How I envy the herd mentality
Up in the morning
Stoic and firm
To repeat yesterday 's activities
 
"This is what people do"
Up at 6, down the coffee
Commute through 8
Work by 9
 
Noise traffic and nothingness
Irrelevant
Bedlam, artificial " Good mornings"
Who cares?
 
Work that they find meaningless
What of it
Mindless chatter and argument
"This is life"
 
But is this life
Or is this an empty shell
Is this life
Or is this death without knowing it?
 
Is this death without knowing it
If you do not realize you are dead
In which case
Forever pity the living
 

Author Bio:
David I. Mayerhoff is a newly emerging writer while being a practicing physician and psychiatrist for the last 34 years. His areas of specialty are in Graduate Medical Education, the chronic mentally ill, and academic research with a focus on the heterogeneity of schizophrenia disorders. His current work involves caring for the mentally ill within the developmentally disabled population. Selected poetry of his can be found at drsyke.wordpress.com, allpoetry.com, poetry.com, as well as published selections at PoetryBay/ Long Island Quarterly and at the Paragon Journal and elsewhere. www.authorsden.com/davidmayerhoff 
allpoetry.com/David_Mayerhoff

Bionic as she might be with her new 
knees, she is not yet as omnipotent 
as the huntress Diana who is posture 
perfect pulling back on her bow while 
she aims an arrow; neither can she 
swim from Havana to Key West 
without a shark net like Diana Nyad 
at sixty-four.

At the airport she requires a full 
body search due to the titanium, 
arms crossed over her head like 
a criminal whose car the police 
are searching; then the security 
guard lightly runs her palms along 
her detainee’s hips explaining each
insinuating gesture with memorized 
phrases, “Now I’m going to pat 
the inside of your thighs, now I’m 
going to touch your glutes,” to make 
sure that extra padding is attached.

Once at the condo by the beach,
she removes her clothes, then 
squirms into the blue elastic flowers 
on her bathing suit, her knee scars 
like vines, while she presses her 
sweaty fingertips against the dresser 
top to balance herself as she struggles 
to yank the suit up, clumsily alternating 
her legs that once took long hikes 
but still don’t co-ordinate since 
the surgery, into each elasticized leg 
opening. 

At last, she reaches the white sand 
she has longed for through anesthesia 
and physical therapy, and walks along 
the congratulating waves again. 


Author Bio:
Jan Ball started seriously writing poetry and submitting it for publication in 1998. Since then, she has had 215 poems accepted or published in the U.S., Canada, India and England (hopefully Australia soon). Published poems have appeared in: Atlanta Review, Calyx, Connecticut Review, Main Street Rag, Nimrod, Phoebe and many other journals. Poems are forthcoming in: By&By, Caveat Lector, The Courtship of Winds, Medical Encounter, The Sacred Cow and Straylight. Her poem, “my face emerges from my face,” was second runner-up in the Spring 2010 contest issue of So to Speak. Her poem “carwash,” won the 2011 Betsy Colquitt Award for the best poem in a current issue of Descant, Fort Worth. Her two chapbooks, Accompanying Spouse (2011) and Chapter of Faults (2014), have both been published by Finishing Line Press and are available on Amazon. She is a member of The Poetry Club of Chicago.

Ball has has taught ESL at DePaul University in Chicago until recently. She lived in Australia for fifteen years with her Australian husband. Our two children, Geoffrey and Quentin, were born in Brisbane. She is a twin to Jean Helmken and a Franciscan nun for seven years. When not writing poetry, teaching ESL, working with her personal trainer, going to book group or traveling, she and her husband and like to cook for friends. These background experiences infuse her poetry.

You and I are a lot alike
Except that you’re a woman
I’m not
But we share some of that other stuff
You’re pretty cool, cagey
You don’t jump into things
Do you?
You test the water
With your big toe
I’m like that
You used to, though
You’d leap into anything
That looked like it
Might promise a good time
But then something happened
You or someone else
Miscalculated
Everything went south
Your feelings went through
The ringer
You thought you were drip-dry
And would shed all that
Emotional stuff
That came along with the spin-cycle
And closeness
But you’re fine linen
You have refined thoughts and tastes
It was hard to get those stains out
Right?
You dress well
Not real showy
But your class shows
You’ve listened to me so far
Because I haven’t been intrusive
You married?
No?
Got a boyfriend?
Oh, that’s a nice answer
What a lovely smile in reply
What are you doing here alone?
Waiting for him?
He should be on time
I’d be on time
So how long should a woman
Wait for a man?
A reasonable amount of time
So you’re reasonable
I’m reasonable!
I’m not lonely or anything
Just talking
Are you lonely?
Do you have a great big rip
In your soul’s fabric?
Ah! That smile again!
You’re never lonely
You learned
Once you got out of that spin cycle
Put everyone else in it
Keep them sort of close
But at arms’ length
Sleeves’ length
Till you get a feel for if
They’re genuine or not
Am I genuine?
Hey!  Where you going?
Darn!
Something spooked her
One of two words
Either ‘lonely’ or ‘genuine’
But what a smile she had
A careful smile
A cagey smile
We weren’t alike
She was fine linen
Jacquard from France
Gambroon from Persia
I’m just seersucker
From Sears


Author Bio:
Paul Smith writes fiction and poetry. A lot of new poetry troubles him because it is very oblique. 'Oblique' is a word he learned studying trigonometry or something that prepared him for a BS in Civil Engineering. Maybe that's what's wrong with him.

Capped coke bottles, shake them up, and count
the bubbles. “I want to live as many years,”
she says. In youth, forgetting youth.
Some bastard god with nothing else to do,
his pants unzipped, says fine with folded arms,
“Live a million carbonated years.”
 
And now her teeth are black as soda pop.
She dwells in caves all made of crystal candy
and there she entertains. Her wisdom is
an artifact. Her stories are for sale.
We buy the little bottles of her voice
and pour them over ice. A cool glass
of woman for your father, for your gods,
a million bubbles popping on their tongues.
 

Author Bio:
Mollie Chandler is a student in Lesley University's MFA program. She lives, works, and drinks coffee in Boston, Massachusetts. Mollie wrote her first (very short) collection of poems when she was 8-years-old and has been writing poetry ever since. Her work navigates her own struggle with voicelessness, and explores, criticizes, and celebrates ideas of tradition, morality, and spirituality. Her work has been featured in Paradise in Limbo, Poems2Go, Empty Sink Publishing, The Merrimack Review, The Critical Pass Review, and Sediments Literary-Arts Journal.

In memoriam, Jo Cox, MP
(Tune adapted from ‘The rambling Royal’, traditional)
 
The good die young, the saying goes,
cruel sticks and stones of Fate,
her cause to heal the world she knew
of prejudice and hate.                                                        
She’s killed because she spoke her mind,
a senseless, violent death.
Some zealous bigot fuelled by lies
has robbed her of her breath.
 
A stranger armed with knife and gun
assails her in the street.
‘Put Britain First’ he’s heard to cry;
Jo’s bleeding at his feet.
A man who’s passing goes to help
but he gets stabbed as well.
While ambulance and police arrive,
Jo’s fading where she fell.
 
She sided with the underdog
where fairness was at stake.
Now freedom and democracy
are stumbling at her wake.
She begged the crowd to back away,
their safety her main care.
‘This hatred’s aimed at me alone,’ 
the cross she chose to bear.
 
So the good die young, the saying goes,
cruel sticks and stones of Fate,
her cause to heal the world she knew
of prejudice and hate.                                 
The Queen of Heart’s her epitaph,
so ardent, loyal, kind,
true daughter, sister, mother, wife
to loved ones left behind.


Author Bio:
Peter Branson, a native of N. Staffordshire, has lived in a village in Cheshire, UK, for the last twenty-six years. A former teacher and lecturer in English Literature and creative writing and poetry tutor, he is now a full time poet, songwriter and traditional-style singer whose poetry has been published by journals in Britain, the USA, Canada, Ireland, Australasia and South Africa, including Acumen, Ambit, Agenda, Envoi, The London Magazine, The North, Prole, The Warwick Review, Iota, The Butcher’s Dog, The Frogmore Papers, The Interpreter’s House, SOUTH, Crannog, THE SHOp, Causeway, Main Street Rag, The Columbia Review and Other Poetry. He has won prizes and been placed in a number of poetry competitions over recent years, including a ‘highly commended’ in the ‘Petra Kenny International’, first prizes in the ‘Grace Dieu’ and the ‘Envoi International’ and a special commendation in the Wigtown. His selected poems, ‘Red Hill, came out in 2013. His latest collection, ‘Hawk Rising’, from ‘Lapwing’, Belfast, was published in early April 2016.

Less body than ravens,
crows shine the same black magic.

When their wings graze powdered snow, 
they teach us the meaning of white.

If you see the night ocean ripple in their eyes,
you will long for jewels made from obsidian.

Sleek bodies, sharp beaks, clever feet –
so deep the mystery of their black feathers!

Long ago they gathered in a murder
so large they blacked out the sun.

And night was born.


Author Bio:
Pattie Palmer-Baker is a Portland, OR artist and poet. Although she often combines these two forms of expression in collages of paste paper and calligraphy, the inspiration for and the meaning of the artwork lies within the poem. Over the years of exhibiting her artwork, the discovery that many people responded most strongly to the poetry motivated her to strengthen her focus on writing. The goal of all her creative output is to translate the inner world into a media that moves readers away from their habitual perception of the world. 

If it’s celery with oranges,
let it be celery with oranges
& be good, for we lack these days
the simple & the good--
the wandering child 
lost in make-believe,
the market worker who smiles
& points to fresher bread.
Laminate your mothers’ recipes
in case of rain; box
your father’s favorite suit.
There will be parties later,
mirror balls & munchies 
on sticks. Count on someone
for celery with oranges, too,
a blue dish, a thing for winter’s
holiness. She’s cooking already,
furious hands & slippered feet
to help you forget
what happened yesterday
& what’s coming tomorrow.
 

Author Bio:
Carl Boon lives in Izmir, Turkey, where he teaches courses in American culture and literature at 9 Eylül University. His poems appear in dozens of magazines, most recently Burnt Pine, Two Peach, Lunch Ticket, and Poetry Quarterly. He is also a 2016 Pushcart Prize nominee.

Everyone loves the glorified
and hates the evil villain who came to take the throne.
Well, I am the hated.
I came to take the throne.
How could they say it belonged to you
when they didn’t see how far my arrow could shoot?
Mine does tricks in the air while it glides;
survives under pressure
and if it hits you the butterfly stitches won’t do.
I kept it locked up in its case in a basement for so long;
shame on me.
They say psychological pain induces
the same nerves as physical pain and
I guess that’s why I took to bed rest.
They didn’t even have to prescribe it for me,
for I had already done it myself. Originally, hospice was
far worse than I had prepared myself for.
I walked to the cemetery, laid down in the ground
and closed the casket shut. Everyday
I’d move myself towards that sixth psychological foot.
Unluckily for you, one day I just woke up.
No longer comatose, I looked up and saw people
standing above me
making jokes so funny, I had to change
my back-to-the-earth position to let out a belly laugh.
So I sat up. My joints took a breath
and I thrived again. 

So this is for anyone who has declared him or herself ready
for psychological hospice.
Those thrones belong to you.
They are waiting for you.
Don't succumb to your own prescriptions. 


Author Bio:
Brionna Ketter is a senior at the Pennsylvania State University studying Psychology. She has a strong interest in PR and Journalism. She is driven by creative thoughts that don’t allow her to sleep at night. She lost her mom to liver failure at the age of 11 and her grandmother 6 years later. She is now learning to shape her life around those two difficult events. She hopes writing will help her do that.

In the manner of van Gogh,
sunflowers in a brown pottery bowl
wait in wide-eyed expectancy
on the the altar table.
Their golden petals glow in the summer sun
that spills softly through stained-glass windows.
Their numinous beauty and grace
silently urge sacrifice of praise.


Author Bio:
Sandra Bounds writes poetry because she loves it. Also, the process of writing helps her stay mentally alert in her efforts to survive Parkinson's Disease. She holds a Master of Arts Degree in English from Mississippi State University. A retired English teacher, she has taught in both private and public high schools and in community college. She has publishing credits in Australia, England, and the United States. 

Home,
the aroma of coffee you make for me
in the morning,
shared laughter,
shards of a dream discussed 
before we set out to work,

a hand reaching out to me
when words are dormant.

​
Author Bio:
Julia Hones is a writer, poet and activist. To learn about her published works you can check this link: https://juliahoneswritinglife.blogspot.com