Afternoon of August 27, 2024

when the Milky Way Galaxy was above and below the chained dipper

~Patrick Sweeney

the high anatomy of chewing vegetable roots and gazing at stars

~Patrick Sweeney

out

of

time

&

hyper

space

earth

no

longer

earth

~Randy Brooks

Hang On!

Moon age

day dreamer.

~Keith Snow

Earth again at last

herds of bison keep

radio silence

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

a snake vanishes—

gravity pulls it down

into the black hole

~Suraj Nanu

the cake exploded

the guest of honor briefly

surprised by the claws

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

zydeco deathmatch

another busker thrown

to the gators

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

"how could they be so dumb?"

child asks his parents

after watching historical reenactors

depict racism

~John J. Dunphy

monsoon at the end...

ants trailing thins out

in my bathroom

~Tejendra Sherchan

pest control

she brooms the salesman

off the porch

~Randy Brooks

I heard that there was a paradise.

But we wouldn't have it anymore.

Some idiot would have lost it.

~Marie Derley

a man’s shadow...

shrinks and vanishes

as he leaves the light

~Tejendra Sherchan

The blunt skeletons in sharp competition

The cloudy morning.

The three-wheelers are rushing breathlessly

To catch more passengers.

I watch and watch day by day

The blunt skeletons in sharp competition

And correct a geography lesson-

Every day the sun rises in the west.

~Partha Sarkar

buttonholing perfect strangers with observational irrelevancies

~Patrick Sweeney

we had tsetse flies and H-bombs when I was your age

~Patrick Sweeney

in her quiet way, she answered all my Chinese destinies

~Patrick Sweeney

already dropped

so many shoes

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

active crime scene crumbs of the cupcake lady

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

Haiku Dilemma

I must rearrange

the poetry books. Alas,

I’m not ready yet.

~Noah Berlatsky

Mahout

just off the Pennsylvania Turnpike

the yellow straw

~Patrick Sweeney

father said to son while counting the change in his pocket:

please don't breathe

~Mykyta Ryzhykh

(Originally published in Pate Journal)

although asphyxiation was improbable,

a full congregation

simultaneously exhaling

~Patrick Sweeney

 

Afternoon of August 24, 2024

Ozone

~Kelly Moyer

Photography available here

I Am Old

Yet though the miracle

of imposter syndrome

eternally young.

~Noah Berlatsky

Ignorance Together

I am glad to have been married

twenty-four years

to someone

who can’t remember

our anniversary either.

~Noah Berlatsky

leftover bay leaf

on my meal plate...

I eat only its scent

~Tejendra Sherchan

Irene

to the untrained eye

she may appear average

but Irene

hides a box of 8-tracks

in the attic

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

housed in thrift store basement secondhand allegations

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

Critique of Pure Raisin

bran

baby

bran

~dan smith

condemned house

its lead-based paint warning

written in pencil

~John J. Dunphy

shuttered nuclear power plant

its grounds aglow

with fireflies

~John J. Dunphy

gaps in

papyrus

rolls

endless space

for genius

~Bob Carlton

clearing sky

the crunch of snails

underfoot

~Bob Carlton