poetry
2 poems
by Ave Jeanne Ventresca
by Ave Jeanne Ventresca
life is a thief
life is a thief
with tiny hands
and knuckles rough,
who creeps a
silent journey
through many people’s
calendars, and so
it has become that
living has decided to
paint each horizon into
a gallery of portraits,
all still wet with oil
and long intent strokes
from a world wind, and
so I sit with thoughts
on this
day of clouds, mindful
of cold, empty sidewalks
where many friends
have passed away.
portrait in ochre yellow / pigeons of Milan
according to the locals
pigeons of Milan
listen to people’s conversations
as they wild sprinting grasp
for crumbs along sun warm stone and
grass just plowed. i have seen them
as they repeat phrases of old men,
respond with questions when
young children have faces that
laugh through snow falls soft,
landing in concrete birdbaths
and upon these occasional
umbrellas ochre yellow. notice
their expressions. they actually
wonder when phrases include them
when those who saunter along
see their hunger and winter thirst. it is
obvious at sunrise, they are
not sure how to react, but they do
understand that their existence is owed
to these biscotti throwers, those who leave
crusts on purpose, or others, who toss
wishes for good fortune that heads their way.
crowds of black, gray, and white little bodies
dart through wind soft as conversations
continually unfold. wild sprinting grasps
toward food with appreciative wings
flapping and desperate beaks.
Ave Jeanne Ventresca (aka: ave jeanne) is the author of nine chapbooks of poetry that reflect social and environmental concerns. Her most recent collection, Noticing The Colors of Ordinary, was released in 2019. Her award winning poetry has been widely published internationally within commercial and literary magazines, in print and online. Ave Jeanne was nominated for the Pushcart Prize for 2019. She edited the acclaimed literary magazine Black Bear Review, and served as publisher of Black Bear Publications for twenty years.
the stories we tell ourselves
a poem by Caroline Reddy
by Caroline Reddy
You tried to stitch your songs
to my throat —
and with each word you spoke
I drifted farther from beach parties
and further
into the Manhattan sky.
I swallowed time capsules
to shape a future
without your noise.
You diluted my music box
and coiled us into an endless loop
that widened our trails.
Thus, our trial began:
I hid my twin flame
and danced with swords
as the winter solstice
isolated us within our insecurities.
Scenarios became faint —
peaks faded from
a mountain of memories
and a starless night.
I played with magnets
to force our stories to part.
Caroline Reddy’s work has been published in Active Muse, Calliope, Clinch, Clockwise Cat, Deep Overstock, Grey Sparrow, International Human Rights Arts Festival and Starline among others.. In the fall of 2021, her poem “A Sacred Dance” was nominated for the Best of The Net prize by Active Muse. Caroline Reddy was born in Shiraz, Iran and is currently participating in the exhibit “Playing in Wonderland.” Recently Caroline performed her poetry and led an artist talk on Mohammad Barrangi's exhibition.
rudders
a poem by Austin Kuebler
by Austin Kuebler
Rudders, riggers, rhythm
Seaward stop shy of the Sound
We turn at the gray gone green
And the blue chop
Back for the clumsy, untended beach
With questions doubled down.
Safety is warm and restless,
Untested and imagined,
Leaving the rumble brackish rolls
For tomorrow, to you.
You’ve seen it now,
A father’s decision at the brink.
Tell me what it is like
When you see no land from either eye
At the opening of the sea
Where sky is the only marker
And dust becomes the distance.
It’s a famous line to cross, so I have been told.
Austin Kuebler is a songsmith, musician, poet, manager, and coach who lives in Long Island, NY. This poem is from his upcoming collection, “Notes to Margaret and Songs for Marguerite.”
sleeping on the day I drown
a poem by Bethany Jarmul
by Bethany Jarmul
On the day I drown, I breathe salty water deep into my lungs and blow it out my nose. I bathe amongst the seaweed, dance with dolphins. I give each fish a name, until I run out of names. I dive deep, swim wide—until my legs burn, arms ache. I speak to the sea, sing to the sea turtles. They whisper stories of old, secrets of days long past. And when my spirit has exhausted itself, I sleep on a coral bed—hair floating with the tides, tangled with broken bottles, food wrappers, and cigarette butts.
Bethany Jarmul is a writer, editor, and poet. Her work has appeared in more than 40 literary magazines and been nominated for Best of the Net and Best Spiritual Literature. She earned first place in Women On Writing's Q2 2022 essay contest. Bethany enjoys chai lattes, nature walks, and memoirs. She lives near Pittsburgh with her family. Connect with her at bethanyjarmul.com or on Twitter: @BethanyJarmul.
bones break
a poem by Dominik Slusarczyk
by Dominik Slusarczyk
You cannot be
made out of glass and
expect concrete.
Minds melt.
You cannot be
made out of sand and
expect lava.
We do not know how
to work our way through the world.
We get jobs but it doesn’t help.
We cry but it doesn’t help.
Dominik Slusarczyk is an artist who makes everything from music to painting. He was educated at The University of Nottingham where he got a degree in biochemistry. He lives in Bristol, England. His poetry has been published in ‘Dream Noir.’
before the next storm
a poem by Kevin A. Risner
by Kevin A. Risner
The moments, minutes
before the next storm slides onshore
hold a narrow slice of heaven
An anticipation that mirrors
the cutting of giant circular cakes
or ones that look like inanimate objects
Cats, eyes, boots, onions
whatever the thing is, it’s been videoed
for viewers to wait
The knife lowers to make the incision
and out pours the rain, a water-
fall that way hasn’t been seen for years
Who wouldn’t stay put as the lines
touch cloud to ocean
highlight this connection as noticeable
as a mustard stain on red blouse?
The true nature of weather, the climate
and its portentous portents:
Is it you who’s become a seer?
Auguring layers of rock to tell us
this century is the one that plummets us
into the abyss for good? My dream
this year doesn’t depend on viruses.
It depends on who survives the fallout.
Kevin A. Risner is the author of multiple poetry chapbooks. The most recent are: Do Us a Favor (Variant Literature, 2021) and You Thought This Was Just Gonna Be About Cleveland, Didn't You (Ghost City Press, 2022).
2 poems
by Ryan Hooper
by Ryan Hooper
hope
hope is in the ear of the listener
listen:
the winter
is thawing
asleep/awake
Upon your gaze
the flowers sleep.
Asleep
in the surreal
night.
Thoughts swirl
like falling leaves
carried by all the hands forgotten
in the wind.
We are strangers
when we meet.
Awake in the sprawl.
Inside a house of memories
and strangers.
The most beautiful thing
in the world
must be shadow.
Ryan Hooper is a writer and content designer from South West England. He is passionate about exploring memories and landscapes – both internal and external. Under the name Heavy Cloud, Ryan creates experimental music often in tandem with collage-based artworks and textual explorations.
2 poems
by Charles Hensler
by Charles Hensler
the garden shed
You don’t know
what led you there, after years—
the doorway half-hinged, a rusty
shovel, shears cobwebbed on the shelf:
evening descending, the garden
giving in to field.
Soft rain arrives
like a rumpled man in a tired suit, a weathered face
under a rain soaked brim, pockets full of lint.
He leans at the edge of the field
as he has always leaned.
He waits to be invited in.
articulation
Outside you realized your fingers
had fallen from your hands, words
from your tongue leaving you
only able to push
or punch, only able to utter
a solitary sound
the street a sprawl of rattles
and whispers, gradients of refracted light
a surface of silver cars, a crow
in the afternoon lift of leaves, the lilt of voices
from an apartment window
a shape of home
you remember:
left in your speechless hand
a smooth, gray stone.
Charles Hensler lives and writes in the Pacific Northwest. He attended Western Washington University, where he won the Leslie Hunt Memorial Prize for Poetry. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Jeopardy Magazine, Crab Creek Review, The Shore, One Hand Clapping and West Trade Review.
the way she speaks
a poem by Navi K. Goraya
by Navi K. Goraya
The way she speaks
that small star in her cheek
(one cheek, for two would be too much like the others)
I can’t quite place what it is –
but her face,
it reminds me of Summer.
Of sweetness
of warmth
(of peaceful picnics in parks)
but mostly
of premature proclamations
of love.
Navi (she/her) is a Master of Public Health student at McMaster University. Her research focuses on masculinity contest cultures and mental health in Canadian public safety organizations. Outside of academia, Navi enjoys reading (and sometimes writing) the odd cryptic couplet.
white sky
a poem by Dorothy Lune
by Dorothy Lune
No Christmas presents / natural disaster payment pending— / I tweeze glaciers & land from 3D to strong hold gel. / No Christmas tree / is like no dresses / aren't you bothered. / I'm playing hopscotch / skipping, hand holding— / capitalism lands in slaughter / it never existed / what are you on about. / All I need is open sky / all I have is open sky.
In a past life we were
penguins / you protected our
eggs / we didn't celebrate
Christmas / or we
did / our eggs look like moons /
there are plenty
of moons / & these are
our moons / I chewed
my way out of misogyny /
you love me
after that / racks of
snow / hold
collections / of love /
poems. / I will mimic
embarrassment /
& you will see through it.
Dorothy Lune is a Yorta Yorta poet, born in Australia. Her work has appeared in Pinhole Poetry & more. She is compiling a manuscript, can be found online @dorothylune, & has a substack: https://dorothylune.substack.com/
2 poems
a poem by Joy Andersen
by Joy Andersen
between the trees
Between the steady trunks of oaks
Dappled beams
Through flickering leaves
With twitters
And gentle rustles
Grass softened by breeze
Will lay a pebble
A smooth one
Natural colours
Topped with petals
A small engraving
A sun
Seven lines
Around a circle
Just the quiet
In his beauty
Is all I’ll need
When you remember me
worship
As mouths of seeds
Whistle to the sky
Mist-whirled wind
Dance each away
Blooms of change
Sing colours themselves
Until far reached
Like mountains
They stand
And glorify
Joy Andersen is a messy, praying, daydreaming chef from Cambridge, UK. More of her poetry can be found with Literary Tribune and Words & Whispers Magazine. She’s infrequently on twitter @jyndrsn.
art
a poem by Philip Berry
by Philip Berry
I do not regret –
The slashes into soft clay
Arcs of pigment, one fading
Into the next, a glorious pool
Of nations thickening
In dusty corners.
The time it took to alter marble
Forms, precision violence
Over and over again.
The triangles of canvas
Flapping into the vacuum
Of my heat.
A codex of passionate
Correctives to your blind
ambition, blind to a muse’s
deeper purpose.
To travel with you
Until dark.
Philip Berry’s poetry and short fiction have appeared in Black Bough, Poetry Birmingham, The Healing Muse, Deracine and Dream Noir. He also writes fiction and CNF. His work can be explored at www.philberrycreative.wordpress.com and @philaberry.
ghost of you
a poem by Jenny Turnbull
by Jenny Turnbull
The ghost of you
is everywhere.
Floating through the fog
like photographs
razor sharp edges
that cut.
Sitting on empty corners in the coarse sea air
thrashing salt on open wounds
forever ahead of me
out of reach
looking back.
How did the days turn into years and back to days
that ended.
Our sand ran out.
Your ghost leads me to the ocean
our memories drift there with the current
determined light fights through the fog
and finds me.
A subtle wave of peace
your ghost sent me in the breeze
maybe
you’ve found that better place
a slate pure and clear
of memory
endless sand
not haunted
by the ghost
of me.
Jenny Turnbull is a KidLit author who also writes poetry. Her debut picture book is forthcoming from Crown Children's/Penguin Random House in 2024. Jenny left a career in film and television to pursue her passion for creative writing and has never looked back. Jenny was born and raised in Pittsburgh, PA and now lives seaside in Los Angeles with her husband and Westie. Follow her on Twitter @JennyTwrites
prejudice and life
a poem by Ali Ashhar
by Ali Ashhar
A side of coin flips
bills are passed
some weapons are sold
other side of coin flips
a life is bought
with the currencies of prejudice and pride
news breaks out in the town
but, somewhere down the hill
an estranged mother awaits
her grandchildren ask,
“When will Dad return home?”
she gives her best
to deviate their mind, but only
for a while
they ask again
this time she replies
he has gone
to a distant market
to get some food
not knowing that
he will be back
without bidding them farewell
in the midst of war —
motherhood was left devastated
and nascent dreams of childhood crippled.
Ali Ashhar is a poet, short story writer and columnist. He is the author of poetry collection, Mirror of Emotions. His works appear in Indian Review, The Raven Review, Bosphorus Review of Books, among others.
anything, everything
a poem by Maisie Russel
by Maisie Russel
the thing about metaphors is
they circle around undistilled truths—
like hiding behind breath-taken;
captivated moon-eyes calling it tender
like secret longing that aches, sunlight
touching dust, settling for hunger
like witnessing the tress grow and graze
the garden beyond the clouds; praying surrender
let me say this once: ask me for the world
and I will give it to you.
Maisie Russel is a poet living in the desert. She also works on hcl design, information architecture, and ethical technological practices. Her works are published in various homes for poetry, both online and in print.
when storms reach the edge of the world
a poem by Adelaide Juelfs
by Adelaide Juelfs
The rain blurred the edges of the
world, a gutted fish lay
split on the sand,
salt-soaked and bleeding. A dead
man’s life spit up on the
tongue of the ocean, a storm of fury.
My dragonfly, my pride. Here — a new
day is brought to the edge,
we’ve been here for too long. The clouds that once
muddied the horizon turned it whole,
my hair grew untamed in the early
morning — a thousand little hands
reaching toward the sky. While waiting for
something, I suddenly remember yesterday
when I pinned myself to the sidelines
and a sure-fire cry brought me back.
I notice an abalone shell sitting on the
counter, a turquoise green light drifts in
through the open window
and eats the walls whole.
My honeyed eye, my want.
A dream catcher flies sideways in the wind,
and I feel a part of me pulled with it, out past the waves.
I feel a part of me surrender. Maybe I’m just tired.
Maybe it’s the circadian rhythm. A part of me hopes.
Here is the dark drifting away.
Here, I sew myself back up with the storm and
try to be alive again.
Adelaide is a high school student from Southern California. She writes in an attempt to better understand both herself and the world, and through language, she is both tethered to her life and transported somewhere mystical. She enjoys physics, daydreaming, and water polo.
temper
a poem by Nailea Salazar
by Nailea Salazar
Somewhere — a redwood, charred bark concealed
in thick haze, wild engulfed. Life awaits
your touch, lush with fervor. Temper frosts over
We make nice & skate in infinite ribbons.
Nailea Salazar is a writer from California whose work has appeared in Rejection Letters and Mister Magazine. She believes that God is stored inside Meg Ryan movies.
humming
a poem by Blair Center
by Blair Center
The rapid rattle—the magpie’s cackle
tap-tap tap-taps against the traffic panes
on Loch Street. The beak chaps nails to shatter
the low chorus humming of fumy wheels
which roll in waves below its sparse tree mast.
Brutalism looms. While they call above
the living flow in which I daily swim,
we both enjoy the sweeping coastal air
and the bonnie city’s shining movements
and rainy promises of future spring.
I look upon the sea like endless fields
and I shall hum and sing as is needed
to nest, to build, to keep the crops growing.
Blair Center is a writer and student from the north-east of Scotland. Center has had poetry published by Dreich, Leopard Arts, and The Hyacinth Review. Whether in English, Scots, or his local tongue, Doric, Center finds that themes of nature, memory, identity, and place particularly and consistently motivate his work.
2 poems
by Mykyta Ryzhykh
by Mykyta Ryzhykh
A sweet cloud dissolves in wet eyes.
Mirages of sand in wet eyes.
God’s assistant pressed the wrong button again.
The sea of heaven
Port of clouds
The future flows into its own absence
Mykyta Ryzhykh (he\him) lives in Ukraine (Nova Kakhovka Citу). He is the winner of the international competition Art Against Drugs, bronze medalist of the festival Chestnut House, and laureate of the literary competition named after Tyutyunnik. He is published in several journals and received a scholarship from the President of Ukraine for young authors.
those who knew
a poem by Deron Eckert
by Deron Eckert
The closer the coasts moved in,
the more common the shipwrecks
became. Oceans swelled slowly,
but their slight changes disguised
them enough from those who knew
them so well they could tell the
hour of day by the sound
the waves made as they crashed in
that by the time they reached the
thickets of grass defining
land from sea, those who knew that
song by heart could now only
hear it singing in their heads.
The farther the tides crept up
beaches that grew greedier
in their embrace, the harder
those who knew them best chased their
familiar call, even if
it meant their end, because those
who knew they had already
lost so much refused to let
their beloved song leave, too.
Deron Eckert is a writer and attorney who lives in Lexington, Kentucky. His writing has appeared in Rattle Magazine, Fahmidan Journal, Sky Island Journal, Swim Press, Treehouse Literary, and Rue Scribe and is forthcoming in Ghost City Review and Querencia Press' Winter 2023 Anthology. He was a flash fiction finalist in New Millenium Writing’s 54th Writing Awards. He is currently seeking publication for his Southern Gothic, coming-of-age novel, which explores how personal experiences change our preconceived notions of right and wrong, while working on a collection of poetry and prose.