Thursday, December 31, 2015

Peycho Kanev writes



Lonely Together

Morning light cuts through
the fading eyes of the night

Warmth hugs the trembling
green blades of grass

and again everything dance
the slow dance of life

I breathe slowly

Life is drained out of me
in a sea of bad memories

After a while I look up and
I start walking through the newborn
sunbeams filled with nostalgias

The plain opens up in front of me
with a sigh heavy with silence

I stride towards my dream

Light then darkness then light again

And then the center of it all where
nothing moves

Here I turn out the lights and cover
my self with a blanket of blank pages
with only one ink spot

Sherry Cummings paints

Poinsetta


Arlene Corwin writes

What Is There To Celebrate?

A thirty-first - December morn -
A last day December borne.
We should be dampened,
Unceasing happenings:
A planet shrinking, its news expanding;
Terrifying, shaming.

On this day folk play,
Light fireworks, eat heartily, get tipsy - pray.
With floods, tornadoes, wanderings unsolicited.
If one’s not deaf, dumb, blind one knows.
My very own food table
Weighed down to collapse;
Schnaps glasses ready at the go,
We’ll yell hooray at midnight,
Hug and kiss,
Cheer and dance,
Dressed in our best.
[I’m] just a bit embarrassed, yet
One must find something small thing to celebrate.
I have it! But it’s hard!
Work on the shitty sides of self.
Water daily flowers of your gifts.
Perhaps one can lift a marred
Two thousand sixteen. 

Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Ayoola Goodyness Olanrewaju writes



a step for a thousand dreams

i

and if i find willing hearts of soils
to plant the seedlings of these thoughts
and yet i build no house...

i shall still smile to the sun
for the mansions built in the inks of lines...

for the new world and the index of change
for the men whose doors shall welcome my words
for the expressions to the muteness of these lines...

i shall be grateful still
for the rare hearts who give their soils for my seedlings...

ii

and if these stones are yet to sing me lights
lights for my limes or my limes that need lights

i shall not like the manner of some
hide my lines in the hubs of hubris
where there is darkness and hurting silence...

i shall shine the teeth of these lines for meaning
whet the budding pen over the surfaces of shaping stones
i shall not despise stepping stones for expressions...

for these writings are not greedy chasers for fame
they are first and only for expressions...

iii

and if i find coats for the nakedness of my lines
to keep from the bellows of colds of silence of decay
and yet i am naked...

i shall still be grateful
for i would have shone brightness for hope
and painted beauty for the face of dreams...

that these voice maybe heard here and there
that these words may travel into the years of generations...

for a line not read is wretched
and someday, these words shall clothe me, riches.
.

Sirinya shoots


Bradley Mason Hamlin writes



Desire of a Man Too Drunk to Know He is Doomed
  
He
sits
at
his
desk

flicks
the
switch

listens
to
the
hum
of
the
Cannon

word
processor

takes
a
drink

begins
to
type

listens
to
the
machine
vibrating
gently

takes
a
drink

thinks about

not
thinking about

the
people
outside
doing
things.

Tuesday, December 29, 2015

In Solitary



1. SAMIZDAT*
 Writer’s craft: manacled to conviction 
           like any zek to his sentence, 
            like a blatnoi to a pen
: assaults its own position 
: like a gaybist missionary, assassinates its friends
  
: like any other virgin –
just another bloody period, 
and another conception ends.

2.  YOUR BODY TELLS THE HIGHWAYMAN
If prose is just a page running across your face, 
poetry is the line lying between your thighs.
 
Your body tells the highwayman’s short story life:
The drama of poems at the point of conception, 
but just one more hackneyed form in execution.

3.      LIFE/SENTENCE
 key in the cake –
(in music, truth hid?)
  
oh,
the poet’s prison is 
the rhythm of his
poem 
                        starved, 
                        scarred – 
he makes his
  
break

--Duane Vorhees 



 *inspired by Solzhenitsyn’s Gulag Archipelago

Brigitte Poirson writes

Africa Quadruple Acoustic



A frica’s F iery, R ational I nsanity C reates A fricA!
Fantabulous, a virgin whore, humanity’s better hal F,
Ravenously wielding mystically mystifying powe R,
Inseminating the aging world with her age-old geni I,
Chanting defiant dirges of dreary dearth in dire magi C,
A frica, F reakish, R iveting, I mmortal, C ures A fric A!


ApBob Mitchell shoots

chester giles writes


the cricket

there is a cricket which keeps coming into the kitchen at work
i hear him cricking in the morning when we open up
     so loud
its quite amazing.
filling the whole bar with noise
he comes in to sleep when it is closed
he frightens the waitress and pisses off the owner

then goes silent when you step near him
   and starts up again when you move.
i imagine him watching us all through the day
   while we are working,
 laughing to himself
aware of how much sound he can make
how much larger than his self and everything he can become
he is far wiser than i will ever be
 i imagine him slinking off when he has seen enough
 and laughed enough
    an
d it is safe.
all that noise in the morning.
   its quite amazing
it makes me smile to myself.


 

Monday, December 28, 2015

Kurt Vonnegut says

I sometimes wondered what the use of any of the arts was. The best thing I could come up with was what I call the canary in the coal mine theory of the arts. This theory says that artists are useful to society because they are so sensitive. They are super-sensitive. They keel over like canaries in poison coal mines long before more robust types realize that there is any danger whatsoever.

David Norris writes



Part I: Night Rain

With predatory velocity speeding through the night
Heat-seeking, warm, alive, breathing, moist
Swollen and glistening in the moonlit rain's light

Steps taken, the stolen moments, reflections of life
Swept by long waves and the ways she sways
Both seeking one another in the night, in the rain

Night City Street Rain Raining City Street at Night

Hilary D Zamora writes and draws



"The holiday season can be very bipolar. The range of feelings during this time of year are mixed depending on the individual and their circumstances.

There exists the feeling of division, sadness, and loss, which for a lot of people can cause the season to have a negative connotation. On the other hand, there are those who have ultimate happiness; those who have true cause to celebrate, spending time with their family, repeating traditions, and ultimately feeling fulfilled and light-hearted. Lastly, there is a mixed emotion, one of happiness and gratefulness for what one does have, creating new traditions and making the best of what they have, trying their best to push forward even if the loss exists.

However, all of these feelings can exist within oneself. Sometimes the person who seems the most cheerful, is wearing a mask, in an attempt to benefit those around them. Others can't pull off that facade and the sadness shows drastically most of the time. And for those who fall in the middle, those that experience both happiness and sorrow, they are left in limbo. For me personally, I feel a combination of apathy, guilt, pain, and the chore of trying to pull off a positive outlook in order to not let my feelings, my truth, drag those around me down with me".
~Hilary D Zamora

Abel Iseyen Ancientman writes

WHO RUINED US?
 
Who dried our river's source
That many households are now
Dying of thirst?
Who caused this drought that
Many farmlands are now clothed
With life-less garments?
Who caused this famine that
Tombs now take over our land? 
 
 
They're the rapacious opportunists,
Devoid of wisdom and reason;
The temeranous myopias who
Mistake nightfall for daylight;
Hamate rhetorics, possessors of
Milky lips -
Whose words melt the hearts in thousands,
Even in tens of thousands; 
 
 
They're the enemies of the state,
Whose pens kill faster than nuclear weapons;
Delilahs of our time, betraying
Trust for pieces of silver...
They're the power-drunks,
The descendants of Judas, the Iscariot.
Men of no virtue,
Slaves to greed and coins
Whose footprints are a malediction
To those who follow them. 
 
 
They're the wind of sorrow
Ravaging all households beyond repair;
They're the bad omens in disguise -
Drying our purse to nadir point... 
 
 
But where do we start from
When we are already out of crops?
 
 Samson and Delilah - Image 2
 
 

Saturday, December 26, 2015

Heather Jephcott writes

The Gift of Christmas

Open up my eyes, dear Lord
and the eyes of those around me,
to see, to truly see
the beauty of the gift
that cannot be surpassed.

Open up my heart, dear Lord
and the hearts of those around me
to feel, to truly feel
the joy of the gift
that has no equal in wonder.

Open up my mind, dear Lord
and the minds of those around me
to understand, truly comprehend
the value of the gift
that cannot be bought.

Open up my spirit, dear Lord
and the spirits of those around me
to receive, then to share
the life of the gift
that cannot be extinguished.


Christmas 2015

A new epoch dawned
dividing history
into before and after.

Grace entered in a new way,
the light of the world,
the creator of the Universe,
to become the one and only Saviour.

The one who had always existed
came into the world he had made
as a human,
born a baby.

The wonder of the event
woke heaven's choirs
a host of angels singing, praising,
but most people were sleeping.

His lowly birth was revealed
to just a few
but these moved as fast as they could
to see this one,
the very special miracle baby.

There has been no other birth
in any way resembling this one.
This is not a made up story
but history, His Story.

The Old Bigamist's First Family


ex-wife Kim Chaeryung, grandson Saejer, (some guy who only shows up around Christmastime), daughter Jinna, daughter Sarubia, Duane

The Old Bigamist's Second Family


Duane, Orh, Mandalay

Friday, December 25, 2015

Dorin Popa writes



PROEM
 
I forgot to tell you that I do exist
I know this will seem dreadful, dreadful to you
but – forgive me forgive me forgive me! –
it was much later that I found this out


long after you had left

Alex Krivtsov shoots

Heather Jephcott writes


Sweet Nothings

Sweet nothings
drizzling
through the outer shell
passing leisurely
via imperceptible cracks
finding their mark
eventually

Sweet nothings 
aromatic 
sprayed freely 
the droplets tenderly placed 
at magical intervals 
scented with enchantment 
harmoniously braided 
with soft, pure, caresses

Sweet nothings 
accepted 
with delight, 
liberally given 
shared, tasting, 
enjoying together 
a two way repast 
served to knit hearts closer, 
ever nearer