2010-WomanPoetryProject

The Unraveling

2010-12-31T08:39:00.000-05:00

The point of the needle
enters the cloth
pops out again
moving the silver metal
pulling the thread
binding seam to seam
shoulder to shoulder
bodice to skirt
than down the sides
front to back.
and finally
with delicate motion
it forms a hem.
All done, finished, complete
until something grows,
or something shrinks.
There is a feeling
of unraveling
and it is all gone.

The point of the needle
is forced to begin again.

(c)Doris Gwaltney 2008

from The Poet's Domain, Vol 23

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

She Was Who She Is

2010-12-30T19:40:00.001-05:00

Aline, mother of friend, Barry,
died this morning in her sleep.
2:30 A.M.
He cared for her at his place
fed her, bathed her, stayed
close to the house
watched the Alzheimers grow meaner
watched her gather the small
paper bag of personals
and sit by the door
waiting to go home.
I'm Barry, he'd say, your son.
You are home, he would say.

She'd smile sweetly
and turn to her room.
Those last days
He bought her a hospital bed
to help with the pain
even when softly he lifted her
to hold off the bed sores,
a woman, who,
in eighty some years of life
was likely the first to rise.

He laughed with her
as he bathed her in the tub
splashed water and made her giggle
taking care to gentle all the private parts
just as she had done for him and her boys
when they were little guys.
At the end, surrendered,
she squeezed his hand
and thanked him.

She had nursed her husband, Fred,
through the dark days of his early death
and now had no one left to take care of.
Not even her ownself.

(c)Robert E. Young 2008

from The Poet's Domain, Vol 24

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Bowl of Cherries

2010-12-29T23:24:00.000-05:00

Stay with me

spellbound in laughter

believing tomorrow's miracles.

With you I take no notice

of lightning. Really you say

only Fourth of July sparklers

with chuckles of thunder

minor considerations to the young.

Death grins but stays

on the sidelines

nothing discriminative

just keeping an eye on me.

Oh yes, that old cliche

I'm young in heart

fooling myself.

(c)Doris Baker 2008

from The Poet's Domain, Vol 23

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Rachel

2010-12-29T20:24:00.001-05:00

Her name when spoken
was always in hushed tones.
Her name was Rachel.
She was my aunt.
My mother's older sister.

My mother, six sisters, brother,
and grandmother emigrated from Russia.
Mother was four.
The year 1907.

My grandfather had come before.

At age sixteen, Rachel was put
in the crazy house.
Her name became more hushed.
Sometimes still.

At age forty, she committed suicide.

My grandmother is buried near Rachel.
It was her last wish.
She felt no one would visit her daughter
if she were alone.

My grandfather is buried on the other side of town.

When Rachel died, some wondered if
God would open the gates of Heaven to her.
Or would she have to climb hand-over-hand
on a celestial ladder--for eternity.

(c)Betty Maistelman 2008

from The Poet's Domain, Vol 23

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Drive Ins

2010-12-27T11:27:00.000-05:00

At drive ins
We'd not go to see
The movies,

But park
In the back row,
And abandon ourselves
To each other's pleasure

In a TR3 so small
We couldn't do
Anything serious
Over the cupped
Bucket seats and
Interfering shifter.

Later
we practiced the full
Rites of love again
And again

Learning
The habit of pleasure
For year after year,

Until we wore
Each other
Like old jackets
Molded to our curves.

(c)Dave King 2010

from This Side of Forever

Poetica Publishing Co, Norfolk, VA

Beloved (or: The Legend of Noah's Wife)

2010-12-26T21:55:00.003-05:00

Instead of "Is there a God?"

the question becomes: "Will I see God?"

Peter Kreeft: Love is Stronger than Death

Through the mildest
or wildest of mornings, through the impossible

autumn come swift, in its switch
from nasturtiums to ice, an old longing lives out

its devotion, always a wife.
In a wrinkle too ripe for her skin, in her aging:

a luminous lurker, a bright absentee, night-
fall zeroed in haste, period-fire her desire cinders into --

Ash to salt-ash, her tastebud implies,
and she washes her lips.

Where is he whom I've loved incompletely?

The long deck dips undead, blue-wake

under her ribs; the bowsprit points at risk,
while a pigeon sorts weeds on the mopped boards.

Algae-loose, touch-and-go
is her hope in their land-smell and the smell

of a hand who knolled grass at odd hours, knuckled
after the flood just to cradle

her newborns, squeezed
wisely her heart-valve, worn heart, where it flip

flopped...followed tempest and time-waste,
the red river home,

all is love, all its fishes.
Ah, the inadequate shoremud as platform to pleasure,

the inadequate boulder in blossom.
Inadequate love

for a god slipping westward, clandestine,
all done.

(c)Sofia M. Starnes 2003

from A Commerce of Moments

Pavement Saw Press, Columbus, OH

Vision of the Future

2010-12-25T00:35:00.000-05:00

Amid the frolic of giggling children
is an old man sequestered on a park bench,

his loneliness a linen suit, creases
crisp as creeping moan of evening.

Nannies cast suspicious stares, steer charges away
while paper-thin teens in sagging shorts

point, laugh, know age will never sink claws
into them. Wary pigeons peck

at breadcrumbs he tosses like lost years.
My daughter, 6, spins circles in a field

of purple phlox, yellow Easter dress belling
like a tulip, strawberry hair wild, white stockings

smudged green at the knees. Ten years from now
when I hear the creak of a windowsill betraying

a foot sneaking outside, I hope I trust the sweetness
of her heart, think of today, see her approach the bench,

a ladybug in cupped hands cracked open
for rheumy eyes filled with wonder,

spring blooming on a face
lost in winter far too long.

(c)Bill Gloss 2007

from The Human Touch

San Francisco Bay Press,

San Francisco, CA

"every Spark is numbered

2010-12-24T02:17:00.000-05:00

On scraps, over backs
and sides of torn
squares, pinned
into fold of dress
or tucked down
pocket, delivered
in secret--
Open me carefully
Emily writes
to her sweet muse.

Dropping
task at hand, stopping
to catch the quick
appearance, quicker
retreat of vision or
image, igniting
missive after
missive in
hot assault,
full pursuit sent
burning over
snowy fields
or blazing through
New England June--

the poet's body
breaking into
fiery verb
singing to one
of similar
essence--
passion for one
sparking
passion for
all the world,
its many daily
dark or bright
amazements:

"O One I cannot love enough
O One beyond all touch:
I will then seduce
your soul, delight
your mind--my words
will surpass those of any,
each verse asking
faithfully to the last
Will you
wholly be mine,
each stanza answering
faithfully
to the last, You will

I will write yes and
yes over and
over, each line
shaping you
immortal, making you
divine, divinely Mine:
Love, Beloved, Lovely
Only One, Only World:
my slashes and syllables
stand bold, unbreakable
against any Zero
for all time."

(c)Vivian Teter 2007

from Edge by Edge

toadlily press, chappaqua, ny

Wednesday, January 12, 1944

2010-12-23T10:50:00.000-05:00

A homemade dance frock

with bow at center

takes center stage in your desires.

Supple and limber

you become,

as flexible as

Margo's attitude

toward you.

You, who examines

your own role in

relationships, see yourself,

sometimes the rose,

sometimes the weed.

Phyllis Johnson 2009

from being frank with anne

Community Press, Virginia Beach, VA

Adolescence

2010-12-22T10:41:00.000-05:00

My daughter won't let me touch her
We used to curve together
Our bodies speaking
The language our voices could not.

Now, she has moved away
Though she sits next to me.

I can wait;
I can wait
For the embrace
That would fill me.
She will come back to me, again.

She is preparing herself to love.

(c)Sharon Weinstein 1995

from Celebrating Absences

Road Publishers, Painter, VA

Big Barbie

2010-12-21T13:54:00.000-05:00

It's time we had a real-life
Barbie, a doll that looks like me
and you.

One with thighs that swish
when she walks, and fat that sticks
to her hips like glue.

No make-believe cuties, eyebrows arched
just right. No tiny twiggy dolls, nipped
tucked, everything pulled tight.

Give us a plus-size Barbie, someone round
and warm. An ordinary female with a less
than perfect form.

We want her to look like us, with mismatched
outfits that are fraying. Somewhere between 39,
and a senior discount, hair slowly graying.

No need for another bronzed Barbie,
wind blown hair all over her head.
Just give us a big gal with cleavage,

one who has hot flashes and night sweats.
Put a stash of dark chocolates under
Big Barbie's queen-size bed.

(c)Ann Falcone Shalaski

published in Skipping Stones 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Anniversary

2010-12-20T10:48:00.005-05:00

for Anne since before 1970

Your photograph seduced the sun, projected
on the windscreen of my car your presence,
slashed the span from here in Hampton Roads
to California as our letters had
the distance to he war in Vietnam.

Our love and dining out and working out
our differences reduced the distance from
our youth to parenthood as traveling
the world and settling in one place had cut
the distance from our youth to our maturity.

Although we never knew what might become,
we'd never doubted we'd mature together,
though I have no intention to grow up.
Although I may have mellowed some, 'tis you
who've anchored our relationship with grace.

Nor time nor distance ever shall impose
between us. We are one together; and
when we have shed this earth-bound suit, we shall
be one, together for eternity,
with God, and angels and the universe.

(c)pete freas 2007

Hunting Healing Herbs on James River Banks

2010-12-19T08:23:00.003-05:00

Remote and awkward legs weak-wobble-walk.

Dear mistress cannot swallow or sit up,

Our voyage carved thin limbs, sallowed her face--

but herbs and roots will speed recovery.

My brother questions workers about springs

where rushing water spurts a growth of cures.

Distracted colonists continue on

until a man called Laydon stops to talk.

A carpenter, he searches timber sites.

He brags of watercress with rounded lobes;

then names a wondrous tree with magic bark.

And he keeps turning, turning toward me.

Just a layer herbs between the dampened moss,

just lower head and never look at him.

This sawer calls my name and I respond

to one who tries to tease me into smiles.

I focus on his face, his twitching ears.

I stand and stare him down but have to stop

befor a strangeness that I've never seen.

Green eyes hold visions of a form and face.

No lake or mirror shine such imagery.

This man reflects a me who turns around

to grasp my brother's arm and walk away.

All night I hear his laughter--in my dreams.

* In medieval times, girls were warned never to look into a man's eyes. If you saw your reflection in his eyes, you were destined to marry him.

Patricia Flower Vermillion 2008

from Lady's Maid

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville , VA

Expectation

2010-12-18T06:27:00.000-05:00

While peeling peaches
I think of my breasts swelling,
a sign of seed,
but I fear my age
like rot next to the bone
and I can't finish in time
all the peaches in the box
turning leprous with mold.
I wonder at the juice
running down my wrists,
how heaven stabs
when you are in the kitchen
on August 15,
working away at night
with sore breasts
and a sticky floor,
how a summons comes up
from the fruit,
reckless and sweet.

(c)Suzanne (Clark) Rhodes 1999

from What A Light Thing, This Stone

Sows Ear Press, Abingdon, VA

Inertia

2010-12-17T13:09:00.000-05:00

You wake in my arms.
I am the gray wool
of dawn,
the dream that lingers
as you rise
sinking
from my weight.

All day
I am thick
walls or air,
mud
that sucks at your feet,
dried seeds
rattling in your head.

How you fight me,
lugging uphill
sacks of wet sand
as I steal
your breath.

At night
I am the cool earth
and the quiet stars

Rest in my arms.

Jane Ellen Glasser 1991

published in The Poet's Domain, vol 3

Road Publishers, Fairfax Station, VA

Solidarity Mission

2010-12-16T05:33:00.000-05:00

She spoke no Hebrew nor
knew the city's history while

riding secretly in a tourist
bus around Jerusalem's streets

recently quieted by a suicide
bomber at Ben Yehuda market

taking pictures of walls coated
with memorial plaques, mementos

that can be looked at in the
safety of home in Virginia,

like a foreigner so deeply immersed
in exile she can no longer relate nor

enter into the unsettling rapids
of terror, daily resonating the past.

(c)Michal Mahgerefteh 2009

from In My Bustan

Poetica Publishing Co, Norfolk, VA

The Bedroom Clock

2010-12-15T14:12:00.001-05:00

Reads 2 a.m.
Red digital lines
of today.

The day closed,
still as a locked church
before even the stained glass

has come to life;
shut against the sunlight
and the news that will

break into my life, a thief
who steals my time
measured out

in pieces.
They make no sound,
except to breathe,

intake of air so silent
my lungs hurt to stay quiet,
and then, rise only by degrees,

inches that cannot be heard
for fear the news will be bad,
and the alarm will sound.

(c)Nancy Powell 2007

from How Far Is Ordinary

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Thoughts of the First Apple Tree

2010-12-14T14:12:00.002-05:00

(It is highly likely that this view of the fruit comes from a medieval
pun: the Latin for "evil" is malum and the Latin for "apple" is malus.

--Paul Edwards)

The lonely first apple tree of all time

[grew from seed?--too hard a question]

[maybe from another species' seed--apple trees

are sluts--everyone knows that]

had a decision: where should I stash my seeds?

Should I stick 'em in my fruit

or shoot 'em from my leaves?

[apple trees appear from 8000 BC

in the Tien Shan mountains of eastern Kazakhstan]

[the apple invented gravity--everyone knows that]

I'll stick 'em deep down in my core!

Why? Protection from predators?

Or bribery of the very same

squirrels, horses and monkeymen

so the devious tree's seeds would be branched

[with free fertilizer] around the world?

Damn slut apple trees [always naked] keeping

doctors away with a big scoop

of Cool Whip liqueur and a porn flick

of Ron Jeremy with Granny Smith.
The "first" apple tree of all time took Eve down

["translated"] into English in 1382

has a bad rep because she was sweet and thoughtful

and just wanted to be loved.

(c)Daniel Pravda 2011

from A Bird in the Hand Is a Dumb Bird

Poetica Publishing Co, Norfolk, VA

Grandmother's Funeral

2010-12-13T23:02:00.000-05:00

How the casket gleams
At this shiny funeral
In full sun

With your small laughs
With the birds who know your name

Above the morning pall, you fly
Beyond this tree
Of relatives who assemble here

A burst of sun drives the rain
From the atmosphere

It's high time, Grandmother
To hear your sparrow's tongue

In the afternoon
You rustle the flowers of my plate.

I spy your eye in my napkin ring

With your small laughs
With the birds who know your name

Your wings sweep past the parlor door
And dust the air between
Soul and brain
What better fate than yours
To be clean adroitly

Grandmother, my dreams are made of less and less
They simplify...with time

Then evening rushes darkly
About the sky and farm
Lighting lamps and in the barn

Hurrying ghostly horses

With your small laughs
With the birds who know your name

The chords of sleep make music
...of creaking wheels and slapping reins

Who would ever shoo you?
The scarecrow wears a beaming face
And swears that joy lies in the haunting
-- with your small laughs
-- with the birds who who know your name

And for you, old Wren
That's true, as rain.

(c)Robert P. Arthur 2006

from Vijas War and Other Poems

San Francisco Bay Press

San Francisco, CA

Monarchs

2010-12-12T16:18:00.001-05:00

I don't want to know
The mysteries of Monarchs
Clothed in rainbow raiments
Ready for flight to a winter sojourn as
Cool winds of autumn whisper invitation.

There are those who say
Circadian rhythms stir them to flight
I prefer to ignore scientific research
And would rather believe
A lover awaits in Mexico.

(c)Beverley Isaksen 2007

from I'm Not Leaving Yet

her chapbook

Common Language

2010-12-11T08:58:00.000-05:00

Silk with strength of steel
Bamboo swaying in the wind
Pliant bodies that must bend
Eyes behind shuttered veils

Quiet eyes that own the world
Inner fortress never scaled
One common language all
The daily lives of woman

(c)Anne Darrison

from Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Harbors

2010-12-10T11:04:00.001-05:00

for Joanne

We reach them as a cat reaches, rolled
as long as it can stretch and yawning. We want
the air--by which we mean the resonance
of the slat and breeze and any mammal leaping
too far away to hear--want that great space
against our pores. Windows? Want them open.
Clothes: off. Do we think film lurks everywhere
we have skin? Photograph that one, we say,
and that, that. It's possible in a village
laughing with gulls to forget the way we walked
or pedaled and gasp toward a laugh of our own
that, as often as we turn, we'll never
account for the long choosing that's kept us.
Remember the old man selling pastry
and fudge, the one who'd climbed the steeple
and seen the destroyer erupt, the U-boat
surface? He had that to tell, sprinting the sand
and street of oyster shell, and still had,
counting the coins and bills back to us. One day
we'll riffle through our common purse for who
knows what to hand as change when someone asks.

(c)Jay Paul 1999

from Going Home in Flood Time

The Ink Drop Press, Painter, VA

If I Could Stretch a Dream

2010-12-09T08:59:00.001-05:00

For a moment
I believed I could
stretch a dream
from surreal beginning
to surreal end.

She is a Montreal
midnight, bright,
exotic, with eyes
the color of a high-
way constellation

we pass inhaling
Canadian haze.
I touch her flesh
with my mental
fingertips hoping

to cross ancestries,
an African-Chinese bop
for the ages, a celestial
pulse vibrating beneath
our skins with

expansive, feathery
wings. I smell her
reluctance, a feminine
defense mechanism
for sun-worshippers,

rebels with heaven's
residue on their
lips, and Genesis
in their hands.

(c)Synnika Lofton

from The Burden and the Gift, Vol 3

DMV Diary

2010-12-08T08:22:00.001-05:00

she sat on her stool, a throne
for the queen of DMV window E3
waiting to hear the petitions
of the pitiful peasants
soon to be granted an audience

he sat in a bucket seat, a holding cell
for a prisoner of the bureaucracy
waiting to present his
probation papers
for approval
he was number 11

she hated her job, a dead end
9 to 5 boring routine
that provided a living
while draining away the days
of her life, youknowwhatImean

he hated this chore, an infringement
on his liberty, stealing his time
even if just a few hours

as they both waited
the electric sign above
window E3 flashed the number 11
a mechanical female voice
announced: "Now serving number eleven
at window E three"

Responding to the voice, he jumped
to his feet, his eyes searching
for window E3, thinking
that the word "serving"
was a nauseating euphemism

barely awake despite
recent drug infusions from
coffee and cigarettes she
watched him walk hesitantly
toward her window, he
must be number 11

the "good morning" greeting
that he was able to manufacture
almost sounded sincere, which
in was not,
and it was not a good
morning for either of them

she responded with an accusatory
"May I help you?"
he could smell the distaste
on her breath for the irritation
standing before her

he lost his registration
and needed a new copy
what an idiot she thought
displaying her superior knowledge
of DMV forms she told him he had
not filled in section C of DMV 4017
filled it in for him, directed him to the cashier
now she was puffed
on her own petty power

with that feeling you get
after confession and five Hail Mary's
be approached the line at the cashier's window
while a mechanical female voice said
"Now serving number fifteen at window E three"

(c)Frank Kozusko 2010

from The Man in the Moon has no Testicles

Poetica Publishing Co, Norfolk, VA

Miscarriage

2010-12-07T23:18:00.002-05:00

We'd been trying for months
when one night, we heard
what sounded like a baby,
its cries sharpening outside.
Our neighbors had gathered
in the backyard and stared
high into one of the trees
where a young raccoon clung
to a branch bending slowly.
There were holes in the trunk
where its mother had nested,
and this one, no bigger than
your hand, it seemed, flashed
its eyes in fear when spotlight
ricocheted through leaves.
I think about this animal's
face, how it was taken away
from the tree boarded up
now, its mother long gone.
I take comfort in forgetting
the details and hold our son.

(c)Jon Pineda 2004

from Birthmark

Southern Illinois University Press

Carbondale, IL

After Awhile

2010-12-06T22:10:00.000-05:00

for Haumea

And wasn't the wind wet like April,
late April -- rain blown from the bell
of a blue clarinet.

And Her hair! The dark
guitar of it and later, the long legs
of sunlight uncrossed,

but unseen. Such instruments!

So many mad edges made into music:

Her arms open like a storm.
If I didn't want so much
so much, why would i ever

say anything? My heart takes cover
on two wheels: Her slow walk slow enough

to see by. My mouth harps
and harps, but what

language is this: dumb notes
in a dumb key. I flame
and I fizzle.

Why am I so sickly and tame?
Even now, Her hips play the world.
Bring my voice! I should praise.

like a sax. I should stage
the essential noise --

as if any minute I could die
and the days would forget me.

And won't they?
Isn't it just a matter of time
till somebody stutters S-
S-Seibles is dead.

I'm already dead.

My life looks for itself in the windows.

And what will I do after awhile?
10,000 years with all these
almost-words still tied in my throat.

Her hair. The strum-drunken tongue of my heart.
Always Her eyes: always
so undarkably dark.

(c)Tim Seibles 2004

from Buffalo Head Solos

Cleveland State University Poetry Center

Cleveland, OH

Trousseau

2010-12-05T06:01:00.002-05:00

At my first wedding, I was the central
witness: days before, they killed

three goats and singed their flesh
under the guava trees. Knives

dipped in rum sheared closer
to the spongy membranes later diced

with vinegar and shallots,
served warm, nearly raw.

The laughter and the clink of bottles
rose with the smoke and found

me in my hiding place. I wished
to sleep, never to return to this place

where I had voted yes to my own
undoing. But on the bed they'd lain

the trousseau as though it were another
body: veil and knotted rope of roses,

sheath of silk and tulle, waterfall
of orchids. Even I could fall

in love with such an absent
face. Framed in white, was it what

I kissed, as though it played
no part in this conspiracy?

(c)Luisa A. Igloria 2005

from Trill & Mordent

WordTech Editions, Cincinnati, OH

Opposite One Another

2010-12-04T07:11:00.000-05:00

After 15 years of shared bed
rooms, I needed space.
I needed a 3x3 foot square, concrete
with distinctly carved lines
and no breaks
or cracks along the edges.
Definition of my boundaries
always gives me the heads up
on how far I can go.

She and I came from different places
but found ourselves at the corner
of Core and 21st
like we were magnets pulled there.
She needed the space to learn to live
outside herself, finally.
I needed the space because
I had never had any to call my own

And we would scream to each other
filling back alleys
with our high school frustrations
echoing down train tracks
about the boys that done us wrong
'til the water rose at the Hague inlet
pushed back as if our voices were lunar
movements requiring the shift,
the rising and falling of water.

Her dad was in the military too.
Different branch than my own but
the experience was the same.
Her family stayed together.
And she was smart in that she-was-so-smart-and-beautiful
I-can't-stand-to-look-at-her kind of way.
So you had to love her.
She never minded
that her sidewalk square was missing
a corner to moss.
I came from a broken home full
of love and hope. My ambitions
a neon sign above my head
"Last Hope!" I resented being
the youngest, always doing
right what others had done wrong.
I need to yell this to the world,
still
from a stage, from the corner,
from the place no-one knows inside me.

Nine years have passed since those
corner therapy sessions with Kara.
We still met when she's in town
filling our nights with dancing
and beer to quiet our frustrations.
I find us, more often than not, sharing
long goodbyes in parking lots and on street corners
trying to reclaim the spaces opposite one another
where we knew who we were.

(c)cheryl snow white

from her chapbook, snow white lies

Flying With Icarus (Remembering Anne Sexton)

2010-12-03T12:07:00.000-05:00

   Sing with me
A song of memory
For our beautiful "Annie,"
Jingling her golden bracelets
And checking her lipstick,
While calmly floating on
An un-moored rocking raft
In a placid Sea
   of "Prozac":
Composing well crafted lines
Of beauty in "Bedlam,"
While waiting for her cue,
Waiting for the casting call
   of darkness:
Saving enough toxic pills
To step upon the stage,
She does not hear
Her defiant closing lines:
They are driven with
   blood red ink
Onto the white pages
Into which she sinks.

(c)Jason Lester Atkins

published in Skipping Stones 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Pocket Dictionary

2010-12-03T12:05:00.000-05:00

Wife, Webster says,
is woman joined to man,
stuck like a sluttish Siamese twin
to a suit
who moves freely through the world
as if this body were not dragging
like tin cans behind him.

She makes a pretty jangle
on his wrist,
hangs unnoticeably
in the kitchen, a slow simmer seeping
from the hot stove.

He touches her with potholders
and the smolder of love,
a married man, yes, husbanding
his libido for later,
other whores
to score in the dark where
spouses do not slip in
to the room where
secrets are born like babies.

The secret is this:
He is free, a solo seagull stealing
a ride from the wind, a good time.
Not arbitrarily welded to the
wife, old lady, nagging shrew
who once wooed him into
wanting to stand
not next to
but only slightly in front of her,
who promised to have and to hold
or at least roll between his fingers
once in a while like a smooth
brown pebble in his pocket.

(c)Corey Nixon

published in Skipping Stones 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Mother and Daughter

2010-12-01T10:11:00.000-05:00

Donning your dread-locked hair
And multi-punctured ears,
You look more like someone
Out of Rolling Stone magazine
Than my baby girl of seventeen.

A Bob Marley T-shirt
And hip-hugging jeans.
You're swaying around the kitchen
While I attempt "Catch the Wind"
On my guitar.

Yeah! We're both keeping the beat.

Your macrame necklace
Bounces on your chest
As my Dollar Tree readers
Balance midway down my nose.

The same, but different,
That's you and me.

Confirming the old saying:
"The apple doesn't fall far from the tree."

(c)Patti Fay Schmitt

published in Skipping Stones 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Who Is She?

2010-11-30T00:14:00.000-05:00

Her face is familiar,
Her voice is too.
I think she's someone I once knew.

Memories fade or are buried deep,
In dreams of wake and sleep.
Do I recognize her eyes of blue?
I think she's someone I once knew.

It's in the heart some memories live,
With all the joy and pain they give.
Her hair is blonde, with grays a few.
I think she's someone I once knew.

The years bring change, but at what cost?
Should love renew or should love be lost?
Are memories real? What is true?
I think she's someone I once knew

Now tears clear the haze from my mind.

Oh memories, how can you be so unkind?

For now it is the truth you tell:

I think she's someone I once knew.

(c)Frank Kosusko

published in Skipping Stones 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Honey That's You

2010-11-29T23:41:00.000-05:00

You're cute,
You're dashing,
But oh, so exasperating,
You're the manly man
   With dark looks and a strong jaw,
You're the one-night fling
   Not the forever and ever kind of thing,
Yet here you are
   And the latter is what you offer.

Forgive me, but I can't help
   But look at you askance,
The dark, dashing guy
   Interested in a lasting romance?
I'm not naive or a fool
   So pardon me, while I giggle and snort,
There's such a thing as too good to be true
   And honey, that's you.

(c)Clara Van Eck

published in Skipping Stones 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Size Zero Beauty

2010-11-28T08:33:00.000-05:00

Soft, plump
voluptuous woman
embraced by the breeze,
by the breath
of my warm face on
the old photograph.

Comfortably leaning
on her thickness and strength,
resolute against the fabric
and the amorous air which
caresses her ample shape.

Forgotten mother
of misbegotten children
borne in sickness and despair,
emaciated models
sustained by Diet Cokes
and curious looks
that prelude the inevitable stares.

Diminished bodies
and souls. Frail
frames of discontent
staring blankly as from
the Second World War,
walking awkwardly
from their gas chamber
to the lifeless lights
of the runway floor.

Starving in magazines,
in destitute dreams,
not people, but hangers
for clothes (and souls)
wasting away
on size-zero beauty.

(c)David Lucas

published in Skipping Stones, 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Man in the Box

2010-11-27T22:31:00.000-05:00

His face appears
old, white, weathered and cruel
his lips are pursed
his eyes stare straight ahead
show everything
tell the story of his life
the crimes and more
the emotion
pure hatred
the knowledge sends a chill
makes me stop in my tracks
stop long enough
to see the tiny face next to mine
my daughter's tiny hands
play with the strings on my shoes
and then she turns her head
her bright eyes catch a glimpse
of the killer on display
and her lips form a smile
the same smile she gave
the old lady in the store this morning
and it is then
I realize
the knowledge that sends a chill
has not found her yet.

(c)Ruth Lewis

published in Skipping Stones 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Persistent Yearning

2010-11-26T16:21:00.000-05:00

Grandma Rachel, a Holocaust survivor,
got a job in the 50s at Chicago's
Ida Crown Hebrew Academy
as the cafeteria's cashier,
yearning for the company of
rabbis-teachers, and their students
consuming verses of Torah.
She so missed the learned and
little ones who used to surround
her in Poland, continuing in the
New World to be faithfully
nourished by their spirit.

(c)Rabbi Israel Zoberman 2008

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 24

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Out of Nowhere

2010-11-26T16:12:00.000-05:00

Seemingly out of nowhere
I suddenly began greeting
All whom I encountered with
"Hello, Darlin!"
Puzzled, I reflected on why
This might be happening
When, out of nowhere,
I was zapped with an epiphany!
Oh, my God!
Those were the last two words
She said to me
As she began the next leg
In her spiritual journey home.
So, I began repeating them daily
In the hopes that
Out of nowhere
She would appear to me in a dream
As she had once before,
Or perhaps in the gentle caress
Of an evening breeze
Or the kiss of the sun
Upon my face
Or by the wonder
On a young child's face
As he witnessed the birth
Of a butterfly or tadpole.
She was sweetness personified;
The honey in a honeycomb.
Her cup always overflowed
Whenever she smiled,
Said a kind word,
Gave a comforting hug,
Or an intimate embrace.
So, seemingly out of nowhere,
Mommy,
I hope you hear me when I say,
"Hello, Darlin!"

(c)Mary Martin 2008

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 24

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Rain Moon

2010-11-25T10:38:00.000-05:00

Wan, wispy moon,
shredded with ragged leaves--
the coming rain
could not shade the earth
with more obscurity
than that now untouched
by your pale presence.

No Pied Piper to the stars are you,
no pervader of dreamless sleep.
Your unmoving, unheralded ascendancy
dissolves into darkness,
masking the indulgent countenance
that once encouraged lovers,
leaving relief from sterile stillness
to come only with the silent rain.

(c)Shirley Nesbit Sellers 2008

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 24

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Don't Make Her Cry

2010-11-25T10:33:00.000-05:00

When I was young it was fun
to find the bed gently rocking,
waking me in the middle of the night.
Little quakes occurred regularly
in the continuing collision
of the Pacific and continental plates.
Often the walls, joists, or rafters
or our house would complain:
groaning, snapping, or banging
in the uninvited movement.

I liked earthquakes until age
twenty-six. While eating
lunch at my drafting board
I heard a loud rumble, then the
ancient brick walls of my
building began to move,
shake, and groan as plaster
rained down from above.
Terrified, trembling, crouching
under my drafting board I felt
the floor rising, falling, shaking
as the building groaned, banged,
and screamed for its life.

I cried, "Remember, God,
I am Ruth Kelly's baby boy.
Have mercy on her.
Don't make her cry!"

(c)Robert L. Kelly 2008

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 24

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Time Traveling

2010-11-25T10:24:00.000-05:00

They say gazing at stars
is like time traveling,
light reaching our eyes
from distant nebulae
that may, by now, no longer
exist. The radiance
they emit navigates
an ocean of space
over millions of years,
showing up on Earth to
play a part in our cosmic show,
one point in a constellation's
connect-the-dot pattern or
a bright and solitary pinprick
in the universe's
velveteen fabric.

That's how it is
when I look in your
face; instead of
blots and wrinkles
earned from a life
well spent, the image
I see comes to me from
years ago. I gaze
back in time
at a person who
saw the future,
convinced me
to be deeper than
superficial swagger,
captured my heart,
still holds it
in her hands.

(c)Bill Glose 2008

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 24

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Airborne

2010-11-25T10:16:00.000-05:00

I rode my two-wheeler down Summit Avenue
Past the sissy girls.
Mother covered her eyes,
Father nibbled his moustache.
I urged my steed into the air with a passionate
Squeeze on the pedals,
And I was flying, head thrown back,
Laughing into the sizzling blue sky.

I did not ever have to come down.
Not if I didn't want to.

(c)Laura J. Bobrow 2008

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 24

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Sarah Swifthawk

2010-11-24T14:35:00.006-05:00

Sara Swifthawk in faded brown moccasins
walks three miles to Oljato trading post
--Place of the Moonlight Water.
The frost is heavy the cold bites,
her turquoise and silver jewelry is to be pawned for food.
Sara Swift hawk, jet hair sprinkled with white,
face a network of wrinkles, needs food more than fuel.

The trader smiles kindly as he gives her
canned peaches and beans.
Sara walks home slowly.
She builds a fire of pinon logs,
puts on a kettle of beans to cook,
then settles down in a warm blanket.

Sara Swifthawk passes into a dream world
bright with desert flowers that lift the heart and spirit.
When she was young, she herded sheep in canyons and mesas.
She danced the squaw dance with young men who gave her money.
She rode her palomino pony to sings where she was allowed to chant.
Sam Begay, Sara's husband, married into her clan of many waters.
She gave birth to three children; all of whom

have left the reservation.

Sam Begay died some years ago of the hanta virus sickness.
Now, Sara Swifthawk lives by herself.
She gathers yucca with which to wash her hair.
She weaves colorful rugs to sell.
The harshness of winter has surrounded her.
Sara Swifthawk is too weak to gather more wood.
Sara now in her dream, rides her pony across an arroyo.
She hears the desert owl, small and lively in his cactus nest.
The cold wraps around her,
She is spirited away.

(c)Elizabeth Urquhart 2009

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

While Dancing

2010-11-24T13:24:00.000-05:00

An ekphrastic interpretation of Pierre-Auguste

Renoir's A Dance in the Country (1841-1919)

She wears a broad smile
One hand rests on her partner's shoulder
The other holds his hand and a fancy fan
A red bonnet tied under her chin
Adorned in a flowery flowing
Bustled evening gown
With ruffled bottom
Her dark bearded partner's
Profiled nose leans in
To breathe in aromas
Of her perfumed flaming red hair
Is she smiling because of her partner
Or flirting with someone else's dance partner

Barbara Drucker Smith 2009

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Falling Back Into Life

2010-11-23T15:48:00.001-05:00

Happy late in life,
they're not afraid to let the quiet in
or mix living with dying.

There's hushed talk of what they'll find
on the other side, who will be there
to lift them over the threshold.

That it's best to give everything away now,
her demitasse cups, his silver pocket watch.
How little it all comes to.

Patiently arranging pansies in clay pots,
beneath clouds shaped like blossoms
bursting into the unknown,

they fall back into life again, edge
the garden path with simple stones.
Knowing, little else matters except

this familiar ground of home,
and the end that they see
so clearly.

(c)Ann Falcone Shalaski 2005

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Underwater Ballet

2010-11-23T15:22:00.000-05:00

The sea cocoon
born of raindrops,
of rushing rivers,
caresses the land.
God's other world.

Not always
in harmony with its silent depths
but beautiful in
its secret dissonance.

A world of rainbow-dipped
creatures
performing an
underwater ballet
in ever-moving liquid motion.
A jete
pas de bourree
pas de deux
God's
underwater ballet

Known
but to those who
break through
earth's watery cocoon
to reach its noiseless depths.

(c)Betty Maistelman 2009

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Starlight

2010-11-23T15:21:00.000-05:00

I stand still and watch
as the high bridge lights compete
with the twilight stars.
Now, with Father Moon,
each challenges its siblings in a sparkle race.
In vain, Mother Cloud blankets
her children for bed.
They just laugh and glow.

(c)Shirley Nesbit Sellers 2009

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Secret Funds

2010-11-23T14:56:00.000-05:00

It's not time to go
But already
My substance
Is melting
And trickling down
The highway
West,
Sniffing
Like money
On the trail of a Swiss bank,
A proper place
For quiet accumulation
While my resources ripen
Until the time is right.
Then they'll find
My exoskeleton, an empty
Skin of Lycra Spandex,
Along with dust and dog hair
Upon the kitchen floor.

(c)Anne Meek 2009

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

The Last Room

2010-11-23T14:29:00.000-05:00

Here I am, Love, left behind
In this old house you loved and had so briefly.
You are close enough to touch today,
Alone in this old house with paint and plaster;
This is the last room, cleared away.
Square feet with me is still disaster,
And not a chance I've figured right.
If you were here, math would not matter;
You would look up, your eyes alight,
And grin at me, perched on this ladder.
You would be seventy and nine.
I can't imagine your quick body
Even so frail as it became
Before the end when death was kind:
A sleep within a sleep and no awaking.
Or did you, as I long to think, arise,
Delighted and surprised, as light was breaking
And come to kiss me, sleeping, one last time?
That would be sweetness undiminished;
But I have walls to caulk and prime
and this last room in your last dream
To finish.

(c)Bea DuRette 2009

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Choose Something Like a Star

2010-11-23T14:01:00.000-05:00

When the heart needs
something to hold on to--
an anchor to cling to--
a safe place to regain peace--
I'd like to choose a star
as Frost advises,
but I find them, first of all,
too far away.
I'd rather something to look at,
feel, hold, or touch--
you can't always see the stars--
undoubtedly human frailty
on my part.
I sought advice and was told
to speak to trees.
Out loud.
Okay.
I've done worse.
I found three trees,
planted in a triangle.
I stood in the middle
and spoke my heart.
They said I was the first person
to speak to them.
They took my tale and carried it home.

They are black locust I found,
the bark of which is used
herbally as a cathartic;
metaphorically--letting go.

The city has decided
to down these trees
to make the street wider.

Maybe a star . . .

(c)Patricia Adler 2009

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Snow Storm

2010-11-23T13:49:00.000-05:00

By the time I reach
the apple tree
on the far side of the field

the sparse, lazy snow
has grown thick and fast
on a shifting wind blowing it
in wide, blinding swirls

that turn me around until
I don't know which way
to head for home and cling
fearfully to the old, arthritic tree
so serenely anchored there.

Of course, the tree doesn't count time, afraid
of being caught with night coming on.
Of course, it doesn't worry about being lost--
it's already home--

but there's comfort in the way
it allows the storm to unfold,

the way it stands by me, our edges blurred
with those of fences and posts, foxes and crows,

in the storm's smoky whiteness and falling snow,
its tissue-thin wings whispering and humming
like a buzz of electric voices
hidden in wires on telephone poles.

(c)Sunday Abbott 2009

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

February Moon

2010-11-23T13:36:00.000-05:00

Lo! The ice pale February moon

scarves of clouds across her face

serene, round glides across the sky

She admires her progress in the lake

cold, motionless, a shining mirror

reflecting back her light, betraying

Two lovers in the shadows

(c)Anne Darrison 2009

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Ave Maria

2010-11-23T13:27:00.000-05:00

Scent of sweet
impatience, the melon
husk holds August

in its pulp;
   Hail Mary
   full of grace.

The Summer sores,
once close to festering,
now flower thickly,

freely where they
wept; the grove and
graveyard bear

similar swells.
Full are the tombs,
fuller the womb,

the ovum opening'
to strange gust
in the middle of its

breath.
We fail
to understand,
   Hail Mary,
   Mother of God.

All we recall
is ripeness, long
awaited in the stalls,

plum, peach,
or apricot still firm
against our thumb.
   Pray, pray for us
   now and in the
   hour

Wait, it is not yet
time.

(c)Sofia F. Starnes 2001

from A Commerce of Moments

Pavement Saw Press, Columbus, OH

The Ripening

2010-11-23T12:57:00.000-05:00

I was in my gold skin
you in your tan,
and we danced
over housetops
across parking lots
dangled our feet from
neon signs while raindrops fell
into our mouths
like fake jewels
from Second Ave
and everywhere you filled me
with miracle.

Like a new
Artemis,
we chased winds
to fields beyond Hoboken
that greened beneath our feet
and we harvested
each other.

(c)Virginia O'Keefe 2005

published in Poet's Domain, Vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

I Rejoice in Being What I Am

2010-11-23T12:45:00.001-05:00

How long did it take me to rejoice
in being what I am? For twenty-two
years, I'd been looking, searching
for that elusive being who
I felt was there, but I couldn't
quite get a hold of it--or them.
I tried when my children were in school,
I hid it in dresser drawers, beneath
bras, slips, and panty hose. When
they were gone, when housework
almost got me down, I'd take it out,
scrutinize it, and put it back, gently.
Now, there is no need for that;
My time is in my hands alone.
I can sit, dream, and write
to my heart's content. I have
found wheat I looked for:
I Rejoice In Being What I Am.

(c)Marvel N. Mustard 2005

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Who's Rejoicing?

2010-11-23T12:35:00.001-05:00

Nobody's rejoicing in his being what he is
Mean old man, always has been,
Younger, he was meaner still,
What gives him the right
To be so ornery and cantankerous?
She ought to know,
'Been with him all these years.
Did they ever have a really nice day?
Alone, maybe, but not together.
How can they stay in the same house?
Miserable with, miserable without,
S'pose she understands him.
And maybe in those earlier years
When they were very young,
They did love each other
And shared their dreams,.
He is what he is . . .
And she is still holding on.

(c)Beverley Isaksen 2005

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

My Own Skin

2010-11-23T12:29:00.000-05:00

Give me bittersweet dark chocolate to sink my
teeth into,
the soft strains of Paganini,
the wriggling ruff of a devoted collie,
a stack of novels with lines so well crafted
I'm swept away by a literary tsunami,
and I will never want to die,
or think I have already died
and departed
to a blissful afterlife

and then
give me your hand
and I'll remember
who I am.

(c)Terry Cox-Joseph 2005

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

The Moon Is Everything Tonight

2010-11-20T21:14:00.000-05:00

The moon
is everything
tonight not the
lamp shining
on the page
not the TV's blue glare.
The moon
white lady
rides the night
like a woman
astride a black stallion.
She peers at herself
in the pond
and the bullfrogs flood
her light with thrum
and twang.
We stand
under the dark sky--
her brilliance floods
our vision seeps into
our blood. Her silver
flows through our bones
and our tongues taste
swelling tide.

(c)Serena Fusek 2010

Red Moon

2010-11-20T21:10:00.001-05:00

The moon
is everything tonight.
Red and swollen
it crawls up
the east
looms over houses
and the strip mall.
It overwhelms the sky
swallows the stars.
Red as Kali's rubies
it climbs through the trees
gleaming cold fire
in bare branches
and--like the wolf
with blood on its muzzle--
begins to follow me
down the lonely street.

(c)Serena Fusek 2010

The Moon Is Everything

2010-11-20T21:05:00.001-05:00

"The moon will be everything tonight."

Jack Callen, Stream Road

The moon
is everything tonight;
I brought no
battery-clunky
thousand watt-lantern
on this camping trip--
nor firewood.
I pitch my tent
in the meadow.
The dark rises
from the grass
with cricket and
katydid song
as the the last sunlight
slides off
tree tops.

I sit under heaven
no bonfire flames
with glittering shadow plays
to divert my vision.
The moon
that scarred old lady
wise in her silence
lights my meditation.
By the tree line
shadows of deer
browse. An owl calls.

When I crawl
into my sleeping bag
the clockwork cradle
of stars
rocks me
and the midnight dew
pattering on the tent fly
becomes a lullaby.

(c)Serena Fusek 2010

November Moon

2010-11-20T20:59:00.001-05:00

Tonight's full moon
is called Mad Moon
Mourning Moon
Snow Moon. Now
is the time
of the long dirge
the lament. Daylight
thin as fever dreams
sinks into shadows
twisting out of
tangled roots.

The oldest goddess reigns:
Kali of the skull necklace,
Morrigan, queen of carrion crows,
Baba Yaga. Along
the blood rimmed
edge of twilight
the west wind wails
or is that
the howl of hounds
running down
the white deer?

But when the scarred moon
escapes the tree's black fingers
it drags a cloak of stars
into night pure as
angel song.

(c)Serena Fusek 2010

Tuesday Morning

2010-11-16T13:30:00.004-05:00

Within a candid moment, I thought
how I like it when she moves
about the house in various
stages of undress. Confessing desires

comes easy in the early hours.
Sometimes she’ll sigh

how she is calm when
I am near her, and I am moved
to say something like: Me too.

Instead I smile and sip my secret
(whiskeyed) coffee—

once she’s dressed for the day
I must provide my own
comfort. Maybe layered cloth and

shoes that hurt her worried feet
conspire to cover what should be
exposed: Though we inch daily

towards dying, our bodies are warm;

we get what we need; life gives
enough, when it’s simple.

(c)allen weber

published in Loch Rave Review

Sylvania, Ohio 1959

2010-10-31T09:19:00.002-04:00

It's a Brueghel painting.
As the crow flies,
the green fairways below
stretch to the vanishing point.
Dotting the rough,
oaks flourish along the edges.
Tiny men lean into golf swings,
Hunch over putters,
while within screened porches
brothers and sisters eat and
Post-war babies gurgle in strollers:
Bathers carry rattan bags to the swimming pool--

Look again.
A springboard's painted at the upper corner.
A diver soars over the three meter,
Reaching, stretching so high, the clouds and she meet in an arc.
She throws her head back towards the water,
toes pointed; the board floats inches away. Like an arrow
she plummets ten feet straight to the drain spotted below.
Bubbles swarm as she pushes to the surface,
Victorious. Reaching perfection,
soaring, an angel, Icarus
winging towards stars, pulling,
pulling into the beyond--
But her wings don't melt.
Immortality is all she knows.

(c)Christy Lumm

published in Skipping Stones 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Musical Musings

2010-10-31T07:55:00.001-04:00

Simon and Garfield were right:
I am indeed a rock, an island.
The bell tolls only for me.

Where is my bridge to grant me
safe passage
over the troubled waters of life?

Silence is a sound--
it echoes in my mind,
filling my heart.

Where is the home for which
I am bound?
The comfort there?

Goodbye, love...

(c)Melissa Beebe

published in Skipping Stones 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Nothing?

2010-10-30T23:52:00.000-04:00

Nothing has changed,
   But everything has...
You never phone or come by,
   But you were always there, only a jump away.

Where are we now?
   You say we are here.
But I don't see --
   Maybe I'm the ignorant one?

Isolation is a lethal state,
   (as if you saw it at all);
Together we were one,
   But all that has faded.

I was the believer, your disciple,
   You, the chosen one, my leader.
And there was life, excitement
   Until yesterday when the fog fell.

Somehow, I don't know how to pretend,
   We are still the same,
When nothing has changed,
   But everything has.

(c)Anne Gray

published in Skipping Stones 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Joplin

2010-10-28T23:04:00.000-04:00

From my speakers
her voice shrieks
a blues shout
ripped from her guts,
a starving animal
that claws her throat.
Spawned in the hollow
of white-trash suburbs
that raged in her ribs,
its hunger numbed
by a needle,
nursed on Southern Comfort,
shivering, sweating,
bleeding into my skin
it bawls
a romantic lament
"what else can you
count on?"
Nothing.
The voice
screams and slashes
cries
itself to sleep each night
forsaken
when Janis nodded off
never came down
left it snared
in the tape's loop
to wail alone.

(c)Serena Fusek 2009

published in Skipping Stones, vol VI

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Portrait of a Woman in Stained Glass

2010-10-27T23:20:00.000-04:00

inspired by Portrait of a Woman in Pergola with Wisteria
by Tiffany Studios
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA

Her gown cascades down her body
Waterfall of shimmering folds: turquoise and
violet
Golden breasts glow
One hand gently holds a cluster of wisteria,
Their scent: the essence of warm spring evenings, purple
sky

She gazes through me and beyond.
Gathered, as she is into herself
She is pleased.

(c)Amanda Hart Cravotta 2009

published in Skipping Stones, Vol VI

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Loss

2010-10-27T21:02:00.001-04:00

Drowning in a river of memories,
caught in a dam of stunned disbelief,
empty arms numbed, pierced heart,
left breathing stale air of bereavement,
lost in a deluge of dreary days
getting up,
lying down,
waiting for you to change
black and white to Technicolor.

Oh God, only you can make me whole
again!

(c)Laniere Gresham 2009

published in Skipping Stones, Vol VI

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Jewel of the Crown

2010-10-25T23:27:00.001-04:00

The family that survives generations
for generations to see does so
not on its own, but through the woman
whom God has blessed to be its mother
She who is the vehicle of life
also leads us by example to eternal life
She is the Jewel of His Crown

And when worldliness weighs
her family down, she cushions it
with faith and trust
When framework falters
she holds it together with commitment
and when complexity has us in awe
her prayers spark communication
and understanding

The family founded in His word
is the crown trimmed in gold, forged
from elements of nature and love
The crown is eternal, immortal, invisible
But she is the jewel that gives it
virtue and light.

(c)Nathan Richardson 2005

from Likeness of Being

Raggedy Ann on God

2010-10-24T21:43:00.001-04:00

O God, who art a pushover,
loves rubber babies
and any clay-soft,
tit-adoring thing:
Why have you forsaken me?
Is it my arrowbones?
The scars I see with?

Go on, honky, try me.

Stick your son like a gun in my ribs.
It's flesh you smell, not wax,
and believe me, daddy,
these wings are no prayers.

I will claw your dimpled hands
and rake your eyes,
and twist that plushy image
like a dove's neck.
I will not have you amused
and babbling with your play-doh:

I'm shaped too like a cross to let you off so easy.

(c)Suzanne Underwood Rhodes

from A Welcome Shore 2010

Canon Press, Moscow, ID

A Young Woman's Introduction to Color and Death

2010-10-23T05:59:00.000-04:00

In the old-folks home I changed

bed sheets for this white lady.

She was real old, but she liked me

anyway. She’d tell 'bout the days

she was young and the things she’d done.

Said she wrote for a paper back

when most reporters were men.

When she was ready to sleep,

she’d reach up to hold my face—

her hands would always shake—

she’d pull me down to kiss my cheek.

One night she said to me something

like “You know what little girl? I’m going

to die this week.” Well, I didn’t know

what to say, felt like a fool standing there

smiling at her, too young to imagine

anyone could plan for such a thing.

Can’t usually tell with black people

till their breath comes fast and shallow.

But old white folks turn blue before

they die, like their tired blood stops

flowing along with their will

to be the last of their kind.

It starts at their toes—

got about two weeks to live

with blue toes. As the color flows

up their feet they’ve got a week,

maybe less. When it’s to their knees

that’s the day they’ll pass away.

Next day when I got to her room she was

lying down—I’d never seen her do that

in daylight. She hadn’t even pulled the covers

back. Then I guess she didn’t see the need

to muss up the bed. She was all dressed up

except that she wasn’t wearing shoes.

She didn’t speak. That was different,

she always spoke before. This time

she just smiled as I came close

enough to see her feet were blue.

(c)Allen M. Weber 2010

published in 2010 Fall issue of

the Naugatuck River Review

In the Company of Poets

2010-10-22T06:13:00.000-04:00

The threadbare jeans
and coffee-stained pullover
proclaim my profession
as much as the dancing pen
and pad of foolscap.

The pennies in my pocket
are never enough for a tip,
so I arrange them by my saucer
in connect-the-dot portraits
to entertain the waitress.

She'll understand. I've seen her
scribbling stanzas on the backs
of order tickets, pink tongue tip jutting
from the corner of her mouth
while she sifts words
for a golden phrase
to flawlessly describe--

--the woman sitting by the door
tearing perfume samples
from a magazine,
swiping them on her wrists

--her friend, who teases that
she'll have to rub her arms
beneath her husband's nose
before he'll notice

--or, perhaps, me,
sitting here
searching for a way
to describe her.

(c)Bill Glose 2005

published in The Poet's Domain, Vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Sense of Scents

2010-10-21T23:26:00.001-04:00

I smell rain on a hot slate sidewalk of summer
I smell pine needles on a cold Christmas morning

scents not in my nostrils but in my mind

popcorn at a Saturday cowboy matinee
perfume on a girl at the eighth grade dance
   and on women who perfumed for me
baby powder on my babies and their babies

and more
   and more
   and more

I smell the fragrance of the nurse's shampoo
as she leans over me to adjust my IV

I smell life

I smell death

(c)Frank Kozusko 2010

from The Man in the Moon has no Testicles

Poetica Publishing Company, Norfolk, VA

Golden watch

2010-10-19T23:02:00.001-04:00

Summer returns as a memory of a childhood,
as a shadow of the time when we were able to wonder
to be surprised and to love,
without apprehension.
While I am like Crusoe exploring the vicinity
in search of a private spot with a river view,
the calendar announces June.
I hope for a day of solitude, for the corridors of a hotel
where I can slide unnoticed like a ghost,
a lunch in a cafe, where no one ever speaks,
a walk in a garden
abandoned centuries ago,
a nap under open windows
with aroma of steaming fields.
I hope for a day which I can make as long as I desire,
as long as it would take me to get bored
not because of its length but because of its content -
a day that can't be measured with any known device.
I hope to dress in white and open tall glass doors,
walk outside in the boiling air of noon
take my golden watch from my wrist,
place it on the burning surface of the parking lot
and step on it
with my
high
heel
shoe.

(c)Irena Flowers 2010

Anesthesia

2010-10-18T05:30:00.001-04:00

Lying there naked, draped in white cotton muslin.
For a moment she was an Egyptian queen,
Preparing for her daily ritual, of bath oils and Eucalyptus.

So still, she could see her own heart beating.
Its song echoed loud into the room
Thump-thump! fast and deep, whispering sleep.
Then: Enter the King!

She could not move, but her eyes followed him,
Trying hard to calculate his thoughts.
He was the King, and surely, this was his kingdom.
With the roar of a Lion he called order to his subjects.

In unison they began to work, much like a fine-tuned turbo.
White lights and sterile incense.
"Am I the lamb on his sacrificial slab?" she thought.
Her thoughts flickered to a whisper.

Sleep, dear Queen, and fear not.
Time will take you into the late hours,
But you'll awaken to a garden of flowers
And dance like a princess once more.

(c)Donna M Kalinski 2010

Lament of Charmian

2010-10-17T15:07:00.001-04:00

In Rome my mistress was mistook

And never a harlot was. Married

to Caesar, what cared we that he

had a wife in his foreign

barbarous land, a ritual we did not know,

Great Isis blessed us here.

Then Caesar died, and Antony came,

My lady was not beautiful,

From an Alexandrine line

The nose too figured.

And much too fair. But my papers,

my curls, made her--

Blackened, braided, lacquered

Golds, purples . . . ah my craft

--what she was

fit for Queendom. She ruled, but

so did I. . . . We died together

by that good omen.

The work of twenty dynasties to bring her

to that perfection.

And together we

Made a story for all time.

Myreen Nicholson 2005

published in The Poet's Domain, vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Choose Something Like a Star

2010-10-16T09:59:00.007-04:00

When the heart needs
something to hold on to--
an anchor to cling to--
a safe place to regain peace--
I'd like to choose a star
as Frost advises,
but I find them, first of all,
too far away.
I'd rather something to look at,
feel, hold, or touch--
you can't always see the stars--
undoubtedly human frailty
on my part.
I sought advice and was told
to speak to trees.
Out loud.
Okay.
I've done worse.
I found three trees,
planted in a triangle.
I stood in the middle
and spoke my heart.
They said I was the first person
to speak to them.
They took my tale and carried it home.

They are black locust I fund,
the bark of which is used
herbally as a cathartic;
metaphorically--letting go.

The city has decided
to down these trees
to make the street wider.

Maybe a star . . .

(c)Patricia Adler 2009

published in The Poet's Domain, vol 25

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Take a Look at Your Life

2010-10-15T00:08:00.000-04:00

When I was in my forties, a beautiful woman

of 24 fell in love with me.

We worked together and got to know

each other's ways.

She could have had any guy around.

I was married, with three kids

so I don't know why she picked on me

Over a cup of coffee, one morning,

she asked if we could be lovers.

Things weren't going so well at home,

and God, she was gorgeous

but I said no

Later, I thought it over and approached her.

If the offer is still on I say yes,

and so, yes, we became lovers.

Yes, it was like nothing I'd ever known before.

They were writing

good love songs in those days

and I felt like I knew them

from the inside out

I thought our joy would fill the earth
and last til the end of time

We'd meet at her place,
smoke grass, listen to Roberta Flack
and glorify life

One day, she said we should spend
the rest of our lives together.
I said, Look, Ellie, I'm an old man
and you are just starting your life.
She took me in her arms
and made me young once more.

The next day she brought a record
by Neil Young and read the lyrics

Old man, take a look at my life
I'm a lot like you are

She said, I've been thinking,
we have thirty years. That's all I want.
I said no one more time
and didn't come back.
She went on her way

Twenty-four and there's so much more

this afternoon I was driving into Norfolk
and turned the radio on.
The jazz station playing a piano version
of that old Neil Young song.
God, I almost had a wreck.
Been over thirty years.
I'm in my seventies now and take a look at my life.
It's been a good one.
Those few months with her hang 'round

forever young

(c)Robert E. Young 2005

published in The Poet's Domain, vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Objects on the Tray

2010-10-14T07:41:00.000-04:00

The Maidservant, Camille Pissarro

The Chrysler Museum of Art

Is someone not well? The spoon in the glass
makes me think of medicine. And her somber
third of a face, as she is walking away, shows

tight lips and gaze looking down, toward, but not
seeing, the objects on the tray she carries
servant-style, no thumb over the edge.

Perhaps it had been ice cream in the glass,
but I doubt it. And i'm curious about her.
Her abdomen has gone soft and full as a spoiled

cat under the thousand-pleats apron. The dull
butterscotch dress, how hard it must be to pull
that on every day, no matter how bright,

how white the pretty lace and ruffle collar
with matching cap--and straps, as if
she could ever get away for a walk, say

on the breezy coast and have need to tie it.
Where is the knot for her
apron strings? I guess it's been worn so long

the knot, unbowed, has disappeared.
She looks too old in posture for that soft,
full cheek and high, modest curve of breast,

and dark (if it's lifted) eye. The dappling sun
puts a hand through the walkway, despite
the walled enclosure of green, and rests

on her cheek, her dress, the back of her neck
as kindly as it does upon the walk,
the bench, the spoon. does she feel it? She is

no one and she knows it. Almost disappeared
within herself, but useful. Like the bench. So why
does my heart ache, right in the center, like heartburn,

for a person I cannot touch, could never
reach; she has already gone ahead, already
rinsed the spoon.

(c)M. J. (Lanehart) Kledzik

published in Western Humanities Review, Spring 2000

I Rejoice in Being What I Am

2010-10-13T16:45:00.002-04:00

How long did it take me to rejoice
in being what I am? For twenty-two
years, I'd been looking, searching
for that elusive being who
I felt was there, but I couldn't
quite get a hold of it--or them.
I tried when my children were in school,
I hid it in dresser drawers, beneath
bras, slips, and pantyhose. When
they were gone, when housework
almost got me down, I'd take it out,
scrutinize it, and put it back, gently.
Now, there is no need for that;
My time is in my hands alone.
I can sit, dream, and write
to my heart's content. I have
found what I looked for:
I Rejoice In Being What I Am.

(c)Marvel N. Mustard

published in The Poet's Domain, vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Adventure

2010-10-13T16:41:00.000-04:00

My bare feet climb the prickly rope ladder,

backpack clinging to my shoulders,

heart beating fast.

Pinpricks of perspiration dot my forehead.

I reach between the rope strands

and touch rough, mottled, brown sandstone.

Don't look down!

The canyon floor, covered with scented silver,

sage brush, lies far below.

I crawl over the top. In front,

are crumbling dusty Anasazi cliff dwellings,

which shelter secrets of the past.

A deep pit, a kiva, with faintly painted walls,

was a sacred place where elders ruled

and discussed the laws of the tribe.

I find a small translucent skull,

surrounded by turkey bones,

gray and black pottery shards

and bits of corn. The skull,

perhaps exposed by desert scavengers,

rests in my hands:

I see a laughing, bronze skinned child,

dressed in soft skins and plaited yucca sandals,

running from her parents on the canyon floor.

My descent is perilous,

feet feel hesitantly for the next step.

At last firm ground is reached,

my journey is ended.

I look up: the deep turquoise blue of the sky,

and the silence permeate my being.

I breathe deeply and feel content.

(c)Elizabeth Urquhart 2005

published in The Poet's Domain, vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Femininity Cannot Be Lawed

2010-10-13T16:24:00.001-04:00

Femininity cannot be lawed,
Nor womanliness voted out of fact.
I would remain a woman, flesh and mind,
Were I to wield a hammer, wrench, or hoe.
The skies would smile and breeze the plane no less
Were I to man the levers and controls;
Yet life could reach a height as deeply felt
As exaltation sweeping a proud father
When he sits down to rock his new-formed child.
I could see myself, still soft with wonder,
Using a welder's torch, or hauling nets;
Or, with a love for all live things, life-risking
To save a burning home and those within.

But I could never see myself in arms,
Tigress tense, prepared to take my toll.
Never!
Recalling emptied mother arms,
Long centuries and countless banners old,
In empathy I would refuse to go.

(c)Shirley Nesbit Sellers 2005
published in The Poet's Domain, vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

I Rejoice in Being What I Am

2010-10-13T16:10:00.000-04:00

How long did it take me to rejoice
in being what I am? For twenty-two
years, I'd been looking, searching
for that elusive being who
I felt was there, but I couldn't
quite get a hold of it--or them.
I tried when my children were in school,
I hid it in dresser drawers, beneath
bras, slips, and pantyhose. When
they were gone, when housework
almost got me down, I'd take it out,
scrutinize it, and put it back, gently.
Now, there is no need for that;
My time is in my hands alone.
I can sit, dream, and write
to my heart's content. I have
found what I looked for:
I Rejoice In Being What I Am.

(c)Marvel N. Musgtard

published in The Poet's Domain, vol 22

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

Le dejeuner sur l'herbe

2010-10-12T08:49:00.000-04:00

I'm not embarrassed. No, my fixed stare
suggests only that you're interlopers on the scene.
Oh years ago, I could rouse a media storm.
Today my nakedness seems nominal. Clean

country air; a tipped basket of fruit,
a knot of bread; for cloth, the sweet
summer grass--this outing is a holiday from
my cramped flat, heat-swollen city streets.

A friend came with me. By the sun-lit bank
you'll find her, just risen from a bath,
slipping into a white chemise. Surely you've
entered into places like this, where faith

distills your life to one shimmering afternoon
and lets you rest there. But Manet tried
to warn us about opposites. Since you've
stayed, baffled by the canvas, I'll confide

there is something indelicate here. Business
suits at a picnic! Our dates refused to remove
their jackets and cravats. One stares off, bored,
into the distance. My suitor in the hat reproves

critics of the latest exhibit at the Salon
des Refuses as if I weren't here. Their
presence makes me more naked than I am.
Visitors to the museum can't help but stare.

(c)Jane Ellen Glasser 2010

Balcony

2010-10-09T23:11:00.000-04:00

She never sought anyone by phone
or mail or happenstance at a store.
Yet here they come, January thaw,
mud kissing rubbers and overshoes,
picking their way over slipperiness
that's no joke to their bones, the shrinking
congregation, feeling not so much
like a body at ease--a puddle,
say, in a hole--but afloat: a slick
and with precious little coloration.

How long had she been an article
in another section, too little
reason to rustle through the paper!
Now she is one to linger over,
wonder what it was like the last night
counting, waiting for sleep to flicker
down the long track, then without warning
a block signal--only it was blood
flashing, beneath the translucent skin
by her ear, the absoluteness of red.

Never one to listen willingly,
she now waits quietly, what they have
of her, but which of them, faces up
(glasses aglint) and lifting into
the parlor of the funeral home,
which fretful one hovering near her
could speak as the occasion requires?
Besides, the pastor has the collar
to comment. So they lean--the entire
three-sided balcony of them leans over.

(c)Jay Paul 1999

from Going Home in Flood Time

The Inkdrop Press, Painter, VA

In the romance of grief

2010-10-08T07:18:00.001-04:00

In the romance of grief, there are rooms that remain
closed, & for this, the house closes in on the living.

What of the light outside? What of the bird lighting
on the green clothesline near the shirts & pants?

One summer, the mother walked out into the backyard
& hung damp clothes on the line.

A deer appeared at the edge of the yard & then slowly
walked toward her. The doe was nervous, its breathing

moving quickly underneath its coat of fur, & the mother
did not move as the animal approached the line

& licked the cool water dripping from one of the shirts.

(c)Jon Pineda 2004

from Birthmark

Southern Illinois University Press

Carbondale, Il
for Larry Levis

40

2010-10-07T21:29:00.000-04:00

(Love Song to a Young Woman, 1960)

On the first day
In the low green and sacred hush of leaves
The light was keeping its own company

And on the second day
Did I imagine you here breaking the water's dark
Or was it light that was moving from tree to tree

And then, long ago, on the third day,
The river was flowing
And the white birds flying were paths of autumn

and you were my children on the fourth and fifth
day

All hands and faces and knees of them like light
releasing
Through the sixth day to tender callings

Out past the grave on the final day

As if to old men who adore you so
That heaven seems less dear than light they know

(c)Robert P. Arthur 1993

from Hymn to the Chesapeake

Road Publishers, Painter, VA

Nothing but a Hat and Chanel #5

2010-10-06T22:35:00.001-04:00

Surprised Hubby the other night.

Had a ladies night meeting,

ate out with friends,

came home late--

He was asleep

until...

Surprised Hubby the other night

had a red hot greeting,

started a new trend

that he thought was great.

He WAS asleep

until...

I kicked his gear

into over drive...

nothing but a red hat

and Chanel Number Five.TM

(c)Phyllis Johnson 2007

from Hot And Bothered By It

Community Press, Virginia Beach, VA

First Kiss

2010-10-05T10:49:00.001-04:00

for Lips

Her mouth
fell into my mouth
like a summer snow, like a
5th season, like a fresh Eden,

like Eden when Eve mad God
whimper with the liquid
tilt of her hips --

her kiss hurt like that --
I mean, it was as if she'd mixed
the sweat of an angel
with the taste of a tangerine,
I swear. My mouth

had been a helmet forever
greased with secrets, my mouth
a dead-end street a little bit
lit by teeth -- my heart, a clam
slammed shut at the bottom of a dark,

but her mouth pulled up
like a baby-blue Cadillac
packed with canaries driven
by a toucan -- I swear

those lips said bright
wings when we kissed, wild
and precise -- as if she were
teaching a seahorse to speak --
her mouth so careful, chumming
the first vowel from my throat

until my brain was a piano
banged loud, hammered like that --
it was like, I swear her tongue
was Saturn's 7th moon --
hot like that, hot
and cold and circling,

circling, turning me
into a glad planet --
sun on one side, night pouring
her slow hand over the other: one fire

flying the kite of another.
Her kiss, I swear -- if the Great
Mother rushed open the moon
like a gift and you were there
to feel your shadow finally
unhooked from your wrist.

That'd be it, but even sweeter --
like a riot of peg legged priests
on pogo-sticks, up and up,
this way and this, not
falling but on and on
like that, badly behaved
but holy -- I swear! That

kiss, both lips utterly committed
to the world like a Peace Corps,
like a free store, forever and always
a new city -- no locks, no walls, just
doors -- like that, I swear,
like that.

(c)Tim Seibles 2004

from Buffalo Head Solos

Cleveland State University, Cleveland, OH

I Am Anne--

2010-10-04T00:01:00.000-04:00

youngest rabbit in Burras' Burrow,

A creature far removed from harbor towns,

I'm shaped by seasons. Winter caps dry on

stacks of kindling beside our kitchen fire.

Expanding lines of light lift horizons;

then roll back December dark, March rinses

snowy drifts to welcome prim violets.

While Sister works wonders with her sewing,

I wrestle stubborn nettles from sheep dogs.

Paws pain free, they whine to win rescue runs.

Motherless lambs on moors bleat to be found.

Gardens sound water thanks with greedy gulps.

Pestle pushed inside a heavy mortar

scatters blister blossoms on aching palms.

Forgetful, I miss meals while hunting herbs.

Brother John, daydream fed, climbs cloudy sails

to find islands. My berry basket fills.

I meander, gather isolated

hills, quiet meadows. Hidden back behind

my heart, they shelter lambs without voices;

lagging snails with lovely whorl-twirl houses.

(c)Patricia Flower Vermillion

from Lady's Maid

Live Wire Press, Charlottesville, VA

"Orelena's" 100th Birthday Wish

2010-10-03T07:33:00.001-04:00

(Groundhog Mountain: Floyd, Co. VA: June 22,1937)

Each morning I awake
on this mountain,
discovering the new sun
flashing its long rays
down into the valley,
showering diamonds
in the fog,
lighting up
a jeweled promised land,
just for me.

Some bright morning
I want to enter death,
sailing on a sunbeam,
wearing my best blue dress,
with my eyes wide open,
with my arms wide open
in welcome,
ready to hear
the voices
of my waiting children,
introducing me
to God.

(c)Jason Lester Atkins

published in Skipping Stones 2005

and in Ripples 2007

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Dress Rehearsal

2010-10-02T23:38:00.002-04:00

theater in the Round

My father dyed

his hair red for the Claudius Play

(or so I called it, wanting him

to be the star--till mom told me

he was a bad guy--then I cried

and called it Hamlet). He would

come home from rehearsal

orange-headed, my father and yet not

my father, almost like a clown I watched

him practice falling. We went to see

the make-up place before the play where

mom said, It's OK, the knives aren't real,

but my father reaching for his rust-stained comb

dropped the stageprop dagger, and his toe bled.

I got to stay up late that night,

look down through shining dark

to watch Claudius rolling over,

my father and not my father

on the wooden O stage below.

His crown slipped down

and his head lay bare and still.

Now flying from Orly into O'Hare, where

the river's dyed green for St. Patrick's Day

and the stores are full of Shamrock hats,

I've been called home to the funeral home

too late to watch Claudius rolling over,

my father and not my father,

his hair not even gray.

(c)M. Lee Alexander 2007

from Observatory

Finishing Line Press, Georgetown, KY

Reaper

2010-10-01T12:07:00.001-04:00

Pushing the roaring mower through heavy, wet grass,
raising it up on its hind legs, bringing it down
like a mouth over the fluid green to sever
morning glories, nightshade, a ganglia of vines.
Spirits of mint swim upward from shock.
Nothing escapes the power
that scathes the lawn. Nothing
but the white, sunken face
where Emily's pool was.

(c)Suzanne Clark Rhodes 1999

from What A Light Thing, This Stone

Sow's Ear Press, Abingdon, VA

One Birth

2010-09-30T13:33:00.002-04:00

...all the parts, though many, still making up one

single body...and all the parts share its joy.

(1 Corinthians 12)

Let us suppose once more:

The ant has scurried back

into earth's loins,

sweetness on its back.

It hurries past; we recognize

its coveting, the white-gold burden

of its satchel -

and we bundle ours more diligently,

twice.

A scattered fall

has given way to tight, appointed

frost. Our workshoes press

a lode - the gopher's tunnel, dragged

time and time again, bloodless

and bloodletting in its maze.

Once more we recognize

the corridor, purest

always when our heel strikes hard

and opens up a vent.

The burrow air will wish its way

unchecked, zealous in its ache

for exits, smooth or rough-

edged at the ends.

The breeze relies on them....

All that seeps in will outpour,

manifest in fresh aroma, sour

in a bone's delay,

the consummation real

in each death.

Let us suppose we all consume,

will be consumed, and consummate

our living with the heart pressed

hard against the freeze.

A child cries quietly.

We cannot hear the call,

unless an icicle, drawn-out and

patient, close to mouth, melts

with the rush of heartwarm particles

puffed free.

Their carom crazes the cave -

all shells, all crystal, carbon,

lode of iron hidden in the shaft,

gem and no-gem breached

and treated to the same birthing.

The wall is clean eruption,

burst of steam that thaws a single

glacier, single stream -

a single exodus of people....

Ah, how they tug; how we

tug: open at the wrist, digit and thumb,

yolk and tip fingering each other -

tender now, most tender.

And the nerves band into one

ascension, out to spring.

(c)Sofia M. Starnes 2008

from Corpus Homini

Wings Press, San Antonio, TX

Strangers in the Wind

2010-09-29T09:48:00.000-04:00

They keep
mimicking
the seasons,
volatile fragrances,
elusive winds

with gentle, but
heavy hands.
She,
she,
she,

them,
sentimaental lights
burning in child-
hood dreams, past
landscapes with

innocence's fruits.
They place their
visions in time's
unearthly possession
and distrust man's

intentions. I'm
surrounded by fleshly
angels that don't
recognize the origins
of my wings.

(c)Synnika Lofton 2005

from The Burden and the Gift, Vol 3

The Poetry Juggernaut Movement

The Turning Time

2010-09-28T21:39:00.000-04:00

My friends talk of recipes
and clothes, swirl ice in frosted
glasses, whisper of affairs.

Idle men are so divine,
they confide. I pause, toss
it all off with a braceleted wrist,

and as easily as breathing slip
into thoughts of you; coaxing
me down winding paths,

resurrecting me like a vintage
champagne. The improbability
bewildered me.

Such a feeling can only come
once. It's the turning time,
my friends say, sipping

white wine spritzers. Intoxicated,
I see you in everything, feel
the same flush of heat that passed

between us when I wrapped
myself around you, all too
ready, unbuttoned my blouse without

a care. The beauty is,
you'll soon forget.

(c)Ann Shalaski 2007

from A World Made of Glass

San Francisco Bay Press, San Francisco, CA

A Place Apart

2010-09-28T21:30:00.000-04:00

I lit the votive candle
in front of the plastic Virgin Mary,
hung with rosary beads this morning;

the morning after I buried my father.

Watched the wick lick
the air, a hot flame dot
holding in the blessing it gives.

the morning after I buried my father.

Aged furniture creaked,
musty dust filled my nose,
someone else's life,
lying loosely on bones.
The day grayed itself into the window,

the morning after I buried my father.

I mourned like the dove
singing itself into the world again,
tasting the trickle of dew,
and willed myself to walk in the daylight.

The morning after I buried my father.

(c)Nancy Powell 07

from How Far Is Ordinary

Mindworm Press, Chesapeake, VA

Ithaca, 1945

2010-09-28T21:14:00.000-04:00

My love, some evil wind blew you astray.
We carry on alone, my son and I,
Watching, each night, Apollo's horses die
Across the western sea, I can't betray
The anger in my heart at being prey
To unknown armies, horrid in their pride,
Taunting me with fears that you have died.
We know the gods must blow you home some day.
These three brief years alone can seem a score,
Weary waiting with a heart of stone.
Your son and I yearn for some God-sent sign
Saying the sea-spent sailor comes ashore,
Bearded and brown, wind-whittled down to bone.
My absent love, you list too long a time.

(c)Philomene Hood 2003

from Ride Home Through Scented Grass

Pearl Line Press, Zuni, VA

Thoughts of the First Apple Tree

2010-09-28T20:49:00.001-04:00

(It is highly likely that this view of the fruit comes from a medieval
pun: the Latin for "evil" is malum and the Latin for "apple" is malus.

--Paul Edwards)

The lonely first apple tree of all time
     [grew from seed?--too hard a question]
     [maybe from another species' seed--apple trees
     are sluts--everyone knows that]
had a decision: where should I stash my seeds?
Should I stick 'em in my fruit
or shoot 'em from my leaves?
     [apple trees appear from 8000 BC
     in the Tien Shan mountains of eastern Kazakhstan]
     [the apple invented gravity--everyone knows that]
I'll stick 'em deep down in my core!
Why? Protection from predators?
Or bribery of the very same
squirrels, horses and monkeymen
so the devious tree's seeds would be branched
     [with free fertilizer] around the world?
Damn slut apple trees [always naked] keeping
doctors away with a big scoop
of Cool Whip liqueur and a porn flick
of Ron Jeremy with Granny Smith.
The "first" apple tree of all time took Eve down
     ["translated" into English in 1382]
has a bad rep because she was sweet and thoughtful
and just wanted to be loved.

(c)Daniel Pravda 2011

A Bird in The Hand Is a Dumb Bird

Poetica Publishing Co, Norfolk, VA

Do I Really Know Who I Am?

2010-09-24T19:32:00.000-04:00

So long I have wondered
Now I know - I am a misplaced person.
Things around me are dissonant and strange,
I seem to belong in another time, another century.
I cannot imagine how it happened...
Someone else's skin encloses me-
I dont think I can give it back.
All right, I will accept this body
But my mind is what
I really want to keep as me.
My ideals for this space I occupy
Stay with me, hopefully to nourish changes
And foster respect one for another.
Oh, I enjoy being who I am-
Born to play the part of a thorn.
My convictions cause a lot of laughter
And disagreement when I speak
Of how I wish we would present ourselves.
Ah well, this old body
May not last long enough
To see my young friends become misplaced, too.

(c)Beverley Isaksen 2007

from I'm Not Leaving Yet

9.5 on the Richter Scale

2010-09-23T22:59:00.000-04:00

He curled
opposite-ended from me
his head to the foot board
his body on top of the covers
mine tucked below
and we became the San Andreas Fault
the re-enactment of an earthquake
forms that had just touched
accidentally beautiful
tragically timed

Left with the perilous topography
of a queen-sized bed
and our natural tendencies to avoid embrace
our mutual denial of anything that could be stable
upright everlasting or secure

We avoided the center as if it had become the Grand Canyon
I almost whispered feelings aloud
knowing that the echoes would reach him
because my arm span can only conquer single beds
But I feared sound could
reawaken the ground
knocking Richter to his knees
and my fragile heart into the river rapids of sheets that
separated my skeleton from his exposed brick facade

I had never seen him as vulnerable as then
Legs pulled to his chest, fetal position
as if crouching below his desk at school
like they taught him to do in case of an emergency

I wanted to spoon him--hold him
like he had always wished someone would

But I do not know his wishes
and I have saved all my sudden movements
to get me out the door
before alarm clocks and aftershocks
threaten my internal structural system

Sadly, I am not insured for earthquakes or
breakfast in bed

(c)cheryl snow white 2007

from snow white lies