Blog Archives

Celestial~ By Catherine LaFleur

5/29/2015

In the throne room
hidden in forgotten corners
lie filigreed golden orbs
tiny cicada cages forged
to capture immortality,
who loves only herself.

But the Girl of Qi
has escaped or gained release,
in truth, she merely died
turned to jade
in the mouth of unlucky Death,
who believes he is immortal.

Author Bio:
Catherine LaFleur is an incarcerated writer and poet working with ArtSpring Workshops. She is from Pensacola, Florida and is a student in the Incarcerated Student Program at Louisiana State University. Her nonfiction has appeared in the anthology Word by Word.

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Seaside~ By Antonella Reyes

5/28/2015

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Murky shore water licked
the tips of my soiled slippers,
my bottom sitting on
the humid dirt of the coast.

A handmade bonnet was fastened
against my cold ears,
my mother's shawl protecting my skin
from the whipping winds,

low air currents pushed the sooty sails
that marched across the water,
the bitter taste of salt blanketing my tongue
as I called for the ships from a lonely beach

I wait for the men, smiling
upon father's arrival from sea,
hymns of the lead-footed livestock
preaching of safe travel.

Author Bio:
Antonella Reyes is a fifteen-year-old student living in the urban city of Miami, Florida. She has received a Silver Key in the Scholastics writing competition and has been published in Young American Poetry Digest. She has a passion for attending rock concerts and writing about those experiences on her blog.

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An Opened Door~ By Joan McNerney

5/27/2015

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Comets circled in orbit through cool evenings as leaves fell. Red yellow and brown leaves coloring sidewalks. In aerial ballet stars pirouetted through heaven.

Gloria returned from college registration counting the days before night school began. To save for tuition a tight budget was kept. Always bring lunch to work...a sandwich and some fruit packed in a brown bag. She walked thirty blocks rather than splurge on another subway fare. Squeezing all her clothes in one washing machine and dragging half wet laundry home cut expenses too.

Stopping in front of her apartment house, she wondered if it would be possible for her to ever leave this place. A whimsical boiler sometimes broke. Mud brown hallways eliminated any need for new coats of paint. If you pressed the up and down button simultaneously, the elevator came unless it was completely broken. Ping pong water dripping from the basement sink. The familiar cacophony of heat rising through the stairway hissing along walls echoed through the apartment building. Windows rattled as Gloria undressed for bed.

A small assignment pad and large spiral note book lay on her nightstand. Over and over fingering white pages, waiting to press her thoughts upon them. Every sheet must be filled with knowledge written in beautiful script. Listening to the clock softly tick in the dark, she waited as if on the edge of something. The glossy cover of her note book fell shut.

Mahogany doors were decorated with wooden carvings. Gloria pushed a brass handle to open them. She watched her dream self in silk dress glide effortlessly, her fingertips touching a butternut desk. Oriental rugs covered floors. Stopping for a moment, she saw a large rose colored room lined with leather-bound books. All the titles were leafed in gold. Her library so elegant with deep couches and tiffany lamps...she had pushed the brass handle to open it.

Author Bio:
Joan McNerney’s poetry has been included in numerous literary magazines such as Camel Saloon, Seven Circle Press, Dinner with the Muse, Blueline, Spectrum, and included in Bright Hills Press, Kind of A Hurricane and Poppy Road Anthologies. She has been nominated three times for Best of the Net. Poet and Geek recognized her work as their best poem of 2013. Four of her books have been published by fine small literary presses and she has three e-book titles.

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On Death's Doorstep~ By Lucy Goodson

5/26/2015

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Kept to a lonely self never dealing with health
Stumbling and falling to the sway of my own hate
Drugs ravage my heart and mind numbed by self loathe
Tripping on house heart racing, death knocks on my door

Thoughts of the people I have wronged lurk in a blur
What will the world think of me when six feet underground
Just a dumb kid couldn’t handle stress in a mist
Tables turn on me music to the beat, reaper reap

Poor woman who bore me she will grovel on knees
Shaming my name here I go once again dealing pain
Wind all in a stir no longer on the floor
Not on this plane I need not go home again

Wrapped in water and light I feel warm healings again
Revived I am alive, heart throbbing and beating once again

Author Bio:
Lucy Goodson is a mother of four children who decided to take a go at college scene, it has been 15 years since she graduated high school so the experience has been eye opening. Not only is she a mother, but she is 33-years-old. She has always loved to write and has had no formal writing classes until now. Poetry is her passion, along with God and her children.

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Birth of a Nation~ By Justine Johnston Hemmestad

5/21/2015

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As dirt peels open to sensitive blades
Of grass so sublime, sweet and supportive;
As sugar is reaped from lines of wild canes,
True love raises life’s call as birth’s motive.
Renewed life stems from a new quest rising,
Deep questions asked and knowing answers sought,
A new breath in a new realm of living -
A mind opened, hence with emotion fraught.
A door is opened, a new land rolls out -
From its wealth, procured immeasurable
Future nestled in wind’s whispering pout;
Unity of ideas at arrival.
A nation unlike multitudes on earth,
From years of turmoil is given her birth.

Author Bio:
I'm a wife and mother of 7 children, currently enrolled in the BLS program at The University of Iowa where I've taken several Iowa Writers' Workshop courses. My poems have been published for Dead Silence, a compilation of entries into the 2010 Y-City Writers Conference Contest; Poetica Victorian Magazine (2012); The Classical Poets Society (2012); Muse, a Journal of Poetry; as well as the inaugural issue of Empty Sink Magazine (2013); and my essays are included in The Whirlwind Review (2013), Draft, a blog of process (2013), as well as Black Heart Magazine (2013), and a featured historical essay in Cottage Reader (2013); with a short story in Anthology 29 (2013); and a short story in a Halloween anthology published by Mountain Springs House (2013). I also have a short story in the Dancing With Bear Publishing Christmas anthology (2013), and a short story to be published in mid September by North2South Publishing called Whispers from the Past: Fright and Fear. My story about brain injury recovery appears in Chicken Soup for the Soul: Recovering from Traumatic Brain Injuries; and I have a literary essay published in Research Scholar.

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Plaster goddess on a pedestal backset by pink dogwoods and a wooden trellis out a window~ By Lisa Alexander Baron

5/20/2015

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Because this wind and rain-worn
   statue of some forgotten woman, never
named, molded in the likeness of Venus or Persephone,

   is forever turned right, her look
fixed on something unknowable
   as her lineage, I wonder still what prompts

her stare, sets her gaze to the Chinese screen,
   eyes holding the bright
orange stars of koi in place, dark

   ink-brushed women gathered and waiting
on the river's edge, their stillness now confused
   with motion, poised for their goddess to lift

a pale hand veined with plaster cracks from
   folds of cloth at her lap, to give a signal, to set
their wooden boats, hungry too, adrift

Author Bio:
Lisa Alexander Baron is the author of 4 collections of poetry including, Reading the Alphabet of Trees and Sting and Tell. Her latest collection is based on art called While She Poses (Aldrich P, 2014). Her ekphrastic poems have recently appeared in Chautauqua, Confrontation, U.S. 1 Worksheets, and the Maier Museum of Art website. She holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts and is an adjunct professor of speech and English in the Philadelphia area.

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A Prisoner~ By Audrey Bennett

5/19/2015

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A prisoner of hate she becomes
Bitterness simmering
Feeding on endless hate

A prisoner
With gates wide open
She’s deeply scared
Alive she becomes
When reliving
The past

The mind refused
Her body
Was used
The mirror is her own.

Author Bio:
I am a mother of three with a granddaughter on the way. I have been writing since the age of fourteen. Writing released the anger and pain I felt. Mostly the words get into my head and writing them down was also a form of healing.

My plans for the next five years are to study social work. Doing volunteer work in my community for the past ten years has opened my eyes to the needs of teenagers in society.

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Of Earth~ By Susan Dale

5/18/2015

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Earth of pollen and stamens
Of walls breathing in
Breathing out
With an expanding universe
Seeing with dim eyes, the spines
That hold up the nights
bending under the weight of our dreams

Dreams following a dim light
to the very edge of consciousness

There’s another light
This one cascades over shadows
And over the earth of silences
accumulating
In the segments we split

Earth of circles and chains
Of hands groping for the moon
Of bloodless hearts
Of stone souls
Of our blind feet
Stumbling down the path of being

Author Bio:
Susan Dale’s poems and fiction are on WestWard Quarterly, Hurricane Press, Ken *Again, Penman Review, Inner Art Journal, Garbanzo, and Linden Avenue. In 2007, she won the grand prize for poetry from Oneswan. She has two published chapbooks on the internet: Spaces Among Spaces by languageandculture.org and Bending the Spaces of Time by Barometric Pressure.

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Even roots itch sometimes~ By Allyson Whipple

5/14/2015

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The car hasn't been running right since the cold snap. Whether the sky dumps snow or rain or just blows you around, you still have to worry about tire pressure, keep blankets in the trunk, calculate how many miles you can get before dark.

No matter where you are, the winter sky looks the same: bulbous. Just luminous enough to remind you that the sun used to put in an appearance every day. No matter where you are, there's a season to go and a season to stay home. No matter where you are, you'll start calculating the weeks, then the days, until the light stabilizes, the engine rumbles just right. Until you're sure you're safe from squalls or storms or frostbite.

It would be one thing if you could hibernate. But you're doomed to serve your time awake.

Author Bio:
Allyson Whipple is the director of the Austin Feminist Poetry Festival and the vice president of Austin Poetry Society. She was raised by a librarian and an attorney, so she grew up understanding the power of words. Perhaps it is only natural that she became a poet. Her chapbook, We're Smaller Than we Think We Are, was published in 2013. Allyson teaches at Austin Community College and in her spare time is pursuing a black belt in kung fu.

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With Cowardice~ By A.J. Huffman

5/13/2015

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I keep my head down at events,
weddings and baby showers. Avoiding
eye contact equals avoiding conversation
equals avoiding explanations and overly harsh
judgments. It is the 21st Century,
but I am still labeled wrong for ignoring
my biological clock, for not dreaming
of diamond-baring princess and overdone
white gowns. Vocalizing such things
is sacrilege. Defending myself against the inevitable
barrage of “Oh you poor thing” and “There’s still time”
pityings when my “sisters” discover I am
still without husband and child only brings a flock
of bitter lecturing harpies descending to pick apart
my life. So I choose
to sit, alone, in back rows and isolated corners,
attending in show of support, praying for quick
and early escape.

Author Bio:
A.J. Huffman has published seven solo chapbooks and one joint chapbook through various small presses. Her eighth solo chapbook, Drippings from a Painted Mind, won the 2013 Two Wolves Chapbook Contest. She is a Pushcart Prize nominee, and her poetry, fiction, and haiku have appeared in hundreds of national and international journals, including Labletter, The James Dickey Review, Bone Orchard, EgoPHobia, Kritya, and Offerta Speciale, in which her work appeared in both English and Italian translation. She is also the founding editor of Kind of a Hurricane Press. www.kindofahurricanepress.com

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