New Poetry by Nate Metz

But What of Her Flames, Mr. Jeffers?

“To feel greatly, and understand greatly, and express greatly, the natural beauty, is the sole business of poetry.” -Robinson Jeffers

And I understand why Jeffers believed this:

he sat there in that barefaced

Central California air, watching 

the huge sun gliding behind 

the Pacific’s ancient stillness,

and wrote his undeniable truth with what he saw. 

But Jeffers never met her. 

She is an ex-lover, who one May night

laid beside me by the cold bay, 

and with a blade of sincerity in her voice, 

explained to me that all she wanted

was to be beautiful the same way a 

Northern Oak is beautiful

after it had been pitilessly 

consumed to bone 

and ash by flames.

What would Jeffers say about that?

I don’t even know what I could say about that.

All I know is that it seems every bit like poetry’s

business, its purpose, to attempt 

to comprehend, just a little, the fleshy

essence of human captive within that; to explore 

not only the natural beauty but also her, and

her flames.

- © Nate Metz 2021

Nate Metz is an undergraduate writer attending Santa Clara University. He has previously been published in SCU’s The Owl (forthcoming) and won first prize in the Shipsey Poetry Prize. As an avid reader and writer of poetry, he sees poetry as a sincere means for self-expression and a critical way to explore our shared humanity.

New Poetry by Marilyn Humbert

Free-wheeling

Above First Street oaks two crows

lazy-loop clouds bruising the blue.

A red cap flashes

between wrinkled tree-trunks

skinny legs pedalling

the front wheel wobbling

spoke-cards slapping

his wide smile

on the level towards me.

Dad never approved of girls

riding bicycles: skirts winging

pale thigh gleam, bobby socks

rolled to ankle-knobs.

I love free-wheeling

the back paddock’s steep banks

among watchful crows

from the crest

distant oaks.

- © Marilyn Humbert 2021

Marilyn Humbert lives in Sydney Australia.

New Poetry by Lorette C. Luzajic

Jalopy

Some men are Porsches. Sleek and silver, fine and riche, over the top, on top. Well-oiled machines. Some are folksy, vans, Volkswagens, all rusty authenticity, flowery, free loving. Some guys are shy, slim, expensive, Audi, all feline Russian Blue. Some are hot blooded, top down, skylight seekers soaring through the sun. I’m looking for the one who painted polka dots on his jalopy at a demolition derby, proudly wore the runner up ribbon in his dungaree bib. It’s the tried and true, the dilapidated denim driver that does it for me. The soda sweet simplicity, hands up, hands down, crumpled hunk of burning love.

- © Lorette C. Luzajic 2021

Lorette C. Luzajic is a widely published writer of prose poetry and flash fiction. She is the editor of The Ekphrastic Review, a journal devoted to writing inspired by art.

New Poetry by Paul Ilechko

Whirl of Morning

The girls are demanding donuts

their hunger overwhelming     school

about to start     go   they say

and so     she takes the car and drives

rushing back to where she aimed

to meet them     the school bus passing

empty     no girls     back home she finds them

dancing in the whirl of morning

lost inside their mystical inventions

their faces never more alive than when

they see their own reflections

in the darkened pupils of each other

their lives a set of lines     intersecting

with each other’s     and with hers     

sharp edges and diagonals     across the page.

- © Paul Ilechko 2021

Poet and songwriter Paul Ilechko is the author of three chapbooks, most recently “Pain Sections” (Alien Buddha Press). His work has appeared in a variety of journals, including The Night Heron Barks, Rogue Agent, Ethel, San Pedro River Review, Lullwater Review, and Book of Matches. He lives with his partner in Lambertville, NJ.

New Prose Poetry by Charles D. Tarlton

 While the Sun Shines

They are raking the empty beach at Kill Devil Hills with a John-Deere tractor, and the memories of yesterday’s sunny delights, a thousand beach umbrellas, semi-nude sunbathers, and sand castles have all been erased. A cluster of early-birds are stopped cold by the virginal look of the beach, so smooth and ribboned, and seem to wonder if they are allowed to disrupt the flat-ironed sand that stretches now like aisles of vacuumed carpet or the stubble once the hay’s been baled. 

 

Bird Scenes

A white ash in the park was filled with black starlings. Then a bright red cardinal sailed by, and a robin and a ruddy house finch, all partly red, and a wren. The Audubon Field Guide lists warblers and juncos, nuthatches, titmice, and chickadees, but there were none to be found around here. Blackbirds or bluejays, fangs out, were mobbing the slow moving crows in a dogfight while mocking black grackles foretold  Brueghel’s winter hunters limping home empty-handed from the hunt.

- © Charles D. Tarlton 2021

Charles D. Tarlton lives and writes on the shore in Old Saybrook, Connecticut with his wife, Ann Knickerbocker, an abstract painter, and Nikki, their black female, standard poodle.

New Poetry by Patrick Williamson

The cold passages led here

I am in the dressing room, a cot of pleasure

at the foot of your bed, a bare den:

I am the man who adjusts his tie in the hallway

your dreams rush by the window,

your fears rustle branches, the screech of night.

I peeped on au-pairs clutching towels;

keyhole pleasures of steam

flashes of dark hair, flickering tremors,

I held my breath

the draped figure suddenly withdrew.

In the middle of night, each thought dwells,

becomes another moment of my life,

pumped out, the morning light uncovers

a restless sod, that scatters.

Nothing lasts. The floorboards always creaked,

linoleum wrinkled then, as now.

- © Patrick Williamson 2021

Patrick is an English poet and translator. He is editor and translator of The Parley Tree, Poets from French-speaking Africa and the Arab World (Arc Publications) and translator of Tahar Bekri, Guido Cupani and Erri de Luca. Most recent poetry collection : Traversi (English-Italian, Samuele Editore). Patrick is also a founding member of transnational literary agency Linguafranca.

New Poetry by Claire Watson

Zacchaeus

His kind invitations were always declined;

the most he expected were gruff pleasantries.

He piled up his money to form golden shrines.

If the Romans asked six he charged people nine,

then fiddled with figures and pocketed three.

His kind invitations were always declined.

On the Jericho streets, he was pushed down the line;

when he could not see Jesus he climbed up a tree.

He piled up his money to form golden shrines.

‘No, I’m not fooling. The honour is mine.

Now get down, Zacchaeus. I’m coming to tea.’

His kind invitations were always declined.

Zacchaeus raced home and selected the wine.

The meal was eclipsed by sublime company.

He piled up his money to form golden shrines.

He drank of God’s favour, his wealth lost its shine,

and his heart was released from its grim poverty.  

His kind invitations were always declined.

He knocked down his altar and scattered the shrines. 

- © Claire Watson 2021

Claire Watson is a Salvation Army Officer who turned to poetry after the death of her daughter, Hannah, in 2014. Her memoir, Fingerprints of Grace, was published in 2017, and her poems have been published by Meniscus, Quadrant, Hunter Writers Centre, and Friendly Street Poets. She lives in Murray Bridge, South Australia. 

New Poetry by Mark Danowsky

Lucky 

If I was a woman 

I likely would have died 

In the same situation

I lucked through 

Broken eggshells

Carefully swept aside 

I tried protector 

Up latest 

Awake first 

Staying up with our dog 

The cat making do

With attitude 

I played every role I could 

Never well enough

My own frailties 

Shining through  

You knew them all 

& pushed each button 

Breaking them down 

Stuck in 

You went 

I stayed behind 

Then traveled back to 

Amazing— 

Then tragic

We could not help 

Ourselves apart 

On your open porch 

In view of the elements

& sometimes strangers 

We would laugh together

Damn

What insisted—

Take it all away?

All that anger turned inward

Stole our future 

I did it wrong, you know 

I told you I would save you 

When I could not

- © Mark Danowsky 2021

Mark Danowsky is Editor-in-Chief of ONE ART: a journal of poetry and Senior Editor for Schuylkill Valley Journal. He is author of the poetry collection As Falls Trees (NightBallet Press). His work has appeared in Bird Watcher’s Digest, Cleaver Magazine, Gargoyle, The Healing Muse, and elsewhere. 

New Poetry by Michele Seminara

North Facing 

This house has — too many — windows:

anyone can see in.

It’s one of those houses

people stroll through the back door —

they feel free.

This house was not chosen

by me but by my husband 

and father who pronounced it to be 

a fine, solid, master-built house

(built by masters who morph into monsters).

It opens benignly to the morning sun, turning

in the right direction (I’m told)

I should be grateful I am

not which makes me —

This house has two storeys, two stories,

the down stairs unrolling like a fiery tongue 

I was always afraid to be pushed down.

But now that the opening is closing (touch wood) 

I’ve begun to write over the holy hole 

we punched in the door of hell.

(They say suffering is good for you; I can’t tell.)

This is not my home. I don’t live here. 

I abide in the safe house my mind 

has constructed from word-wood.  

Only I can enter the back door:

others must knock.

If I choose not to be home, I’m not.

But here, my face faces

painfully outwards, over-

exposing its north-lit bits,

here, there is only one

room to hide in, one

secret space

in which to sit,

and this, this 

gash of a poem,

this is it. 

- © Michele Seminara 2021

Michele Seminara is a Sydney poet and chief editor of online literary journal Verity La. "North Facing" is the opening poem in Michele's latest collection, "Suburban Fantasy", currently available for pre-order through UWAP. Just click on the link:

Suburban Fantasy

New Poetry by John Tustin

The Water's Edge

I see me at the edge of the water:

I am on my haunches,

Taking water into my cupped hands

And watching it flow through them.

I keep doing it, mildly interested.

I am learning nothing,

My hands keep busy,

My mind is filled with trivialities

As I fail to mark the time

And the water fills, falls away,

Fills, falls away.

I see me at the water’s edge.

- © John Tustin 2021

John Tustin’s poetry has appeared in many disparate literary journals since 2009. fritzware.com/johntustinpoetry contains links to his published poetry online.

New Poetry by Kitty Jospé

What We Don’t

control, is the web of events

that will press on these young men

back from the war as they

start a teaching career,

marry lively wives…

and what you don’t

guess, is what is behind

this joke with a roll

of toilet paper—

my Dad sitting as straight

as Osiris holding the scroll

for his pal to paint…

and what you don’t

hear is the clink of glass

bottles of beer —

and what I hope you, reading what I wrote, 

might understand, is the mystery

that a shot showing a side of my father

I never knew, cracks my heart open

to love him even harder.

- © Kitty Jospé 2021

Since 2004, Kitty switched from teaching French, turning her work as docent into explorations of ekphastics, and pursued workshops and an MFA in poetry. (received in 2009 from Pacific University, OR)  Since Feb. 2008, she started  weekly sessions to help people to be more attentive readers and increase appreciation of good poems. Her 6th book, Sum:1 appeared in March 2021,  http://www.foothillspublishing.com/2021/jospe.html

New Poetry by Elan Radousky

Wrapping Paper 

A small imaginary being 

carved out of human form 

and gifted to a world 

that has magical powers

when she believed 

she had gold fairies growing

down at the bottom of her 

very frilly dress 

of uncut roses and

pressed seaweed

anointed in green olives 

from some foreign realm

of promised jars.

- © Elan Radousky 2021

Elan Radousky enjoys writing poetry, juggling objects, and most types of fruits and vegetables. His poems have appeared in Eunoia Review, Right Hand Pointing, and One Sentence Poems. Some of Elan’s Poetry (and comics) can be discovered over at his website Lagoticmoon.com.  

New Poetry by Dale Cottingham

Fruit In Season   

Well darlings, morning again.

Time to get up and try some new steps.

We distaste the old way, the emulated way,

those lines we read that were elegant, intelligent

for as long as their taste lasted.

But now I’m working up these eggs,

toasting toast, putting out

my own version of cinnamon biscuits and

a little sorghum on the side.

And out the window, some jays

singing in trees. Who knows if their voices will carry.

who knows what their songs mean.

It’s their time, their songs.

It all seems to contribute:

the early summer heat, the clouds portending something,

the dew berries we planted in hope

that they’ll give fruit in season.

- © Dale Cottingham 2021

 

Dale Cottingham is of mixed race, part Choctaw, part White. He has published poems and reviews of poetry collections in many journals.  He is a Breadloafer, won the 2019 New Millennium Award for Poem of the Year, and is a finalist in the 2021 Great Midwest Poetry Contest.  He live in Edmond, Oklahoma. 

 

New Poetry by William G. Davies Jr

The Death of a Mermaid on the Susquehanna River

Her bones,

bleached timbers

splayed over

a caisson of rock

where the dark horses

of the river

lunge toward the sea

but her red hair

has enveloped

a pair of bluegills

as they flit

about the silt

in whose creature

has lent her halo

though a ring

around a murky moon.

- © William G. Davies Jr. 2021

William is a 66 year old purveyor of the mundane, the fellow at the dinner table who might imagine a face staring back at him from within the gristle on a pork chop. He was able to glean from these observations a slim volume of poems; "Before There Were Bones" published by Prolific Press in 2015. He has been published by numerous literary journals such as The Wilderness House Literary Review, The Cortland Review and of course, the "pepper" to which he is humbly indebted. William has been married to the same woman for 47 years and accepts increasing delight in the longevity of his marriage compact. William's Pastor recently suggested that his voice would do for audible books what John Glenn did for the space program. He lists this as a peculiar accolade but one consistent with his craft.