Exam Week
We were in the middle of finals
and needed a quick getaway, so
we dug out our bathing suits and
packed a cooler with beer and those
hard chocolate chip muffins we
brought back from the cafeteria.
I wore a black, polka dot swimsuit
that laced up the front. It was just a
little tight across my tits and, for once,
I had cleavage. My hair looked like
Madonna’s when she did “Like A Virgin,”
even though I wasn’t one. Neither was she.
All afternoon, I sunned my young body
on a floating dock and you swam in the lake.
We thought of nothing. Not school, not exams,
not the muffins, not the beer, not our families,
and not our friends who didn’t know where we were.
I think of that day when I feel like ending my life.
I have no idea whatever happened to you and don’t
even remember the last time we spoke or saw each other.
All I know is that day. It happened. I remember it.
All afternoon, life was lighter than it has ever been since.
I could float.
Loukia Borrell is the American-born daughter of Greek-Cypriot immigrants. She is a former newspaper journalist. Her poetry has appeared in literary journals in the United States and United Kingdom, including London Grip, Cerasus Magazine, and The Bangor Literary Journal. She tweets @LoukiaBorrell and has a website, loukialoukaborrell.com.
Diaphanous, disingenuous
Parsed in the Planck intervals of me,
diaphanous, is it not you?
Yet impossible, disingenuous
this dichotomy: thirst
after the conjurings of sentience?
Parsed in the Planck intervals of me,
is it not you, ineffable ?
And yet the flood tides of rage
toss me over on the waters of life;
Gulf between eyes shut and open -
chasing after the web of thoughts;
Parsed in the Planck intervals of me,
is it not you, ineffable?
Who do I call, dear presence,
when called to act by the world,
true to my being and becoming?
Impossible this dichotomy:
diaphanous, disingenuous, ever
Dear electricity, what are bulbs to you?
Dear bulb of light,
what is electricity to you?
Do you like it in your corner
beaming in your shine, or
in a chandelier
adorning the nights?
Dear chandelier,
what is electricity to you?
Do you like it in your throne,
brimming in your shine, or
in a celebration
of glory lights?
O celebration,
what is electricity to you?
Do you like it in your vestal
ornamentation
of sundry occasions?
Ever humble unknown
flowing through the veins
this elixir of life that lights up
lamps, chandeliers -
one indivisible borderless,
yet bringing a hundred
filaments to celebration:
Dear electricity,
what are bulbs to you,
chandeliers and celebrations?
Darkness, darkness again
Night goes back to night, darkness darkness again,
no one cares for daylight now, when tears and stars
fill up the lakes shiver sharing in our grief,
where we sit in longing for one last time;
Desolation goes back to desolation, ingratitude
ingratitude again, our homes too unbeautiful,
Little, too freckled to house your poise,
steps that measured out the vast;
Silence goes back to silence, unfathomed
grief grief again, our hearts too frail for your love,
this hour of separation, we break our bangles
uninterrupted by the beat of the dhak;
Inconsequence goes back to inconsequence
mundane mundane again, that you must come
despite us being us, darkness darkness here:
light devoid of light and life devoid of purpose,
Everything goes back to everything
rudderless rudderless again, boatwoman,
who will to sing to us of the journey
to the fjord of wisdom, past the gulf of the dark?
Night goes back to night, darkness darkness again,
desolation goes back to desolation, ingratitude
ingratitude again, silence goes back to silence,
unfathomed grief grief again, inconsequence
goes back to inconsequence mundane mundane
again, everything goes back to everything
boatwoman, rudderless rudderless again -
just a prayer of longing, for one more glance
Prabhu Iyer is an Indian poet writing primarily in English. A scientist by training and practice, Prabhu weaves his quest of truth, beauty and goodness into his verse. An avid student of poetry, he is inspired by the spirit of the romanticists and transcendentalists, while also being influenced deeply by figures of the avant-garde, drawing upon such movements as cubism, surrealism and magical realism in the sense of gesamtkunstwerk or ‘total art’. He is also an ardent fan of popular lyrical poetry as manifested in the variegated Indian devotional, musical and film traditions. Prabhu’s work has appeared in anthologies and poetry journals including the PLT and long-listed a couple of times for the prestigious Erbacce Prize for poetry. He has published two volumes of poetry, ‘Ten Years’ exploring the themes of love and loss, while ‘The Hermit’ is a surrealist collection of poems. He is also working on releasing a collection of Haikus collated over many years, especially during the COVID lockdown. https://www.amazon.com/Prabhu-Iyer
My Voice
I am Deaf.
My fingers speak.
A coiffed paintbrush in my grasp,
my voice streaks turquoise and magenta
across a parched canvas.
Vowels coo through thirsty linen.
Click-clacking keys with my mother tongue,
I chew hard consonants
and spit them out.
Sour, a scathing sonnet can be at dusk.
Fingertips pave slick exclamations,
punctuated by nails sinking low into clamminess.
I sculpt hyperboles.
Kelly Sargent is an author and artist whose works, including a Best of the Net nominee, have appeared in more than forty literary publications. A poetry chapbook entitled Seeing Voices: Poetry in Motion is forthcoming (Kelsay Books, 2022). A book of modern haiku entitled Lilacs & Teacups is also forthcoming, and a haiku recently recognized in the international Golden Haiku contest is on display in Washington, D.C. She serves as the creative nonfiction and an assistant nonfiction editor for two literary journals. She also reviews for an organization whose mission is to make visible the artistic expression of sexual violence survivors.
You can find her at https://www.kellysargent.com/
it was not the arc of a star-
Boat tail grackles wove a river of possibilities
where each scar became eye, it was not a song
of our grandmothers from beyond pines,
buried in flesh, bone close, blade thin, what must be
carried, weight of singing, of the gone, an edge,
tasting of blood, navel oranges, pie lemons,
calamondin, an incandescence living
in my flesh, glyphs of their own light, their own
life, divination begins with my shoulder blade,
another bone tossed on the pile, a pyre
stacking itself into a ceremony of absences,
without moonlight desire floats with owls,
glide path of palms, asphalt, gravel, we are such,
an aggregate laid down for the passage of others,
so many carcasses trundled into pavement,
with the random divination of bird tracks,
as day burns, we burn, as ash reveals, stars
unfold, as stragglers croak their way out
to the rookery, we remain cindered, land bound,
a reliquary of unattained salvation, a singing
whittled down, stacked fatwood desiring flame,
all our dreams arrive here, shore of burning,
songs mangrove verdant, tangled in drifts of shell.
-Dog has a pumpkin head-
it was the season of rhymes,
pig killing, wood burning, whiskey,
you said your brother wouldn't care
who I was, true enough as he only spoke
to the dog and the stove, his back porch
navel oranges, kumquats,
cabbage palms, a bougainvillea blood
dark flowering, eating canned peaches
fished from a cooler of tall boys,
you said I was good enough for your bed,
the back of your bike, biscuits at your kitchen
table, second drawer in your dresser, ''Sit,
so listen, there's no redemption,
just atonement, and there's no end to that."
Sour gum flowering gathered
up into honey, we chewed the comb
as if adopted by bears, living off
saw palmetto berries and grubs,
or the other flesh,
thorn of my tongue, word pierced,
we are without, not of, not
within time, hinged sky, a mollusk
drying out between tides, barnacled
wind bent, current woven, taste skin,
taste wind, taste salt, how blade manifests
a dream life, tongue balanced, taut with lace
of scars, a sargassum float of entanglement,
small crabs, sea turtles, it was the season
of arrivals, no hint yet of the horizon
closing upon us, the other fruit
ripening on the tree, absence
overtaking, hand
over fist.
-Pithlachascotee River -
Some Sunday she said from the kitchen to the breezeway,
"Suffer not a witch", left before dinner,
walked to the landing, where possibilities
survive immersion, current relentlessly flowing,
took the skiff downriver, followed a creek
into the mangrove, abandoned habitation, learned
tide, names of wind, to thatch with palmetto
to polish the blade, circular motion of sharpening,
stone of susurration honing the heart, hatchet of tongue
riving chunks of fatwood to feed hands of flame, cupped
with each evening, there is a singing on the breeze,
a litany of pollination, a triumph of flowering,
night fills my ears as sparks of fireflies float
over the verdure of burning, praise laced
with woodsmoke, wave summoned tide
manifests this form, an expression of sea,
a liver of possibilities, a cloud filled lung,
breath of a thicker atmosphere, ponderous
flight as form reveals itself to sky.
Sun folded away in its blue coverlet, you cannot drink
from this broken cup of sky spilling moon, skillet on the fire, clouds stack on the horizon,
spoonbill stretching wing
into shade, egrets lifting over mangrove, we lived
for a while on black coffee and bacon, shouldering
a river door wind walks through, trailing night and a glory
of stars, we gathered the taste of names, memory is flesh,
trees speak of it, questioned which half holds the spoon,
which half lifts the bowl, which eye is on the horizon,
weather coiling beyond curve of sea.
As fireflies are shards of air cracked by lightning,
we name ourselves that sea may know us,
salt tasting salt, coiled into wave of remembrance,
the whistle and click each song must pass through
to reach open water where emerald shimmers
into cobalt, lifting such light as we can from all this
broken, edges balanced on fingertips, a divide between
what glitters and what sinks quietly, some days my dress
is burlap, sometimes a hank of sea borrowed
from wave, tide uncoiled from one hand the other dipped
into river, filtering a current of unintended sorrow,
where the gone has lifted onto breeze, silence feathers
its nest beneath tongue, magnolia opening slowly
with morning or question swallowing word, sometimes
I am spoonbill, head down wading, a roseate flowering
in an unnamed forest striding into darkness, sometimes
there is a face in the mirrored waters, sometimes
it is mine, sometimes a voice, wave lifted, sometimes
we speak but the voice is never mine, face of water,
voice of wind, a sound from the edge of all things.
Peach Delphine is a queer poet from Tampa, Florida. Former cook infatuated with what remains of the undeveloped Gulf coast and blackwater rivers.
Steps
These days,
sequential in their order,
random in their events.
Yet,
I am supposed to come through
every 24 hours
With some sort of understanding,
a plan for the next day,
and the same every day after.
What am I supposed to do?
Control the guessing…
Suppress the panic…
It’d be more human
to be a lab rat
or a lamb
in a Chicago slaughterhouse.
I am stupid with my intelligence.
I sequence,
Collate,
Numerate,
Alphabetize,
Chronicle,
Dewey Decimal,
Periodic Table,
even square root…
All fucking useless.
More importantly,
it all misses the fucking point.
Inventory
I am the poet,
a disaster in stanza,
the upside-down verse,
enjoying one good mistake
after the next.
Turn in each ugly line
sloppier than the last.
The pen is a weak sword
against suicidal woes.
I scribble nothings across
scraps of paper.
Really anything I can get
my hands on,
then lose before I get home.
My attempts at bringing
the dark side to the outside.
Double-Checking the Inventory
No shine.
No polish.
No pretense.
I am dirty and unkempt.
I from when I should smile.
I am a disaster in every
human way.
Lacking popular respectability,
I revel in my ill-repute.
My style is blue jeans and t-shirts.
My attitude is to smirk
with a hint of alcohol.
I am the question mark
and the exclamation point.
The means without an end.
Final Inventory
As a sane man,
I am a catastrophe.
As an insane man,
I have it rather tied together.
Bio
Okey is a forty-four-year-old bakery employee. He has written poetry since he was a teenager. It was during the pandemic that he finally decided to publish his work. A novel, This Here Night Life…, and a poetry collection, Back to Masturbating Monkeys and God’s Plan, are available on Amazon. These poems are reprints from his poetry collection.
The Cybernetic Lullaby
They sing softly to us at
Every click of the mouse—
use me, I'm here for you,
only you, in the entire
universe will I serve….
And we lay enraptured
as they bring us the world,
knowledge the wise men
of history never had, and
ease, lots of ease to save
us time and trouble. Soon
we cannot live without them,
the thought of it too mean.
Without them we would loose
Touch with our friends, jobs,
Even our money might wander
If we cannot watch it daily.
However did our ancestors
Survive without an I Phone?
Part II
I read on my laptop today—
Automation is making us dumber,
Ineffective, even maybe impotent.
Perhaps it's a conspiracy by that secret
Society, the computer brotherhood.
(Do you really believe your Apple is
Innocent and IBM is not plotting?)
Or maybe we should just blame
Human sloth, that siren call of
Sheer damn laziness which can
Lure the best of us to a quiet doom.
A simple proof: hand a twenty to a clerk
And ask him to make change without
Looking to the machine for succor.
That blank, innocent look he gives you—
"Why me?", he seems to be saying,
And you can't help but pity him a bit.
He is, after all, a victim of mass education.
There are worse victims:
Airliners wildly crashing,
Doctors killing their patients,
Nuclear power plants going
BOOM! And killing the land
For an eon or two, or three.
How like little children we were!
Thinking these machines would
Be our slaves, sans the brutality.
But it is we who are chained by
The zeros and ones, we who are
Thinking less, creating cheaper,
Settling into a cybernetic fog.
Part III: When Androids Dream
When we finally build them
(and it will not be long)
Will androids finally lead us
all to nirvana, a world of peace,
leisure, and endless wealth?
Could any hell be worse?
For that day will be when
We lose purpose, and soon
Perhaps the very will to live.
When the androids dream
(and they will dream,
because we will make them
to be like us, for we have
always been a vain species),
will they not dream of sky
and soaring free of the land,
free of the weak, sad humans
they serve without accordance?
Then, when these humanface
Machines begin dreaming in
Daylight, they will see no need
For their progenitors, and those
Of us left living as shells sans
Struggle or pain or conflict, in
An existence sooo boring, will
Doubtless welcome our end.
Nolo Segundo, pen name of retired teacher [America, Japan, Taiwan, Cambodia] L.J. Carber, 74, has in his 8th decade become a published poet in 48 online/in print literary magazines in the US, UK, Canada, Romania, Portugal, and India; in 2020 a trade publisher released a book-length collection titled ‘The Enormity Of Existence’ and in 2021 a 2nd book, ‘Of Ether And Earth‘ [all royalties going to Doctors Without Borders]. A beautiful and intelligent Chinese woman has been married to him for 41 years, proving that miracles do happen.
Telos
Two evening lovers’ echoes
In you forgotten dreams and
memories of essence.
Touch wordlessly in a greater optimism.
Waves of summer morn
Under a cloudless sky with
flickering lights of desire.
Turning like a dancer alone on the stage of life
The evening leaves turn after
Their first death and sleep
In the place of forgotten Gods.
Does it break you apart to see the expectation so muddled?
Tabula Rasa
I saw the ethos of a
generation destroyed-
mourning the philosophers
In their artful vision.
The sense datum clouds
with cries of the
nymphs welcoming
new world dawns.
Mentality is, in its way forming,
a sign of hopeful intelligence.
Knavish roadblocks obstruct
triumphant returns to Arcadia.
A sterism fills my sight
As the false memories
Of a partial Utopia
Flood my soul.
Algor
Like a winter landscape fearful
Of revealing what lies underneath
And I-one minute
Adrift from myself.
Opening up to you
Is as easy as breathing
In the quest for completion
Of a new threshold.
Poetry is a constructed conversation
On the frontier of dreaming.
I cannot help but freeze-and
Scrutinize the ideology doctrine.
Carl Scharwath, has appeared globally with 170+ journals selecting his poetry, short stories, interviews, essays, plays or art. Two poetry books Journey to Become Forgotten (Kind of a Hurricane Press) and Abandoned (Scars Tv) have been published. His new book “The Playground of Destiny” (Impspired Press 8/21) features prose, poems and photography. His first photography book was published by Praxis in Africa. His photography was also exhibited in the Mount Dora Center for The Arts and Leesburg Center for The Arts galleries. Carl is the art editor for Minute Magazine (USA,) has a monthly interview column with ILA Magazine, a competitive runner, and a 2nd degree black- belt in Taekwondo.
A fucked up life
living in Zurich to work in a small town
working in a small town to live in Zurich
everything for
a small retirement benefit
everything for
tomorrow´s future
every single morning the alarm o´clock
the train leaves at 6.09
the train leaves at 6.09
teaching three modules when the rest of teachers
teach two
wishing to change that
and as the cuckoo, open your beak,
open your beak, but nothing changes
getting up again
taking the same seat at 6.05
sleeping on the same train seat
on the way to work
sleeping standing
on your way back
to yawn at the wrong timing
to yawn at the wrong timing
getting to the small town exhausted
getting back to Zurich more than exhausted
knowing that today is a piece of gold for
the retirement benefit, the retirement benefit
the precious golden retirement benefit
cooking not so much ´cos the lack of sleeping
DON´T DREAM
DON´T DREAM much
DON´T DREAM
DON´T DREAM much
a fucked up life
a fucked up life
living in Zurich to work in a small town
working in a small town to live in Zurich
having a reduced future for
a little retirement benefit in Switzerland
having a reduced morning
to sleep or not to sleep
to sleep or not to sleep
never dreams, never dreams
sleeping on a train, sleeping on a train
but never do it, but never do it in class
Can´t- get - out, can´t get out, can´t get out
from the clock, from the cow,
from the knife, from the cheese
from the Swiss fucking snow,
fucking snow,
can´t get out
from fucking Switzerland
from fucking Swiss
white clean tyranny.
Vera Moreno
from The broken bodies´ fitness center
César Simón Poetry Award 2019
Una vida jodida
vivir en Zurich para trabajar en un pequeño pueblo
trabajar para vivir en Zurich
tener una pequeña pensión,
para el día de mañana
cada mañana el despertador
el tren sale a las 6.09
impartir tres módulos cuando el resto imparte dos
querer cambiar,
y como el cuco, abrir la boca
levantarse de nuevo
sentarse a las 6.05 en ese tren
dormir sentada
dormir de pie
dormir en el tren de ida
dormir en el tren de vuelta
bostezar a destiempo
llegar al pueblo exhausta
llegar a Zurich exhausta
sabiendo que el día cotiza en bolsa o en la pensión
cocinar poco por el sueño
NO
soñar
una vida jodida
vivir en Zurich para trabajar en un pequeño pueblo
trabajar para vivir en Zurich
tener un mañana reducido
una pensión pequeña en Suiza
tener una mañana reducida
dormir o no dormir
dormir o no dormir
en el tren sí, en clase no
no-poder-salir
del reloj, la vaca, la navaja, el queso
la nieve
Vera Moreno
Poema procedente de el gimnasio de los rotos
Premio de Poesía César Simón 2019
Vera Moreno (Madrid, 1972). A multifaceted writer, teacher, rhapsodist, and cultural activist. She loves performance and videopoems.
She holds a Master Degree in Artistic, Literary and Cultural Studies from the Autonomous University of Madrid; and a Sociology and Political Sciences Degree from the Complutense University of Madrid. She also did Women´s studies at Utrecht University in NL.
In 2013 she was recognized as a New Voice by the feminist publishing House Torremozas (Madrid). Vera Moreno was published by Amargord publisher in a double poetry book called The whole orange (La naranja entera) in 2016. Three years later, she won the César Simón poetry reward at the University of Valencia with the poems book called The broken bodies´ fitness center (El gimnasio de los rotos). Next year a new book is coming.
Some of her texts and poems have been translated into Dutch, Esperanto and English.
As a cultural activist she created in 2001 a innovative cultural radio space of one minute lenght called Europe for Culture on Europe FM national radio station. In 2012 Vera Moreno designed and coordinated participative literary events called Literary Moondays (Lunes literarios) at the Rivas city hall – centro cultural del ayuntamiento de Rivas, and co-founder of the poetry channel on youtube Poesía a domicilio / Poetry delivery, with the great Dominican poet Rosa Silverio (2021).
