foliage hatching – Martin Potter

 

twitch-woods

fresh trees’ switches

sprout cocoons

along spring-necks

 

the fledge-buds

begin to fan free

bat-wing tender

in salad green

 

wing-take

flutter-leaf among

anchored branches

earth by root-claw

 


Martin Potter (https://martinpotterpoet.home.blog) is a British-Colombian poet and academic, based in Manchester, and his poems have appeared in AcumenThe French Literary ReviewEborakonInk Sweat & TearsThe Poetry Village, and other journals. His pamphlet In the Particular was published in 2017.

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Consequences of Salt – Tammy L. Evans

 

Angry water reflects a mirror of

Distorted decisions

Shown to me one by one

Like a slide projector I have broken.

 

My pretend life is

Different from the one before me

 

A handcuff of small lotioned hands

Full of promise and sweat

 

Salt lures me with

                                        Crunch

Substance and

                     Bite.

 

But dissolves rendering it invisible

Before I can ask what my purpose is

 

Orphaned again

Not by death but by

Dissolving back

Into this version of myself.

 


Tammy L. Evans writes, walks, inspires, and teaches. She is the conjurer of everyday magic with short concise poems and stories. Her fiction has been published in Gone Lawn, Cabinets of Heed, Spelk, Five on the Fifth, Clover and White, Fiction Berlin Kitchen, Shorts Magazine, and Elephants Never. She is the lead moderator for the Sarah Selecky Centered community and a teacher for the school. You can connect with Tammy through IG @inspiretammy.

Soft W – Kristy Snedden

 

She perks up her heads

and debates which exit

to use. A few consonants

run for my throat but the vowels

want to journey through

my heart, get polished

by the oxygen rich blood

flow into the crowded world.

 

Now the consonants talk

to each other and to my throat

which makes guttural noises

and feels lost without vowels.

But the ws come, wanting

who, where, what, when.

With soft puffs of air

and a whoosh they blow

 

the letters out of my mouth.

Like magnets the vowels

and consonants pull to

each other and rearrange

themselves by the relativity

of the morning light.

And there she is, ushering

me out of granite into form.

 


Kristy Snedden has been a trauma psychotherapist for forty-plus years. She began writing poetry in June 2020.  Her work appears or is forthcoming in various journals and anthologies, including Snapdragon, The Examined Life Journal, Open Minds Quarterly, Pensive, and Anti-Heroin Chic. She is a 2024 Pushcart Prize nominee. In her free time, she can be found hiking in the Appalachian Mountains near her home or hanging out with her husband listening to their dogs tell tall tales. You can follow her on Instagram @kristy_snedden_poetry.

fog fall – Martin Potter

 

stepped inside to sidestep

a throat-tickle chill in the air

an hour later fog fell

 

haze of night had smothered

murk-wise the tight street

only your own echoes

 

bounce off walls pavement

resonant but ghosted out

lamp-glare haunts the home-walk

 


Martin Potter (https://martinpotterpoet.home.blog) is a British-Colombian poet and academic, based in Manchester, and his poems have appeared in Acumen, The French Literary Review, Eborakon, Ink Sweat & Tears, The Poetry Village, and other journals. His pamphlet In the Particular was published in 2017.

Longwood – Louise Walker

 

Hail hard in our faces, sun in our eyes,

we push through brambles, past the dovecot

and piles of tumbled bricks, driving deep into

the heart of the wood. Long before the house

burned down, someone planted daffodils here

and every year there are more, seen only

by those who still remember where to look.

Around the empty walled garden, bastard

fruit trees shoot upwards from ancient rootstock,

foaming white, but there will be no fruit,

unless we bend to read these faded labels

beside each shadow tree against the stone,

unless we plant again to face the sun

with Concorde, Harrow Sweet, Laxton’s Superb.

 


Louise Walker is a poet and teacher who lives in London. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in anthologies by the Sycamore Press and Emma Press, as well as journals such as SouthOxford MagazineAcumenSecond Chance LitARTEMIS and Dreich. Commissions include Bampton Classical Opera and she was Highly Commended in the Frosted Fire Firsts Award in 2022. She is working on her first collection.

Murky Valley – Chandan Dey

 

The questions, turned
into the waves ~
                            hissing & slamming
into the screen door

A swim ~
                 in a spiral galaxy
a sense
                            of your close presence

A signal ~
                  from a neutral field,
where blur
joy                  &                  sorrow A ditch ~ a love flux
                  around your house,
an agonizing severance ~
                                                    too…

 


Chandan Dey is a young and emerging writer. His work has appeared in Liquid Imagination, Vayavya, Sky Island Journal, Foxglove, and is forthcoming elsewhere. He works as an accountant in a company and is a passionate reader and writer of poetry as well. He takes a special interest in writing speculative poetry and fiction, and loves to write articles and books on scientific philosophy. He lives in Kolkata, India. Some of his work can be found on www.chandankumardey.blogspot.in.

Parkour – Daun Daemon

 

sailing through saplings

            claws clutching first one stem

                        swinging to another and another

            paws grasping winter’s bare branches

                        tail dancing and switching

the giddy squirrel flung itself

            into the berry bedecked holly nearby

                        deftly dodging the prickles

            finally kicking with its back legs

                        launching onto a tall pine tree

scrambling up rough bark

            stopping thirty feet off the ground

                        and barking at its competitor

            parked on the poplar nearby

 

I had never thought of trees

            as vertical obstacle courses

                        for athletic risk-taking squirrels

            showing off their kinetic prowess

                        their giddy sciurid confidence

or was it joyful desperation

            to navigate the world by vault

                        and leap from here to there

            as fast as we can with as few

                        scratches and falls as possible

even then to rise and climb,

            fall and roll, crawl, and run

                        around, across, over, under, and

            straight through to the moment

 

when we must stop

 


Daun Daemon’s fiction has appeared in Flock, Dead Mule School, Literally Stories, and Delmarva Review among others, and she has published poems in Third WednesdayTypehouse Literary Review, Remington Review, Deep South Magazine, Into the Void, Peeking Cat Literary, Amsterdam Quarterly, and other journals. Daemon is currently at work on a memoir in poetry as well as short stories inspired by memories of her mother’s home beauty shop. She teaches scientific communication at North Carolina State University and lives in Raleigh with her husband and two cats.

Downtown after the offices let out – John Grey

 

Tall buildings cast overlapping shadows.

It’s night long before nighttime.

Last of the commuters catch their train, their bus.

Garages empty out.

The few inner city dwellers

lock and latch the doors

of their small fortresses.

At street level,

two men approach each other.

It’s dark. Identities are smudged.

Is it? No it can’t be?

Wasn’t he the one who… ?

And didn’t he…?

They nod as they pass –

recognition or just acknowledgment

that there’s no other in this world –

neither gives an indication.

Each hears footsteps

on the concrete sidewalk,

softer and softer,

farther and farther away.

Then all would be silent

if it weren’t for themselves.

But they don’t feel responsible,

just alone.

 


John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Published in Nebo, Euphony, Columbia Review, Leading Edge, Poetry East and Midwest Quarterly.

Walking the Dales Way in Autumn – Ceinwen E. Cariad Haydon

 

Rain-glistened raised roots

emerald moss-coated stones

water spattered, spreading cow pats

slippery wooden footbridges

rocking, ancient stiles

with hard-sprung gates –

 

all conspire to tumble me as I walk

our old ways in these Dales

long swept by winds, storms,

artists’ eyes, mizzle and sunlight.

 

Somehow, I stay upright

and advance slowly, mindful

of the present moment

rich with overflows

of tricky beauty

as breezes waft smells of byre

and mulch of fallen, slithered leaves –

 

I find I am

unbalanced only by time

about to run out.

 


Ceinwen lives near Newcastle upon Tyne, UK and writes short stories and poetry. She is widely published in online magazines and in print anthologies. Her first chapbook is ‘Cerddi Bach’ [Little Poems], Hedgehog Press, July 2019. She is developing practice as participatory arts facilitator. She believes everyone’s voice counts.

seals’ dreamtime – Martin Potter

 

readier to roll about

than to drag seal-bulk

shingle-crunch climbing

the beach’s skirts

 

haul and lay their mass

press on the pebble bed

a bay’s broad outscouring

they bask the lull

 

when a pair of helpless eyes

pitch-bright in bristled snout

ratchets round in meeting

yours with sea-thoughts

 


Martin Potter (https://martinpotterpoet.home.blog) is a British-Colombian poet and academic, based in Manchester, and his poems have appeared in Acumen, The French Literary Review, Eborakon, Ink Sweat & Tears, The Poetry Village, and other journals. His pamphlet In the Particular was published in 2017.

Gaia’s Song – Claire Shaw

 

We start slow

Let the fire burn low

As the shadows grow

by Moon Mother’s glow

Wait

 

Lick the grease from our fingers

Breathe the smoke in that lingers

Wait

 

Test the ground with our feet

Wait for the beat

The thrum

Feel the life in the peat

The hum

We drum

 

We dance

fling the embers as we spin

a trance

there’s heat on our skin

a chance

to feel the fire burn within

 

and now we’re striped with sweat and dust

 

we’re dripping

with the scent of musk

heady incense

burning lust

 

and we are bound

to the sound

of the beat

that we found

at the hearth at the heart of the world

 


Claire Shaw is an emerging UK-born poet and author whose work has appeared in publications including Black Hare Press, The Dawntreader, Silkworm and Grimsy. She currently resides in The Netherlands with her husband and two cats and works in Digital Marketing. She loves to travel, practice her photography, and read like it’s going out of fashion.

diner – Tammy L. Breitweiser

 

A three day trip

A torn plastic booth

White stuffing protruding

From the wound.

Bandaged haphazardly with silver tape

 

The aroma of stirring coffee with a spoon

On day 16.

Fills my nose

But my mind is still on

Six driving hours and two time changes

 

Misty droplets roll in from the lake

The fog horn is not the sound

Which concerns me.

 

“I am four years old

The year I learn to lie,”

Says my little companion.

Elsa always told me

“Don’t get attached”

 

What else do you need?

“Pink marshmallow mountains”

You had a bowl of ice cream

I had a glass of tequila and lime.

 

We drive down Highway 90

The bridge from old life to new.

I grip the wheel and think about

All the times I have driven on this road

Where I was going and how

A boy started the whole thing.

 


Tammy L. Breitweiser writes, walks, inspires, and teaches. She is the conjurer of everyday magic with short concise poems and stories. Her fiction has been published in Gone Lawn, Cabinets of Heed, Spelk, Five on the Fifth, Clover and White, Fiction Berlin Kitchen, Shorts Magazine, and Elephants Never. She is the lead moderator for the Sarah Selecky Centered community and a teacher for the school.  You can connect with Tammy through IG @inspiretammyb.

Life with a View – John Short

 

Gascony

 

After we parted yesterday

the grass was dancing.

You’d wanted kind words

but I was happily silent.

 

Outside the old room

with flaking plaster walls

I sat on the porch

and watched young frogs

hop through vines.

 

Rough wine from oak barrels.

I drank it on the porch

as the world seemed to dance.

 

Beyond fields of maize

and bright yellow rapeseed

your village perches

with its pink roof jumble.

 

From the highest point

land shimmers like mirage.

We see for miles

to glacial mountains

ascending from the plain.

 


John Short studied Comparative Religion at Leeds University (UK) then spent many years in France, Spain and Greece doing a variety of jobs. In 2008 he returned to Liverpool and a couple of years later began submitting work to magazines. Now internationally published, he’s appeared in places like Pennine Platform, South Bank Poetry, London Grip, Ink Sweat & Tears, Envoi, French Literary Review and The High Window. In 2018 he was nominated for the Pushcart Prize by StepAway Magazine and has been featured twice as Poet of the Month on the Write Out Loud national poetry forum. He lives in Liverpool, is a member of Liver Bards and reads at local venues and beyond.

Palm Civet – Rahana K Ismail 

 

To Úrsula Iguarán

 

A mouth gnawing at the cemented floor.

The tail a sky of shadow. Between niches

mousing, a scratch of claws. Two eyes

planetting the room

 

of my conscience. Guilt can take on

many forms. As a hole

in the sprawl of air. A hole

that housed

 

a spear. A throat it makes around it.

A head it wedges in, the mesh

of bone and body it zeroes in on. The hand

that weaves into esparto grass.

 

Walking as a man does, sad

and searching

until you haunt courtyards

for the open faucet, or floorboards

for the ticking beetle,

or the telling heart in spite.

Ever since grandma told me, a civet cat

 

knocking over boxes of what I have

squirreled in my head.

 


Rahana K Ismail is a poet and doctor from Kozhikode, Kerala. Her work has been featured or is forthcoming in The Penn Review, Yearbook of Indian Poetry in English, nether Quarterly, Contemporary Haibun Online, Usawa Literary Review, POSIT, Io Literary Journal (Refractions), The Alchemy Spoon, Paradoxlit, Farmer-ish, Poetic Sun, Chakkar, Alipore Post, Aainanagar, Hakara, Verse of Silence, EKL Review, Pine Cone Review and elsewhere.

The Wave – Kristy Snedden

 

A wave curled over my bed

last night, fell into the center of my body,

surf ran through each cell.

The words I was saving for today

Washed away leaving empty space.

It was warm, like that glow around

The waning crescent moon.

 


Kristy Snedden has been a trauma psychotherapist for thirty-five plus years. She began writing poetry in June 2020. Her poem “Dementia,” was awarded an Honorable Mention in the 90th Annual Writer’s Digest Writing Competition. Her work appears or is forthcoming in various journals and anthologies, most recently Snapdragon, Open Minds Quarterly, The Power Of The Pause Anthology, and The Examined Life. She is a student at Phillip Schultz’s Writers Studio. When she isn’t working, reading, or writing poetry, she can be found hiking in the Appalachian Mountains near her home or hanging out with her husband listening to their dogs tell tall tales.