Morning of February 26, 2024

 

 

 

 

 

 

two shoes minus one poltergeist

~Lafcadio

π 

8 

1 

4 

2 

15 

@

~Lafcadio

around and around

pictures on a spinning top

of extinct species

~John Hawkhead

sudden nightfall

pulling tarpaulin

over a face

~John Hawkhead

others are shackled to walls or masts

~Barbara Anna Gaiardoni

chasing people down / yelling / "you ate my brother!"

~Barbara Anna Gaiardoni

If I referenced a classical myth or a jazz musician

you would have to love me, my Pulitzer judge of the heart.

~Noah Berlatsky

lost wallet

retracing my steps

i find myself

~Stephanie Zepherelli

war orphan

finding a teddy bear

with one eye

~Stephanie Zepherelli

the actress

eyelids all aflutter

a moth in a jar

~Mike Gallagher

early hours

crackling cockroaches

underfoot

~Mike Gallagher

ruminating —

a mountain goat treads

the track less taken

~Mike Gallagher

reflections in the mirror

all the voices

in my head

~Mike Fainzilber

 

 

 

power cut

the silence

of the lamps

~Mike Fainzilber

 

Morning of February 19, 2024

 Discovery

evidence galore

exhibits A to Zillion

hoarder in the court

~John H. Dromey

like this her gestures / yes a shadow's width apart / safe from whatever

~Charles A. Perrone

Vomiting

really sucks.

Everyone knows that, I guess.

But sometimes

we need to reaffirm

the simple truths.

~Noah Berlatsky

Help! does scream the kelp

I've washed ashore and cannot

get back to the sea!

~Charles A. Perrone

party animals

tearing the place all to shreds

making life worthwhile

~Charles A. Perrone

fangs

chasing dogs

chasing cars

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

Ay, There’s the Rub

thinks boarding pass is

scratch-off lottery ticket

stranded at spaceport

~John H. Dromey

alley

coatless man and a dog

                frozen

                together

~John J. Dunphy

blood tracks

in the snow

yet it’s certain

his knife is plastic

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

AI flash mobs some assembly required

~dan smith

then when she wasn’t

she was

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

free jazz sandwich—

swiss cheese melody

hold the chords

~dan smith

Afternoon of February 12, 2024

We’re passengers

on the Orient Express

killing time.

~Nolcha Fox

night owl

at his regular perch

picking at a slice of pie

~Christopher Peys

mom's gratitude

for doing the dishes

and holding my tongue.

family politics

~Christopher Peys

I aired my thoughts

on the clothesline. Someone

stole them, how thoughtless.

~Nolcha Fox

Even your successes are failures.

Even your memory forgets.

It is down a long way to have nothing in your hands.

It is down a long way to be nowhere.

~Noah Berlatsky

Hey diddle diddle

Trump said he jumped over the moon

To his disgust

A black hole swallowed him whole

The end

~Philip Hornblow

Floh + Floh = zwei

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

bite

of brown recluse

scurry of legs

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

 

 

field trip

urban kids learn

where milk comes from

~John J. Dunphy

high school activist

her yearbook photo

her first mug shot

~John J. Dunphy

the felon's fingerprints

lifted from

a baby bottle

~John J. Dunphy

eddy poe, jr.

"dada, caw, caw…"

                                             he said

                     "Me a raven."

To which his father replied —

          "Nevermore, my little man,

                    go back to bed ... 

                                                                 forevermore."

~Christopher Peys

MoMA ...

an abstraction

of an abstraction

after the image

the afterimage …

still just dots

on a white wall

~Christopher Peys

feedback&distortiontheslowerosion

~Mark Gilbert

ellipsing around that which is not visible

~Mark Gilbert

the poet is a lamb drinking water

the wolf is a poem that eats us

poems drown with us in sugar water

the river of time moves towards uncertainty
 

~Mykyta Ryzhykh

(Originally published in Setu)

Morning of February 4, 2024

in this neat suburb

where residents conform

the sudden hubbub

when a ring of toadstools

bursts out of the lawn

~Keith Evetts

community sounds nice in theory

~Noah Berlatsky

A Creator’s Wish

Down on me the universe presses

into the microverse I release my stresses.

Planning new lands

with cerulean sands.

As I sit on a boulder,

my imagination a-smolder.

Would that I could create

something, which could luxuriate

and remain till the world’s bygone

like this boulder I sit upon.

~Bernardo Villela

this way daily passing on

~Keith Evetts

once it was real childhood

~Keith Evetts

kingfisher the useless words

~Keith Evetts

Shadowed

I don’t know why that dark reflection

likes to stick to my feet.

Maybe it was the gum I stepped in yesterday.

~Nolcha Fox

A circular copse

Of denuded trees engaged

In pagan rites

~Bernardo Villela

chipped nail paint —

mom’s guitar lessons

in full swing

~Debarati Sen

paradoxical insomnia

nursing

the misogynist's monkey

~Kelly Moyer

stone's throw

a roadtrip

to the afterlife

~Kelly Moyer

Afternoon of February 21, 2023

 

my toe is still blushing from meeting your foot at the boardwalk

~Nolcha Fox

Song


I'm exile

I'm smoke

I'm long dead in the trenches

I am home

nowhere

alive in the fire

erasing words

with the bone of a crow's wing

I'm alone with a voice

of the blank page

~Alexander Etheridge

Last Change of Address

The earth knows we’ll return‒‒

our few feeble movements 

down under the flowers,

and our names repeated like a song’s chorus 

so the ones left won’t forget 

through all the winters.

Look, moon, sun, and moon and sun again,

the mist coming down 

to the cold lake and the churchyard‒‒

It’ll all be forgotten.

~Alexander Etheridge

Past Life

It’s strange how time falls into itself.

One second I’m here, the next

I’m back in middle school---

the hour is bright, my friends there

are so young.

That long dead day is risen

and my life is gone into 

its white-gold October 

moment, my only

life.

~Alexander Etheridge

She opened her mouth

and swallowed a bird.

She spit out feathers

instead of words.

~Nolcha Fox

my dad

still never says much

ouija board

~petro c.k.

the chug-chug-chug of a party bus

~petro c.k.

no fewer people

could see me

than already did

~Noah Berlatsky

 

Ocean Daybreak Sketch

Fogshifts

and a respiration of inland trees

Unanchored graves

Foot-tracks of light

opening

along the lengths of the tide

~Alexander Etheridge

Retreat


Laundry

Expands to fill

All space. All time. The house

Is worn by clothes and we flap loose

Worn down.

~Noah Berlatsky