Fearless one buzzing
breezing o’er radiant flowers
diving into feeders in urban
gardens, jet speed in and out
Who’s more vibrant,
‘You or I?’ to the
scarlet beauty,
as you zoom past
looking to perch
for a second, no more
Forest fires spreading
Men and women
in masks grumpy –
‘Hard to breathe!’
Amidst all, you’ve lingered
hardy…
On the Edge
I am not the one
To lead the herd,
The one that chooses the path
That leads to the cliff
And the necessary fall
And slaughter.
I would rather be the one
Who stays
At the edge of the herd
Watching and worrying
About the wolves,
And the men dressed in hides
That set fires, and fan the smoke.
No. I am not the one to lead.
I am the one to start to fight,
Or try to change the direction
Of the wind.
The Gospel of the Delivery Man
Pizza I give you,
And cash you give me,
Hopefully more
Than the price of the bill.
There has to be
A tip in there somewhere.
My wages are low
And barely cover
The cost of gas.
Someday with luck
And lottery tickets,
I will have a nice house,
Like you do,
And be able to send out
For food as well.
Until then, I shall dine
On oatmeal for breakfast,
A free hoagie
For lunch,
And the cheese fries
I forgot to give you
And you failed
To mention.
Not Your Stooge
No. I will not be
Your stooge.
I will be
My own buffoon,
Without need
Of eye pokes
Or theatre
Or television
Audience.
The pratfalls
Will be real,
Known only
By those
Who chance
To be around.
The laughter,
If any,
Will be gathered
And kept in a can
To be served later
Along with
Cold duck soup.
The Hare’s Lament
No. I can not do it,
Fulfill the expectations
Required of me
To exist.
All this breathing
In and out,
Foraging on all fours,
The fear of things
With sharper teeth or beaks
And claws.
There has to be
A better way,
A life one could
Truly live.
I sense it out there,
Somewhere,
A different incarnation
Worth living
Or dying for.
Zen Procrastination
Poetry is one of the ways
I delay dealing
With reality,
All those duties
And responsibilities.
Who needs them
And their
Anxiety ridden
Timetables?
The poet revels
In the now.
In the moment
All is glorious.
Let’s not talk
About later.
Later will be
A mess,
But possibly
Another opportunity
For poems
if we’re both lucky.
That Ego Of Yours
It is an ugly monster,
larger than your shadow.
It won’t stay behind you.
It wants to walk up front.
It obscures your vision
and the path you travel.
You wish you could
get rid of it.
You have tried.
You can’t.
Exorcised, it returns.
It only takes
a single compliment
to grow from nothing
to a looming mass
taller than
the Statue of Liberty.
When will you learn?
Never it seems.
“You could be so nice
if you weren’t
such an asshole.”
Shadow People
I do not fear the shadows.
That is where I hide best.
I watch the world of sunlight
And know it is not mine.
I dwell where the others are,
Vacant but not alone.
Where we are is where we must be
For our faces seem
Too horrible
For those who walk in the light,
But, as for ourselves,
We know we have value
And beauty of a kind.
Maybe the many
Cannot appreciate
Who or what we are,
But the strange
Will know the strange,
And recognize them
As kin,
No matter where they are
Or what their particular sin.
Joseph Farley has had over 1350 poems and 140 short stories published. His 11 poetry collections include Suckers, Her Eyes, Longing For The Mother Tongue, and Yellow Brick Pilgrim. His fiction books include Labor Day, Once Upon A Time In Whitechapel, Farts and Daydreams, and For The Birds.
You can find more of Joseph’s work here on Ink Pantry.
Explaining my Silence
It is unsaid, this night, tongue crushed,
silence crawling out of its hole
and into the moonlight, the salt air.
I am a history of silence, with you,
with anyone of the past, the present,
the future. You wait for my commencement,
its following, but how to reckon truth
eludes me. My speech instead decides
on agitated mumbling on the dark inexorable,
the universe unbelievably immense. I cannot speak
of all that terrifies me so nothing is said, to you,
to someone, but to you above all others. I’m the
winter sky frozen with stars, on the beach, clung to
footprints, and the ocean listening, seething and heaving
Solar System
We’re down here
concerning ourselves
with pitiable stuff
like did I ogle
that woman who just passed by
or why did you buy
that new microwave oven
when the old one
still works fine.
Meanwhile,
the sun is slowly burning
itself out.
No knowledge of our lives.
No familiarity with our emotions.
Someday,
it will cave in, fold up
in one almighty bang.
We’re out of its league
with our modest implosion.
The Losing Game
He lost money on the prize fight.
And the poker game.
And the roulette wheel at the casino.
He lost money through the hole in his pocket
and the woman he gifted a fancy bracelet to
who never afterward returned his calls.
He lost money on the stock market.
Then he lost money on the church
that he tithed to his entire life
that left him as nothing more
than a body in a hole in the ground.
Tree roots benefited
from the minerals in his rotting corpse
as did the weevils and the worms.
But, as far as I know,
no money changed hands.
Her Man Returns
A small blue Japanese car
pulls into her driveway.
It’s as thrilling
as the rose she planted in early spring
that’s now blooming in the height of summer.
Though not blue.
Though not Japanese.
And, of the bees
that buzzed away from its bud,
not one knocked on her door.
The Current Occupant
In this room are some
who will never be again.
One is sitting on the bed.
Another pokes in the drawers.
A third interrogates closets.
The flightier kind
gravitate to the ceiling.
The dour, the funereal,
lie down in the dust.
Ancestors?
Most likely.
They resemble me
and yet are remnants
of other lives.
They’re cursed with
hands that don’t touch,
mouths that can’t speak.
Yet, I dread the feel of them.
I fear what they have to say.
The Cry
In one house, the attic window
is a long, painful cry.
And that cry passes through
glass and darkness,
treetop and streetlamp,
shivers the sidewalk below.
It resonates with the primal dynamo
from which everything comes
but also the fear,
that all living matter
must now come to a stop.
A woman’s face,
wide mouth pressed against the pane.
upholds this dichotomy.
But then two bodiless hands
squeeze her white throat,
cut off all sound at the source.
The street now reflects
the silence before life,
the silence that comes after.
As the only witness
to this frailty of life
it’s a struggle, on my part,
to be anyone.
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in Sheepshead Review, Poetry Salzburg Review and Hollins Critic. Latest books, Leaves On Pages and Memory Outside The Head, and Guest of Myself are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in Ellipsis, Blueline and International Poetry Review.
You can find more of john’s work here on Ink Pantry.
Fear of a Black Psychic
When you know too much,
You grow too much…
You’re sure too much.
You’re poor too much.
You feel too much.
You’re real too much.
Start thinking that you–
Can heal too much.
You hear too much.
They feared as much.
Line/Break
I break lines
With thunder-crack
Keystrokes
To outshout
The voice
Of your lover.
Chris Courtney Martin (They/Them/Theirs) is a multidisciplinary artist and psychic medium originally from Philadelphia. Their post-kundalini creative quest has yielded a prolific burst of poetry publications via Alien Buddha Press, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Erato Magazine and more. Their debut poetry/prose chapbook THE BOOK OF I.P. (Idle Poems) is available on Amazon in paperback. The follow-up full-length collection SLAM POEMS FOR MY BATHROOM MIRROR…And Other Selected Works… is due to launch in the Fall of 2023. Martin also releases music under the name KWEAN OONTZ and continues to build a career as a screenwriter and budding producer. Twitter Instagram Threads
Me and Amelia. On our way
to the hospital. Visiting. We
are. A sick friend. But these
places. Geez! Whose idea
was this? Who? That hospitals
should be the size of small
cities? Tell me. I’d like to
know. Hey. At least they allow
support dogs. But still. All
these towering buildings. So,
so tall. All of them. All the
same. And now. Of course.
We’re lost. We are. Me and
Amelia. Driving around. Rats
in a maze. That’s us. Until,
until. We find the right one.
The building we want. And
a parking place. Alrighty!
I slip Amelia into her harness.
Attach her leash. And off
we go. Amelia in her pretty
little dress. Pink. Of course.
And me in my t-shirt. The
green one. The one that says:
“Emotional Support Person
for My Rescue Chihuahua.”
Close enough. Right? Yeah.
That’s what I’m thinking.
Laura Stamps is the author of over 50 novels and poetry collections. Most recently: “The Good Dog” (Prolific Pulse Press 2023) and “Addicted to Dog Magazines” (Impspired, 2023). Recipient of a Pulitzer Prize nomination and 7 Pushcart Prize nominations. Lover of feral cats and Chihuahuas.
You can find more of Laura’s work here on Ink Pantry.
Reading the philosophers
From sun to moon rise,
Transcended to ages
Amalgamating
the Infinite pain.
Memories radiate along,
With Blaring Roars and fierce Glints
through the pathway of deluge.
Serenity alluring through
Just like,
The absolute circle that radiates
taking the light of gleaning flame.
Memories with their cluster of pain
Gazing from the clouds
Emerge to reveal the blaze
Of Warmth in the dark.
Was then
The moments of sight
Still sharp and defined
A ball of brightness
In a feel of trance.
Smudged with emotions heavy
A smoulder I saw
Life in my hands
The torment, pain of life process –
Call it by any name!
Was no less than bliss
To see
My celestial boon.
Dr. Anila Pillai is an assistant professor of communication skills. She teaches in the land of Lions- Gujarat, India. Her passion is to pen her emotions in verse. She has published her literary creations as well as academic articles with national and international publishers. Kailani is her collection of poems published in the year 2022.
You come to me in Hiding
At the deepest hour of night, You, my Lord, come to me in hiding.
In your strong arms, you pull me close enough –
You are my bliss.
You are the charioteer of my chariot moving past amidst all sorrow.
You, alone, are my friend.
You are my vulnerability, you are my catastrophe.
You are my bliss.
You conquer my enemies in concealment.
You, my Lord, solely is my friend.
You are the Rudra incarnation, you are the fear of the fear.
You are my bliss.
You are the thunder bifurcating my bosom.
You alone are my friend.
I bid you to lull me in death cutting me from the ties of all the bondages of Samsara.
You, you are my bliss.
Had I known
Had anyone known that you would beckon me?
I was dead-ignorant-asleep.
Samsara had encroached on me in deep darkness.
Had I known that you would pour in the bliss of grief in my soul,
had I known that you would drench me in tears!
I had not known when the sun of your benediction graced the eastern hemisphere,
without much thought, I could feel your gracious warmth filling the innermost folds of my heart, soul, skin –
You, my Lord washed off my shore with the tide of your immortal sea –
You broke open all the bars that I had put across.
You brought the wind of evensong, you brought hope in my heart.
The boat of my existence is now anchored at your lotus feet.
At your touch
My sadness has crossed the paths of infinity.
At last it has touched your feet, a summation of happiness and mirth.
Since days, I have shed tears boundlessly,
I have not known why it has been flowing relentlessly-
Today, I have woven a string of my teardrops, to garland you, O my Lord.
Your Northern Star has beckoned me in evading darkness.
I have never reasoned the sadness that I have borne all the while
I was still in quietness.
Today, after ages, at your touch, my sadness has become a string of the lute that plays for you.
Ritamvara Bhattacharya writes from a darling’s heart, Darjeeling. She believes in what Sylvia Plath said, “And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.” She writes for the pleasure of it. She writes for the ‘I am in her heart’, a voice that creates ripples and sensation. She received The Nissim International Poetry Prize in the year 2020 and the Tagore Poetry Prize in 2020. Her poems have been published in some noted portals like The Muse India, Café Dissensus, The Sunflower Collective, Aynanagor, Chakkar, The Indian Periodical, Plato’s Cave and others. Her debut chapbook,’ In the mirror, our graves’ along with veteran writer Ravi Shankar N published in 2021 has received accolades. She is an avid lover of life, literature, colours and has lived in awe for the past quarter-century. She intends to see the world stricken with fear and courage, in silence and sound, in love and hatred, all. She believes contradiction adds to the aroma of living and would love to dwell in the same, giving birth to more celebratory bells. August Rituals is her first solo debut poetry book published by Writers Workshop in August, 2022.
POETS
Where are you, Poets,
You, Wizards?
Let us paint with our poem
This sorrowful world
And people with masks,
For behind the mask
Even eyes are lacklustre
And we no longer breathe.
Let us raise voice
And scrape the mud from our soles.
Let us raise voice
For all of those silent in their homes
And isolated,
Immersed in the misery
Of everyday boring jobs.
Let us cloak with our imagination
This programmed world
And keep the scent of childhood
And first kisses
Alive.
Let us bring back love,
That divine joy of life.
Let us pour it over from our poems,
May it flow down the streets
Worldwide
And may it touch
Every solitary man in tears
And women wearing black.
SILENCE
Silence in me
strikes in lightnings
of the sky, too grey
and destroys my accumulated
fear in the years
of non-belonging.
Silence in you
does not know my fears
and gets lost in the words
of unknown people
whose hands cannot
touch the softness
of our hearts.
Don’t let me stay silent
because my love is
louder than your smile.
The loudest one.
LIFE
This life is
soaked with tears
and the words are too small
to pronounce
all life in an instant
and my love
hidden in the corners of solitude.
This life is
soaked with tears
and the pain of the past
is stronger
than the impending ecstasy
in the kiss of the night
and my escape is stronger
than the strength of your will.
This life is
soaked with tears
and the joy gets crushed
by the sorrow of the
desperate and disbelief in a
new longing.
This life is
soaked with tears
but today there is a smile
in my eyes
so don’t walk away
from my smile.
Don’t let the grief
to put out these embers
at least sometimes
when I forget
that this life is soaked with tears.
HOPE
I would like to take
the paths of new hope
and erase my footprints behind
me because your escort is
superfluous before the rising sun.
I would like to walk
the land of solitude
for years
and walk on
the silence of the
pathlessness liberated
of all your words and
deeds. I would like to be
born again
bathed in purity
of my soul
and stand
in front of the starry sky
as a newborn.
And pardon
my rude words
and be patient
because my loneliness
is your loneliness, too.
You are my other self.
You do what I am afraid of.
All Rights Reserved @ Jasna Gugić
Translated by Anita Vidakovic Ninkovic
Jasna Gugić was born in Vinkovci, Croatia. She is the Vice-President for public relations of the Association of Artists and Writers of the World SAPS; Global Ambassador of Literacy and Culture for the Asih Sasami Indonesia Global Writers, P.L.O.T.S USA the Creative Magazine Ambassador for Croatia; and a member of Angeena International, a non-profit organization for peace, humanity, literature, poetry, and culture. She is also co-editor of the anthology, Compassion—Save the World, one poem written by 130 world poets.
The last important award with a single nomination for Croatia was awarded by UHE – Hispanic World Writers’ Union – César Vallejo 2020 World Award for Cultural Excellence.
Jasna is a multiple winner of many international awards for poetry and literature, and her work has been translated into several world languages. Her first independent collection of poetry was published in 2021, a bilingual English-Croatian edition, entitled Song of Silence. She lives and works in Zagreb, Croatia.
Many of her poems have been translated into several foreign languages and are represented in joint collections. Her poems have been published in magazines in the USA, Spain, Greece, Italy, Russia, India, Syria, Denmark, Brazil, Mexico, Bangladesh, Serbia, Albania, Nigeria, Belgium, China, Chile, Nepal, Pakistan, Korea, Germany and etc. Her poems are published in so many world-famous print and electronic magazines, journals, websites, blogs, and anthologies like Spillwords Press – USA, P.L.O.T.S. The Creative Magazine – USA, Mad Swirl – USA, Synchronized Chaos Magazine – USA, Cajun Mutt Press – USA, WordCity Literary Journal – USA, Medusa’s Kitchen – USA, Atunis Galaxy Poetry – Albania /Belgium, Lothlorien Poetry Journal – UK, Polis Magazino – Greece, Homouniversalis – Greece, Chinese Language Monthly – 中國語文月刊 – China, Eboquills – Nigeria, Azahar Revista Poetica – Spain, Sindh Courier – Pakistan, Magazine Humanity – Russia, Entre Parentesis – Chile, Daily Asia Bani – Bangladesh, Bharat Vision – Denmark, Litterateur Rw, Dritare E Re – Albania, Literary Yard – India, Gazeta Destinacioni – Albania, The Moment International News – Germany, Kavya Kishor English – Bangladesh, PETRUŠKA NASTAMBA, an e-magazine for language, literature, and culture – Serbia, Güncel Sanat magazine – Turkey, Cultural Reverence, a global digital journal of art and literature -India, A Too Powerful Word – Serbia, Magazine Ghorsowar – India, Al-Arabi Today Magazine, Magazine Rainbow, Humayuns Editorial – Bangladesh, Himalaya Diary – Nepal and Agarid br. 24 and 16, Online newspaper NewsNjeju, Korea, Willwash. wordpress blogzine – Nigeria.
Nappies
Nappies. Knew nothing about nappies
in 1965, nor 1970.
Nappies in 1980 meant:
Big Sis with toddler under one arm,
milk bottle in her mouth
and my camera playing tricks.
Yet in 1993 we bought full-size/
boy/known brand
and experts in disposables
within a week.
Tried pull-ups, swim shorts,
recyclables: sodden, all.
Too scared of pins.
Nappy mountain friendly;
reluctantly.
Advanced driving next:
ante-premature super-mini
(and willie test-tube in the hospital).
SCBU/humilactor/and that gentle
sweet aroma of breast-fed Tinies.
Experts in six weeks.
Gave up on nappies in 2000
(incontinence pads reach the parts…).
Occupational Therapy assistance,
a life-saver. Granny grab-rails
to assist the ‘crouch and drop’
of special needs. Learnt in no time.
A year for collection of
discharged equipment.
So, when I say that I’m thankful:
the Care Home took charge
of extra-small dementia and
personal care… Nappies.
Nothing extra-sweet
like a pure breast-fed baby.
Island Dreams
Happenstance of Zoom meetings:
it was a new day, a new name, I could manage
to sign in/unmute/and Leave.
My dreams, like hot air balloon rising post-sleep,
for friendship on a little ethereal island
for a couple of hours. Memories are made…
of – a name – Poet and Editor,
speaking on Publication and Performance.
Vibrant young speaker challenging beginners
and experienced poets to move forward, floating
on enriched tomorrows; avoiding drowning lands.
Awaiting the fruitiest stork to fly in, select the wing-
beat for a new birth; far at sea before sunset.
I wake to stacked competition, soft mess of guano
bleaching the Farne Isles (post-season). Lark rise…
Polly Poodle’s View with a Room (Sestina)
I watch that awful photo fade so fast,
regret the scuffs and scratches from that time
no-one could imagine as worth preserving.
It was just a flat, shared grounds, open-plan,
somewhere to leave in daylight (leave behind).
So many times returning. One day, gone.
I know it was expected, now you’re gone,
I thought that bin estate would not fall fast.
My memories of you are there, behind
those boarded windows into frame-washed time.
I had thought to improve your room: a plan
that vanished – with you – nothing worth preserving.
The mantelpiece a hazard. Worth Preserving?
You knocked your head; the bed-head wrong. Now gone,
within such view (your things/path/grass). No Plan
to catch and throw each stick beyond that fast
road without a crossing, just dodging Time.
Don’t cross to corner shop. Don’t look behind.
I found it on the sideboard (bills behind
your lottery card). Was it worth preserving?
A rug/a chew, yet dog-hairs spread in time,
exacerbating your chest. Now long-gone,
Polly-Poodle. Oh, such a dame! So fast,
she ruled your heart (and purse), yet no Vet’s Plan.
You should have moved – for her, for you. A plan
for slowing down, city living left behind,
before that pooch ran out, wagged tail, too fast
for doggie treat from old man. Worth, preserving?
He left for hound-view heaven. Now all’s gone:
the flats, the paths, the busy road. And, time.
You kept quiet (what the doctor said). Your time
vanished before last visit. All cold-plan,
to pack/house clearance/keys; a service. Gone:
nostalgia/demolition/visits behind
one scratchy late-found photo worth preserving,
while I breathe peace to my view, over breakfast.
So now it’s time to leave this frame behind,
within my heart. For what plan’s worth preserving?
They’re gone, self too, releasing heaven’s fast.
Wendy Webb: Born in the Midlands, home and family life in Norfolk. Published in Indigo Dreams, Quantum Leap, Crystal, Envoi, Seventh Quarry) and online (Littoral Magazine, Autumn Voices, Wildfire Words, Lothlorien, Radio: Poetry Place), First in Writing Magazine’s pantoum poetry competition. She devised new poetry forms; wrote her father’s biography, and her own autobiography. She has attempted many traditional forms and free verse. Favourite poets: Dylan Thomas, Gerard Manley Hopkins, John Burnside, John Betjeman, the Romantic Poets (especially Wordsworth), George Herbert, William Blake, Emily Dickinson, Mary Webb, Norman Bissett, William Shakespeare, the Bible, and the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.
Last Look
This is ice-fire, the layers
of veins, crystal hard from the centuries
which flowed & flow still
when touched…
So us runaways, exiles, pariahs on
home turf know what blood is made in these jagged
streams carved between the shoves, the shaming shouts of:
“Shut up & get out!”
We know there is worth here & are miners of that resource
if fear won’t cripple belief, sell short the dream.
Look man, it’s all I got, got me
a ticket, got me a plan
though the streets took my man
& I’ve got a kid comin’ who’ll need something
besides skeletons I’ve been told, warned—–
better left in the closet.
Hell no. These are the roots, these are the voices to be brought out
in the light so as not to repeat things, so as to glean from the cracks
every rough shine teaching the gift of shelter—–
Can’t hock it, can only neglect—& I won’t—the estate of love
our arms deserved.
Bad Patch
To be mad as hell at God put yourself in the shoes
of some dying subway runaway, some throwaway hustler.
Read, between news sheets: abuse, deprivation,
the shamed spirit stripped to an armor’s shine called Courage.
Lord, wrung out by fury & then flung adrift, what luck,
love will still establish anchors,
a network for, if not, leprosy, the unwanted,
only, a bad patch, antiseptics will come to replace caring.
This is bitter business, this death, a vandal desecrating every cell’s sanctity
& then hocking what’s left.
Come on, Heaven, besides blind righteousness,
cough up an explanation.
Though bile-loaded, I won’t shun it, nor surrender to numbing,
the foul predator of fury.
Here, in these trenches, empathy replenishes, paints word, forges Will.
Here, witnessing anguish, the hardest, most feared moment,
longing is a warrior angel for the gift of intimacy
staring pestilence down.
Crab Heart
My, what a device, each a hand a hook
hoisting me up to squeeze & leak out.
Such a sump pump, this muscle,
only central and capable
of thinking like Mengele.
All day I can feel it,
cramping animal fitted to size,
a vice with incisors clicking worse than a clock.
I feed it minutes, all paintings
wax paper wrapped in order to keep,
but it peels them in self-preservation then roosts in their chips.
Oh old bulging crab heart, old warty crustacean, what do you want?
To be boiled and salted, your shell picked clean too?
I would do so gladly but your hide is too tough & you’d bite off my fingers.
I know how you operate,
every night performing surgery & regenerating like a messiah.
My body’s the Eucharist with an altar for a soul.
So break, humiliate me as you must
& have yourself a banquet.
Smoke & Sand
Hemmed by the tender resentments,
a lifetime’s invisible shroud giving a brand to the hands even
so all that is touched smells of caste-marks…
Yes, I am dissolving from this with the aid of specific spices
& liquefied ointment to anoint what is wrapped upon sand
by light muslin.
Waves come, waves biblical as revival tents at Saks,
& I smoke off into old summers, into the sensations of green.
Here is the psychology of poetry returning heat back to fluid,
& I will mix it like white chocolate into a chilled cocoanut drink.
Sip, sip—–
the specifics of your mouth meant for sweetness,
that tang of risk, that volcano, that brook of your tongue
meant for desire alone…
Is it insanity this quest that I have should you belong to another
but still want me? So mad it may be, but whatever sun I now am,
borne from grit & from fog, pours full for your shores
as every beach waves.
Stephen Mead is an Outsider multi-media artist and writer. Since the 1990s he’s been grateful to many editors for publishing his work in print zines and eventually online. Recently his work has appeared in CROW NAME, WORDPEACE and DuckuckMongoose. Currently he is resident artist/curator for The Chroma Museum, artistic renderings of LGBTQI historical figures, organizations and allies predominantly before Stonewall.
You can find more of Stephen’s work here on Ink Pantry.
