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Famous Pink Raincoat~ By Eileen Cunniffe

2/29/2016

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March in the U.S. of A.: Every window I passed, every shop where I shopped, pastel-colored spring jackets were on display. On the last business trip of that chapter in my life, I fell for a pink, belted, double-breasted, knee-length raincoat from Jones New York, in the crowded racks of Filene’s Basement in San Francisco. I folded it into my suitcase for the flight home to Philadelphia, thinking how au courant I would look on the vacation I’d planned with my friend Lorraine. I was most emphatically done with my dun-colored, calf-length, practical raincoat.

April in Paris: Lorraine in her tasteful black jacket blended in with natives and tourists alike, all obeying some unwritten rule that permitted only black outerwear. We joked that if we got separated in a crowd, Lorraine would easily find me. Me, in my famous pink raincoat, wandering through the icy drizzle and slick streets of the City of Light, looking like an oversized bottle of Pepto-Bismol, feeling like an experiment with barbe à papa (cotton candy) run amok.

And yet: Despite my fashion faux pas, that coat suited perfectly my mood on that trip, and in that season. I’d just untethered myself from the corporate world, with no idea what I’d do next.   With my collar turned up against the chill, I wore my heart on a bright pink sleeve, falling in love with the uncertainty of it all. Ma vie, en rose.


Author Bio:
Eileen Cunniffe has been writing nonfiction for 35 years—but the first 25 were without the benefit of a byline, as a medical writer, corporate communications manager and executive speechwriter. Her essays have appeared in journals such as Hippocampus Magazine, Ascent, Superstition Review, Stone Voices, Lowestoft Chronicle and Philadelphia Stories. Three of her essays have been recognized with Travelers’ Tales Solas Awards and another received the Emrys Journal 2013 Linda Julian Creative Nonfiction Award. Eileen also writes newswires as a citizen journalist for The Nonprofit Quarterly. She holds a BA in English and Honors from Villanova University, and an MS in Organizational Dynamics from the University of Pennsylvania. Read more at: www.eileencunniffe.com. 
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Animal~ By Deana Nantz

2/25/2016

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​Nothing like a snow day to snap a put-out public school teacher
back to her senses. 
 
High stepping in the living room with Buck-Stove warmed hands
to match her heart, free from fret, she feeds an old goldfish
rescued from a contaminated pond during summer vacation. 
 
Coffee temps perfect with a touch of fresh cream as snow and
slivers of light beckon her to the kitchen window aglow with silver
strands of wonder and a white-tailed deer.  They lock eyes. 
 
Safe and secure, the deer bows her head to nose nature.  A beautiful
stillness calms a mind—sanity tested—by the scariest animal of all,
 
her classroom. 
​

Author Bio:
Deana Nantz holds an MFA from Eastern Kentucky University's Blue Grass Writer's studio where she teaches composition and modern drama. Her chapbook, Fits of Wrath and Irony, published by Finishing Line Press is available on Amazon. Her flash fiction "Blanched" received Fiction Southeast's Editor's prize. Her work has appeared in The Southern Women's Review, Fiddleblack, and other literary journals.
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Elizabeth~ By Ryen Bowers

2/24/2016

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Heals your soul when you are sad
But...
Her pages only made it to 50
I'll never let her walk out of my heart
It's like ashes in the wind when she blew away
She lays forever in happiness
 
​
Author Bio:
Ryen is 8-years-old-old and a sibling to an older sister and younger brother. He was born and continues to live in Boulder, Colorado. He enjoys the outdoors and likes skiing, soccer, and walks to Pearl Street. He has such a loving heart and the sweetest nature. 
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Dubois at 90~ By Darryl Lorenzo Wellington

2/23/2016

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for Jim Campbell 

When W.E.B. looked back on salad days -- 
so-called: revolving: evolving: history in the making
the vagaries of events spread like dominoes 
in play. History’s black and white dice rolled. Oceanic
possibilities bobbed like shipwrecked hulls. 
He looked back on Titanic tribulations weathered
pell-mell. From tailor shops to modern tanks. 
The fin de siècle’s severed horse and carriage –
The post-war movements as they crested on the waves
and liberated a few from the unintelligible
politics of rage. He studied each new print edition
like braille. By his fingers’ touch he read
A 19th century’s lost pastoral; the 20th’s impenetrable 
armor –
From divergent paths he gleaned a centre axis.
The way you wake to today and tomorrow’s headlines.
Today and tomorrow’s interpretations.

***

Hey Jim. Explicator of history’s laws of gravity--
Penetrator of DNA science and revolutionary hearts --
Taking a leaf from hawk, musical oriole, the haunted dove,
Tell me again the fault that lingers is in ourselves
-- like a stifled lyre in accord with private error.
Tell me with your voice like a melodious viol
the new newspaper dawn still swivels on an axis
of hope. The propagandistic 21st century terrors
still obey a trajectory. Take away The New York Times’
poisonous cup. Too murky to be trusted ---
Coming into your 90th year’s still disciplined glory --
Tell me the truth is as transparent as water, as water
and air. And instill in me the news of the future.
Fill me with the CNN of brighter days.


Author Bio:
Darryl Lorenzo Wellington is a poet living in Santa Fe, NM, and his poetry has appeared in Boston Review, Chiron Review, Pedestal, Turtle Island Quarterly, and Matter Poetry, among other places. He is also a journalist whose articles address race, class, and poverty issues. This poem is a tribute to a friend on his 90th birthday.
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Ballad~ By Cristina DeSouza

2/22/2016

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If I fall in love, when I fall in 
love, I want to lose my breath
bridge my dreams, breach the
earth and the invisible chains
around my neck. Suffocate in
miles of air.

It will be like a
blood clot in my open chest,
throbbing like an inflamed
wound, burning like oozing flesh.

It will be about
how my heart will speed 
race inside my breast.

Then you whom I 
don’t know yet, will be of
the color of my iris,
shining in the early morning.

I will be dizzy
in the now but anchored
to the ground, so that I can
reach you and kiss you,
lingering till dawn.

And the nights will bring me
your body stretched on my bed
white like moonlight, your
eyes silvery like skyless stars.

I will awake and see
your lips sweet and red. I will
touch your womb and caress your 
neck. I will hold you tight 
but gently against my breasts.

Because when I fall in love, I
will be finally able to rest amidst
the flames and high water of the
world. I will chant the days and
feed myself with the comets 
crossing the twilight. And then I
will glow one more time, one more
night, if I fall in love.


Author Bio:
Cristina DeSouza is a physician and poet, living in Phoenix, Arizona since 1990's. She is currently attending Vermont College of Fine Arts in Poetry and enjoying every minute of it. She has poems published in Portuguese, both in Brazil and in Portugal an has a book of poems released in Brazil in 2011, titled "Uns Poucos Versos." She is an internist and hematologist who needs both aspects in her life: science and art. She will complete her Low residency in writing/poetry in July 2016.
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Account of an Ex-Man~ By Kareem Awwal

2/18/2016

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In my little room, six feet wide and high
the mosquitoes sing of a hungry baby
ready to devour a milk pump.
I couldn't resist it, the rattish angle.
like a dead rat, forming the food of the perfect friend: a housefly
The agony of the inmates
spurred a flashback of the free world 
where you could sleep with two eyes closed.
There I was, till a tap of an inmate
geared me back to life.
The language was only jargon.
Do I need be here? Let us see.
my train took me quickly back back to reality
when the smoke of the 'golden' stick
found a way down my nose
I wouldn't breathe.
I couldn't breathe.

No foe, no enemy
anthem of the inmate.
Equal task,no leader jingoism
by these, inmates fight not
bit by bit, one by one.
everyone bade
to meet outside the free world.

Such was the account of an ex-inmate.
here he stands to preach oneness
should jingoism we abolish.
The better we approach
no foe, no enemy evaluates our words,
the better we touch.

If doing this will better us,
if this is our path
if the others refuse
let all become an ex-inmate
let all taste the bitter-honey
the ex-man account rings.


Author Bio:
Kareem Awwal is a native of Kwara state, in north central Nigeria. His passion of writting poems came to him as a secondary school student. He is currently studying at Osmania University in Hyderabad City, India. His work has been review in blogs including NIBSTEARS.BLOGSPOT.COM. He is currently working on his anthology.
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Life~ By Taylor Shaw

2/17/2016

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Don't cry over the past, it's gone.
Don't stress over the future, it hasn't arrived.
Live in the present and make it beautiful.

They try to convince us it's going to be okay
Or that this pain is temporary. 
They don't realize that we have 
Caught on, and we know it doesn't get any easier. 

When something bad happens
You have three choices: 
Let it define you
Let it destroy you, 
Or let it strengthen you!


Author Bio:
Taylor Shaw is 14-years-old.  Her hobbies are reading and writing. Friends and family encourage and motivate her to keep writing.
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Season's End~ By Rachel Timmins

2/16/2016

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Reposing wistfully aware
she sighs and accepts that
the end is near for her
glorious crimson beauty.

Not all her summer dreams
were fulfilled
admired in youth’s fleeting season.
Now red petals lean against the vase.

‘At least I was loved by the eyes
though no bees spread my delight.’
We gaze with love at one another
sharing our summer’s end.


Author Bio:
Rachel Timmins is an online journalist and a chief writer for Weekend Notes Library of International Attractions. She is a member of the Toowoomba Wordsmiths, Australasian Christian Writers and Christian Writers Downunder, for which she has written blogs. Her published devotionals and poems include: Studio: a Journal of Christians Writing, Penned from the Heart, Poetica Christi, Footprints, The Mozzie, and Sunday Mail. She is also working on children's fiction. Many of her poems may be cathartic or helpful to others relating to a background of abuse. As a Christian, she believes God has healed her of trauma. In general, she hopes her writing may encourage others to believe that healing is possible and that life is worth living. 
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Her~ By Gisselle Castro

2/15/2016

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My eyes have laid upon beauty once before
The beauty was weak and withering before me
She had no hair
Was nothing but a small frame of skin and bones
Her smile was sad
But her eyes remained strong
Looking at me
I knew that this was a different kind of beauty
An internal beauty
An everlasting beauty
Something you’ll only see once
And as she took her last breath
I’ll carry her beauty
Through me
Her daughter


Author Bio:
Gisselle is a high school senior from Far Rockaway, New York. An aspiring make-up artist, Gisselle is inspired by her mom Mercedes who taught her how to apply make-up and find the beauty in people both on the inside and outside. The poem Her is written in loving memory of Gisselle's mother.
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Talent~ By Sid Orange

2/11/2016

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​I kill and it is clumsy and slow,
as if murder is the alphabet
a toddler crayons.
 
I practice killing until proficient
and without an obvious signature.
I reinvent time to repeat your last
 
and deepest wound.
You die often and softer
than my indifferent deep shiver.   


Author Bio:
Sid Orange was a bouncer, thug, drug addict and conman. Always an autodidact, he was raised in London, UK, but now lives in The Cotswolds, UK. 
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