Evening of May 7, 2024

7.951 billion people on trash day

~Patrick Sweeney

searching for a phrase in the snowy ash of my burned-up journals

~Patrick Sweeney

suspicious behavior...he's circling the violets again

~Patrick Sweeney

the witness said he was counting the petals on a rose when shots were fired

~Patrick Sweeney

Webbing

Among more than 4,600 kinds of spiders

We belong to the one that knits a single web

Throughout its lifetime, throwing out all

Its silk, not to catch flies or insects, but

To contribute to the making of a shroud

~yuan changming

maple tree bangs

against my window

a cry for help

~Patricia Carragon

hospital dinner

i ask for soy

and hot sauce

~Tom Blessing

after surgery

one perk

warm blanket

~Tom Blessing

self-driving car

ignores the suggestions from

its backseat driver

~John J. Dunphy

May's heat

the first cicadas

emerge

~B. L. Bruce

Cicada’s Secret

You expend your whole lifetime in soiled darkness

Only to sing a single song high up on a tree

At the sunniest moment of the season. Though too

High-pitched, too mono-toned to the ear, your voice

Sounds like heavenly music to someone that can not

Only recognize you from myriad others, but remain

Your true soulmate until the end of the day

~yuan changming

blue hour

ships passing

silently

~B. L. Bruce

freedom

out of small crack

the chick

~Satyanarayana Chittaluri

barking

in the door gap

a shadow

~Satyanarayana Chittaluri

noise cancelling:

airplane engine droning

drowns tinnitus

~Morag Elizabeth Humble

when the noise stops

silence, once longed for

is deafening

~Jennifer Gurney

Sound of Fury

In this vast

Valley full

Of red dust

Each noise

Is an echo

Of what has

Been muted

As a protest

Or warning

~yuan changming

solitude . . .

my loud thoughts dilute

into the forest floor

into the cloudy sky

and the path ahead

~Anthony Lusardi

packed train

a passenger sits

shaving her legs

~Tuyet Van Do

woolly caterpillar,

I'm down to the log

you were sleeping on

~Patrick Sweeney

first snake sighting

I put away

my winter coat

~John J. Dunphy

Here in This Antlike Moment

Here in this antlike moment

Arise my spirits

Illuminating my own shadow

They’re up against the dark cloud

Ready to join in a heavy storm

Shooting like a thunder

Now I see the unlimited sky

Besides the cracking light

Now I know my fate

~yuan changming

looking skyward

lifted by your graceful flight

I grow wings

~Jennifer Gurney

 

Afternoon of May 4, 2024

an innermost bear

draws his claws along her skin

and brings forth blood.

 

it spills, hot, red, river-running.

 

the bear, gently, draws his tongue along the wounds

and she is cleansed

~isabella mori

spidery old apple tree

you and me

            gnarled

~isabella mori

scratchy socks

thrice darned they’ll have to last

until the babe is born

~isabella mori

mailman –

the irritated nostrils

of the doberman

~isabella mori

played in my head the Gymnopédie No. 1

trudging aimlessly

on maze-like streets of the city

~Fhen M.

on a rooftop, I talked to the full moon

requesting her to return to my arms.

~Fhen M.

whispering wind telling me about the moon

it was meant to last to caress lost souls

~Oana Maria Cercel

left the hive sweet home scent disappeared

~Oana Maria Cercel

Fast train

the door opens

to perpetual life

~Oana Maria Cercel

In this place, there’s

old & new,

order & disarray,

variety & then the mundane,

evidence of winter & spring among the

hand-me-downs & discards surrounded by

brokenness & near-perfection.

Where is this place?

My closet or my life?

Like & vice versa are the former & the latter.

~Suzanne S. Austin-Hill

Over The River


The covered bridge

flashes a strobe vision

of a primordial cave

before releasing us

to grandmother’s house.

~Diane Webster

Glee Tumbles


The three-legged chair

invites pedestrians to rest

then tumbles them out

in a wobbly guffaw

like Dad did his girls

when he pushed them

in the wheelbarrow

then tumbled them out

in arms, legs, hair

screaming in glee.

~Diane Webster

Night Eyes


Into the night two lamps

stare like beasty eyes

caught in a flashlight beam

then gone in a blink

and wondering where

they are now.

~Diane Webster

Pier Bones


The spine of the pier collapses

into a jumble of bones bleaching

into the hope of fossilization

in the river’s solid silt

encasing a wooden mummy

awaiting discovery,

awaiting reassembly

of ooh and ahh!

~Diane Webster

Moment of Gone


The crevice shimmers vertigo

of false landing only a step

away; a staircase descends

one stair at a time

each step safe and secure

against granite cliffs

until the step

that never ends

while you’re still alive

in a moment of gone.

~Diane Webster

Afternoon of April 30, 2024

when you say “I don't know” you're not lying

~Keith Snow

the bird breathes with wings of hope

~Mykyta Ryzhykh

daddy longlegs steady as he goes

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

be ready your driver is three strawberries away

~Keith Snow

heaven is born for its own crucifixion

~Mykyta Ryzhykh

another day

adding to the list

why, why and why

~Biswajit Mishra

Nasal Passage

follows her nose

her deviated septum

leads her astray

~John H. Dromey

Ripple

Hear, see, write

Hear, see, change

See, think, change

Think, change

Hear, change

back

~Biswajit Mishra

crystal-clear dreams

I fall asleep wearing

my glasses

~John J. Dunphy

Bargaining with a hawker

And underlying him

I get repentant and

Search for the hawker

To overvalue my cognition.

~Partha Sarkar

the seagull doesn't know that it can't fly, so in the end it flies

the feathers were left lying on the windowsill

feathers can no longer be considered feathers due to the absence of a bird

feathers can turn into a souvenir

feathers can turn into an ornament of an ancient person

feathers can turn into an anthropologist's find

feathers can turn into anything

but where has the bird gone now?

~Mykyta Ryzhykh

Sweeping away the innocent dead birds,

The bastard wisdom:

Not my stupidity, El Nino causes

The birds' death

From / in heatwave.

~Partha Sarkar

birds die like dots

on the horizon of a sky

pierced by military missiles

~Mykyta Ryzhykh

dusty webs

and the husks of flies

cedar chest

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

Chore Embellishment

Light bulb is replaced.

Dawn returns to universe.

Christ has returned.

~Chad Parenteau

writing a haiku

in the snow

the dog pees

~Noah Berlatsky

catching

large-mouthed bass as his wife gives birth

fisherman

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

Cold skin learns to warm bones

Another star falls from the sky to the ground

Another bone falls into the autumn coffin

~Mykyta Ryzhykh

 

 

"you call that a eulogy?!"

minister interrupted by

the deceased

~John J. Dunphy

tired photons fly

into the forever dark

end times

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel