2023

 

JULY

 

 

Catherine Arra, Ace Boggess, L. J. Carber, Eva Eliav, George Franklin,

Ann Malaspina, Liz McPherson, Debarshi Mitra, Stephen Page, Michael Salcman,

 Claire Scott, Richard Slottow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

CATHERINE ARRA

 

Ode to the Woolly Bear Caterpillar

(Isabella Tiger Moth)

 

You curl into the belly of winter,

your banded predictions paralyzed

in quilted decay of maple, locust, oak.

 

You cushion into a soggy bog of stasis until

ice and snow sleep you through the frozen time

with daffodils, tulips, chipmunks, drowsy bears.

 

You wait the gestation of mourning, grieve the memory

of your life before, until a single sunbeam thaws

your furry body and your heart cracks open.

 

You remember the joy, flourish, chorus of spring,

wiggle into moss, feed again, spin, and transform

to live beyond the carcass of leaves.

 

You understand this, too, is living.

Without this, you cannot.

 

 

The Lineage of Poison in the Cooper’s Barrel

 

He forged iron hoops to hold the bellies of barrels,

cooled them in stagnant rain water.

Each day marked new cuts to the skin.

 

          This one a vampire, that one a werewolf,

          alcoholic, addict, predator, thief.

 

That’s how he poisoned his blood.

That’s how the poison killed him

there, in the house in front of his six-year-old son.

 

That’s how the boy and his mother came to

live at the family farm.

 

          This one a vampire, that one a werewolf,

          alcoholic, addict, predator, thief.

 

Grandpa reached for the boy’s tenderness.

The mother said she didn’t know, but the boy knew.

He promised to never tell.

 

Poverty poisoned the nation.

They had nowhere to go.

 

          This one a vampire, that one a werewolf,

          alcoholic, addict, predator, thief.

 

The boy kissed his mama, gave himself to sleep,

stayed there, in sweet anesthesia

while the poison stole through the bloodline.

 

          This one a vampire, that one a werewolf,

          alcoholic, addict, predator, thief.

 

Catherine Arra is the author of four full-length poetry collections and four chapbooks. Her newest work is Solitude, Tarot & the Corona Blues (Kelsay Books, 2022) A Pushcart nominee, Arra lives in upstate New York, where she teaches part-time and facilitates local writing groups. Find her at www.catherinearra.com

 

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ACE BOGGESS

 

Yours

 

Start with corset like a new machine

that builds a house where a house already stands.

 

Mask & mascara black as a concert piano

reform eyes to be a stranger’s.

 

Riding crop—you asked for this?

My hand trembles—I’ve never believed myself

 

a man of harsh design; we will call this yours:

your body, your need that stings

 

like a low angle of the sun

spiking its blindness through glass.

 

Ace Boggess is author of six books of poetry, most recently Escape Envy (Brick Road, 2021). His writing has appeared in Michigan Quarterly Review, Rattle, Harvard Review, and other journals. An ex-con, he lives in Charleston, West Virginia, where he writes and tries to stay out of trouble.

 

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L. J. CARBER

 

After Costco, Before Ukraine

 

You saw the lines weren’t too long

so you went for the gas first---

spend a little time, save a lot of

money you thought. But it took

longer than you expected [too

many ‘tanks’ as you call SUVs

filling up their 50 gallon tanks]

so by the time you went into the

giant store, you were feeling like

a crab trapped in a net as you

wrestled through the weekend

horde of bargain hunters….

 

Finally at home, you plopped

down in the comfy chair as

the nightly news came on and

sipped the fresh brewed French

roast and ate a piece of rich

chocolate cake you bought at

Costco and felt a bit sad for

those poor people in Ukraine

as you watched war in hi-def.

 

Still, the thought uppermost in

your mind, as your eyes scanned

so many dead bodies lying quiet

in the streets like stones thrown

randomly, was just how damn

good the coffee was and how

much you had saved going to

the big box store….

 

L. J. Carber is the pen name of Nolo Segundo. 76. In the past 6 years has had poetry and essays published in over 150 literary journals in 12 countries and a trade publisher has released 3 poetry books: The Enormity of Existence, Of Ether and Earth, and Soul Songs.

 

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EVA ELIAV

 

Heart Songs

 

1

 

your life flies

from my hands

 

the wind

indifferently

cruel

 

plays with your lips

your fingers

your warm skin

 

teases me

before it snatches them

away

 

the wind is dressed

in you

 

leaving me naked

 

2

 

my husband’s dying

 

I want it to go

very very slowly

 

he wants it to go fast

 

I want to whisper

into his still warm ear

all that our life held

 

what my heart holds

 

he is impatient

 

greedy for peace

for darkness

 

3

 

we saved you from death

three times

 

but death is stubborn

 

your hands stretch

towards a spectre

no one sees

 

you see him

clearly

 

          4

 

this year

summer slid past

 

it didn’t feel

anything

like summer

 

it felt like cool corridors

blank rooms

 

it felt like exile

 

home is in our hearts

I tell you gently

 

home is where we are

 

imagine it

 

          5

 

last night you visited

 

you looked healthy

for a ghost

 

and cheerful for a man

who’d died

protesting

 

I rained on you

months

of hoarded kisses

 

you gave your shirts away

 

burdens

a ghost won’t need

 

clothed in light

 

I woke covered

with a rug

from beside our bed

 

bright fibers

tangled with earth

 

Eva Eliav studied English literature at the University of Toronto and the University of

Tel Aviv. Her poetry and short fiction have appeared in literary journals, both online

and in print. She is the author of two poetry chapbooks: Eve (Red Bird Chapbooks,

2019) and One Summer Day (Kelsay Books, 2021)

 

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GEORGE FRANKLIN

 

I Was Reading Today 

 

I was reading today about an explosion

Eight billion light years away.  A black hole

Swallowed a cloud of gas and quietly

 

Released energy the size of a galaxy.

It made me think about beginnings and

Endings, and how the universe is nothing

 

Like ourselves.  We may not remember

Being born, but we know it happened—

And we’ve seen plenty of people die.

 

So, we argue about whether something

Came out of nothing or whether something

Was here first, because we want to think

 

The stars are just a larger version of

Old men walking around the block,

Knowing that before long, a niece or

 

Nephew will have to make the phone call

Beginning with “I’ve got some bad news….”

We want to think our corner of the universe

 

Is a giant child who one day just appeared

In the garden, where a childless couple

Found him among the daffodils and

 

Raised the boy until he grew too large

For the cottage doorway and looking

In the window said good-bye.

 

George Franklin is the First Prize Winner of the 2023 W.B. Yeats Poetry Prize.  His most recent poetry collections are Remote Cities (Sheila-Na-Gig Editions, 2023), and a collaboration with Colombian poet Ximena Gómez, Conversaciones sobre agua/Conversations About Water (Katakana Editores, 2023). He practices law in Miami and teaches in prisons.

 

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ANN MALASPINA

 

The Cake

 

I’ve been searching for the cake –

dark crumbs, walnuts, orange, cloves.

Margarita lifted it, for us to admire,

before passing around the plates.

 

The cake tasted sweet as the afternoon,

pale blue sky over Athens,

sun setting beyond the ruins.

 

Our family gathered on the terrace,

my grandfather pinched the white blossom

of the jasmine plant

and held it to my mother’s nose.

 

Diving

 

My father is afraid of heights.

He says they make him want to jump.

He won’t look into the caldera

or climb the stone steps above the sea.

 

At the viewing stand in the refuge,

I stand back from the railing

and he sits in the car

as the osprey dives from the sky.

 

A poet and children's author living in New Jersey, Ann Malaspina holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts, and has published work in Gargoyle, The Tishman Review, Silkworm, The New Verse News and elsewhere. Her YA verse novel Kiki In The Middle came out in 2022. You can find out more at www.annmalaspina.com.

 

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LIZ MCPHERSON     

 

How to stitch a songbird

 

Skewer flesh/ pin feathers/ notch a beak/ fix the shellacked pieces to bind it closed/
snip each thread precisely/ so the song shimmers inside/ trembles with each flutter of a beaded heart/ take netted thread/ to weave a cage/ trap inside it all the bones you’ve stitched in chains/ clip its felted wings/ pin it to the wall/ with a single brass nail

 

Re-homed

 

In this place          there are metal fences     I sleep on the floor   back pressed against concrete   people are sick      I show my papers     they write 18      I am 15    but they won’t change it back          next my home is a blue plastic bag    they leave me at a bus station       I don’t know    where I am   I have no money      I can see the sky now         but it’s not the same         as belonging

 

Liz McPherson has been horse-riding in the Mongolian desert and motorcycling in Morocco but tends to stick more to poetry these days, which is not necessarily a safer pursuit but definitely a less sandy one. Liz’s work is forthcoming in Dreamcatcher, The High Window and Dreich.

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DEBARSHI MITRA

 

I am the hour after midnight

 

the word before the light,

I am here and now

then and there,

I am starlight

in the eye of a sailor,

I am the long staircase

winding down into

the very depths,

I am the scholar’s first ink

the cold gaze of neon,

the sinews of steel,

I am what stirs in the first light at dawn

in the howls of nightmares,

I am what moves not but makes

all movement possible,

I am the lost, the wayward and the vain,

I am strange revelations of dreams,

and the crimson sunset settling

gently on the domes of old mosques

I am glass held forever in stasis,

the deep dark encompassing

eons in my shadows,

I am the prey in moonlight,

grimacing in pain, I am

the hunter shooting arrows

in the womb-dark

of the page. 

 

Debarshi Mitra’s debut book of poems Eternal Migrant was published in 2016 by Writers Workshop. His second book Osmosis was published by Hawakal in 2020 and was subsequently shortlisted for the Rabindranath Tagore literary prize. His third book Nightwalkers, co-authored with Goirick Brahmachari was recently published by Writers Workshop. His works have previously appeared in several anthologies like Yearbook of Indian Poetry, Best Indian Poetry 2018, The Red River Book of Dissent, Collegiality and Other Ballads among others and in many journals like The Shore, Guftugu, Coldnoon, The Indian Cultural Forum, Samyukta poetry and The Sunflower Collective among various others. He was the recipient of the Wingword Poetry Prize 2017, The Srinivas Rayaprol Poetry Prize 2017, and was twice longlisted for the TFA Prize.

 

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STEPHEN PAGE

 

Elvis

 

Jonathan wakes at 9 o’clock

Hungry He drank a half-bottle

Of Scotch last night while watching

“Elvis,” the movie, with Teresa. She ate

But he did not. She only sipped one

Neat glass of whisky. His head hurts

As he opens the fridge. “Buzz,” the doorbell

Blares. “Fuck you,” Jon shouts at the door,

Then opens it. Cati stands there wearing

A smile. He imagines her naked,

Petite breasts, pink nipples, gumdrop areolas,

Lithe body, blonde pubic hair. He smiles,

“Buen día.” She returns, “Good

Morning.” He steps back

To let her pass by carrying her

Suitcase full of hairstyling

Equipment. She wafts of

Jasmine. “One moment,” he says

And strides to his marriage

Bedroom to wake his wife,

His headache gone, the front door left

Open.

 

Stephen Page is part Native American. He was born in Detroit. He holds degrees from Columbia University and Bennington College. He has 4 books of poetry published. He loves his wife, long walks through woodlands, nature, solitude, peace, meditating, spontaneous road trips, motorcycles, and accidently on purpose losing his cellphone.  https://smpages.wordpress.com/ 

 

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MICHAEL SALCMAN

 

The Difference Example Makes

 

You don’t have to take my word for it,

interrogate Rilke’s eyeless torso of Apollo

or ask Jim Wright lazily a-swing on his farm

in Duffy’s hammock, feeling his future sting.

 

Hour after hour of writing poems they tell me

can be all or nothing, even those of our master

Yeats, nothing happens beyond futile beauty

as Auden wrote in mourning our greatest great.

 

Why waste the hours putting words to paper

if limning a portrait with paint is often quicker

or composing music that much richer,

opinions hidden and proof against burning?

 

Yet Williams and Stevens, living outside their art

made example the difference and gave me heart.

                                                           

Michael Salcman: poet, physician and art historian, was chairman of neurosurgery at the University of Maryland and president of the Contemporary Museum. Poems appear in Arts & Letters, Barrow Street, Café Review, Hopkins Review, The Hudson Review, New Letters, and Smartish Pace. Books include The Clock Made of Confetti, The Enemy of Good is Better, Poetry in Medicine, his popular anthology of classic and contemporary poems on doctors, patients, illness & healing, A Prague Spring, Before & After, winner of the 2015 Sinclair Poetry Prize, and Shades & Graces, inaugural winner of The Daniel Hoffman Legacy Book Prize (Spuyten Duyvil, 2020). Necessary Speech: New & Selected Poems was published by Spuyten Duyvil in 2022. You can find him at www.salcman.com, msalcman@gmail.com and @poedoc.

 

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CLAIRE SCOTT

 

God Is Not A Good Listener

 

Maybe in need of hearing aids or a soupçon of empathy

take two teaspoons with communal wine

maybe listening to too much Fox, changing his mind about this world

he created in six days or feeling one-upped by scientists saying

the world is over four billion years old

putting him out of business, no miracles needed

I know because my prayers are never answered

no lottery ticket bringing millions, no Lexus in the garage

not even a loss of ten pounds or a few wrinkles

let alone erasing the dark spots on my lungs

are my prayers not being delivered

maybe God c/o Heaven is an insufficient address

or perhaps the communist satellites circling the earth

are intercepting my prayers, diverting them to a black hole

or a trash can on an AI computer

I recently asked god if there really is an afterlife

but maybe he doesn’t believe in me

since I don’t say any Our Fathers or sing A Mighty Fortress

but here is my final prayer to You if indeed You do exist

I don’t care about harps and white robes or gilted streets

but please let me live a little longer

 

 

The Third Act

         

The third act reveals the tragedy, the tears,

triggers a craving for cocaine or a serious bottle of scotch

or maybe a trip to a therapist at sixty dollars a second.

No, let’s linger in Act Two where

the soprano and tenor live happily

in the countryside, riding horses and sipping champagne.

 

Then let’s ask the manager to close the curtain

before Act Three. Before our heroine lies

in the ICU, barely breathing, holding a pink bonnet.

Before she jumps off a parapet after her beloved is shot

by lackeys of a lustful baron. Before

she kills her children in a psychotic rage

to spite her lover who has cast her aside.

Before the stage grows dark

and we stumble out

in a downhearted daze.

 

We want to savor the good feelings, the warm glow,

floating in clouds, enjoying a pastel life of periwinkle,

lavender, pale blues and lemon yellows, not wanting to land

in this messy, muddled and mixed up world.

 

Yet in time we grow tired of the soft-hued tedium,

yearning for a wider palette of colors, including ebony,

onyx, grey-green, graphite, mocha and mahogany.

We circle back for the third act.

 

Claire Scott is an award winning poet who has received multiple Pushcart Prize nominations. Her work has appeared in the Atlanta Review, Bellevue Literary Review, New Ohio Review and Healing Muse among others. Claire is the author of Waiting to be Called and Until I Couldn’t. She is the co-author of Unfolding in Light: A Sisters’ Journey in Photography and Poetry. 

 

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RICHARD SLOTTOW

 

Dad and I

Dad and I

Got the old 1909 car started

Once we opened

Those double wide doors

Smoke bellowed towards the skies

We rattled, down the drive

Dropping parts

Hollow head light mounts

Running boards

The fire trucks stopped when

They saw us out for a drive

Dad mum-mum mumbles

"We should have tightened those bolts a bit son”

 

One Young Girl With A Cello

 

She could be

Considered attractive

Deep brown eyes

Small upturned lips

Black colored nails

 

Drab green sweat shirt

Extra-large jeans

(Like way too big)

New army boots

Short blue hair

 

Little ears pierced

With seven rings

Diamond studded skin

And through her tongue

A 1/4-inch post

 

She may be attractive

Like squeaky brakes

Or old road kill

It is the cello

That turns me on I guess

 

Richard Slottow has never gone by that name. He prefers ot be called Rick. Rick self published a book of poetry back in 1997.  Since then he has gone silent until now. Inspired by his pain he now wants to be heard.

 

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