Hold On
It’s 9:45 / at night / phone rings / I’m reading in bed / his dad answers / friend calling / from the
E.R. / he’s going into surgery / and wants you to know / he loves you / jarred into flight mode
I grab a canvas bag / robotically drop in / two pairs of underwear / an extra t-shirt
all my medication / clear the nightstand / of reading glasses / ear plugs
unfinished / journals and books / ready for a / numb to the bone
150-minute trip / to the next state / hold on son
we are on / our way
—Laura Daniels
Three Haiku
garden pinwheels
spinning in the breeze
jealous sunflowers
summer storm
lightning flashed back
to my childhood
wisdom offered sweet
is advice rarely taken
fortune cookie
—John Kiersten
Plantings
So much depends on the yearly growth of green—
the rise of the moon,
the mess contained in a garden’s noon.
Spring is a map of the human mind, too sweet to be seen.
—India Braine
what sleeps so soundly
in democracy’s bell jar
still awaits a kiss
—Jennifer Howse
Last Request
A boulder beckons.
How can I refuse this proffered seat
Amidst a shady hemlock grove?
In front of me, a sylvan glade
Of velvet, verdant ferns,
A mossy bed of softest hues;
The moss bed cushion bids me, too.
Please, when I am old and frail,
Bed-confined, or of questionable mind,
Please do this for me:
Paint a forest on my walls
Of dappled leaves with muted light
And fill my room with forest calls;
A gentle hush of wind, a bubbling, chucking creek.
A veery trill, an oriole,
Black-capped chickadee’s
Cheerful, captivating call
A soaring hawk, an evening owl,
An eagle’s lonely, eerie trall.
And, if I am as crazy as a loon, then
Give me loons as well.
Paint a lake into the scene and let me hear
Their hollow, plaintive cries that bring to mind
The lovely, melancholy days
Of trees and birds and love
And almost love…
And this, the most important, most of all:
I need at dawn and dusk a hermit thrush—
Its fluting, pulling, soulful song…
If I can look ahead to numbered days,
Not moribund, but forest-bound,
Then I will gladly take that proffered seat
And live my final years or days
In grateful, blissful, natural peace.
—Margaret DiBenedetto
Oh Happy Day
I wake up with a song in my heart
And a light in my head
When the song moves to my head
At least I can shine a light on it
And ask it to leave.
—Richard Shea
Sleuth
When Sherlock was my lover
his long lanky body
smelling of cherry tobacco
wrapped me with dark heat.
His lips tasting of red wine
made husky promises to love me while
he discovered my mysteries.
I would have expected nothing less.
—Susan Liev Taylor
The Holes of Notebooks
One, two, three, the clock ticks
I’m sitting at my desk taking notes in my blue notebook
Four, five, six, the student taps his pen repeatedly against his desk,
Seven, eight, the door shuts, making a clicking noise
Nine, a piercing noise echoes through the halls,
The booming sound continues, shouting in the distance
I freeze, putting my pen down beside my notebook
Ten, I gaze around the classroom to see my classmates,
The color draining slowly from their faces, eyes wide in realization,
The clock continues to tick, eleven, twelve
I hoped for time to freeze, and correct itself, it doesn’t
Time is continuous, the blaring sounds down the hall approaching
Thirteen, the clock ticks
I retrace my morning
I ate a bowl of cereal only two hours ago
I said bye to my mom only two hours ago
Fourteen, I sit under a desk, once used for class
Now, my shelter of survival
The clock ticked again, and the darkness of the room
engulfs the faces of my peers
The clock ticks again, Fifteen, I am only Fifteen years old
Sixteen, our backpacks have become shields
Seventeen, I touch the now-dampened sleeves of my hoodie,
I brush my tear-stained cheeks, each tear,
reminding me of reality
Why?
When is it enough?
How many lives have to be taken,
How many have to be injured,
How many parents have to come home to an empty house
To realize that notebooks should only have three holes
—Lily Reynolds (16 years)
The poems we love six months in
Endless variations on the
fertile theme of navel gazing.
Yes.
Poems about genocide
—and hypocrisy.
No.
Bags of flour for the
famine-stricken soaked
in the blood of children.
You can’t sell designer real estate
ads with that.
The broken time piece…
ticks on.
Beautifully consistent.
Post-it on editor’s desk:
“Put a BIPOC on the June cover to
show our solidarity with the downtrodden”
—Ken McCarthy
Riding Trains
Some of the most profound reflection
has come from riding trains
A liminal space
I’ve been riding a particular line
for so many years now
Try it sometime
—Brian Gallio
Making an Altar
I watched my judgements to see where they land
and became eaten alive.
Flowers and sweets do not adorn this altar,
only confusions and pains,
empty cups for losses to come,
the agents of my humbling,
the seeds of awakening.
—Paul Sacca
Everyday Issues
Dog I thought barking was not
but a machine catches grinding
burps
barks
this happens when neighbor knocks
on her window I think signaling help
follow this
like a film noir unfolds
its tale: dog, machine, lady
linked
bizarre story
so
dog did not bark
machine
was grinding it up burping
sausages in neighbor’s kitchen
and
she wasn’t banging on window
for my assistance
(she’s always hated that dog,
and me) now startled
falling backward down
outside cellar steps…
solution
of conundrum.
—C.P.Masciola
Ancient Agora
Block upon block
Stone upon stone
Piled high in holy adoration.
Paths worn smooth over centuries of pilgrimage.
Philosophy debated, votes cast.
Long ago democracy born on this sacred ground.
Monuments paralyzed in pose remind us of a glorious legacy.
We must choose to recall what these men long dead have said.
Block upon block
Stone upon stone
Piled high in holy adoration
—Warren Mumford
Love Is Not Small
love is not small—
love is grandest—
the very grandest
of it all
*
so when you tell me
there ain’t enough room
it’s just that in you
love has yet to bloom
—Christopher Porpora
Molting Season
Suddenly I am shedding objects
like a molting tanager or grackle.
Yesterday my mobile phone
drove home with a friend
after our lunch date. Day before
my fitness tracker departed
for places unknown. One brown
leather glove sits alone in my
bag, its mate abandoned roadside
or downed on some restaurant floor.
Of course I know the difference.
Bird molts are timed to restore,
repair wings, ready them once more
for mating dances, fancy flights,
nest design, pastimes that entrance
others—younger, heady with raw
desire, stamina. I wonder
if leaving things behind is a
last stand. A plea—remember me,
like that bygone Kilroy wall scrawl.
What I really want to do is shed
meaningful words onto a page.
Not scattered riffs or easily erased
random rhymes but a more enduring
chronicle of my migration.
Most birds molt to stay vibrant,
aloft, worthy of awe. Their feathers
do not vanish all at once. Instead,
they drift softly toward ground—
wing shadows, an off-kilter haiku.
—Mary K O’Melveny
Baby Lady
It’s odd
I wake like a baby lately
helpless and befuddled
waiting for someone to pick me up
and turn me in the direction
I belong
hold me and provide what is
good for me, lest I let myself
dissolve like piss into cloth
I am soft like a baby
but gangly
stretched by thirty years
the pull of lovers, the
yank of knowledge how
it drags the limbs out and
bends them, the vessel growing
larger in an attempt to contain
all which passes through
it’s crowded in there if
I’m being honest
too crowded
oh, so this is the difference
darling baby cannot move for
it knows not yet where to go
lanky lady lies still for she
knows all the places
she could
—Madison Corbin
This article appears in June 2024.
