Afternoon of June 8, 2024

 Recruiting

before

activity

ends in the cerebrum

a precisely located shock

it jumps!

pattern

realigned with our objective

it thinks our thoughts believes

our ends our means

are best

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

old stump

my old butt

good company

~Tom Blessing

“Hey Joe, give me a chewing gum”

barefoot, soiled feet

this boy could have been my grandpa

~Fhen M.

just words

the jurors play

hangman

~Robert Witmer

the golden egg

each morning a different

goose

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

summer sunset—

a bulbul flutters out of a bush

and flies in a curve

~Tejendra Sherchan

My journey

Without a caravan.

Feel the vacuum, beloved.

~Partha Sarkar

the dune moves on

polished metal emerges

from the sands of Mars

~David C. Kopaska-Merkel

Knowing and Not Knowing

 

There are books on my kindle

I probably won’t read before I die.

 

So much knowledge

not in my head when my head

is filled with earth.

Who knows which books?

 

I mean, Finnegan’s Wake, obviously.

But other than that.

~Noah Berlatsky

candlelight

the fortune teller smiles

through the nervous shadows

~Robert Witmer

a white pale man

wore a Donald Duck hat

hired to build roads & airstrips

~Fhen M

flea circus

a mangy cat

snarls at a tiny chair

~Robert Witmer

lying listless

in wet mud

street cats

~Rupa Anand

catastrophic heat

the tree sheds mangoes

just to keep cool

~Rupa Anand

opal sky

the morning slug’s

trail of slime

~B. L. Bruce

sun slow to set

two hoots

from the owl

~B. L. Bruce

You are a hazy

moon, hiding

your intentions

in murky

mumblings.

~Nolcha Fox

annihilation—

Mexican Devils ravage a Peepal

halfway up

~Tejendra Sherchan

Pookie—

dancing to a cover of Boom  Boom

a hearty bowl of Soupy

~dan smith

"here

take everything I have"

i hold out my

empty hands

~Tom Blessing

dining out now checking for symptoms

~Ruth Holzer

giving the bird medicine he screams and dies

~Ruth Holzer

syrtaki for once joining the circle

~Ruth Holzer

waking to the brittle voices of the morning ravens

~Tom Blessing

memory

a brief visitor to my life

the man on a raft of cans

paddling down the ganges

at hardwar

neither of us knowing

the end of the journey

~Tom Blessing

 

 

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Evening of June 4, 2024

Invented Tongue

Griblish glubmitsch

Glinglyglingly

Beritched

Griblish glubmitsch

Mumubliblik

Demingcik digribnik

Duffisuffidly

Vifucked

Demingcik digribnik

Susuçuник

~Olinda Ninolakis

the harder

I hold on

the harder letting go is

~Jennifer Gurney

barcoding

illogical fuzzy logic

tuxedo cats

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

Swiftly

swifts perform a passeggiata

at twilight in Chania harbour

tourists click pics on their mobile phone

parea gathers noone alone

poets recite verse in Terza rima now

the sun melts gently into the lighthouse - how

fast the transition from day to night

scent of jasmine our senses excited

~Olinda Ninolakis

minor misunderstanding

bring on the banjos

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

if I only knew

the path this journey

will lead to...

~Jennifer Gurney

in the corner of my eye

supernova remnant

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

write about

what you know

write about

nothing

~Noah Berlatsky

 

Evening of June 3, 2024

PRF (The Pluto Rehabilitation Front)

Let's campaign to rehabilitate Pluto!

Since I was a child

Pluto was the ninth planet

of our solar system.

I don't want to believe that our teachers

were wrong for so long

or that Pluto had a free ride.

Let's campaign to rehabilitate Pluto

FREE PLUTO - FREE PLUTO!

~Marie Derley

it's too easy now for loners to keep in touch

~Patrick Sweeney

always the first to spot Hitchcock

in the films

he never made

~Patrick Sweeney

leaving the bathroom

a female worker

washes her hands

at

the kitchen sink

~Tuyet Van Do

On the last day of May I lay down

And wept with joy for many things

For friends for foes for sunsets

Sunrise, birds' dawn chorus

Journeys in space time

Lines without rhyme

Love lasting

Soaring

Still

~Olinda Ninolakis

bracing my heart

for the letter in the mail

final papers

~Jennifer Gurney

late night fire pits

long, slow mornings...

the pace of summer

~Jennifer Gurney

droplets on glass

a race to the bottom

I always win

~John Hawkhead

he doesn't want to go to the search party

~Patrick Sweeney

strange quarks

I revise my story

one more time

~John Hawkhead

bulldozers cut coconut trees

to construct a Quonset hut community

~Fhen M.

coke is a symbol of friendship

one advertisement claimed

& we believe it.

~Fhen M.

when only time

stands between now and the end

the finality

~Jennifer Gurney

a fern fiddlehead--

why can't I bloom?

ever questioning

~Tejendra Sherchan

Afternoon of June 3, 2024

The Seductress

~Kelly Moyer

Photography available here

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

separating the river's twin spiriting a boat to drown in

~petro c. k.

innocent antarctic parallel pines

~J. D. Nelson

no possums in the propeller

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

never nevering

~petro c. k.

there once was a twice

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

could be risky hundreds & thousands

~J. D. Nelson

looking to blame Prometheus done with us

~petro c. k.

checkered bovine weirdly impoverished

~J. D. Nelson

digging in the snow

on Burns Night

a handsome skunk

~Janet Ruth Heller

“…not this poem, not this space…”

sweet spot, sucker-punched

solar plexus, took a direct hit

domain of negativity, engaged

like a match to dry hay, papers scorched

recall a poetic colloquialism

writer’s glass chin

~Suzanne S. Austin-Hill

power company

razes lilacs, wild peas—

war zone

~Janet Ruth Heller

antique chamber pot

elevated on a shelf

after all the shit

~Kimberly Kuchar

left in the dust

3-D coral reefers

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

high school stadium

a track hurdle jumped

by a deer

~John J. Dunphy

London wall

two men peeing

across time

~Kimberly Kuchar

behind the singing boys

guitar cover’s dreamcatcher

sways in the wind

~Tejendra Sherchan

my "happy father's day, dad"

drowned out by

the cemetery's lawnmower

~John J. Dunphy

birds

without beaks

ask for a drink

~Mykyta Ryzhykh

(Originally published in Password)

neither here nor there

meet me in Rumi's field

Somewhere Else

~Olinda Ninolakis

bone grates on bone

pain…movement slows

mobility aid

~JL Huffman

I used to feed

a stray cat and her kittens—

now I feed her alone

~Tejendra Sherchan

used furniture store

test-sitting a sofa

I rise with fleas

~John J. Dunphy

Morning of June 2, 2024

the pain of separation

tossing

peanuts to the crows

~Kelly Moyer

dusk

crow

bough

~Noah Berlatsky

fire rainbows

behind polycarbonate

lanugo

~Joshua St. Claire

confounded by her bra clasps night sakura

~Joshua St. Claire

totality

the feel of it

in my goat feet

~Joshua St. Claire

sunset sky

walking home

together yet alone

~Nisha Raviprasad

soft breeze

dandelions cloud

my thoughts

~Nisha Raviprasad

daybreak—

a quick swish

lost in the ripple

~Bette Murdoch Hopper

lorem ipsum

the forests

i have created

the forests

i cannot burn

~Tiffany Elise

dermatologist

interprets constellations

on my skin

~Anthony Lusardi

another time-out

her apple slices

turning brown

~Anthony Lusardi

bare pine tree

your bald head

looking smaller

~Anthony Lusardi

Holy Rolly

I now know that

Papal Pay Pal is

the Pontiff's way

to compensate us

via digital means.

~Charles A. Perrone

The New Baptist

fish sticks and blueberry wine

are how I get closer

to Him.

~Jacob Hatfield

orbital linings

of a pebble—

my fatelines

~Tejendra Sherchan

After Chiya

hototogisu

hototogisu again

daylight again and

~Noah Berlatsky

so you crush moonlight

i too

fight the past tense

~Tiffany Elise

 

Morning of May 28, 2024

 

The Plot Twist

~Kelly Moyer

Photography available here

 

 

 

 

 

 

(metaphysics in the mirror)

flesh: ah, self

~Scott Parker

Buddha Anniversary —

almost all cockroaches die

I seek forgiveness

~Tejendra Sherchan

there's nothing wrong

with montana 

than an early

summer trail

run can't cure

~Scott Parker

 lying in bed,

reflecting on getting older,

telling myself I’m still

sharp, strong, looking good,

then waking up

~ Todd Matson

peeping through

graveyard vines —

black sand hourglass

~Debarati Sen

studying the configuration of violets on the front lawn

~Patrick Sweeney

muddy river      drinking trees

~Scott Parker

another one of my 3 a.m. parleys with a bilocating saint

~Patrick Sweeney

chrysalis moon  shedding my former self

~Debarati Sen

if by salvation you mean the internal temperature of cod

~Kelly Moyer

my last meal   maybe a piece of dry toast

~Patrick Sweeney

hunched man begs

at freeway off-ramp

I offer a prayer

and a dollar

~Shasta Hatter

mug warm with coffee

no rain yet falling

~Scott Parker

dawn

our swimming pool already occupied

by cicadas

~John J. Dunphy

unfazed

the moon has so little

left to say

~Kelly Moyer

early summer's heat

queue for Goddess Sankata

a butterfly’s company

~Tejendra Sherchan

The Elephant’s Stand-In

 

not to be ignored

the dinosaur in the room

recycled junk science

~John H. Dromey

huddled on the dry corner of the mattress...

the bedwetter's

long eyelashes

~Patrick Sweeney

 

Ladylike

~Kelly Moyer

Photography available here