POEMS of EIGHT POETS
(Winter 2014-2015, Volume 2)
(Winter 2014-2015, Volume 2)
Kate Wisel
Special Sauce Down in the kitchen, in the white smoke, you are chopping a red onion to bits, knife smacking the wooden board, exact as a sprinkler. It’s no place to play, the pans behind you electric blue with heat and men who move around you in orbits, wiping sweat off the forehead with shoulders. I stay against the wall and watch you, back turned over a giant pot, one arm raised up high to sprinkle salt, then stepping back to turn the knob on an orange flame that dances down to blue. Just when I think I do not get what I want, you pick me up and lift me to the counter, my wrapped arms around the dark meat of your neck, a bouillabaisse of skin warming me like a vacation, and hold a wooden spoon out to taste. Biographical information, favorite public domain poem. |
James G. Piatt
His Last Rhyme Images headed inward, the incessant drone in his mind weighed down by shattered rhythms of an unfinished poem. His soul, Heavy… lead lined… trudged ahead to grasp his ego, collect scarlet words that fell to the floor and died, gaudy similes rotting under his shoeless iambs: His soul, perishable as newsprint, inky as smudges beneath his scarred unfaithful pen, warped around a sentence of which he was too tired to carry. His fear of nocturnal beings born of rusted iron and splintered ice, which grow in the night below his broken window, crushed his literary assurance. Too fearful to carry common metaphors alone across the heavy groans of the night, he finally escaped into his past and breathed his last rhyme. [Note: Poem has previously appeared in The Homestead Review.] Biographical information, favorite public domain poem. |
|
Des Clark-Walker
Taktsang Monastery (Tiger’s Nest), Bhutan. An hour before first light the last hush of night is ended by clear calls from the Blue Whistling Thrush waking us to our aim to climb to Tiger’s Nest precariously placed on a narrow ledge. While climbing at 3000 metres we are breathless but our guides, genetically adapted to thin air tell us that we gain extra merit by our exertions. As we wind through the forest we glimpse white buildings hung with prayer flags, a sacred temple complex for spiritual renewal through meditation, image veneration and chanting of mantras. In the main temple, the most admired images are a central Buddha flanked by couples directing their life-force towards perfect bliss. Gold adorned images created centuries ago, while in the West, liberty with virtue could only be shown by a kiss. Biographical information, favorite public domain poem. |
Julie Finch
Once When the world with its ample crush Has turned its body against you Remember the time we owned Every street, every star, every bird That flew from its solemn joy out Into the awaiting world, where it sang, Miraculously, among the living. Remember the sky that would not forsake us, The strangers who did not look away, The lights of their faces saying Yes to Whatever it was we stood for in their eyes. Remember the night that did not close in, But instead, expanded with every step And led us back into each other's gaze. Remember grace, and its blossoming. Remember when the morning arrived rich, Undaunted by the journey beckoning forward. Remember that you were cherished fully, and wholly held By arms that could barely reach beyond The blessings. When this earth and its infinite solitude spin Outward upon your every path, Remember there was a time when we walked as one Under silent shades of an evening's falling, When we conjured the unsayable, the bold and certain Unfolding of a love that was not mistaken or misspent But sprang like tulips in an empty field To be lavished, to be revered, to be free. Biographical information, favorite public domain poem. |
Pedro Marrero
Le Noyé There are two sides to a closed window,: On the outside the dreary rain taps against the glass, Asphalt glistens. A small dog barks down the road. A little brown boy rides his little red bike Up and down the wet concrete Of a nameless soggy street. Its weathered sign hanging On a crooked pole, Faded and confused on the corner of the block where the empty husk of an abandoned bar now rots. - A middle-aged prole turns the key the engine ignites, waves goodbye to his wife, she smiles at the doorway returns the gesture , then crosses her arms, lowers her head and frowns as she walks back into the house; he drives away and lunchtime is over. Behind the rain drenched glass, on the inside of the foggy window the silence looms. Cigarette smoke rises like thread Weaving simple auguries Through the stifled air of a quiet room. The door is locked. No one knocks. An ashtray on a desk that does not exist Becomes, in the eyes of an attic ghost, A boneyard, menacing. He dips an invisible finger into the ash And scrawls a burnt poem onto a slanted wall, A haiku al fumato: Spring brings rain again, The light shines blue-dim on me; Bored to death; ennui. Unconcerned with accepted norms the unlit candle, unaware it’s being watched, of its own volition, lights itself, Begins to burn alone And no sooner then it begins to flicker A shadowy form comes to term as it starts to toss and turn On a bed laden with books. Gives birth to dark blue burden of light Startled into a shock of flame flaring into an incandescent ” Oh!” The candle falls off of the mantle Whimpers a little while and With one last flickering glow goes out… the room gets cold the clouds head south the boy goes home the ghost redoubts the sun comes out - chrysanthemums turn to dust on the dead man’s chess table. the proletariat comes home and his wife, behind her smile, still frowns And the moonborn man newly awakened On the bed laden with books, awakens To find that he has drowned. Biographical information, favorite public domain poem. |
Brandyn Johnson
Neighborhood Nocturne The neighborhood is a barking dog rippling the galaxies of streetlight scattered on smooth sedan hoods. Trains moan like lost humpbacks. Teenagers practice cartography of shadows and unlatched windows. How much gets done by moon of muted TV. I, too, was once a shadow splashing a trail through snow. Lights chime like spokes in spinning bicycle tires unless the wind is sleeping. From somewhere: laughter, a car door, a car door, keys, door, canary curtains burn white. A cat nuzzles rusty gutter lips and disappears. And me, loosed from sleep, lone campfire ember coming to in darkness. Of what am I the echo? Biographical information, favorite public domain poem. |
Emily Strauss
Leaving You Again Leaving is like dying in slow motion Like tearing thick ivy off a crumbling Stone wall and watching the spiders Run for new cover. Yet leaving is a conscious act While dying is a destination A finality of light Leaving can be rescinded Unmade Disallowed You might return suddenly As if you were hardly Gone As if spring had begun again The whole summer looming hot The days lengthening, Not like the start of midnight In winter, not like being Extinguished. I will leave you this time Not like death, and you will look For me in the ivy and spider webs On the old wall when you clear The garden, as if summer could Mend our broken path. This is the feel of dying. Biographical information, favorite public domain poem. |
George Stratigakis
After The Children Are Fed He was an old man with tired eyes-- The kind that open only in part-- Too many days in the sun you see Working his body and arms. Later he wandered on cobblestone alleys, Shuffling to errands that still were worries, Clutching an expired savings book in hand His daughter gave to comfort his perforated mind. But that day in honesty he had said, “After the children are fed, Reared, schooled as best as we can, Our other hope is for a normal end.” Biographical information, favorite public domain poem. |