

 

Five Fleas swag:

https://www.zazzle.com/store/five_fleas

 

 

Afternoon of August 8, 2024

 
SidDelicious

~Kelly Moyer

Photography available here




he always had urgent information that nobody could use, or ever want to think about again

~Patrick Sweeney




his earliest memories were a buzzkill waiting to happen

~Patrick Sweeney




dead rabbit somehow no more tranquil

~Herb Tate




an antique sign pointing to a change in circumstances

~Patrick Sweeney




all this way to turn around and be stupid me

~Patrick Sweeney




path curves

universe asks

which way now

~Jennifer Gurney




maraschino cherries

in my ginger ale

it’s 5:00 somewhere

~Jennifer Gurney




twilight zone

what I think about when I think

about thinking

~Herb Tate




disquiet

in the library

shushing the shushers

~Herb Tate




The Fun With Physics Series or How I Learned To Start Loving Those Crazy Muons
And Stop Worrying


electron fields

quark fields

W. C. Fields

~dan smith




hail

man shields himself with his

'homeless vet' sign

~John J. Dunphy




my heart weeps

every year

this anniversary

~Jennifer Gurney




many years ago, now

learning about this day…

my eyes opened

~Jennifer Gurney




fertility shrivels

weeping rain drops

a She Oak

~Wanda Amos




my grandson says

we all have gravestones

on our heads


do you know where

your bones are?

~Tom Blessing




bored

the holes

in our blue boat

~Robert Witmer




night storm clouds

a hole shows the blue sky

with one star

~Tejendra Sherchan




death's door

an invisible hole

in the metaphor

~Robert Witmer

 

 

Afternoon of August 4, 2024

 

The Asemic Vacuum Cleaner Demo Being A Poem In Which I Embrace The Group's Critique That They Don't Understand My Poems And By Which The Lack Of Meaning Is Its Meaning And Because It Is Flawed By Having Some Meaning It Doesn't Have Any Meaning


The cosmic sucking sound of entropy

of worlds being pulled apart gone

is any disordered delight

in deforestation now only

deserted deserts of mind blowing

emptiness forever bubbles bursting

cyclic universes coming and going

like traveling circuses

~dan smith




this funfair

down the helter skelter

on a doormat

~Keith Evetts




brazen fly

killed by temptation

my girlfriend’s lemonade

~Chad Parenteau




he spent his life as a non-playing character

~Patrick Sweeney




opening myself to this umbrella

~Maya Daneva




5:45 a.m.    the complete, unabridged and unexpurgated story of how he put his roof on

~Patrick Sweeney




as a silk flower I might last forever

~Roberta Beach Jacobson




it makes perfect sense that the buttermilk boy would be the one to see the Mother of God

~Patrick Sweeney




flooded with moonlight our sunroom

~John J. Dunphy




sugar ants rushing to the scene of the nosebleed

~Patrick Sweeney




a fly not moving on the hour hand not moving

~Sharon Ferrante




house sparrows bathing in the dust of my walkway edging

~Patrick Sweeney




summer evening

the cumulus behind a house

out-wings it

~Tejendra Sherchan




waiting room…

a butterfly fish

jumps on my lap

~Sharon Ferrante




after the long rain

inhaling

all the earth spices

~Kathleen Cain




swarming bees

at the feet of Buddha…

taking refuge

~Tejendra Sherchan




after his child's death

the 'God'

in his correspondence

downsized

to 'god'

~John J. Dunphy




waves are incessant / they come in just to go out / and still I wonder

~Charles A. Perrone




I blink

my visit

is over

~Jennifer Gurney

 

Morning of July 30, 2024

 

 

 

outdoors

the housefly and I

putting our feet up

~Melissa Dennison




Olympic

flame-throwers

dragons

~Roberta Beach Jacobson




flashing church billboard

‘We love you

Sundays at 10’

~Christa Pandey




blaspheming against tv testimonials as a hobby

~Patrick Sweeney




requiem mass

donning the muted colours

of shadow

~John Hawkhead




they threw half-eaten hoagies at the Hurdy Gurdy Man

~Patrick Sweeney




Love is giving him the top half of the bagel every time.

~Rachel Turney




what if all my

dandelion wishes

come true...

~Jennifer Gurney




muscle memory

each room in the house

with its own flinch

~John Hawkhead




Bastille Day

convict breaks out

a deck of cards

~John J. Dunphy




in the sea

diving into flames

water dragons

~Roberta Beach Jacobson




the bronchial cough of the trash-picking bear

~Patrick Sweeney




no one in my reading group knew how to tie a shoe

~Patrick Sweeney

 

 

Morning of July 27, 2024

 

The Burlesque Dancer

~Kelly Moyer
 
Photography available here




 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hold for Poet


Thank you

For your patience.

Our poets are helping

Other readers. Please do not turn

The page.

~Noah Berlatsky




it was in the Roman-controlled Antioch

in the late first century AD

that the plagiarist copied his unnamed sources

~Fhen M.




vows

after so many husbands

I know what to say

~Roberta Beach Jacobson




open window

a gentle breeze

caresses my hair

how warm your hands were

on our last meeting

~Fatma Zohra Habis

 

 

 

starred restaurant—

coming and going of flies

at lunch time

~Nicoletta Ignatti




Mud Holes


Just because you see little holes in the mud

is no reason to suspect earthworms were here.

Birthday candles are the same diameter

and mud is a kind of icing on layer years.

~Terry Trowbridge




asteroid

horizon so close you can

see your back

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel




you must be this tall ↆ

to exit the quicksand

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel