Afternoon of March 25, 2023

a tailor

hanging by a thread

gets the scissors

~Eavonka Ettinger

sky shepherd

tends her fluffy clouds

the sun beams

~Eavonka Ettinger

world war III

avoiding my fear with

serial killer shows

~Eavonka Ettinger

mom finally

learns to text

‘lpbr you teo’

~Eavonka Ettinger

I am still waiting – 

for the Undercover Boss edition 

when Jesus shows up incognito 

in one of those self-righteous 

racist, sexist, homophobic 

evangelical churches 

and fires everyone. 

~ Todd Matson 

a prayer for the eight-legged soul of the spider

~Patrick Sweeney

barefoot on the sharp stones of my hosannas

~Patrick Sweeney

object permanence

the peek-a-boo

of old age

~Patrick Sweeney

I'm the foreigner coughing on the crowded train

~Patrick Sweeney

maybe the trees have their own names for each other

~Patrick Sweeney

traveling light –

a suitcase

full of dreams

~Bonnie J Scherer

baggage carousel …

picking up

where we left off

~Bonnie J Scherer

Afternoon of March 24, 2023

Reason for Being

Your mittens are empty.

Oh, how they carry on 

in their desire 

for something (anything)

to give them purpose! 

So,

you fill them with pudding

(perhaps butterscotch),

and they believe they are

happy for a time.

~Kelly Moyer

sea shells sold by the sea shore—

late-stage capitalism

~petro c.k.

noon forever old VCR

~petro c.k.

midnight with eyes cat

~Roberta Beach Jacobson

draw the curtains

color the windows

with the clear crayon

~petro c.k.

faux fur

lying

around the neck

why choose

false rumors

cover

truth

all that is fake

is not

real

~Julie A. Dickson

Help Yourself to Another!

Futility is a chip

of the highest-quality

chocolate, baked

into a thin disc

of delusion

for your masticatory

pleasure, an expression

of the aggression

that drives 

each moment

of your unfortunate life.

~Kelly Moyer

Seedless

Forgive the woman

inside the watermelon.

How could she have

known

you were allergic

to the salt of her tears?

~Kelly Moyer

Ambi-Ants

Do you feel the way they open themselves 

to the music of the cosmos? 

How effortlessly they transform toil 

into surrender?

There is no hill.

       Only sanctuary.

~Kelly Moyer

blue jay flying off

in its feathers

a piece of sky

~Daniel Birnbaum

under the umbrella

her lips at reach

almost

~Daniel Birnbaum

people in the street

what do we have in common,

we can talk about

~Daniel Birnbaum

Evening of March 21, 2023

Libelous

The summer Sky told

the local newspaper

that she is my sister,

but I don’t eat

grapes for breakfast.

And, I’ve never been

anything . . .

akin to a proper noun.

~Kelly Moyer

Right on the Tip

No language is quick enough

to save a murdered thought—

you know how your word

dangles bleeding from a pole

when you need it in your jaws,

when you need it to be heard.

You have no way to get it

once it’s gone, no way

to pronounce it out loud

once it’s down and gone.

~Will Reger

writing

create, invent, make it

a little bent; real

but not too real,

fun but not humorous,

jokey but

serious

too

~Wayne F. Burke

fog 

trying to read my wife's 

handwriting 

~Devoshruti Mandal

At the Picnic

A bug is crawling down my neck 

With clicking claws and spikey beard. 

I must curtail its frenzied trek 

A bug is crawling down my neck.  

I jump and shout. How could a speck 

Of protein make me feel so weird? 

A bug is crawling down my neck 

With clicking claws and spikey beard. 

~LaVern Spencer McCarthy

wrestling the symphony of fingers and strings on a harp

~Devoshruti Mandal

the car

that blocks the ambulance

seeing red

~Bisshie

old prune juice

clearing the cupboards

and myself

~Patricia Hawkhead

black ink scribbles

deciphering the secrets

in his shadow

~Patricia Hawkhead

passengers of the wind

some almond petals

on the balcony

~Françoise Maurice

In Vain

Flies like fresh fruit, though past their best,

blood orange, rotten to the core;

yet fleas for flesh, as mashed in mess,

drinking vessels, capillaries,

their platelet dish, corpuscle quiz.

Old fools’ gold from prospectors’ hunch,

in vein, a seam of red from blue.

as stake their claim, rare, bloody hue.

Are chips laid down, accompanied,

salt in the wound to irritate?

~Stephen Kingsnorth

Pizza crumbs

From last night’s dinner with you

Memories

~Jennifer Gurney