Afternoon of October 17, 2024

 

chronologically displaced the now of her body

~Vijay Prasad

A Bare Leaf

All the ants have our backs.

The giants without speech wouldn’t

Dare squash us now.

~Dominik Slusarczyk

Harsh words follow tears

Objects fly smashing down hard

A fly on the wall

~Jiel Narvekar

our yule log

flames consume

the 1990s

~John J. Dunphy

A Man Called Toothbrush

bristles

at the thought

of death

ignorant

of the fact

Sylvia Plath

would never

write a poem

about him

~dan smith

late-night thoughts

scratching at the walls

of my skull

~Nalini Shetty

news cycle—

we chew the same fears

again and again

~Nalini Shetty

chasing a buzz

through tangled wires—

still no spark

~Nalini Shetty

country cemetery

a tombstone epitaph

crumbling into brevity

~John J. Dunphy

for years she paints pictures

writes prose and poems

invisible

~Susan Pope

the kettle whistles

mouth dry

she whispers his name

~Susan Pope

Magician

 

Make magic with me.

If we wish hard

Enough we can

Summon rabbits

Wearing tuxedos.

The rabbits will

Know what we

Should conjure next.

~Dominik Slusarczyk

The Light

 

There is a light

Right at the

Bottom.

Sometimes I

See it when

I’m sleeping.

It talks to me:

It says we feel

The same pain.

~Dominik Slusarczyk

spilled ink

pooling between pages—

the moon half-full

~Nalini Shetty

eyelash on my thumb

I make a wish—

the wind takes it first

~Nalini Shetty

stale cereal

a spoonful of routine

to start the day

~Nalini Shetty

country-by-country—

one dream jumps

around the forest

~Ernesto P. Santiago

writer’s block . . .

I shake the jar really hard

to free the fireflies

~Ernesto P. Santiago

We Were Led Past Prickly Bushes

 

I never pretended to know.

I only pretended the

Lights shone when they did not.

 

I needed to see another

Stream sauntering across stones.

 

Those who know don’t

Know they know.

~Dominik Slusarczyk

 

Evening of October 16, 2024

 

atop the altar

a kitten

who knew better

~Kelly Moyer

Don’t go away

Under sunlit leaves

Coffee IV

~Sarah Mahina Calvello

Open doors

A chance to redo this

Ghost of what was

~Sarah Mahina Calvello

signs of spoilage

she longs

for a dignified death

~Kelly Moyer

autumn leaves

we shuffle through piles

of regret

~Kelly Moyer

tucked in for the night

the body

that betrayed her

~Kelly Moyer

chronic illness

if only this life, too,

were fleeting

~Kelly Moyer

RIP Tide

The moon is clutching

the oyster’s pearls,

for she has no family

of her own, while

the rest of us, orphans

all, remain unfazed,

traversing the pitch

by our sorcery alone.

~Kelly Moyer

Come back, Woolly Mammoth

Woolly Mammoth,

If you feel my pulse,

I will remain warm.

Come back Woolly Mammoth,

No warmth in the ambulance–

Only transport for the innocent.

Come back, if you can,

Along with Dinosaurs,

Following the sad last tune of extinct glaciers.

Some precocious are trying to bring you back

To bring chaos in the chaotic miasma.

~Partha Sarkar

midnight mass –

smell of mothballs

from the coats

~Daniela Misso

seated in a bed of hydrangeas my sanity

~Katherine E Winnick

crescent moon

a sickle carving the night

for a day

~Tejendra Sherchan

on the road of maybe dawn light

~Arvinder Kaur

the how of letting go waterfall

~Arvinder Kaur

on geometrical patterns your absence wrinkles

~Arvinder Kaur

 

 

live online

the randomness

of egos

~words & image Wanda Amos