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Issue 6

POETS

AMBOS, EMMA
ANTEBI, DEBBI
BARNETT, BRIAN
BLANKENSHIP, WENDY
BOONE, RANDY
CLARKE, LAUREN
EARL, CHANEL
FERDON, JOEL
GREENWOOD, ALIX
HARRIS, BRUCE
HAYES, THOMAS
HOWARD, CHRISTINA
JACOBS, SIMON
KOJI, WILLIAM F.
KRAFTON, ASH
LINDSEY, SAMUEL
MARSOM-RICHMOND, RACHEL
MURPHY, CHRISTINA
MURPHY, MICKEY
NGO, DEBORAH
PARADOWSKI, DEVRIE
PHILLIPS, GLENN ALLEN
RAGG, EDWARD
RATCLIFFE, MICHAEL
ROMANO, FRANCES
ROSE, DEVON
SHOWALTER, SHAWN
SOTO, KANTRE
TAFT, MURIEL
TAYLOR HORN, L.M.
TRUNCALE, JOSEPH
VON NORDHEIM, CHUCK

Devon Rose



Trust abandoned her long ago,
only returning
to destroy her once more.




Alix Greenwood



Dusk’s delicate rain
Lightly testing a new world.
In the night, thunder.




Deborah Ngo



Pink cherry blossom,
Tossing in the changing winds...
Her destination uncharted




Joel Ferdon



Hipster girls with tattoos
Of birds make love
Under the train tracks.




Michael Ratcliffe



Mourning dove, do you notice me
as you alight upon the patio?
I wonder, who is in whose space?




Michael Ratcliffe



Ten thousand blossoms
have bloomed and fallen again.
Will we ever walk among the cherry trees?




Thomas Hayes



Dear ones come and go,
Leaving tattered souls flapping,
White flags in the wind.




Thomas Hayes



Inspiration came,
Flowed effortlessly from pen,
Echoing the past.




Thomas Hayes



Strong baritone voice,
Too soon the singing silenced,
School chum remembered.




Muriel Taft



No more judgment, no more grudges.
Her joy is new every time.
Dappled light through a fractured mind.




Debbi Antebi



she keeps telling lies,
like tossing cigarette stubs
into an overflowing ashtray




Randy Boone



tiny crimson crab
flits briskly along the shore
walks sideways, ahead




Joseph Truncale



A small river
Beginning of autumn
Quiet woods.




Brian Barnett



he looks famished
that windego in the woods
I won’t deliver




William F. Koji



The great silverbacks
Slaughtered
In African rain




William F. Koji



Catch the wind
Sea birds glide low
Hunting the wake




William F. Koji



When the bomb exploded
Life stood still
Many died years later




Wendy Blankenship



Still a mystery,
the way wings
unfurl from seeds.




Wendy Blankenship



My mother’s shoes
waiting by the door
are hardest to remove.




Wendy Blankenship



Afterwards, on every chair
he piles notebooks, coats, bills
even shoes to fill the quiet, empty room.




Frances Romano



if you could promise me
that heaven is a library
I would repent




Ash Krafton



shadow-filled whispers
a voice in the dark
illuminates path ahead




Ash Krafton



The king’s crown:
greatest of power forged with
heaviest of burdens.




Christina Murphy



spiral of rain clouds
gray on a sad horizon
of fading sunlight




Christina Murphy



sharp rocks throw shadows
from the jetties to the tides
rippling in moonlight




Christina Murphy



flower petals fall
letting go of safe branches
to descend or fly




Debbi Antebi



the same silent mirror
can be a cheap flatterer
or a blatant truth-teller




Kantre Soto



Roaming the streets of bitterness
I made an abrupt stop
at the intersection of bitterness and peace




Christina Howard



I fell off the grid.
I noted no one noticed,
And folded my wings.




Christina Howard



False happiness bites.
Love screams but pain does not hear.
Bitter, yet I taste.




Glenn Allen Phillips



I hold my breath
like this night
is the ocean.




Glenn Allen Phillips



She wore sex like lycra.
He wore it like wool.
All they had was static.




Debbi Antebi



a sun-soaked cat
sprawled out on the sidewalk
refuses to react to a scurrying rat




Simon Jacobs



Goth burger,
mutton-based;
sheep to the fashion slaughter.




Bruce Harris



by the ninth inning
his spikes obliterated
the path leading home




Emma Ambos



There is a place
where seamstress-pin stars
wink and die




Chanel Earl



Sometimes,
"beyond description"
must suffice.




Rachel Marsom-Richmond



Blood pools like parking lot puddles;
we jump into them
and ruin our shoelaces.




Edward Ragg



In the winter of ’39
I walked through these halls
But could not share their views.




Edward Ragg



Only with fatigue
Arrive certain conundrums:
And of the uncertain




Muriel Taft



A penniless widow, she sleeps alone
in her room, in my house,
and dreams of waking up with him.




Chuck Von Nordheim



winter weather grips
cold blast turns snot to ice—
testicles retract




L.M. Taylor Horn



Bleeding esophageal varices
Drinking, delusions, denial
Death crashes down, coughing blood




Samuel Lindsey



The globe
is the atmosphere of change
not just a spiritual visual aid




Mickey Murphy



Whispering grasses
Singing ballads of solace
To the graves beneath.




Shawn Showalter



No matter how twisted our journey seems,
there’s always light ahead
if only we choose to see.




Shawn Showalter



Mistakes we have made
Unable to erase
Powerful lessons fill our soul.




Devrie Paradowski



A grasshopper jumps
from a leafless okra plant.
He is satisfied.




Lauren Clarke



Today he created the soundtrack to her October,
Red and gold leaves
Will forever sound like his hands on the piano keys.




Lauren Clarke



I dream of
Blood on tarmac
Your life leaking away.







© Copyright 2020; Glenn Lyvers; Prolific Press Inc. All Rights Reserved.