Flood Small hands pull a mud-stained pillowcase across wet ground, prized possessions, blessings still bound, boxes filled with half-spilled lives, lugged uphill. Hear the river roar: I take all I take all from those who look back. Listen I came here to count the bells that live upon the surface of the sea… Here by Pablo Neruda Now on this turquoise sea glitter a million silver reflections of the morning sun. And I think they make no sound at all— Still, I listen. Judith Grissmer has been published in The Alembic, Burningword, … Continue reading Flood; Listen by Judith Grissmer→
I Have I have never been so tired in my whole life. The mountains run across the river—pointing like a knife. Forlorn boathouses perched out on rotting piers. Empty lots of naked scrub. A water tower. A column of fire. The lattice of clouds make sparkling fishmouth, the intervening atmosphere, twinkling distant lights. Crepuscular, this stand of trees. In my hands, a paperback— its yellowing leaves. Everything I have and everything I need. Home It may not be as surprising to you as it was surprising to me to learn that a … Continue reading I Have; Home by Benjamin Harnett→
Joshua Trees They are repetitive across the hills for hours, stillness in the space around them. As for the sky, one dark cloud drawn out as if between two hands and me underneath, held together by skin, scrutinizing the world for severity, for intention, for final episodes. The other cars seem lost, but the road is even, the pavement, newly blackened and unbroken. Destinations and departures, resolutions of the human creature—they all soar past like blackbirds and hawks. It is the piercing alertness of the lizards that stays with me. I know they are … Continue reading Joshua Trees by Carla McGill→
Beatitude It is winter. It is cold. Meek sky offers no color. Hardwood skeletons assemble along the treeline. Roots knuckle up through blizzard’s encumbrance, grasping at sunrise. Rhododendrons sag, iced-over leaves weighted like bats roosting through chill’s clutch. Snow frosts the cedars’ dulled-blue berries and skulks backside shadows as along dark edges of the moon. I scuff out among other tracks across frost to seize prioritized news. Daffodils sprout behind liriope, fractures splitting freeze, peaceful blessings to scatter any frost, virtuous blooms declaring along the garden’s brink. Green shoots shame wisdom of the wise … Continue reading Beatitude by Sam Barbee→
The Bear’s Back Last night I dreamt of a bear who carries us through the forest on his back. He goes through the mud, we cling to his fur, he wants to bury us in a storyteller’s throat. Julia Travers is a poet, author, artist and journalist. Her creative writing appears with OnBeing, The Mindfulness Bell and Heron Tree Poetry Journal, among other publications. She holds a BA in Literary and Cultural Studies from The College of William and Mary and a BFA in Art Education from Virginia Commonwealth University. She is on Twitter … Continue reading 2 Poems by Tom Montag & Julia Travers→
Full Snow Moon Fat and slow, she climbs the eastern sky like an old woman climbs stairs, holding onto tree branches and stars to make her way to February’s zenith. She rises on time, a beacon fully seen. A passing comet with a green head tips his hat and is gone. Look. The Sea of Tranquility is next to the Sea of Crises. Wolves howl, but she persists. Joan Mazza has worked as a medical microbiologist, psychotherapist, seminar leader, and has been a Pushcart Prize nominee. Author of six books, including Dreaming Your Real … Continue reading Full Snow Moon by Joan Mazza→
Agnostic In the bath a spider crawls along the ledge. It’s tiny enough that it doesn’t scare this arachnophobe. Isn’t that the way fear works, the smaller the threat the less a reason to run? Unlike the huge, or maybe average wolf spider that cornered me in the kitchen. In a panic I reached for Easy Off, sprayed the hirsute carapace into an igloo of chemical foam. Drenched, seemingly undaunted, the fizzy white dome skittered across the linoleum toward me, and I fled, as if from Godzilla. But here in my tub this little … Continue reading Two Poems by Diane DeCillis→
Common Stingray Dasyatis pastinaca In the infinite silence of her velvety skin, she roams through moon water at night, scours coastal shallows, glides around the Mediterranean, Norway, Canary Islands— fluid creature soaring, foraging chink snails, snapper biscuits, spiny shrimp, undulating in and out of waves. She is a wave— primordial, flexing spine and filament, overlapping, ruffling her flexible body— a pectoral fin disk, graceful as gull wings in watery air. Diamond-shaped, she resembles a stealth fighter, almost alien, yet magical— all flesh, fiber, cartilage, onyx eyes peering through sand when she buries herself in … Continue reading Common Stingray by Carol Was→
Blue It must have been her accent that seduced and baffled my ears. The Egyptian woman, still lost in the desert air of Cairo, read her poems filled with water from the Nile and blue heaven, blue heaven, blue heaven flying over the lotus flowers. I heard “heaven” but later discovered she said “heron.” A distant cousin to the sacred ibis, herons (even blue ones) are commonplace–are everywhere–even in the non-exotic marshes of northern Ohio where another blue creation–my mother– landed. Blue Helen, blue Helen, blue Helen. The kids in Cleveland would tease her. … Continue reading Blue by Linda Nemec Foster→
23 Feet Deep The footway we walk sketches brown lines on green fields that seem to hover over the Irish Sea. All around us sheep and cows hold their mouths to grass, unmindful of heaven. This perpetual path traces cliffs, cuts into rock, curdles to mud, descends onto beaches of rock draped in laver fronds, home to codling and flounder. Kelp, clams, fishermen, children who splash and swim, all know the sea’s routine. Even Annie the cab driver knows the tidal ways: in out in out days nights, unending. It’s the far away sun … Continue reading 23 Feet Deep by Martha Snell→
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