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.

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March 6, 2023 by foxglovejournal Categories: Poetry, UncategorizedTags: air, communication, consonants, creation, creative, creativity, elements, form, journey, Kristy Snedden, language, letters, light, magnets, poem, Poetry, sound, speech, talk, US, vowels, word, writing Leave a comment

You’re so cool – Anna Idelevich

 

A tear mist stettled on the city

and I can’t see, I don’t write for show-off,

I’m driving on the night road of interconnections, you can’t see

point blank,

but it is audible, audible as if the stars are pouring ointments,

on the rustle.

I am one of them small, millionth.

Communication with you is nothing but needles,

but it’s dark in the car, I’m sitting lit up,

let’s say lit, but the Universe was not enough

gunpowder,

and it’s just a silhouette filled up with you

light, do not remove all the sadness from the stains,

and you can call for a long time and pull your hands into the distance.

Such a nebula over the city

illegal,

your colossus is reinforced concrete,

but the song sounds not funeral, but restless,

as if window tokens were nailed through the air to

rest,

and if there is no time, then there is neither river nor bank,

turn your head, I am parallel to you, to the fire and

time.

 

---

Anna Idelevich is a scientist by profession, Ph.D., MBA, trained in the neuroscience field at Harvard University. She writes poetry for pleasure. Her books and poetry collections include DNA of the Reversed River and Cryptopathos published by the Liberty Publishing House, NY. Anna’s poems were published by BlazeVOX, Louisville Review, Salmon Creek Journal, Bourgeon Magazine, In Parenthesis, O:J&A, Gyroscope Review among others. She hopes you will enjoy their melody, new linguistic tone, and a slight tint of an accent.

February 8, 2022 by foxglovejournal Categories: Poetry, UncategorizedTags: air, Anna Idelevich, city, communication, creative, creativity, distance, drive, elements, light, mist, poem, poet, Poetry, river, road, sadness, senses, song, sound, stars, time, writing Leave a comment

Water – Gareth Writer-Davies

 

catching water

always leads to a cacophony

 

never mute

water talks as it spouts or fountains

 

from mossy lips

to the drum of the barrel

 

murmuring like a cherub

or roaring like a freshwater Neptune

 

who opened his mouth to yawn

and was surprised

 

by a deluge of vowels

that kept on flowing

 

O, if only my hands

could catch what the water is saying

 

 

Gareth Writer-Davies is from Brecon and was shortlisted for the Bridport Prize (2014 and 2017) and the Erbacce Prize (2014). He was commended in the Prole Laureate Competition (2015) and Prole Laureate for 2017. He was commended in the Welsh Poetry Competition (2015) and Highly Commended in 2017. His pamphlet “Bodies”, was published in 2015 by Indigo Dreams and the pamphlet “Cry Baby” came out in 2017. His first collection “The Lover’s Pinch” (Arenig Press) was published June, 2018.

 

November 12, 2018 by foxglovejournal Categories: PoetryTags: cacophony, catch, communication, creative, creativity, deluge, elements, fountains, Gareth Writer-Davies, hands, nature, poem, Poetry, roar, senses, sound, speech, surprise, vowels, Wales, water, writing, yawn Leave a comment

Día logues – Margaret King

 

She talks to every living thing

Maybe even more than humans

She talks to her plants as they grow

To butterflies & birds who visit daily

She has an ongoing rapport with the

Blue jays and chickadees

Who boisterously call for food

Whenever she walks under the trees

Of the yard

Underneath, the grass is littered with

Shells of sunflowers & peanuts

A beach, an ocean of giving &

Giving back

She talks to her cats

Marking loyal days together.

To her, these things are as alive as anyone

& worthy of communication.

But why doesn’t she speak to the

Hummingbirds? Messengers, she feels

She should at least send a prayer

Or a wish

Or a private longing

A cry for help

But she doesn’t

Want to scare them away.

 

 

 

Margaret King is a Wisconsin writer who enjoys penning poetry, short stories, and young adult novels. In her spare time, she likes to haunt the shores of Lake Michigan, similar to many of her fictional characters. Her most recent work has appeared in Unlost Journal, Moonchild Magazine, Enclave, and The Ginger Collect.

March 2, 2018March 2, 2018 by foxglovejournal Categories: PoetryTags: animals, birds, cats, communication, creative, creativity, dialogue, elements, fauna, giving, insects, life, loyalty, Margaret King, nature, plants, poem, Poetry, speech, US, WI, wish, writing Leave a comment

Bird watching – J V Birch

 

I watch a pair of lorikeets gorge on overripe peaches. They hook the ample flesh with their beaks chattering between mouthfuls, their green the green of the leaves so only the vivid blue of their heads is visible, with an occasional blaze of breast. I think of the women at the café in Brighton. Every Sunday they sit at a window table slurping tea and cream cakes, heads bent in gossip, oblivious to their surrounds and smeared lips. At that time, in their world, it’s just them. I note the silence, feel watched, look up to find the parrots staring at me, a couple of plump sunsets untouched at their feet.

 

J V Birch lives in Adelaide. Her poems have appeared in anthologies, journals and magazines across Australia, the UK, Canada and the US. She has two collections – Smashed glass at midnight and What the water & moon gave me – published by Ginninderra Press, and is currently working on her third. She blogs at www.jvbirch.com.

September 19, 2017 by foxglovejournal Categories: PoetryTags: animals, Australia, birds, blue, colours, communication, creative, creativity, fauna, food, fruit, gossip, green, humanity, J V Birch, lips, nature, peaches, poet, Poetry, wildlife, world, writing 2 Comments

Sartre Building an Ant Farm Out of Company Sand – Ryan Quinn Flanagan

 

His library was impressive

but I could tell by the way that he

buttered his morning toast

that he was not well read.

 

Who gets up in the morning anyways

if they do not have to?

 

That was a flag right there.

 

And I could see

he had something against the Russians

because he would never look east,

not even for the sunrise,

it is little things like that.

 

People confuse language with communication.

 

What is NOT said by what is said

is often more important.

 

The minutia, the nuance…

like Sartre building an ant farm

out of company sand.

 

And he asked me to stay another night

and I told him I could not

because poison ivy is contagious.

 

And now

I am in bed

listening to the

rain.

 

Nodding off every so often

like the elderly do

on the subway.

 

Ryan Quinn Flanagan is a Canadian-born author residing in Elliot Lake, Ontario, Canada with his other half and mounds of snow. His work can be found both in print and online in such places as Evergreen Review, The New York Quarterly, Word Riot, In Between Hangovers, Red Fez, and The Oklahoma Review.

 

January 27, 2017February 25, 2017 by foxglovejournal Categories: Poetry, UncategorizedTags: Canada, change, communication, creative, humanity, ivy, language, life, literature, morning, nature, poem, Poetry, poison, rain, reflection, relationship, Ryan Quinn Flanagan, Sartre, sleep, sunrise, writing Leave a comment