Definition in the face of an unnamed grief

 by Deborah A. Bennett 

to know it is to know your own hand
opening, to exhale to be bodiless
whether mad with joy or sorrow
steeped in vine or briars 
all reason glows in simplicity 
the world is out of your eyes
it is always june & you are walking
in the cool of the day
hearing its name in the wind
in the root light sings, laughter
breaks in its stems, fills the
petal folds with music old as sun
& dew & summer
in the heart makes flesh of heaven
spirit of earth
in the head tangles round & waits
in the mouth blossoms with thorns
& with leaves sweet & ripe
as an apricot 
broken open.

Lines

by  C.X. Turner

full worm moon plucked from the soil

Lines

by Chen-ou Liu

algae blooms ...
beneath the surface
of his anger

Lines

by Maria Mathai

Ripples of wind
Shiver the leaves of a willow tree
Rain drops speckle wood

Lines

by Ulrike Narwani 

scorched hillside
fireweed
ablaze, ablaze

Lines

by Hifsa Ashraf

April morning chill 
a bamboo partridge’s call
rippling the stream 

Three Photogarphs G. Tod Slone

 

Lines

by  I.W.B.S. Sister Lou Ella Hickman

an old frog singing 
a flash of green startles 
winter now is over 

Through the Desert’s Eye South Mountain, Phoenix

by David Chorlton         

The bones roll loosely underneath
a coyote’s skin, the spine a tangle
with his ribs and every limb
a lightness strong
enough to carry him where
he needs to go.
                           The ice has fallen
from the moon
and South Mountain warms
from a yawn to a smile.
                                             A fallen
saguaro is part memory
part earth, and asks
whether the coyote
was actually here, or turned
from fact to mystery
                                     when he stopped
looking left, right and inward.
There’s hidden chatter
in the mesquites and cholla
of mockingbirds and thrashers
seeking out the starting point
of spring.
               The sky is balanced
on the ridgeline. Each ascending trail
winds its way to where
nobody can follow except the hawk
with shadow
                       for a wingspan
who spirals into nothing
                                           and disappears
the way illusions do
when the Arizona desert blinks.

Lines

by Ron Scully

upper Merrimack
the gull out of scent
of the Gulf of Maine

Lines

by Hifsa Ashraf

late winter afternoon 

slipping into the dust haze
a junglefowl’s crow

Lines

by Douglas J. Lanzo

Mountain elk
graze snow-brushed grass
tilted antlered sky

Lines

by Michael Riedell   

bear creek valley—
three old cows corralled
in winter rain

Lines

by James Kangas

bedroom floor shadows
of two frigid legs walking
in windowed moonlight

Lines

by Carl Mayfield

footprints leading
to the sandstone cistern
filling with snow

Lines

by Chen-ou Liu

job interview
winter morning darkness 
at the bus stop

Motus Plantis

by Moray McGowan

Indignant pines stare down the woodsman 
Shame him, till he hangs his yellow helmet on a branch 
And shuffles back to camp 
 
Wheat stalks cup their ears 
For the harvester’s throb 
Then blind the driver with a storm of phosphate dust 
 
Furtive carrots couple in the soil 
Their blissful misshapen children 
Send packaging robots into tantrums of despair 
 
Roses mourning their beheaded offspring 
Put away their pretty pastels for the nonce 
Their next dull blooms, unplucked, set seed 
 
Poodle-clipped privet grows steely stems 
Bouncing the shears back on their own cable 
Banish the bandaged gardener to a bench. 
 
Potatoes shrug off their mounded earth 
Greened, inedible, 
Sun-worshipping sprawlers on the soil 
 
Lettuces, though, throw themselves flat  
Overacting in their green doublets 
They let the slugs raze every last leaf 
 
Celery and rhubarb 
Sick, to their pale cores, of the blanching pot 
Up sticks in the early hours and hammer on the bedroom window  
 
And the lawn, the lawn! Aching for buttercups, 
Aching for clover, daisies, dandelions, 
It sends the mower slithering into the pond 
 
One night the pond too eats its own underseal 
Lily roots follow the seeping water 
Long-lost lovers reaching with blind fingertips for the earth  

Lines

 by Douglas J. Lanzo

sockeye salmon
steely-eyed resolve
spawning red, upstream

Tidal Flow

by Gary Beck

When I walk on the beach
I see the loneliness
of the Florida surfer,
who waits and waits
for the big wave
that never comes.

bird: morning/evening

 by Ingrid Bruck

in the woods 
the robin's song 
cocooning dawn

on the shore 
a seagull’s silence
wrapping sunrise

early evening 
egrets wheel west
chasing sunlight 

twilight 
blackbirds wing east 
racing darkness

Crow City

by Maureen Teresa McCarthy
 
Light shimmers
Shadows flare 
Ghostly ribbons
Beyond my window
            Crows                                                                                  
Soaring wing to wing
Dark shining as night sky
Settling on bare trees
Plump rich winter berries
Close community
Stalking ground proud
Calls loud tossing heads
Stars in a dark eye
Young are tended
Old are not exiled
All ride the wind                                                                           
 
Murder of crows?
Unkindness of ravens?
                                                           
Earthbound as we are
Strangers to each other
We name them so.           

Lines

by Chen-ou Liu

shelter entrance
under the snow moon
shards of glass glinting

Rita Hayworth, The Dragon-Slayer (Line from: Post-Modernism by James Galvin)

 by Ingrid Bruck

Cloud Dragon, you wake devils and bring doom.
“Rita Hayworth was taped to the bomb that fell on Hiroshima.”
Big Boy never asked, “Wanna be a destroyer?”
No, it’s, “Pretty Lady, come ride with me.”  

In the name of woman – I call you Monster. 
Fury poisons atoms, even water rebels. 
Ocean Shaker lifts a tsunami. 
Sky Thrasher hurls torrents of rain and floods. 
Strangler traps a catch in a riptide.
Ice Heart churns snow to an avalanche.
Desiccator sips rivers, lakes and streams to desert. 
Fire Breath charges inland on waves. 

Cloud-Lady shape-shifts and rides.
A stallion kicks a mare in the side, 
his hooves pound and drum her ribs, 
beat flesh like a drum skin.  
She cringes at each hollow blow, 
follows each crash and boom. 
Sorrow sings in drumbeat and flute, 
chant and cheramie echo,
rumble shakes the air, 
  vibration courses in raindrops
rivulets stream down her cheeks. 

She-Dragon blesses each day's gratitudes. 
Griefs, she limits hers to three:
one for each story-doll under her pillow,
they work out problems at night.  
Heavy sand lifts on gusts,
sharp edges shave off,
harsh notes sand down, recombine & sweeten. 

Witch. Bitch. Slut.
Life Force. Life Taker. Baby Maker. 
She forgives what she can’t control
but shears Solomon’s hair.
Rita Hayworth sleeps
with angels. 

Morning Dramaby Christi Kochifos Caceres

Little Green Men

by Chris Butler

 
In metal stealth birds,
invisible to radar, sonar
and the naked eye,
unidentified flying objects
traveling at supersonic
speeds around the globe
before slowly touching down
in the town square,
emerging from a door,
backlit with bright lights,
metallic mushroom tops
upon their hairless heads
and camouflaged suits
with attached gas masks
and night vision goggle eyes,
with vests on their chests
impervious to bullets,
with weaponry
light years ahead of
the pitchforks and torches,
speaking some
language foreign
to the local townsfolk,
that have come to invade
and enslave your people
and claim your land
in the name
of their strange State.

Lines

by Royal Rhodes

at first light
on top of the snowbank
a black feather

Lines

by Sarah das Gupta

silver birch bends
wren hops over
deep drifts

Lines

by Mona Bedi

calm sea--
a cormorant lazily
dries its wings

Winter Hosanna

by Meg Freer

 
The usual dawn praise of life dances
at the horizon above the valley.

A saline seep flows down the hillside
into the brine spring.
 
Sun dogs scatter light from ice crystals,
diamond dust drifts until the colours
merge into white, a halo overhead,
rays skewed from horizontal.
 
The sun dogs move away from the halo,
day moves on in earnest. Deer walk
across the valley, up the other side,
and taste salt on their tongues.

Snowfall Steliana Cristina Voicu

 

Lines

by Bri Bruce

cows
out to pasture
dawn frost

Lines

by Farah Ali

broken ice
floating downriver…
letting go

Lines

by C.X. Turner

the slow slide
across a frozen river
blues guitar

The Wild Swans At Island Park

by Bruce Morton

It is in winter they are most
Striking, white as the snow 
Set against the black water
Which will not freeze over.

Everything is framed in frozen
Branches and twigs brittle,
Furry with hoar frost coat.
They warm themselves there

Drifting in the stream fed
By hot springs, steam rising.
They have settled in, staid,
Regal in their curve and preen.

It is no wonder that they stay.
Should they now take wing
Belly and breast become ice
Bringing them fast to ground.

Cuckoo's song

by Ram Chandran

from morning
following me everywhere-
this cuckoo's song

a cuckoo's song
answering 
a distant cuckoo's song

banyan tree-
a cuckoo's song lengthens
through aerial roots

cuckoo's songs 
in sync with
monsoon rains

Lines

by Joshua St. Claire

trash trucks
the clutter clatter
of capitalism

Lines

by Douglas J. Lanzo

pressed black tea
tannins of peat
stain sea bay

Lines

by Nancy Scott McBride

busy intersection-
sitting by the side of the road
LAZY BOY lounge chair

Lines

by Chen-ou Liu

clean coal billboard ...
a fork-tongued thought 
darkens the night

Excerpts from the Book of Suns

by Kevin Maus

1. There is no burn-out, only banquet.
2. Peace of mind is of horizon; waking and setting suns play upon this plain. We fulfill these
suns.
3. Banners of light filling the sea: God's army. Sentinels of light that burn in unfailing worship.
4. Look to it: the bared heart above is so much of the kingdom within.
5. There is an absence in beauty—this is calling home.
7. Omniscience is forgiveness.
8. Larger than any want so, larger than any despair.
9. To what do you genuflect? —92 million miles away is the altar to which I bow; which is but a
tabernacle to the true Host.
10. “Because it's there”, is the refrain in view of the mountain; so much better in view of a blade
of grass.
11. Let it roll, laughingly bright. Halos for holy fools.
12. It's alone like I am alone. In its remove it seems as though its face is turned, pondering
infinities—perhaps looking upon a sun of its own. But even with its face turned, its light is one
unbound.
13. There is sleep in it, dream even. “Return to the source.” It is all just a wayfaring of return.
14. A bird on its perch brighter than all thought; an iris in which are outdone all worlds. Where
else do we look? Why else do we look?
15. Even at the lowest hour, light lays about like an indisputable wealth.
20. The sun wrecks like a sacrifice upon the sea everyday: a marveling emptiness that makes me
long for home.
24. It's there, it hasn't aged—unfolded from the velvet lining of my travel bag (blue-black-green
gun-oil velvet). I draw the charm forth anytime, to warm myself with it.
25. It's there despite me. It burns eras away like a traveler gazing into his night's fire. It stops
every mouth. It stops every mouth of Human Being: Thank God—the Silence: its most utopian
potential.
28. Energy enough to power a body til the end of the earth; or enough for a soul to carry it into
the dark.
29. Vigilant: I watching it, it watching me; and it alone is escaped to tell thee.
30. It smiles upon me, eliciting my own: a smile alike to that which comes when watching a
child who is free at play. With an ease it comes, with a knowing ease it comes over us.
31. My friend, always waiting where I know to find; with nothing said, we accompany each
other in the thought: there is a light up ahead.
33. It burns there on my cell wall—and none can see that which I stare at all day, gratitude
bleeding across my face. I'm unable to help them understand.
34. A light which the darkness cannot see. An irreducible flint to strike alive at anytime—
marking the dark with dendritic, firework bursts; putting holes in the false-backed abyss.
35. I can't take it with me, for it is already up ahead waiting for me.
36. Honeysuckle amber, skyward fall. Tending the fire—a mere watcher.
37. “Out there,” only those wishing to get to it say that it is. I know that it is here, and worship as
such.
38. Bonfire of twilight. Dayend pyre to the genius of the sun. —It burns with the work of the
world.
39. In the shooting gallery of the eye: here I love to endlessly fire into its glorious void.
40. The temple steps are time.
41. An ache of loneliness yet in its glory: the loneliness being the end it contains.

Route, Root

by Morouje Sherif

Davids’ in Providence, smothered in maple leaves.
Soaking in the rusted moonlight, probably eating an In-N-Out double cheeseburger.
Volcanic rust, the cold is in colour, sheltered.
The cannonballs in place of your eyeballs, I’m sure—
God, I should drop my torch.

Lines

by John Grey

December twilight
stand of naked chestnut oaks
erased by darkness

Lines

by Phil Huffy

the old orchard

few apples
many memories

Lines

by Chen-ou Liu

late night walk home ...
the distance between me
and a stray

The Belt of Venus

by Marisa Frasca

The Belt of Venus generously lifts
above the horizon just before sunrise,
the sky awash
in pearlescent-pink luster
at the bottom of every war.

In the presence of Earth’s unbroken curve,
the great blue heron feeds in the marsh
and whistler swans build nest bowls
of aquatic grasses and sledges
among the industrial pipes 
leaking at sunset.

there are men i hate with the whole dark country of my heart

by Dan Leach

there are men i hate with the whole dark country of my heart
men like wolves for whom kindness smells like blood
men with souls like the ice at the bottom of the world
watch their mouths and wait for something true
all that spills out is grey hatred and falsehoods
the lowness of fools made brave over time
they crush bodies for money
they crush bodies for free
if you are civil with these men
they twist civility into labyrinths
if you go to war with these men
they say thank you 
then grind your children into dust

i got so weary I had to ask the holy ghost
what are we to do with such men
he said there is nothing to do
except to suffer and to dream 
he said you must suffer them until you see 
the old earth rolled up like a scroll
then you must carry that vision inside you like a secret
i asked if maybe there was some other door 
an exit kept hidden all these years
but the holy ghost said no
he said beware they are devils, these men 
and if you think you can escape them
then you know nothing about their reach
this is their empire and they cover it like the wind

I want to focus on light,

by Susan Vespoli

not grief, not the gut clench that startles, 
shows up first in the solar plexus, 
then spreads to the heart and lungs to stifle
breath.    No.    I want to focus on the soft 

underbelly of birds, how they are cupped-palm-
sized,    feathered,    backlit by morning light, 
how the wings stretch and soar like Blue Angel 
jets above my head       if I remember to look up.

Repairing Light

by David Chorlton
 
Next week the men will come
to mend the sky.
Early one morning they will pull up
in their trucks and climb
on ladders to begin
chipping away the clouds
and come back down to unload
the material for holding off
the rain. Here doesn’t feel like here
today with hours
of a misty curtain drawn
across the mountain. Soon there will be
feet on heaven’s light
and scraping to remove the darkness
that accumulates on days
like this. Expect a moment soon
to look straight up for a brief view
through eternity
and the passage into space begins
when mission control announces
it is time to follow hummingbirds
to their mystical beginnings.
It won’t be long
before each broken shingle
is replaced with a blue
so clear and startling the desert
glows beneath it.
For a few days there will be
footsteps above and the hammers
tapping down the nails
that hold earth and air together, that
when the sun goes down
turn into stars.

LInes

by Douglas J. Lanzo

blood moon
illumined slice
of sandstone peak

Lines

by A. J. Anwar

country road
a rare cochoa lands gently
and disappears