November & December 2019
Vol IV No VI
Not your ordinary poetry magazine!
If good coffee (or just the concept of coffee), great books, sharp wit, and great authors excite you, we are for you!
Tip: if it is underlined it is a clickable link.
Note: drop downs from the menu below sometimes take a few seconds to load.
Published bi-monthly
Free Verse with Vera Ignatowitsch
Rescues
Sometimes this is all there is:
Kindness that floats on the air
Like the first September leaf that drops
And is captured by the breeze
To land on the bench where one sits alone;
Like the call to come share the ledge over the
Sheer face of despair,
An elbow gripped to change
The course away from the faithless fall;
Like the rocky field that renders grain
husbanded in grace
By a caring hand.
It is night ending.
The long devotions of the heart,
In the dreary dawn, stopped,
Awake to the pulse in the ears
Against the pillow
That signifies survival;
Small words from one
Working small miracles
On another.
Sometimes kindness is all there is.
And the limits of deep grief expand
With a whispered word,
Grow thinner like a cloud.
The closet where
Tears are hung to dry
Opens to a raging moon
That fades below a rising sun.
Michael Cawley is a retired marketing executive who has been writing poetry for over 45 years. He had a few poems published many years ago but did not submit again until now. He is a father and grandfather and lives in West Chester, Pennsylvania.
My Sister and I
On our jungle gym in mid-August
and she believes
we are the same. The air presses against
the round baby fat of our thighs,
the ridges of our outstretched necks.
We think we might choke on it.
Her bangs lick the sides of her face,
hiding the forehead freckles
that only come out for the sun.
Same as mine.
I do not tell her
what my mother has told me,
that although we are so close in age,
I will always be much older,
that there will be some things
she may never understand,
like long division or falling in love.
I do not tell her
because I would like to pretend
she is my best friend, that the silence
between us is our choice.
With the same grasping motion,
my sister and I
pull and push ourselves over
the sea blue plastic bar
and tumble forward into the eternity
three feet below.
Heather Brett is a middle school English teacher in New York City. She studied creative writing at Binghamton University. Her favorite writers are Dorianne Laux and Jhumpa Lahiri.
Refugees
Imagine, if we stopped migrating
birds at the border . . .
Said, “No, this stretch of sky,
sea, and land are out of order
Can you perch someplace else,
please?
Perhaps, in your native trees?”
​
Migrant Caravan
These are the wandering years . . .
homeless, at last
tormenting idea
become beckoning reality
Lovers of longings’ song
and whispered promises
all the colors once fixed
now, profusely bleed
​
Just as constellations disperse
the pattern no longer discernible
here, within reach, the future looms
high as imagination, deep as fear.
​
Yahia Lababidi is the author of seven books of poetry and prose, most recently Signposts to Elsewhere: A Book of Aphorisms by Yahia Lababidi (Hay House, 2019)
Dementia in Two Parts
​
she forgot our name
stares at me like
she doesn't know who I am
no flash of recognition
strangers in an empty room
or
two women in the same mirror
dead eyes searching for
memories lost to the mind
new pieces go missing every day
she is fading
she is fading
new pieces go missing every day
memories lost to the mind
dead eyes searching for
two women in the same mirror
or
strangers in an empty room
no flash of recognition
she doesn’t know who I am
stares at me like
she forgot our name.
Gracy Boes is a recent college graduate with a degree in creative writing from North Central University in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Her work has appeared in The Wineskin, Rouge Agent, and Visitant.
The Balcony Part One
​
The attempt to maintain a surface calm is more frightening than the rest. Your coat matches the carpet and every mile
of that eye promises everything and nothing at all.
A cleared throat like rain splitting the sky. A sea floor smeared with halcyon and pearl.
The heart of this bunch has no hinges watching as she threatens to jump.
“Nurse, pass me the gasoline.”
Law enforcement was called because there are certain flowers you were never allowed to know.
The Balcony Part Two
​
Because there is no answer.
Because no one cleans up after themselves.
Because I’m surprised we find the time to care at all.
Opening the windows and watching people relate is like television.
Because we are all buckets of oil spewing from some dead kid you heard about.
Because of the way people lie in such a fashion that no one’s ever been hurt.
Because I was raised on talk shows, drinking from a broken cut.
Paul Ferrell’s last name is pronounced “feral,” like the cat. Though his first name is spelled like “Raul” it’s actually pronounced “Pall.” Paul is a stand up comic living in Las Vegas. His poems have been published in [PANK], SAND Journal, and Jet Fuel Review. He was 193 years old.
Archive of Free Verse Poetry with Suzanne Robinson by issue:
September 2019 July 2019 May 2019
March 2019 January 2019 November 2018 September 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018
March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017
August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017
December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 June 2016 May 2016
​
Archive of Free Verse Poetry with Vera Ignatowitsch by issue: