April 2013 | back-issues, poetry
If tires could score patterns into pavement
then these would be indelible whorls,
fingertip prints dancing like
overburdened bunting,
stretched until tight,
then released
to snap in rubbery tangles,
twisted and perfectly unplanned.
Everything’s reflecting
as visible music,
an evening composed in motion,
all the shining eyes aglow,
waypoints, lit fuses,
blurred meteors blinking
over darkened sidewalks
as I nod my ragged head,
frayed heartstrings
rubbed thin and ringing,
dilated gaze anchored
onto an uncommon image,
gleaming up from blacktop water,
shimmering in joyful ripples
while earth flies by below,
constant and faithful, steadfast
as the path is abandoned
under shorn sycamores,
as the solitary garden patiently bears
a flattening weight, the fallen body
of a man in love with the moon.
by Joshua Herron
April 2013 | back-issues, poetry
Variegated strands of weather weave
their magic tapestry on my mind.
I revel in their changing voices,
interpretative attire, and cacophony.
I look forward day to day, no, even
every moment, to their malleability.
I love sun, blue sky and light breeze,
but no less mad tempestuousness.
The splendance of the greyest dawn
smiles, blows scudding across my day.
It is dramatic change I seek, almost
as the leech smells out fresh blood.
Fastening tenaciously, I suck the
marrow of the barometer’s change.
I meter not my days, but greet each
a new acquaintance, friend or lover.
I extend my soul in welcome as a
knight did his in visual declaration.
Holding no weapon, bearing no
malice, I am seeking no combat.
I wish only to enwrap, submerge,
enjoy weather’s spirited vagaries.
Each changeling child of revolution
brings her own unique enjoyments.
No doppelgangers exists in this with
the parting curtains of each dawn.
Regardless how low the light or loud
the music, my day is a unique option.
I tease out deeper meaning, affinity of
an All: earthly, ethereally, spiritually.
Therefore: every day is acquiescent:
geographic, atmospheric, temporal.
I, too, add or subtract from each day
by the attitude and demeanor I bring.
by Rick Hartwell
Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school (remember, the hormonally-challenged?) English teacher living in Moreno Valley, California. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large; and, like the Transcendentalists and William Blake, that the instant contains eternity. Given his “druthers,” if he’s not writing poetry, Rick would rather still be tailing plywood in a mill in Oregon.
April 2013 | back-issues, poetry
Have you ever felt music?
have you ever felt a sound?
have you felt it swirl through the air
until in penetrates you
stirs up the past and present
show’s you the future.
And you’re no longer numb
you’re alive, you woke up
the sounds come from within now
you’re the player
and the instrument
you’re the audience
every note is powerful and strong
every note has meaning.
Don’t listen – feel,
let it penetrate
let the sounds fill you
music is magic, it’s sublime
and listening’s too rational
feeling is the key of every piece.
by Jonas Cimermanas
April 2013 | back-issues, poetry
Surrounded by the Buddha’s bounty,
a calming serenity hushes the crowd
as a docent provides a brief biography . . .
The bump of knowledge crowns his head with
Tightly bundled curls of second-growth hair,
Framed by long lobes stretched by gold earrings.
“Only real Buddhas have these three things!”
I hear her, but I wonder if it’s truly those that
make Buddhas something more than . . . men.
It is this “something more” in which to bask,
a golden warmth of subtle majesty renounced,
to shoulder the suffering of the world at large.
A larger world was what he sought,
the world of intense introspection,
in order to understand . . . himself.
With minds on fire and pillars of intellect,
exposed, crucified, pinned as for dissection,
performing mundane exercises, shoveling shit;
Bodhisattvas exchanging thoughts for actions,
expiring moment to moment in Phoenix flames,
waiting to be reborn . . . endlessly.
by Richard Hartwell
Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school English teacher living in Moreno Valley, California. He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large; and, like the Transcendentalists and William Blake, that the instant contains eternity. Given his “druthers,” if he’s not writing poetry, Rick would rather still be tailing plywood in a mill in Oregon
April 2013 | back-issues, poetry
This was not just a room – it was
A milestone- a first communion,
A crisp suit, a new car, a fresh haircut-
A blank set of blueprints on how to be human.
It was a field where shoes aren’t needed-
Where you break curfew and don’t care about
Time or memory, where everything stands
Still because your mouth can’t keep up with
Smiling it wants to do. Eyes speak more
Than hands because they meet others and know
That there’s no need to hide and blow lines
Off of picture frames holding the dead eyed stares
Of mistakes and regrets. This was a room,
Where a beautiful girl and I first met.
by Michael Murray
April 2013 | back-issues, poetry
A spicy seam, unraveled in a café, brunette with streaks. Jittering fingers unstitch brown and red; a smell like mad-heat buried in cheeks, flesh wild and fever-drenched. His lips are swollen on warm treats, but he stretches the peppered vein and drinks.
by Janae Green
Janae Green is a recipient of the 2nd Annual Gypsy Sachet Awards in Letters and Biography from Fiction Fix. Her poems and short stories have appeared in Atticus Review, Eunoia Review, Fiction Fix, Paper Darts, Poetry Quarterly, scissors and spackle, The Ofi Press, The Salmon Creek Journal, Turk’s Head Review, and forthcoming in various online and print literary journals. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her partner, artist Shea Bordo.
