We are pilgrims in the earth and strangers— we come from afar and we are going far. –Vincent van Gogh Abroad for some time now following our family’s wishes without much success or happiness. I sense their exasperation, their disappointment growing— soon there will be no tolerance left, even for an eldest son. I prefer not to speak of it except to you, brother. I hold up a mirror to the deep things which pass through me, sometimes flickering, sometimes blazing, always indomitable— feeling no connection to these plans for me. This I freely admit. … Continue reading Abroad by Brent Short→
William Prindle has earned an Honorable Mention in Streetlight’s 2025 Poetry Contest The Orchardist’s Lament If I spent less time in unstructured circumspection and dreadful inference I might remember that circumference is nothing but pi times diameter and I might not have to rue the mismeasurements I make in fencing these apple trees from noisy birds and sneaky squirrels. I might not keep repeating what a dolt to myself as I continue to overlook my own advice and nurse my sore thumbs from recutting and rebending this eighteen-gauge wire, when all these years I could … Continue reading The Orchardist’s Lament by William Prindle→
John Thelin has earned an Honorable Mention in Streetlight’s 2025 Poetry Contest Pennies from Heaven Soon they will stop minting pennies. I will miss their crusty copper ridges, Abe Lincoln in profile, a calming image as he stares into a future he could never imagine over 150 years ago. Time stretches, an elastic band, for a while, then snaps back on itself, leaves a welt on a wrist that tries to flick a fishing line perfectly into a pond on a lazy summer day that can cloud over while you doze, wake to a smell … Continue reading Pennies from Heaven by J. R. Thelin→
Rebecca Faulkner is the 2nd place winner of Streetlight’s 2025 Poetry Contest Father’s Day Mum says I have a new family now, matter-of-fact with the tea brewing. A half-sister who rides her shiny bike without training wheels, plush carpet hugs her staircase. Suppers in the car nights he drives me home, fish & chips steam the windows. My eyes vinegar-itch but I will not cry. Weekends he fails to fix the bird-feeder, spilling seed in my sandals while I jostle sparrows for crumbs. When he’s back I’ll make him read Charlotte’s Web, work busily like … Continue reading Father’s Day by Rebecca Faulkner→
Abby Murray is the 1st place winner of Streetlight’s 2025 Poetry Contest Of All the Qualities She Could Have Inherited She carries my penchant for flowers she hasn’t learned to identify as weeds. she brings me dandelions, red clover, morning glories, buttercups, even scotch broom, and I prop them up in a vodka bottle on the windowsill because she can’t believe her luck, how nobody fought to collect these beauties before she did, how she found them heaped on yard waste piles or reaching up from the cement or clay beneath utility poles and … Continue reading Of All the Qualities She Could Have Inherited by Abby Murray→
They tried to protect us from the TV as it vomited unspeakable news straight from Cronkite, night after night Age six, I snuck looks at the evening news a few times, a ticker at the bottom of the screen announcing the death of solider after soldier. The ashes fell like rain. Much later, I learned about the red death the world had witnessed, brought to us in black and white every night. Mom cried. It was 1968. Now, 60 years gone, I stand at the top of Crabtree Falls, a hike Mom loved when she … Continue reading The Tet Offensive by Debbie Collins→
If the river is a metaphor for life and death, for time, and loss of time, for the rise and fall of seasons, for disastrous floods that carry hope downstream and leave stinking mud in its place, what then, when a river dies? You can see the river from atop concrete steps with granite tread that lead from the cobblestone along the current’s edge to the manicured grass and pruned trees of federal land beneath the stainless-steel legs of the Arch. The Museum of Westward Expansion is closed for renovation. This river was once the … Continue reading Ephemeral Streams by Richard Stimac→
Spooned out formed by force of gravity diameter to be determined, from silver dollar to as big as a frisbee. Over burning embers, prehistoric ancestors flipped and peeled them off flat granite, their aroma luring cave dwellers from their hairy sleep. The same flapjacks I begged for at Bozo the Clown TV lunches when I ran home from school at noon and ran back at 12:45, tracking a mile burning off whatever I ate. Oh, circle of sustenance, you’ve been working class fare from B.C. to the 21st century or are you just the Mardi … Continue reading Pancakes by Cynthia Gallaher→
………………………………………….After Fragonard’s Les Hasards heureux d’escarpolette Fragonard’s lady sways among the clouds. while gentlemen pull at cords to help her float. An accidental shoe tumbles from stockinged foot. Ruffled and peachy skirts, pastel cushions bespeak her wealth and youth, her future set secure as the golden ropes she grasps and holds, her face as pale and smooth as a fragile egg. My brother hung our swing to catch a breeze to stop my mother’s racing heart for rest from housework’s plodding measured due. We’d sit and wait for beat to gentle down. I’d snuggle up … Continue reading Swings by Joyce Compton Brown→
I never sort my clothes. Sorry, mom. Sure, my whites gray and colors fade, but they all go into the same load. All share the same daily sweat and stink. I leave them clean in a basket all week and must sort what I may wear that day. I’m jeans or slacks. Oxford or tee. My socks match up—what’s beneath nobody sees. My machine rattles with forgotten coins, a pocket knife I never use, the odd bolt or rock I might pocket. Sometimes, I find crumpled bills, all crisp after dryer cycle, a surprise from … Continue reading Self Portrait as a Pile of Dirty Laundry by Jeff Newberry→
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