Guest Poet

Will You Please facts not withstanding in a manner of speaking the ball’s in your court this too shall pass but before & just in case the matter gets out of hand there’s always a stopgap a fail-safe when the moment comes just pretend but play it safe check your battery be convincing these are good people this has never happened before alternate side of the street parking the privileged few it takes years not weeks news leaks fake faucets turn off ramp sideways not an easy decision to make the majority form a majority to make matters worse a light at the end of the tunnel libraries are closing cows smell like fish if there is a remote chance grab the opportunity hedonism arose thank you all for coming it’s an honor to be here

– Heller Levinson

Slow; stitches and scarred.
The monster turned on Master
And became human.

– Heather Handy

Stay a little longer.
The Sun is still visible on the treetops,
the birds are still complaining,
the brook has just started to grey,
and the evening is still not dressed up,
there’s yet time to squander.
Stay a little longer.
The ice of silence has just melted away,
let the heat of your words blow it –
like the vapor,
let the fragrance you brought along
Get thicker in the air,
let the drowsy sky rouse and wonder.
Stay a little longer.

– Ravi Prakash

Catch me alive on the mountain’s crest
summer wave of wind over afternoon naps
your dreams blending into my dreams
when cities weren’t dying prisons

It took years to find this hollow tree
small room with knot-hole windows
seeing out
cloud backsides lifting
wondering if they’ll ever touch heaven

But down here
earth centuries
long and hard under man

Woe the wars
we have committed
small and great with the death of the poor

The haters that always crave hatred
they’re coming after me spies of my tribe
jealous with my continuous escaping
finding hideaways
within the last treasures of earth

I tell you and you listen
take a deep breath before I exhale
remember this tick-of-time we have shared

A few birds still singing in the branches
a light rain later tonight
love winning in the heart

Their evil footsteps circling
thinking they’ve caught me
but I’m already whispering in your next dream
dream of escape from
this place.

– Stephen Jarrell Williams

once turquoise canals
bubble like tar pits
laden with leaves

debris and ash
clog ports & streets
from seasons ago

when mortals ceased
those gods exited
to another planet

feral poppies
cloak & intoxicate
across voided landscape

that last unanswered
telephone call will
ring for eternity

– Terrence Sykes

can chaos be sad?
wiring in the brain corroding
synapses clicking wildly sizzling
walk as softly as you can to not
jangle or jingle the brain
it goes to terrible places hysterical
repetitions despite warnings to not
go there caution tape has a gap
they posted a guard named amygdala
the details are there
on the other side of that post
where a home a monster mansion
traps a young vulnerable living being
by conquistadores holding crosses
dna cells infected punctured
inside your forgotten body
who screams trauma
silently deep inside
clenching ugly stories
and the answer
is…

chaos can be sad.

– Nilsa Mariano

the mustache hair grows up into the nostril
gray hairs sprouting everywhere
how irritating

as usual the snake-skin itches
like a brush fire across the surface
of centrifuge earth

my problems, minuscule,
trivial
it’s not like I’m getting impeached

I’m just going for the Walt Whitman look
or maybe Monet
and what about Brancusi

the beard hair alights out of the brush
Joan of Arc on fire
orphans every damn where

turn on the cable news streaming vitriol
the viruses will gang up against
the mouth breeders

drunk at the airport bar
you’re gonna miss your flight
best miss it
just so you can live an hour longer

– Jay Passer

One Day
You heard
your name
in the midst of the crowd:
Somebody was calling you

You turned back
There was neither the crowd
nor the sound

An old woman
with a doll in her tiny hands
stood beside you

She smiled and said –
Nobody called you
It was just an echo
of the rustling leaves
in the silent jungle

You were then
A red grasshopper

– Raja Puniani

A child’s hand outstretched; the morning air
Sprawled in among the cabinets; a cat
Paws gentle on the windowsill, a broom
Stood in the corner, glass jars filled with grain
The day will be quite warm, the morning meal
Is hours off; each room is full and still
The carpets lie, the clocks speak on the walls
The burden of the attic shifts, and drops
Fall murmuring; the breezes rise and cease
Each bed but one still weighted, linnet song
Deceives the silence, woodsmell dries the air
The ceilings brighten, all the lamps unlit

I promise to forsake no mote of day
For I have had my decades in the wind
The whirl and flux; I seek the moment whole
And unattached, all spark and sin forgot
The child takes a crayon in his hand
No wind can sweep the vision from his soul
Not though he never draw it out; believe
The cherry blossoms in his outstretched hand

– Alan Cohen

This is not a romance novel.
It’s a short ending
to a long story
you’ve heard before.
Common, lurid tale
of love and something
else.
This is not a whodunit.
Warning:
The processor is unreliable,
the data corrupt,
the files no good.
Screen version:
You run a move
he follows and lust
follows and ends.
He runs
a move
on somebody else.
You could call this a thriller
but not for you.
Defense:
There was an intimacy
to our disorder.
Until he killed it.

– Mickey J. Corrigan