2023

 

 

SEPTEMBER

 

 

Charlie Brice, Abby Caplin, Eric Chiles, Joe Flood, Katie Kemple, Lanny Ledeboer,

 Betsy Martin, Kushal Poddar, Lisa Rossetti, Rochelle Shapiro, J. S. Watts, Sarah White.

 

 

 

 

CHARLIE BRICE

 

Rattle Bag

With thanks to Gerard Manly Hopkins, W.H. Auden,

Thomas Hardy, and Ernest Henley,

 

I am Margaret grieving,

          the one who thought

that love would last forever,

          who shot a foe I might

have helped to half a crown,

          the master of my fate,

a dappled thing,

a brindled cow.

 

I am the Rattle Bag*—

          the plethora of poems

on my bathroom shelf

          that pulled me through

the infection and depression

          of the worst illness

I ever had.

 

I thought I’d surpass Freud,

          write 24 volumes of theory

(one more than Sigmund—

          if you don’t count

the index).

 

I thought I’d pound kick-beats

behind James Brown,

or the Four Tops, or Percy Sledge,

          or write the philosophy

tome that would make Heidegger

          blush and Sartre consider

suicide.

 

I thought two analyses

          and 35 years as a therapist

would carry me through life

          on a cloudy couch.

But it was words,

          lines built of words,

stanzas staunch on a scaffold

of lines that saved me.

 

And today, in our backyard,

          I join a chorus

of House Wrens, Titmice,

          Chimney Sweeps,

Song Sparrows, Blue Jays,

          and a Downy Woodpecker,

whistle my way into their lives

          until I become a bird,

ready, at 73, to fly away

          at a moment’s notice.

 

* Seamus Heaney & Ted Hughes (Eds.), The Rattle Bag, Farrar, Straus and Giroux: New York, 1982.

 

Capital Punishment

You’d best avoid the voyage to the bottom

of the sea.

                        Jim Harrison

 

It’s a capital day to spend some capital.

We are the Titans! What claim does

Poseidon have on us? Most stay close

to the surface of life, but we are the adventurers,

drawn to the highest, the most remote,

the most expensive.

 

          We grieve, of course, for the uncapitalized

          capsized, those crowded immigrants

          in the Mediterranean,          families fleeing

oppression, who sought freedom, only

to drown in Neptune’s unforgiving depths.

 

We, we have lots of capital. Spending is our forte,

our birthright. Some might open hospital wards

for children with cancer, or finance food programs

for our hungry masses, but we buy adventure.

 

Some look at the sky, find friendly shapes

in cirrus clouds, track birds in flight, listen

to their songs, or linger over the beauty

of a sun-dappled forest floor.

 

Some are satisfied with a child’s breath

blowing out candles, the robed procession

on a graduation stage, a melody molded by

Mahler—pleasures that are priceless and free.

 

Where is the adventure in that? We jump out

of airplanes, hike kill-zones of cragged peaks,

machete our way through jungles rife

with parasites and predators.

 

          What of a woman’s thigh at midnight,

or Warne Marsh’s sax          asking how high

is the moon, the sweet smell of earth and leaves

in fall, or snow-mist bracing frosty cheeks?

 

We swear nuptials to adrenalin, live only for the moment,

forget that the future, while not yet here, exists—forget

that its name is hope. We spend our capital on hubris,

suffer the punishment of Icarus, of all those who

go too high, too low, and leave so many behind.

 

Charlie Brice won the 2020 Field Guide Poetry Magazine Poetry Contest and placed third in the 2021 Allen Ginsberg Poetry Prize. His sixth full-length poetry collection is Pinnacles of Hope (Impspired Books, 2022). 

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE

 

ABBY CAPLIN

 

Self-Portrait of A Doctor as a Young Woman

 

She stands on the bathroom

scale, looking down

 

at her abdomen,

having been cut open

 

in two places.

Inside, a daughter clings

 

to her liver, a son

from links of intestine.

 

Stretched by

no end of demands,

 

she drags

her wounded body

 

to work; in the medical clinic,

she will press

 

patient chests

to flesh out a wheeze,

 

examine the storied

contours of nasal airways,

 

stare at a no-

longer-white coat—

 

souvenir of training

that hangs in her

 

office closet, muddied

with the blood

 

of children who fought

their IVs,

 

and ink markings

where a pen’s tip brushed

 

against the cotton-

polyester blend

 

as she rose from a chart

to respond to her pager.

 

Someday, she will write

about this, look with X-ray

 

focus into the mirror

and deep into her brain

 

to her pineal gland, Descartes’

seat of the soul,

 

home of a velvet

universe, a softer self

 

smiling back, hand raised

in greeting. One day,

 

it will begin with a pen.

 

Abby Caplin’s poems have appeared in AGNI, Pennsylvania English, Salt Hill, The Southampton Review, and elsewhere. She was a finalist for the Rash Award in Poetry, a nominee for Best New Poets, Best of the Net, and the Pushcart Prize and is the author of A Doctor Only Pretends: poems about illness, death, and in-between. 

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE

 

ERIC CHILES

 

Steak

 

That New York strip oozing fat

and blood once had dark eyes

as deep as time that searched for clover,

and chops, back straps, briskets and roasts

that would shiver its black hide glossy in the sun

to shake off flies. Now it’s medium rare,

red pooling on your plate

as your knife slices off a bite,

salty and buttery on your tongue.

 

After a newspaper career, Eric Chiles began teaching writing and journalism at colleges in eastern Pennsylvania. He is the author of the chapbook Caught in Between (Desert Willow Press, 2019), and his poetry has appeared in Allegro, Canary, Rattle, Tar River Poetry, and elsewhere.

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE

 

JOE FLOOD

 

I know about

in response to a reviewer 

who thought I should write about things only I know

 

I don’t care

no not

about brittle mothers

and cyclopean rapist stepfathers,

or old men

playing draughts, chasing kings

and dead Queens

in Centennial Park.

Why would I?

When I close my eyes

I see life rising,

the fabulous plains

of Africa rolling

away, falling away

around me.

 

Joe Flood comes from a family of five poets, but he never wrote any. He had a family to support and worked with the United Nations in 63 countries. Then one night the world cracked open. So he wrote a book of poetry but sat looking at it.  Now he's 72 - so far so good, this year he has published in Hecate and Thema. 

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE

 

KATIE KEMPLE

 

The Labor Market

 

In the grocery store parking lot

a woman is a kind of caboose,

standing behind a long train

of metal shopping carts that have

collapsed into each other like

an accordion pressed to make

a rumbling vibrato, and she

the smallest hand squeezing,

pushes up hill with her body

tilted toward the entranceway.

The shackles of heavy metal,

the song of a headbangers

parade undulates throughout

her body. Her head tilted down,

her silver hair overgrown.

The commuter rail of commerce

ends here. She's Sisyphus strong

this woman. She's seen shit.

And she knows how to push.

The future jousts, it tilts. You've

got to lean your whole body

into it. Gravity wants you back.

But you've got this job to finish. 

 

Katie Kemple has had poems published by, or forthcoming in, Chestnut Review, Ploughshares, and Rattle. She lives in California. 

 

Back to POETRY ARCHVE

 

LANNY LEDEBOER

 

The Golden Bough

 

In books there is a place

where if you rest your eyes

on the page and wait,

a pathway appears

at the edge of sight.

A broken trail of white

cascading like a staircase

down a dozen floors of ink,

a stairway descending

into the heart of a maze.

But turn toward the stairs

to follow, to find gods

or monsters in their lair,

and the steps disappear.

Then close your eyes

and feel your way

to the beast who keeps

the secret you seek.

 

Lanny Ledeboer is a longtime high school history teacher in the state of Washington, USA.  He has been reading and writing poetry ever since taking Mr. Powell’s Intro to Poetry class back in college.

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE

 

BETSY MARTIN

 

Maybe It’s The Moon

 

A visitor to Moscow

stands gripping the rail of a crowded bus

as it creaks along snowy streets

          under a dim winter sun.

 

He met a Russian woman yesterday in a cafe.

Sonya’s hands as she talked

danced

          like a pair of courting birds.

 

Cataracts of hoarfrost

          encrust the bus’s windows.

 

He can see out only through a small hole,

past which flit gray bits

          of buildings, claws of trees,

         

and his visions of golden onion domes,

drinking tea with his new friend, sharing

          his soul.

 

Through the hole a streetlight bobs

          or maybe it’s the moon.

 

His legs ache.

 

Going round and round, he has missed his stop.

          Too late to visit her now.

 

Betsy Martin’s poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Atlanta Review, The Briar Cliff Review, California Quarterly, Cloudbank, Diverse Voices Quarterly (Best of the Net nomination), Juked, Louisville Review, Pennsylvania English, The Round, Slab, THINK, Third Wednesday, Typehouse Literary Magazine, and many others. She is also a visual artist.

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE

 

KUSHAL PODDAR

 

The Sick Story

 

I wheel away my story

from the hospital.

 

One cannot unsee

a story between its robes.

 

In the lobby it wobbles,

says, "I have been tired of dying."

 

The fiery flowers on the car's bonnet

reveal no name. You may call them. 'Silence'.

 

This is the dated way of chronicling-

build a blaze, sit, hush.

 

Melanophile

 

Rain roils the riled puddle

near my feet. My shadows are one with

the clouds'.

 

A sponge crow on a pale bamboo

holds its worth of water. When the rain

ceases to pour it sprinkles.

 

If the obliterating handbill on the road

rolls a question loosing its pertinence

the crow is a dark answer.

 

I close my eyes so I can read them all.

 

Kushal Poddar is the author of Postmarked Quarantine and has eight books to his credit. He is a journalist, father, and the editor of Words Surfacing. His works have been translated into twelve languages, published across the globe. Twitter- https://twitter.com/Kushalpoe

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE

 

LISA ROSSETTI

 

Rules for Nighttime Spellcasting

A witch has come to your house.

She hides in your curtains.

She hangs motionless watching you.

She has no head,

just a long purple cloak.

 

Sometime the cloak flaps,

twisting towards you.

 

Outside in the twilight world

gas lamps flare greenish-white.

You hear once again

those invisible strangers

passing by your window.

 

Make a magic for the night.

Begin.

 

Reach out your hand

to the wall by your bed.

Touch the surface.

Feel how it is cool and solid.

This is fundamental.

 

Count the nine purple flowers

twining in the wallpaper garden.

Counting begins the magic.

 

Then stare into the picture on the wall

till it opens up, becomes a portal.

There are people moving in the painted snow.

You may travel with them

down the painted street.

 

Now you are gone into another land.

quite out of reach.

 

Till morning light seeps through again

illuminating the edges of the window,

bringing the promise of blue sky

restoring all the shapes

and colours of your room

 

Blessing you.

Banishing the witch.

 

Lisa Rossetti is a bibliopoetry therapy practitioner and writer, working mostly in community with vulnerable people. Her poetry can be direct and observant, often focusing on social injustice and female ageing. Lisa is currently compiling her second poetry collection.

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE

 

ROCHELLE SHAPIRO

 

A Stitch In Time

 

The tiny red x’s Mother embroidered to form roses

on the hems of our pillowcases

 

The dresses she made from Butterick patterns, guiding

the fabric beneath the presser foot of her Singer sewing machine

 

Mother kneeling to shorten the hems of our dresses, straight pins

bobbing in her lips as she spoke

 

The turquoise café curtains she sewed for my bedroom window,

where I stood to watch orphans play in the yard of the orphanage across the street

 

The sleeves, back, and front of sweaters she joined with a plastic

needle threaded with yarn

 

The buttons she tightened on our coats and blouses and the new ones

she bought every time we lost one

 

The grosgrain, ribbons, and frog closures she attached to our clothes,

the sprinkle of rhinestones

 

The stitches dropped on knitting, leaving holes like the dark spots in her brain scan.

Her stilled hands placed at her sides in her coffin. 

 

 

The Black Wall Phone Rang, 1955

 

We couldn’t hear what was said, but Father’s face

blanched, then tightened, arrows shooting from his pale blue eyes.

 

“The Klan,” he said, “they’re burning a cross on Sam’s front lawn.”

 

We didn’t live in the South. We lived in Queens, New York.

 

“Don’t go off alone,” Mother pleaded.

“I’ll call the cops and the firemen,”

but Father stepped into a pair of pants.

 

We tried to hold him back, but he had been

a middleweight boxer. Our grasp on his sinewy

arms was like autumn’s last leaves.

He had to protect his sister, who already lived

through the fires of a pogrom with him,

and her three young sons, born here

where they would be “safe,”

and Uncle Sam, whose heart was failing.

 

When Father arrived, dawn had begun to lighten the sky.

No police, no firemen ever answered the call.

The front lawn bore a scorched cross.

 

Fists clenched, Father roamed the streets,

searching, as if this time he could be a victor,

and not a victim.

 

Rochelle Shapiro’s novel, Miriam the Medium (Simon & Schuster, 2004), was nominated for the Harold U. Ribelow Award. She has published essays in NYT (Lives) and Newsweek. Her poetry, short stories, and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in many literary magazines such as A Thin Slice of Anxiety.

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE

 

J. S. WATTS

 

Price of a Poem

 

Be true to yourself, they say.

Write what your honest bones know.

He knows he is blessed not to know

the gut twist of hunger

the deep ache of war

the shattering of loss.

 

Should he write small lines, ignoring

those loud bleeding calls?

What price a poet playing with his words

trying to preserve life’s tiny beauties

in case they are misplaced

as the world cracks apart?

 

Should he envy those

whose acid days etch their work,

utterances dragging proud with immediacy,

lost, displaced, making a loud stand

in words glistening and burning

with raw reward?

 

The words clustered on the page are his,

vein-deep, hugged close and personal

silvered with poet

to mirror the almost cloudless

blue bird-speckled heavens

he imagines umbrella him.

 

Yet the words regret they cannot haul

the black iron heaviness

of hard-earned scars,

do not make sharply pressing demands

like those counted well.

How should he value a poem?

 

Why not shape these tender syllables

to greater purpose,

fill his reduced stanzas

with the steel of urgent stories,

earn worthy applause

in their bright reflection?

 

His words never marched

across a world-wide stage,

just squatted unobtrusively in a poet’s backyard

charting the quiet progress of garden snails.

Writing with the fluids from others’ wounds

would be a betrayal of sorts.

 

 

Uncertain Heard Voices

 

Fast as feathers, loud as women,

some days winged voices ride the wind.

Then suddenly are gone

leaving behind an absence of sound

an aroma of cavernous night.

It is memory.

It is promise.

 

Today is a day they might come.

I may catch a hint carried in the arms of the wind

whispered and urgent.

Maybe in the answering silence

there will be alternative words, other voices.

What if one is yours?

What if it is not?

 

Sometimes I listen for you in the hedgerow choir,

soft rude jostle of life amongst blackthorn’s sharp spears.

Other times I shout my own raucous song

fingers jammed frantically in my ears

footprints running rapidly towards the waves’ retreat

then returning faster than the hiss of the sea.

Life in constant, unhesitating motion.

 

Winter Aconites smile through the dark of tree

singing sunshine at the world

without need of sun.

If I do not know what I am listening for

how will I know when I hear it?

Will the ice spread black branches if I step on it?

Will sweet biting spring return after winter’s hard iron?

 

Each day births a new hope, a chance to start again

repeating faded mistakes until they are scrubbed clean.

Freshly washed linens flap on the breeze

like white feathered goose wings, joyous percussion,

that never make it skyward.

I peg them down to better hear their music

should the wind return

 

like yesterday is nailed by certainty

holding its song clear. Slowly articulated

notes chanted and released into the waiting air.

For all the solidity, it is only echoes I hear

when I stop

to examine reflections in the blank mirror of this day,

like a woman unexpectedly meeting an old lover.

 

J.S. Watts is a UK poet and novelist. She has had nine books published: five of poetry, Cats and Other Myths, Songs of Steelyard Sue, Years Ago You Coloured Me, The Submerged Sea and Underword and four novels, A Darker Moon, Witchlight, Old Light and Elderlight. See www.jswatts.co.uk and http://www.facebook.com/J.S.Watts.page

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE

 

 

SARAH WHITE

 

Pan-Italy

 

Everyone I know is fond

of this peninsula. It has given us the Sweet,

the New, the Comic,

and the Politic.

 

 Municipalities

have created geniuses, some brilliant,

others wacko.

                     Dearest Giotto,

don’t be piqued. You’ve been accused of excessive homeliness. I can fix that.

                  Join me in Arezzo.

At the Church of San Francesco.

We will wait for Piero

 (though he isn’t born yet).

He will paint us into

his great fresco,

giving us a part in the Story of the True Cross.   A hundred years before the Quattrocento,

we’ll be among its jewels.

 

After retiring from 23 years of teaching French language and literature, Sarah White published 7 books of her own poetry and studied painting and drawing. Her most recent book is a lyric memoir, The Poem Has Reasons: a Story of Far Love (Dos Madres Press, 2023).  She currently lives, writes, and paints in a Massachusetts retirement community.

 

Back to POETRY ARCHIVE