TABLE OF CONTENTS - POETRY

Cereus - Tommy Smith
The Algebra Of The Soul - Dr. Greg Grove
Spring - Thomas Michael Baumer
Bug On The Blade - Daniel Phillips
Pill Bug - Daniel Phillips
Po Pierwsze - 1 - Mateusz Kurcewicz
Billet Doux (for Patricia) - Paul Payton
A Love No Greater - Ngoc Minh Nguyen
Away From You - Trivik Bhavnani
A Rose By Any Other Name - Paul Nachbar
Autumn - Mark Norman
To The Poet - Ed Glomski
Resistance - Kay Lindgren
Primal Silence - Maria Claudia Faverio
Contemplation On The Laws Of Chance - Brian R. Johnson
Poet, Bag Lady - Thom Hadley
The Accusing Cigars - Jonathan Marin
Creatures Of The Sky - Daniel Phillips
Armageddon - Ngoc Minh Nguyen
Gridgerwocky - Ed Glomski (With Apologies to Lewis Carroll)
Jaded - Jonathan Marin
Even If - Paul Nachbar
Ode to the Long Suffering Baseball Fans of Boston - Brian R. Johnson
Bag Lady - Ed Glomski
To the Vagrant - Ed Glomski
The One-Legged Plover - Kay Lindgren
Glorious Plummage - Paul Nachbar
On the Salutary Craft of My Psychiatrist - Brian R. Johnson

Cereus - Tommy Smith

She seethes, not pours
For to seethe is to boil ever so suddenly
A transient transparence
A window of mania
A moment on the shores of Pharos

Fleeting vibrance
For to shimmer is to attract the shadows
The forgotten fog
The auroral apex
The seepage through the pores of Eros

Scrambling bedlam
A cascade of formless impulses compelling
Lateral projections
Written in sweat
A torment born of her naïve pathos

Exhausted lemming
For to expend is to do it vivaciously
Psychical shambles
Emotional swindling
Seething in the wake of Prometheus.

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The Algebra Of The Soul - Dr. Greg Grove

The Arithmetic of birth
The Geometry of life
The Trigonometry of age
The Calculus of death.

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Spring - Thomas Michael Baumer

It comes quietly,
with a warm wind
and a wonderful scent.

Life starts growing,
in the nature
and the heart of all beings.

Dreams rise again,
like an unfolding rose
and a spreading wing.

Hope is developing,
based on experiences
and curiosity
and respect.

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Bug On The Blade - Daniel Phillips

bug on the blade
jade, auburn, browny
the wind passes
still you cling
you have not moved
how do you feel
nature's production line

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Pill Bug - Daniel Phillips

pill bug
how did you get your name
did you used to get swallowed a lot
was that your part in the game
or were you but framed
by that which you are named
when touched you curl
just like a pearl
is that the origin
of the mystery
or but another dead end
maybe I should ask my friend
or would he think it but a jest
and toss me a hornet's nest
perhaps it is in a book
of bugs that can be cooked
nay it shall not be
for I shall answer this mimicry
mayhap the bug of pill will answer me
but it seems not inclined
the bribe it was offered
but the thing merely did curl
oh well
think I'll go find a girl

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Po Pierwsze - 1 - Mateusz Kurcewicz

XXX
Czasami pytasz: „I gdzie dalej?”,
A odpowiedzi brak.
Czasami zycie cos zadaje,
Co psuje s³odki jego smak.

I bunt podnosisz wciaz wytrwale,
Zawrocic chcialbys caly swiat.
Lecz on nie czuly ciebie wcale;
Tak bylo, jest i bedzie tak.

XXX
Trzeba isc spac. Ale po co?
Zeby sie nie bac, trzeba spac – noca.

XXX
Dotknij mnie Panie, swym palcem najmniejszym,
Nadziei zasiej kruszyne.
Pozwol mi stac sie, choc troche weselszym,
Weselszym, choc odrobine.

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Billet Doux (for Patricia) - Paul Payton

"Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not neither do they spin."
--Matthew 6:28

The letters sit within my ready reach,
  stamps long spent their charge,
  pounded to antiquity by postal abuse.
Yet her feminine hand prevails, unyielding,
  a softness smirking at Cronus' scythe.
Her musings ferment as impassioned wine,
  burgeoning with succulent intoxication.
Nestled in pastel and beige sheaths is
  the stationery that annals her adoration.

These are the touchstones of our days,
  pebbles on a pathway
  in the Garden of Devotion.
Her words validate my life,
  prove that I am loved,
  evince I am cherished as her mate.
Unwittingly, she has written our biography
  as a saga told in Byronic vignette.

Her quill has kissed the pages,
  ennobling them with her thoughts.
The course of our romance
  forever chronicled in swirl and flourish
  of royal blue ink.
Avowals of ardor are never to be discarded.

Our first meeting -- an afternoon stolen from duty.
A lecture, then dinner -- heady halcyon days.
Her first scribe of "love" -- a hand gently given.
Fear and concern -- assurances sworn.

They are, at once --
  photographs of a mind reflective and placid,
  paintings from a heart of tender empressement,
  jeweled keepsakes of our moments together.

Her words are the gems of my existence.

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A Love No Greater - Ngoc Minh Nguyen

My Dear, with hand around thine supple waist,
And the other none too chaste,
Let us not this moment waste.

Tonight can be ours if we so dare,
And as I undo thine flowing hair,
It falls around thee in the cool, night air.

I am filled with passionate delight,
To know pleasures eternal we will prove tonight,
But when the pitchers of Michelob-Lite,

Wear off the next day I turn to brittle stone,
As I roll over and see that thou art ugly to the bone!

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Away From You - Trivik Bhavnani

half an hour ago the pizza dough tumbles
and all was pleasure
half an hour later the pizza dough tumbles
and all is pain.
i want to hate you with all my heart
but i cannot.
all i do is wait and see what
the next half hour brings.

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A Rose By Any Other Name - Paul Nachbar

A rose by any other name is
A rose by any other name
She may be bitter or sweet,
Sour or salty or even umami.
But a rose by any other name is
A rose by any other name.

Some roses have thorns
Some roses merely hang out with them
Some roses marry them
But a rose by any other name is
A rose by any other name.

Uh, just solved the secrets of the universe as specified in my last email. You should send me lots of money for that,Paul

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Autumn - Mark Norman

Upon the trunks
of our sentinels
standing tall, announcing
and guarding the coming
Fall,
Posion Ivy's
tendrils redden
dreadlocks among the
fallen leaves.
Crisp tan corn fields reaped,
populated
by Amish corn stock
teepee sheaths.
Awaiting the coming faena frosts
land locking
innocence of spring lost.
Under metallic grey sky
mocking the dying flora
sap surrenders to lie deep
before the frozen sky begins to weep.

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To The Poet - Ed Glomski

Magician of shadows,
Levitator of words,
and will O the wisps,
Extracted from id crevaces.

Dream artist,
Funneling foggy scenarios,
From the deep wellspring,
Through a kaliedoscope.

Piper of the nearly discernable,
Drawing us close,
With your mirrored magnificent,
Brightfaced abstractions.

Is it painful when you kick the world?

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Resistance - Kay Lindgren

The architect of disillusionment
would crown with dunce caps turrets of ideals,
extract the merlons of my battlements,
the teeth that bite all who would make me kneel
to masters, tyrants, kings and conquerors.
He'd chain mercurial moat with cyclone fence,
opaque my windows, bar the doors of stars,
and cube curved dreams to Bauhaus common sense.
Surrender Neuschwannstein to Gropius?
I'd sooner give to swans the necks of owls,
to nightingales, the voices of the crows.
A stubborn mortar binds these castle walls:
They stun the real-world wrecking ball, deflect
its blows and disenchant the architect.

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Primal Silence - Maria Claudia Faverio

At the edge of self,
uncertain drift of things
stirs -
verdigris of hope.
The supreme fiction of life
outwits itself,
bending under the whims of the mind.

Where does heaven open up its gates?
Where does aesthetics turn into a principle
mightier than hedonism?


Dorian Gray is weary
of his unfading beauty,
of the concealed images
of desire
unsublimated,
while life’s fevered surge
welters to its own decay,
shifting impossibles
into potentiality,
summoning visions
in the blue latitudes
of hope.

The uncertain edge of faith
perfects the catalogue of images
pouring out into the mind
like a primal silence
or a surge of blue
outspeeding rage of thunder.

Under the scooping arc
of creed,
the spectral canticle of thought
takes hold of eternity.

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Contemplation On The Laws Of Chance - Brian R. Johnson
(Unabridged)

Cancer took my dear mother
I blamed it all on God’s wrath
My quarrel with the deity fruitless
More fairly a question of math

For sometimes “things just happen”
Complying with nature’s laws
Though it’s difficult comprehending
When effect seems divorced from a cause

In vain we manipulate numbers
And sometimes we fuss and we fret
When the storm clouds of life drop their water
The fool and the sage both get wet

To bullets all hearts are equal
For they strike both the vile and the just
Good or evil put in a casket
Both sleep in the same field of dust

Chance no respecter of persons
Chance wounds and often does tear
It touches both rich man and pauper
Chance is cruel
Chance also is fair

When I think of you dear mother
Thinking how they say justice is blind
But poorer the eyes of her brother
Chance takes everyone equal
That’s kind

(in memoriam: Jeanette J. Stealy, my mother)

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Poet, Bag Lady - Thom Hadley

The bag lady: (fascinating 'foto' snapshot.)

                     we carry cemeteries within

                          yet seeking resurrection

                               that one wheel keeps wobbling

                                    sounding a tattoo futilely

The poet: (Id crevices; nice conception.)

               i've broken my toe kicking the world

               kicking the wall in utero

               stumbling in the hall of mirrors

                    sometimes the world just rolls over

                         "...making me feel like I've never been
born"
(Revolver)

                         i push through the looking glass

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The Accusing Cigars

How proud I was of my cleverness
The day I bought expensive cigars
-- Boxes and boxes of them,
More expensive than I could afford.
"Now I will finally quit cigarettes",
I said to myself,
"I shall puff cigars but not inhale."
I confidently formed a plan:
"I'll keep them on my breakfast table
Where I cannot avoid them.
My frugal self will never tolerate
The waste of so much money."

How proud I was of my cleverness!
How I reveled in my private victory
Over cynical farmers and loathsome executives
Who are not at all distressed to know
That the bellows that bloats their wealth
Is the wheezing of gasping addicts.

As I puff on a cigarette,
I ruminate upon my clever scheme
(Oh! To light and puff but not inhale!)
Then take another, deeper, drag, accused
By the boxes and boxes of expensive cigars,
More expensive than I could afford,
Stacked high on my breakfast table
Where I cannot avoid them.
I turn my back on my accusers:
My cereal goes soggy;
My eggs go cold.
Inside their fancy cedar boxes,
My cigars go stale.

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Creatures Of The Sky - Daniel Phillips

falcon, hawk, eagle
creatures of the sky
if I could but fly
I would be willing to then die
flight for a mere mortal
to achieve unattainable height
gliding on the wind
current of air
ultimate of all dreams
and lowest of despairs
up above the wild so high
how I would like to fly the sky
watching the creatures below
the aviators did constantly bellow
a mouse, a snake, a fish
all could be prey
with their keen eye
and swiftness approaching night

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Armageddon - Ngoc Minh Nguyen

My paper-thin soul is cast in shades of fire
burning without forgiveness or remorse
within me like Hiroshima or Nagasaki on
nuclear fire To continue unquenched and
unabated until the Gestalt of the unsuspecting
around me are themselves without mercy
consumed by its incorporeal and supernal
force like weary Heaven and Hell in
conspiracy together...and like searing heat
in my burning bones I cannot stand to
behold before me the blazing Jesus who
by His very light lights my tongue
afire like a funeral pyre and all
the meanwhile the sight of Him liquifies
my eyeballs into so much putrescence and my
head is ablaze and my clothes fall from my
charring flesh in flames even the thews
sinews ligaments and tendons melt at the
wrath of the Almighty's Second Coming
'til I perish without redemption.

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Gridgerwocky - Ed Glomski (With Apologies to Lewis Carroll)

Mugling under dusty brunbar,
Peering at perspiring Gridges,
Runking past the thoming Hutars,
With their refermating stridges.

Slile all you gathing Gridges,
Slile while we hove the ukar,
Slile all you umly Kridses,
Slile while we trick the Hutars.

Krole around the utsdip Gridges,
Krane behind the thoming Hutars,
Gribam them from the ackling bridges,
Hove their indemendant gusgars.

Hove them thirmly, Hove the Hutars,
Graump the horikary Kridses,
Graump the kridses at the ukar,
Gribam the gathing utsdip Gridges.

Grive now all you gathing Gridges,
Along with all the thoming Hutars,
Grive dirmation all you Kridses,
Grive among the hoving ukar.

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Jaded - Jonathan Marin

Love is old,
Soft whispers are history.
Sex is empty,
Ecstacy obsolete,
Yet nightly I fatten
On suppers of roses.

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Even If - Paul Nachbar

Even if all this
is ultimately trivial
and I am not everything
then I am also not nothing
being like and unlike you:
I am also real
I am also complex
I am also ineffable
I am also magical
I am also a creator

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Ode to the Long Suffering Baseball Fans of Boston - Brian R. Johnson

Seventy-five years of frustration stab
At every New Englander's breast
A spring's bright promise again falls dead
A throng of soul's depressed
In '18 Frazee sold dear Ruth
For Broadway's show "Nanette"
To those hated Yankees
Years on, we suffer yet
But still we sing the praises
Of those men of great renown
Oh that those boys from Boston
Should someday wear a crown
So buy your tickets one and all
And to your faith attend
If there's a God in heaven, pray
that suffering will end

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Bag Lady - Ed Glomski

Mumbling along
toothlessly pushing
stolen dreams
while comforting
the cartridden naked
doll-daughter.
Leather skinned
memories shaped
and spewed out
of an incongruent reality
to nobody.
Another tin can day-
Dipsey Dumpster Hag.
Damned crooked wheel
and dead god.

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To the Vagrant - Ed Glomski

Broken Beggar,
Wretched wreck,
The doomsday ruins weep on your lost horizons,
Your decomposing soul moans in despair,
You speak in dreary drivel of rejection,
And scream in dreams where tears have all run dry.

Undesirable dreg,
Derelict,
The all-seeing shrew forecast's your collision.

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The One-Legged Plover - Kay Lindgren

I mope along the water's edge and brood
on feelings of inferiority.
I tint the waves to match my cobalt mood.
I long to drown in my self-made blue sea.

The plovers come. One hops on its right leg,
lame limb akimbo under its left wing.
It mines damp sand for supper, does not beg
from abler birds. And still, I think, "Poor thing."

It does not know self-pity - just the need
to keep up with the flock - and this it does,
hopping along at their frenetic speed,
not brooding on a nest of sterile woes.

It does not think, "I'm not as good as you..."
I'd give a leg to be a birdbrain, too.

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Glorious Plummage - Paul Nachbar

glorious plummage of the sun
perhaps it does not shine for anyone
perhaps it shines for us
its good to think it so
and here I really simply do not know
it shines up there after our days are done

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On the Salutary Craft of My Psychiatrist - Brian R. Johnson

My brain cells they stopped talking
And my psyche was in grief
There was a friend
Beloved friend
Who gave me some relief
Someone that I could talk to
When my soul was gripped with fear
A quiet thump upon my chest
Says "show me what's in here"
He never at a loss for words
Suggestions for my growth
He is a skilled disciple
Of the Hippocratic oath
It's true I'm oft afflicted
And sometimes of heavy heart
But through these times I've come to trust
In your physician's art

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