Afternoon of May 7, 2023

 

~Brian Konopasek

 

their son

died 20 mass shootings ago

22 . . . 23

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

Mindscape

 

From my weeping springs a river

that flows past mountains razed

 

into a valley where the sun

rises and sets on mourning                   

 

and the road not taken, which snakes

around the dark side of my mind

 

forming nightmares sharpened

by starlight and crystal tears

             

slicing holes through a memory,   

half-forgotten, filled with weeping.

~Lauren McBride

I procrastinate

by doing

the wrong work.

~Noah Berlatsky

By the inkwell

Plunge thy drop

      Listen

~gc gould

 

Evening of May 6, 2023

Shy Man Blues

I’m not sure wot to say or even if I should

If I could open up it’d feel good

Can’t express myself without half a dozen beers

I got the shy man blues when I ain’t got no booze

My emotions and thoughts are bound up inside

If I could say wot I want, I’d have a smoother ride

I plays the strong silent type / But it’s a disguise

a week of waiting for Friday nite’s a very bad exercise.

Shy man blues / Shy man blues

There’s no excuse for the shy man blues.

~David Boyle

Fangs devour my day

in their hunger.

Leaving only the pain of dreams.

~Christine Emmert

Flower Moon

bloom beams whitewash

the bedroom

~JL Huffman

irony —

global warming seminar

inside an ac hall

~Debarati Sen

final exam

a student's shirt

stained with espresso

~John J. Dunphy

pink flamingos

the wedding photoshopped pic

with bridesmaids

~Mirela Brailean

dusk

her kohl completes

an arc

~Daipayan Nair

sea breeze

I am never

alone

~Daipayan Nair

Gurneys Norman's

Jack and the Monster is coming

scrapbooking precious lives

from the local press

carefully selected.

~Daniel de Culla

Empty Streetlights

Rub off the stain of people please.

Hustling, Bustling, Rustling like paper leaves.

Unlike the birds

Whose habitat was inhabited

By you, and by me.

Let the trees talk to vacant streets.

Let the streets speak to empty lights.

Leave the gossips to the sky ones, o thee

Click that candid photo

and vanish into your candied beehive.

~Ms. Nobody

The rash spreads

over my heart,

denying remedy.

~Christine Emmert

Lost serenities

in the buzz of time.

~Christine Emmert

draped

in a dusky red saree

the mirror

~Daipayan Nair

Afternoon of May 6, 2023

 

passive aggressive

I shove a bunch of neutrons

out of my way

~Mark Meyer

unusual depth

without

the added weight

of detail

 

i wish to report

i skipped stones

 

and, unable to find Suzie,

i did it alone

 

was that shallow?

~Geoffrey Aitken

picked up coins

in my dream last night

woke without pockets

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

glamorous visions

high pitched voices

the result of gifts

~CJ The Tall Poet

100% implausible

 

perhaps

the inefficiency

 

of the machine

rests

with its inability

 

to feel for itself.

~Geoffrey Aitken

sensor faucet

I pretend

I already know

~Daipayan Nair

Meatgrinder


draws you in

no empty promises

just steel orifice

and ever-turning blades

you go anyway

~Robert Beveridge

a lifetime

of deposits and withdrawals —

memory bank

~Mark Meyer

here there everywhere

I'm just playing around

in a quantum field

~Mark Meyer

FB friends

life diminished

to social distance

~Christa Pandey

autonomic transmission my body stuck in neutral

~Mark Meyer

paranoia out there somewhere an asteroid with my name on it

~Mark Meyer