Afternoon of December 22, 2024

 

 

winter night

this silence inside

and out

~Debarati Sen




hothouse flowers . . .

between outcomes

just a matter of degrees


    redirecting force

    Iceland

~petro c.k.

& Jerome Berglund




My insomnia is not worthless

for I have written a bad poem.

~Noah Berlatsky




Goes far yawning yawning


Three points of philosophy.

Yawning...yawning...yawning.


Three points of revolution.

Yawning...yawning..,.awning.


Three points of life...

Rustling...chirping...hissing.


Goes far yawning yawning.


Either a human or the profit.

~Partha Sarkar




prayer sent

13 billion light years

of mostly nothing

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel




slow movement

towards and away

the old master

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel




the senator's

serpentine tongue

reading the room

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel




volcanic pools

waiting for your bones

just a push

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel




self care destruction

~Jerome Berglund




web made visible the struggling fly

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel




stale mints stalemate

~Roberta Beach Jacobson




a beam beams through lexical cracks

~Vijay Prasad




whatever details Neptune won’t tell us

~Roberta Beach Jacobson




tomentosa even hyphenated

~Jerome Berglund




six continents

recoalesce

you need your space

~Richard Magahiz




pseudopods

on the grass

don't tell the HOA

~Richard Magahiz




earth rotates the sun

at 107,000 kilometers per hour

so do I then

~Tejendra Sherchan




world imprisoned

in the social distance circle

three years

~Tejendra Sherchan




agreed upon safe word fait accompli

~Jerome Berglund


 

Morning of December 19, 2024

 


sparrowsong

the girl i remember

myself to be

~words and image Kelly Moyer


from an original line drawing by Molly Harrison









stars?

or holes punched in the top

of my box

~Anne Fox




star navigation…

I find my way

back to earth

~Anne Fox




unpacking…

all the ants

from our old house

~Anne Fox




imagination

a butterfly without

its predators

~Tejendra Sherchan





It’s not fun

To be one of the plates

With no direction

~Sarah Mahina Calvello






Wasted words

Among geraniums

Trying again

~Sarah Mahina Calvello




No escape. It waits.

The laundry.

~Noah Berlatsky




my day

folds and unfolds

clean sheets

~Jennifer Gurney




skating

on the edge

of life

~Jennifer Gurney




etched

in the back of my mind

past-life birthdays

Roberta Beach Jacobson




rain on pavement

car tires shatter the stoplight

into red fragments

~Diane Webster




skylight

illuminates

escape

~Diane Webster



 

 

gallery lighting

the second wife’s

tramp stamp

~words and image Kelly Moyer


Nominations for the 2024 Touchstone Awards

January:

nursery ward baby's first barcode

~Keith Evetts



February:

twist of fate

a typo

in the tea leaves

~Kelly Moyer



March:

microwave burrito showing me its good side

~petro c. k.



May:

chrysalis moon  shedding my former self

~Debarati Sen



June:

on a hushed mountaintop

I play a melodious music

a rhythm of dots, dash, & space

~Fhen M.



July:

outdoors

the housefly and I

putting our feet up

~Melissa Dennison



August:

cryptocurrency the look on grandma's face

~Keith Evetts



September:

wings of geese moving on with my life

~Maya Daneva



October:

a tuft of lint

drifts from my sock

namaste

~Kelly Moyer



November:

fingers don't know how not to love your hair

~Mykyta Ryzhykh



defining

her shelf life…

the matrimonial column

~Rashmi VeSa



December:

midnight silence

another panic attack builds up

in my bones

~Nisha Raviprasad



twelve days 'til Christmas; the mother ship is over New Jersey

~Patrick Sweeney



observing the generally unobserved in the free museum of my mind

~Patrick Sweeney

 

Congratulations to these talented poets.