At Seven

by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal

At seven
I hardly spoke any English.
I would get car sick
and could not distinguish
shoes from choose.
My heart was pure.
I stayed away from knives.
 
My mother was my barber.
Sometimes I would cut my own hair.

Your Shadow

by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal

I look at you,
and I look at your shadow.
The shadow seems nicer.
I could look at
the shadow a little bit
longer.   It is difficult
to talk to a shadow.
 
I get dirty looks from you.
Your hoarse voice would be
 
lovelier in absolute silence.

Dream To Life

by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal

I want to bring my dream to life.
I fear it is vanishing.
The presence of oblivion is near.
It approaches in a cloud of smoke
in the quiet hours of night.
 
I am after the elusive dream,
the lost music of the heart.
I want to arrive to a place
where our nights are spent together
if that is not too much to ask for.
 
I want to say your name and I love you.
My time is fading fast.
The sound of your voice moves me.
My fugitive dream escapes me.
The breeze of your breath is
the most pleasant noise I ever heard.
The hours take flight and my heart
cannot remain silent.
 
The sweet months are dissipating.
I cannot count on my dream.
Each day the dream is vaguer.  Dates
look like shadows.
 
Silence envelops my heart.
I rest my head in my unconscious state.
I dream of rain and of a
solitary figure gathering flowers
in the tremulousness of days.
It is a quiet dream.
I do not even know it is night.

In The House Of Song

by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal

I stand in the house of song
and give my heart to you.
I seek your love just like
the many before me.
 
Perhaps I am wrong.  I know
you deserve flowers and
much more, my friend.
 
I stand in the house of song.
Take my flowers.  Don’t let
bitterness fill your heart.
 
Adorn your hair with them.
Take my flowers.  Like you,
they’re more precious than gold.
 
You are beautiful and I
sing for you like the
ancient turquoise birds.
 
In the house of song I bang
my drum for you all night
long.  I drink wine and
I pour a glass for you.
You make my heart happy.

I Don't Want To Wake Up

by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal

I lie still,
pretending to be asleep,
pretending to be a tree;
before long I am dreaming.
I don't want to wake up.

I wake up in a village
and then I nod off.
In this dream I am far
away from home.

I take a long nap.
I don't want to wake up.
The blue sky dreams
it is a cloud.

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Shine

by G. E. Brown

shine

shine

this late spring breeze

plays your chimes

please

please

rest your right left hand

in mine

eight fingers intertwine

like ivy

long distance runners climb

the incline

straight line straight line

I ring

each metal sign

You

harmonize

the key of your chimes

lively eyes lively eyes

shine

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Homeless

by Jenny Catlin

I miss the snow. Miss it in bones and muscles and fibrous tissues.
Miss it the way I missed drinking and
Missed faceless sex. Heart sinking into belly when pictures freeze me here.
 I am not home.
I am not sunny and never grey home.
Foggy mornings and bright spread trees never heavy under the weight of powder and white landscape.
I am not hot chocolate, more schnapps than marshmallows home.
Or call in-stuck. With white Russians and board games and 
hope that the sun never comes out again home.
Oh god I miss snow on pine trees and black in car tires forever cold-fireplace home.

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The Handyman's Funeral

by Robert Demaree

Could not have been fifteen people there,
Including the men with the flag:
The widow, flanked by—what?—sisters,
A cousin or two;
Others called by duty:
Had they known him, liked him
Any better than I,
His work for us marked by
Scowls, hateful slurs,
A way of getting things
More-or-less fixed.
The young minister was a stranger, too,
His eulogy brief:
Ah, those skills, he said, those skills.
The men from the Merchant Marine
Didn’t fold the flag just right.
She carried it with her when she left
Along with the book that held our names.

Casting

by Robert Demaree

After two generations
Fishing has returned to our dock.
The right kind of ripple
Would summon my father
From the table,
Abandoning coffee and dessert,
Sometimes his dinner guests,
To cast a plug
In search of small-mouth bass.
Those less fortunate
My mother, with some reluctance,
Would fry in deep fat,
Oily Fifties fare.
Other days I rowed him around the pond,
Adolescent thoughts skittering,
As he patiently trolled.
 
I left his plug on the shelf.
Our girls had no interest either.
Now their sons drop lines
Off a different dock,
Night crawlers seeking out
The descendents of other bass.
The Fred Arbogast Jitterbug smiles,
Awaiting a second turn.

Blue Heron

by  Robert Demaree

The blue heron glides low across the pond,
Slowly, as though suspended.
In my mind it is 1968 and
The Lockheed C5A hangs in the blue air
On a test run
Over a shopping mall in Georgia,
The British engineers who worked on it
Outraged at Kroger’s, laid off, sent home.
How many tanks did it transport,
Unreported to undeclared wars,
And why is it you never seem to see
The blue heron with a partner?

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Spring Breakup 

by John DesCamp

I’ve been drawn to the perilous magic
of walking on this frozen river;
suspended on water by water.
Saved, like Peter, from drowning;
although my faith is in the simple laws of physics,
which I can grasp.
 
Your Spring arrives.
My ice cracks
under the sun’s lengthening gaze.
When it sets, I’ve asked the stars.
Their answer doesn’t change:
“Why stay frozen here?”
But this way of being is hard to break.
 
I’ve grown good at this game;
can live as I have, recklessly,
jumping from one dangerous and disappearing
ice floe to another:
lovers, travel, work, solitude— poetry;
I’ve stepped quickly and lightly
on each of them
searching for warmth and solid ground.
 
Maybe it’s time.
Each day the islands of refuge are smaller
and my river more insistent.
I’d like to feel the sun on my back,
new green on my banks
and the apprehensive joy
of flowing into a new, warm, land.

Prayers, Then And Now  

by John DesCamp

All-knowing God, give me what is best for me. Avert evil from me, though it be the thing I prayed for; and give me the good which, from ignorance, I do not ask.
Prayer of Socrates
 
 
Then: 
May the depth and intensity of my love
be proportioned to my desperate need
for the lover who will complete me.
Send me beauty without warmth,
transient lust instead of enduring love,
self-absorption that only I can serve,
material wealth and spiritual poverty.
 
Now: 
Give me kindness, the long curve of a slender hip,
quick intelligence, strong hands and
warm easy laughter.  The wisdom of Athena
and the unashamed passion of Venus;
a secret grotto at the base of the neck, and
a happy delight in my sometimes difficult presence.
 
I did not know how to ask for you. 
But only invite me
into the quiet harbor of your affection,
and I am safely home.

 

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Spirit Level

by Karen Douglass

A long bar with a round window
in the middle, divided by
a glass tube, itself marked
with two lines and filled with
amber liquid but for enough air
to leave a bubble that fits exactly
between the centered lines.

With the bar laid on a horizontal,
the air glides like a spirit to the center,
drawing “Aah” from a builder intent
on balance. Thrown down in anger,
the level shatters, otherwise lasting
for generations, guiding the spirit
toward the center, keeping it within
the lines between good and not so good,
nudging the work toward level and true.

A plumb line and right angle will do,
giving similar advice, but not with
the same easy air.

Standing in the Bottom of the Sky

by Karen Douglass

Today is not a church
wherein women faint from desire
long restrained. I can slip into
some loose thing and survive
this thrashing, fevered day
as if plagued by constrictors
and anacondas. I can ride
the wind horse, pole vault over fear,
limbo under it, loosen
the fainting corset of no breath,
leap into the last lifeboat and
sail into the sky.

But
I am already there--here
in the ocean of air, ruffled
by its eddies and currents. Not
separate from those
six white pelicans
riding high on thermals.

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An Old Pump Of Long Ago

by Duane Locke

It might be speculated, this pump, old iron.
Rust-gold speckled, green cilia forests
on sprout--
Red-clay dust, lightened to become skin color pink
On the lilting curve of its iron back-- was
My Bible.
Its squeak a music--atonal- predicted Schoenberg,
From its high pitched serialism came a flow of water
With red-gold specks from out of the earth, an
Epiphany.
Holding and moving its iron handle was a holy
Moment like watching the fluttering of a moth’s wings.
My shoulder felt its companionship, a type of
Communion once attributed to guardian angels.
I looked at the water, its tiny scraps of beige roots,
Its red-lipped sand grains, felt the earth’s enchantment.

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Taking Her By Surprise

by Keith Moul

They agreed he was no thief

but surely he had taken

her by surprise,

caught her singing sultry melodies;

spied on her enjoyment

of herself; wished

to travel with her

to her favorite getaways.

Her eyes are especially good

with surprise.  Her body

contains its joy

for savoring later,

with him, and without shame.

Taking Hold

by Keith Moul

They agreed she was no thief

but surely she had taken

hold

with renewed passion.  Sometimes

she humbled him, grabbing

the lead in their dance of love.

Sometimes his mind struggled

to accept how she molded its thought.

She cornered him, sometimes,

until he climbed the walls

of his cage, lost control

of his body, sought sanctuary

in recollection of his ascendancy.

Taking It As Her Right

by Keith Moul

They agreed she was no thief

but surely she had taken

it as her right

to hope for wonder,

to build an enduring bliss

and sit atop it like a queen.

He had no architectural skill

and haunted the low places.

He had no royal blood,

preferring to suck others'

in the rat alleys among walkups.

He had small hope

and wondered by what right

her sights aimed so high;

many feet lower

and he would be hit dead center.

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The Backyard Cartographers

by Ben Nardolilli

We had a sacred authority
While everyone was away,
Setting horizons to coordinates
During the off-seasons,
No one knew the woods
Or the underpass environs
Better than us, wood
And cement we took time
To learn them both,
Masters and archbishops
Or such varied trivia,
We can only hope that now
These settled tourists
Will buy the maps we made
By us trolls in elves’ clothing.

Recording Legend

by  Ben Nardolilli

Too much time in the shade,
But it was the kingdom’s domain,
Trees against all the houses,
I had to hammer in artificial light.

Under the gate, there was hacking,
Even of saplings, I was vicious,
I rejected truce and surrender
In order to open the door fully.

Through the woods I ran,
Hopping from patch to patch
Of whatever sun was let in
By the court of branches overhead.

Soon I left the canopies behind,
There were bridges instead,
Smokestacks and buildings,
And parks filled only with grass.

Loose over an urban grid,
Moving with curves in my steps
And giving off words in bloom,
I was happy to be the only plant

Nothing came over to perch
Curious for my shoulders,
Or the strength of my arms,
I shed much but sheltered little.

When winter came I was bare,
My skin hardened, I desired
To return to the forests
And feel soft and short again.

When all was green in the hills,
I left the mountains man-made,
And wandered back into the shade
Along the leopard colored floor.

Blocked Together

by  Ben Nardolilli

Here everything is practical,
Efficiently wasted and exhausted, 

No song comes out the car horn,
No poetry comes out the nearby speakers,

But sometimes the pair can arrive here,
And not just framed in a gallery,

They  might settle down beside the corpse
Of a suicide completed after a fall

From an observation deck to a car roof,
Leaving a face at rest in a sea of twisted metal.

No Sympathy For the Jukebox

by Ben Nardolilli

She flushes the product business
Of all her interests from every region,
It was meant for tears
But instead draws laughter from us
In the neighboring rooms,
Since we are only separated
By walls made of brown paper,
Oh, she screams for silence
And becomes a movie instead,
You blame the wine and I blame
Her ineptitude at settling down
To write a better screenplay
That might avoid such messes,
Nevertheless we have to stop her
From hurting the poor innocent
Credenza and china playthings
That she gave to us as a menagerie.

Untitled #22

by Ben Nardolilli

In this ventricle, I search
For an atrium, vines
Vibrate on the walls and floors,
All are forced to shuffle,
Empty glasses shake at the bar.
An ostrich dances, the men
Compliment her feathers,
While turbans, pillbox hats,
And patched together tuxedos
Pass through the crowd.
The lights sweep the floor,
One beam passes over another
Like palms reaching for faces,
They turn my ice to stained glass,
But the taste of untaste remains.

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My Brother Once Had A Job

by Burgess  Needle

My brother once had a job
         standing day after day
         before enormous scanning devices
Recording the past for the future.
My brother once had a job
         placing large volumes face down
         page by page to be lit and copied
Digitizing brittle sheets into binary code
My brother once had a job
         operating what were called
         optical character scanners
Capturing every word of every page
My brother once had a job
         where he worked alongside
         a Mi’kmaq Indian who believed
They were stealing souls
         and when they were finished
         that would signify the end of time
My brother once had a job
         where the Mi’kmaq shared his
         belief and both of them quit
Before the end of their shift
Before they’d qualified for
         medical and term life figuring
         they’d already done so much damage
Why wait around for coverage

No More Than A Myth

by Burgess  Needle

She was dying and he didn’t know what to do
         except have a waking dream of himself
         in a library searching for a cure.
The woman’s name was Columbia
An on-line reference was hopeful.
There was a catalog number that stretched
         over a dozen numerals, so he was
         grateful for a piece of cardboard
                and pen handed him by a glowing child.
The heavy book, on a distant shelf, covered
         foreign policy.
Carrying it to the parking lot, he looked
         around but could not see his car which
         was filled with promises
                and hopes for the future.
The single volume was
         impossible to carry all the way
         to some idealistic destination.
A seductress appeared and told him
         if he helped her, she’d show him
         where his car was and everything in it.
With fluttering hands and wild hair, her eyes
         so red they burned holes through ideals.
She requested he hold her in his arms
         and sing the phrase
         Down will come baby cradle and all
        until she relaxed and said Okay.
He ended up before a five-sided building.
It was summer. There were many stairs.
There was a hint of lilacs in the air.
He strained to reach the front door, but
         his fingers were wet and losing
         their purchase on the book.  
Something was decomposing.
My first olfactory dream, he thought.
In the end, the book was of no help.
The dying woman was now
         beyond recognition.
Back on the street his red-eyed goddess pointed
         to a distant vehicle, a possible goal,
         in an otherwise empty lot.
He finally dropped the book by the side of the car
         that was not his and cried until the music alarm
         by his bed went off and the cannons of the 1812
        plucked him from an empty lot to an empty bed
         where he lay with aching arms,
         the smell of death inside him,
         and bright sunlight streaming through lace curtains
         belying his mood, telling him it was all ancient
                history and he’d been old and alone a very long time.
Could it be, that Columbia had never been more than a myth?

Lottery Of Friendship

by Burgess Needle

There in that magic house
Resting on a hill of volcanic rock
I stood before a wall of glass
Clear as an eye to the loving universe
Astonished at my own impossible age
Some ridiculous biblical number
And sighed in a kind of ecstasy aware
Of their faces nodding my way
Surely I was blessed by the Gods of chance who let slip
First prize to me in the lottery of friendship

The Kindest Man In The World
 [Based on an experience I had in northeast Thailand]

by Burgess  Needle

Short, dark, intense Sanguan stressed
            me daily to bike with him
            and visit Sweet Vegetable
A small village at the edge of our province.
Riding along berms separating
            rice paddies we pedaled our rickety
            machines within the peripheral gaze
Of leery water buffalo who jumped
            at our clickety-clack then resumed
            work as we careened
Along their muddy world.
Downtown Pak Wan
            several huts on stilts and skinny children
            playing mindlessly in dust until
I nervously opened a new pack of cigarettes
            allowing a thin strip of cellophane to float
            their way, initiating pandemonium
In pursuit of that shimmering prize.
As I inhaled smoke, we pushed our bikes
            to a dry field and over to a silent hut
            and meet, in Sanguan’s words,
The kindest man in the world.
Cheewin, had been a cop who loathed
            his reflection in the eyes of others
            so took the love of his life to this barren
Lot and shortly had two children and no rice.
Nothing. No seed. No water.
“The Buddha will show his love for this man,”
            Sanguan said. “For his kindness.”
“There’s no water on his land,” I stated the obvious.
“Rain falls all around him,” Sanguan sighed.
Not far away I thought I saw bones of a fallen
            buffalo and wondered
Am I in some morbid parable?            
We approached a three-walled structure
     of wood strips and corrugated steel.
The roof was a sagging piece of sheet metal, mostly rust.
Cheewin appeared and we all wai’d each other
            before retreating to shade and a few
            stained mats and it was then I felt
The dark energy of the kindest man in the world.
A man in the wrong universe.
His alert eyes probed
         my appearance and my features.
Here was a man who should be holding court.
A tentative smile then a hand held out for me to shake
        allowed a surge of despair to run from his palm to mine.
He motioned for us to be seated.
Inside, his wife breast fed the latest addition.
            Her curiosity overcame her shyness. Putting her baby down
            she slipped out to meet us, wearing a bra that’d been
            loosened to feed her baby.
A drab pasin was loosely wrapped about her waist.
“This is my wife, Adjara,” I understood him to say.
Despite the humidity, heat and dust, Adjara’s silky hair
        fell lightly on her smooth shoulders. She looked up
        at the mention of her name. Seeing my stare, she quickly
        glanced away. We squatted on the floor and using Sa-nguan
        as an intermediary,  talked about school, Thai food, America and work.
Adjara had the loveliest smile in a thousand acres of greenery.
She whispered something to her husband.
He clapped his hands, directed his boy to get a coconut.
The boy quickly scooted up a tree as Cheewin
           played with his fingers and spoke faster than I could follow.
 Sanguan translated that Cheewin was ashamed he could not offer
           me anything more substantial than a coconut.
There was a loud scream followed by a thud.
Adjara leaped to her feet so quickly one breast flew free
       with a drop of milk still clinging to a brown nipple
       away from her baby’s eager mouth. Clutching
      the infant tightly and slipping her breast back inside
      all in one motion, she disappeared
      behind the rear wall of the house.
A small boy’s painful whimper emerged despite her cooing.
Cheewin seemed lost in thought, so despondent even this family
     emergency wasn’t enough to shake him.
I began to stand, but Cheewin shook his head.
I remained seated. Everything was going so badly
             all I wanted to do was leave, but at that point
            Cheewin offered me a drink of cloudy water.
Despising myself for even thinking of the water as cloudy,
I drank it and thanked him profusely.
His look implied I was over doing it.  
I flipped the lens cap off my camera, set
        the aperture for a sunny day and asked him to look
        in my direction. My thought: take a few pictures and
        send copies back as a present for his hospitality.
Cheewin looked down at his lap as his fingers fought themselves.
Almost inaudibly, he said something to Sanguan.
       I paused and waited.
“Mr Cheewin says he feels ashamed to have you
take a picture now.  These are bad times to photograph
for your family in America,” Sanguan said.
“He prefers you wait until after the harvest when
 he will have a new shirt.”
In some clumsy fashion I made my goodbyes.
We pedaled away leaving Cheewin to wait for a better harvest.
All the paddies near Paak Waan appeared strikingly lush
save Cheewin’s parched soil and dried plants.
I wondered what sin he could have committed in a previous
life to deserve such a sentence.
I left with no photos of that area.
The images stayed sharp enough without reminders.
Later, when I struck the prayer bells
in Ayuthya’s largest  monastery, I prayed
for a good harvest in Paak Wan
And better times ahead for
            The kindest man in the world.

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Freed, Emphatic Rubble

by John Pursch

Heels conclude their systematic tiling
of every cloven wheat field,
cowering and crowing
about and above,
impishly fecund.

Doors fly beneath the card deck's crannies,
stiffen over fermenting heights of cookie beasts,
and grate indemnity into curling irons.

Periodic pieces of rousing redemption
stamp cleanly in the moot, evaporative stares
of lonely mosquito netting,
cooly umpiring the blue's expired legions.

Ruminating clouds
draft choice portions
of freed, emphatic rubble,
tippling toward the tomb line,
ecstatic yet berieved.

The lost arrival's misbegotten envelope,
the bin's connubial quandry,
the leash's angry phosphorescence,
the eel's clarity in svelte, styrene joy;
immanence expands it all,
quickened by aliquots of alabaster
and virulent, red wine.

Lost and Frozen Leaves

by John Pursch

Pure fumes of sulfur acres,
anonymous and arthroscopic,
hang from taught, distended bowlers,
threatening gutters everywhere.

Clogged veins, translucent leaves, grimy fingers,
the dust of a thousand spinning plains,
the swarming cackle of animal lust,
the longing for just one, solitary instant
of unexpected joy...

Shade your eyes, young warrior.
Cover your flanks, bovine brethren.

Limp slowly over the parapet,
drift quietly into the cumuli,
spin with the settling snow,
anchor your boots on the heaving deck,
eye the airborne icebergs,
let fly the hideous, hibernal harpoon...

Maim the mariner's mammal,
marooned marauder,
maundering for a day
of clean release.

Merge with the mast's arboreal lineage,
shimmering with lost and frozen leaves
in the endless, icy sea.

Mohair Ejection Seat

by John Pursch

Off to disinfect her agile escalator's
blue jean repose mechanism,
history's perusal blanches
at denizens of prosaic milk cars,
columnar ejection seats,
and greasy dudes from an inner earache,
pendulous and dimly esteemed.

Armpits of the pelted, mythical whirlpool
gallantly cavort with crucial knapsacks,
hinting at sparse peril
and fierce, embodied land lock.

Spaniels drift into mirth,
heady in their omniscient
undertones of song regret.

Haberdashers go limp at the
slightest sound of a graceful wolverine,
piling like cord wood and sprung wattage
in the bilious biplane's jungle.

Time Ran Down

by John Pursch

Looking south, time ran down
corridors of solid, velvet steel,
tilting the fabric of geriatric need,
spilling out tumblers of tourmaline
and jaded quarts of tangled warnings,
woven hampers notwithstanding.

Flying through hasps of cloud,
swordfish imbue the rank, seditious flock
with beakers of another flagrant yen,
flooding the neighbor's blue landlord
with inklings of a nadir's bland irrelevance.

Yellow noise drifts over the tracks,
pins down the nearest amulet,
swings a swiveling carbon copy,
and rests its weary reeds,
nibbling at the conductor's score,
elevating clear art to a purity of discourse
rarely spawned in this brackish, backwater town.

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King of the Mountain

by Thomas D. Reynolds

There was no annointing,
No bowing or tipping
to the weight of history,
no lines of succession
stretching back through
a forest of legitimate
or illegitimate heirs,
no incantations,
no torches or troops.
 
The day he put
The finishing touches
On his mountain cabin
Amid a moat of stones,
Only a curious hawk
Circled about him,
A patient, silent advisor
Warning him to hurry,
Winter approached.
 
A vacuum of power
Leads to fragmentation,
A cabal of rivals.
His throne stood
On the cabin’s west side,
A five feet wide boulder.
From there he surveyed
A range of five peaks,
A kingdom of pines.
 
Squirrels were peasants
Already chattering
Of revolution.
Somewhere lumbering
Among the dense trees
A bear planned overthrow,
The only rallying cries
His fierceness,
His cold vacant eyes.
 
By the first night
The drawbridge was up,
The castle lit only by
One narrow lantern.
Outside torches flashed
In the darkness, cries
Drew closer on the paths.
Not even the hawk
Remained at his side.

Saturday’s Wolf Hunt
Paola, Kansas 1903

by Thomas D. Reynolds

Wolves have gotten numerous
in areas of this county,
Lurking on edges of fields,
Stirring cattle in pens at night,
Howling on hillsides so that
A number of the womenfolk,
also a good portion of men,
Have lost a bit of sleep these weeks.
None enjoys dark things
Lurking on the edges of one’s mind.
 
So about two hundred men and boys
With determined minds for a route
Formed lines on the Sol Henness farm
Promptly at 10:30. The mayor himself,
Pleased with the turn out, was among
The group beginning at the southeast corner
Of the Light Hill, west of Paola. Other lines
West to Ethan Chiles’ southwest corner,
East to Wes O’Connor’s corner, and at
The southeast corner of Long Altman’s
North corner began moving toward
Jake Kiser’s place, south of Wagstaff.
All fellows hale and hearty, trekking
Across half the county still as mice.
 
Two wolves were sighted by noon.
One large grey timber wolf about the size
Of a yearling calf, from one account,
Ran over three or four good-sized men
And got away, while in a ravine by
Bull Creek, another run up against
A good-sized sapling of a boy and
Forthwit received his just desserts.
 
The aforementioned specimen of
The lurking, howling sleep invader
Was stretched out over a oak limb
When his elder but come-up-empty
Fellow wolf hunters gathered around
To congratulate him. A few brave ones
Examined the ruffled hide and one
Checked the formidable row of teeth.
Canteens were passed about, and then
The mayor mentioned more fiends
Wandering out there, among downed
Trees, in thick brush along fence rows,
And if the womenfolk are going to sleep
Soundly in coming days, it is advisable
That lines begin moving out again,
Meeting up, may all be a resounding success,
At Jake Kiser’s place with more hides
That the Devil can carry on his back,
As broad and hairy as a wolf’s.

Sawmill Country

by Thomas D. Reynolds

Nothing moved or seemed to move about the sawmill
two hours after workers trudged home in groups,
Some gripping buckets, others lowering their heads
As they parted at the top of the hill and entered,
Just as they entered that morning, the darkness.
Below, the great blades threatened to carve up silence,
To slice it into four by four beams and lay it in rows
To be hauled by moonlight aboard phantom rigs
Down dim roads leading no place, no time.
Before nodding off, the watchman pulls out his watch
That he forgot to wind before coming on and glances,
Just as he glanced two hours before, at the end of time.
Only a thin shadow, maybe a mouse or twitching tendon,
Rustles his boot strings, catching dim threads of denim
And launching itself up one knee past dense hairs
Of his right hand, which recoiled from something grim,
Something soiled or dead or which used to be dead.
For the first time that night, the watchman glanced
Through timber at the place where the workers parted,
Some with a few tired words, others with only a nod,
But all then quickening their pace through darkness
To meet up again with something human and alive.
 
 
That afternoon the Jameson crew was cutting timber
On Peacock Ridge, where trees were spaced so thick
No truck could maneuver the snake-ridden logging roads.
So the men set off on foot with saws, one on each end,
down rocky paths with a glance every third or fourth step
into the dark trees, as if someone or thing were watching
that if not for the jagged saw teeth, might have pounced.
The day was cloudy, wind as rough and hoarse as breath
Of a septic mule, staggering in the pen before with rifle
Some old farmer took pity and squeezed the trigger.
All day trees fell into tangled vines and brush,
Then were chained and pulled by team and wagon
To the top of the ridge, where the waiting trucks backed
And hauled them away in darkening sky and then rain.
Even when Jameson’s muffled shout to haul in echoed
On the other side of the mountain, off the high bluff
Where a startled black hawk dived from a scrub pine,
No one spoke aloud the thought that stirred and beat
Its wings and clawed air in the caves of each of their brains:
This is the place where the wandering boy from Ponca
Was last seen five months before, vanishing into timber
While his father turned his back and the sun faded.
 
 
Six days the men, women, and children of Ponca
Had searched timber about and around Peacock Ridge,
Through caves and bluffs above rolling Buffalo River,
And in sandy juts along surrounding creeks.
Footsteps clattering along rocks stirred up quail
And bob white and rabbits leaped from within brush piles,
But none turned up even a scrap of the boy’s flannel shirt,
Or heard even a throated whisper from the silent timber.
Only the mother’s howl periodically echoed through hills
As if it were the noon or quitting bell beside the sawmill door
But instead of quitting it urged them on, on into the dark
When kerosene lanterns were passed out by Jameson,
With John McCrory passing out plates to those returned
Shaking their heads and avoiding looks at the father
Kneeling by a stalled truck clutching the sides of his head,
Watching each party as it materialized out of the timber,
With a buzz saw cutting his heart in jagged two-by-fours,
Ends as jagged as a tree trunk torn up by the roots.
Finally, the search was called at the end of the sixth day,
And now timber on Peacock Ridge has another secret,
Stirring like leaves as wind picks up long after midnight,
Just as the night watchman glances off into the timber.

Bear Traps and River Rock

by Thomas D. Reynolds

His first companion on the mountain
Was a dirt-gray rangy horse
Bought from an old man selling out
To move back to Ohio.
 
The nag was cross-eyed
And moved with a slow, off-kilter cant
As if he were always heading downhill
And trying to break its fall.
 
No name other than “Hey”
Or “Gol-durn it anyway.”
Mostly they worked in silence
Like a bitter old man and wife.
 
Him calling in the morning
To harness him to the cart.
And he turned away shaking his head
Studying flies on the fencepost.
 
Or him nudging a cold nose
Against grandfather’s  shoulder at evening
As the old man with far-away glance
Studied clouds cresting the mountain.
 
Even a nagging, obstinate wife
Shut off as a bear trap
Feels compelled once in a blue moon
to seek some human touch, I figure.
 
And a husband as stubborn as dust,
Dense as river rock,
Might turn in such a moment
To pat course hairs atop the head
 
And if not in words so much
As in something more elemental,
Deeper than all the stars
Scratch that wrinkled ear.

Jumping Mule

by Thomas D. Reynolds

On possum hunts,
Dogs bounded above waves of stinkweed,
 
Their fierce breaths echoing from pines
And between bluffs where underground
 
Even dog bones of ancient Sioux
Tensed and trembled in the dark.
 
The thin blade of a kerosene flame
repeatedly just missed the patch of dense fur,
 
hunted eyes rolling like balls of fire
down the stony path toward the mountain,
 
only stirring of leaves or rush of wind
that caught one’s breath to give evidence
 
that the spirit of one whose life mattered
passed this way still in its corporeal body.
 
In these hills, God too was often hunted this way,
A mad bracing rush through night air as still
 
With only phantoms of one’s fading light
Bobbing among the tangled brush of sleep.
 
Always seekers clutched the tangled mane
Of the dark-eyed mule they rode,
 
Leaping over fence rows and ravines,
Legs clenching the course, bony back.

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Spring Viewing

by Iolanda Scripca

...The rhythm of cobblestone in Spring
Pressed hard by memories of wheels...
As I lie down against a see-through wing
Life happens...On the other side it feels
A daring thrust of Snowdrop flowers through the chills

The heavy gates squeak open...I sense birds chirping
As they move beaks and people's sunglasses cry
The priest is chanting while a couple is flirting
Pink buds welcome me reassuring their roots are not dry
There is so much clear blue I almost attempted to sigh...

I joke with Rain bombarding soil from the above
Like two teenagers who hate to wear school uniform
We tear the pain away releasing one single dove
My Dad in black drives back my classmates to the dorm
My Mom caresses me as freshly planted tree...her heart is torn...

.

Frog In Limbo

by Iolanda Scripca

So here I am -  Reincarnated
No more keeping up with Joneses
Free at last ! ... forgetting though:
They love to eat frog legs for dinner...

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A River Becomes the Center

by Rob Spiegel

The highway becomes a town;
the freeway marks
the center.
 
A river becomes
the center,
the moon just rising.
 
The light becomes night,
becomes a beacon
on the corner.
 
You become night,
a beacon
changing colors.
 
The voice becomes blue,
confiding almost
nothing.
 
The edge in
decorations, a warning
saying nothing.
 
Leaving becomes morning,
black coffee
and a warning.
 
Finally becomes a town,
crossing freeways
at the center.
 
The clouds become
a light, covering
the moon.
 
Nowhere’s back
to center,
losing all direction.
 
Your dreams become
a freeway, a river
through the town.
 
The signs point nowhere,
remembering
the center.
 
The freeway is the center,
pushing outward
into darkness.

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Blackberries Ripen

by John Swain

Fled from the day
into sanctuary
where the hills leapt
from interment.
The world like a claw
was too red,
let blackberries ripen
and come back
to a happiness
while thrushes echo
in the forest.
A heron kneels,
frogs kerplunk the pond
before the statue
of a healing lady
in a box of windows.

Sleep

by John Swain

Oriole child
do not weep,
lay your head
on silk,
the king is returning
to our dream
of living here
in this house
of rain flowers.
Death together,
a coffin breaks,
you have me.

Poultice

by John Swain

The blurring sky left a residue
darkening the skin of the river,
I followed an osprey glimpse
to the edge of the sounding water,
a beach of geese slid into currents.
Birch trees grew through nails
and the paintings over our bodies
to be human, naked, and divine,
I married myself to the fleeting,
loving you with a language of palms.
Herons, gulls, and vultures line
the tide wall stones like judges
as I made a poultice of feathers
for the wound opening us like a sun,
I turned into the shadow of your face.

.

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Scraps

by Joanna M. Weston

spaces between the days
fill with scraps of darkness

patches tacked to trees
torn fabric on roads

I sew remnants of night
into stories that gleam in the dark

A Diet of Words

by Joanna M. Weston

If poems be the food of love
let them be served at every meal
sautéed in wine and served on gold.
Let half rhyme bravely lead the dance
down vocal paths to dinner-time;
may rhythm beat its steady drum
on tiled roofs while breathless poets
chase metaphors through their sleep.

Does the rhymer catch a comma
and use it for an emphasis
or leave a couplet incomplete
at the ending of her breakfast?
So let adverbs be served up cold
and all these poems be read aloud.

The Cry

by Joanna M. Weston

of a single gull

caught on rock

flung out

past tree and mountain
and beyond
          to me
on an island

Picking Blackberries

by Joanna M. Weston

under thickets of behaviour
love plucks deeply curved thorns
from the skin of the day

sensation slices through accidie
to perfections of feeling
whose reaction can be an honest
obscenity or trickled blood
muted by my heart’s
ravaged green minutes

this surge of emotion
through walls of intellect
reveals the who that I am
in entanglements of loving
where every inflection
pricks doubled purple

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Star-Chasing Over The Pacific

by Allen Qing Yuan

Air gyres crowd into the boy
As he dashes through the clouds of hope

Surfing on a wish
He descends to the touchy ocean
The sun eagerly follows him like a bright shadow
Intimidating mountains forcibly rise
From the serene horizon

Upgrading his life board,
With exhilarating dreams
As he dashes through the clouds of hope
Chasing the Pacific Star.

All Fading, Fading To Black

by Allen Qing Yuan

My shadow engulfing heart
It's grip, tight
It screams glaringly in snowy silences
Like a distant storm on fall’s fingertips
It aches, but i can't stop
Even if i fade to black
Under this
Everlasting sky
Fading, Fading to Black

My shadow engulfing heart
It's grip, tight
It screams glaringly in snowy silences
Like a distant storm on fall’s fingertips
It aches, but i can't stop
Even if i fade to black
Under this
Everlasting sky
Even at the backyard of the world’s night

Albino Croc

by Allen Qing Yuan

Shamelessly showing his naked, pale, white body
Yet he is full of shame
With his pink eyes, looking as if he is crying or will cry
Unwillingly to move from his wet corner
Although all see him, but with fascination rather than pity
Little by little, piece by piece, shade by shade, he will regain his
confidence
Swimming free, lurking in the waters

Komodo Dragon

by Allen Qing Yuan

Staring menacingly at all observers
You being the greatest observer of all

Claws scraping the loose earth
Scaly tail weaving through the sky

Rocky exterior grinding rock
Squinty eyes seeing all

And you wonder
What more is beyond this glass?

Electro-Powder

by Allen Qing Yuan

The prickly crystals crunch
As my warm-hearted hand breaches Earth’s exterior
My system flickers on
Like the candle lights of an endless hallway
More snow pellets assault my doubts
Perhaps they are God’s liberating force
Recharged, I plough through with the energy of
The electrifying powder.

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My Crow

by Changming Yuan

As a popular Chinese saying goes
Crows everywhere are equally black
But this one in the backyard of my heart
Is as white as a summer cloud
I have fed him with fog and frost
Until his feathers, his flesh
His calls and even his spirit
All turn into white like winter washed

My crow’s wings will never melt
Even when flying close to the sun

Self-Renovating

by Changming Yuan

In the heart of every selfhood
Is there a tiny seed of antiself
That keeps growing unnoticeably
Until it is big, big enough
To become one and the same
With your entire being inside out
Like a drop of condensed color
Dyeing all the water
In a diaphanous jug

Each time an antiself gains a growth
Your previous selfhood gets thinner
Lighter, larger, yet more colorful
Like yin seeking to become
Totally mixed up with yang
In an ever renewed balance

Sorghum

by Changming Yuan

Swarms of baby bees
Attracted to the head of every sugar cane
All busy sucking the sweet from mother earth
Or collecting sunlight for a rainy day

Far beyond the fields of late summer
They stand tall above evening arrays
As if to salute the new crescent moon
Like red reeds, with red seeds

Light vs Shadow: A Recursive Poem

by Changming Yuan

I
Was it the shadow?
Was it the shadow beyond?
Was it the shadow beyond the shadow?
Still fell the thick night,
When the heart blocked the light.

Yes, it is light!
It is light within!
It is light within light!
Loud sweeps the morning glow,
Where the mind has no shadow.

II
if only there were still 10 suns hanging in the sky
as in the ancient chinese mythological universe

if only all stars were close, close enough to us
like millions of broken mirrors
put back together around us

if, if only every light on earth were much brighter
or, simply if our eyes were just a bit more insightful

there would be no shadows moving before or behind us
there would be no darkness within or without our minds

III
1. Do not be carried away with so much sunshine
for shadow is right behind your feet

2. Do not be afraid of shadow in front of you
for the sun is arising just behind your back

3. Stand still for a moment or two
and you can tell shadow from light or vice versa

4. Keep walking in your chosen direction
and you will find your way out of the shadows

The Loss of a National Identity

by Changming Yuan

Neither Chinese foods
Nor Chinese parents
Nor the Chinese language
Nor our Chinese outlooks
Not even our Chinese names
Make us truer Chinese now

Just as all the Chinese
Born after the Song dynasty
Were no Chinese to Japanese, so
Each Chinese coming of age
After the Ming was no more
Chinese than another to Koreans
While to other westerners
We Chinese were never the Chinese
They had known or known about

Nay, we are indeed no longer
The Chinese our ancestors used to be:
During the Yuan, we became
A nation of slaves, less than animals
In our own land; during the Qing
We learned to dress ourselves up inside out
Like our conquerors with queues
Since the opium war, we have been
Trying to modify, to remove
All our yellowish Chinese genes
Deeply coded within Chan
Within Confucianism
Within the one hundred flowers
That came to full blossom
Once upon a long time

Yes, we are offspring of ancient Chinese
We still eat and look like our ancestors
But we are not Chinese any more
No more than Japanese, or Koreans
Who still use some ancient Chinese characters

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