A Poem by Sandra Rokoff-Lizut

My Spirit

To keep it safe for awhile,

I hide my spirit

in the crook of a sycamore tree

like my ancestors did.

Because, now that I'm 

fourteen, my spirit

is growing too wild and unwieldy

for me to carry around

in my back-pack anymore.

Sandra Rokoff-Lizut, retired educator and children's book author (published by Macmillan, Holt, Reinhary & Winston, and Hallmark Inc.), is currently both a printmaker and a poet.  She is a member of Oregon Poetry Association, Mary's Peak Poets, Poetic License, Gertrude's, and a weekly writing salon.  Rokoff-Lizut volunteers, by teaching poetry to middle-schoolers, at the Boys and Girls Club in Corvallis, Oregon.  She also studies poetry at Oregon State University.  Previous publications include Illya's Honey, The Bicycle Review, Wilderness House Review, The Tower Journal, The Penwood Review, and Wild Goose Poetry Review.

A Poem by Inna Dulchevsky

Snowing

Snowing    snowing today . . .
Lots of thoughts are in my head . . .
Snowflakes run through the streets
They do not know where they'll land

Thoughts run somewhere
They do not know where they fly
Numb and beautiful snowflakes
They do not know   what is   to die

It is white in the city
All have been blessed
By tango of snowflakes
And waltz of spinning wind

It is cloudy and muffled
Inside of my world
Thoughts are brutal to me
Thoughts are broken
                            into millions
                                            of    thoughts

As painful shards of puzzle
They encircle my heart
Rip it into fragments
Coldest beauty of falling-snow charm
Burns what is left of red witch-hazel

Curse of whitest dance
Covers all with cold wing
Bends the branches of trees
With frost of snowflakes

Storm is deep in my world
Pulls the roots of my mind

It fails

Shelters frozen sprout of love
Thaws it with the heat of my tears

Inna Dulchevsky spent her early school years in Belarus.  She currently resides in Brooklyn, New York.  She was awarded First Prinse in the 2014 David B. Silver Poetry Competition.  Her poems have appeared in the both journals and books including Pyrokinection, Lavender, and Antheon.  Inna's literary influences include Pushkin, Lermontov, Yesenin, Akhmatova, Tsvetaeva, Block, Bunin, Turgenev, Chekhov, Gogol, Tolstoy, Bulgakov, Nabokov, and Dostoevsky.  Her interests include metaphysics, philosophy, literature, practice in meditation and yoga.  Inna's musical education in violin and classical singing, as well as her discovery of Vermeer's light and expansion of consciousness through the connection with inner-self and nature, are essential in the writing of her poetry.

Three Poems by Susan Dale

September

A golden hush
Crimson and bronze days
And the earth willing
I am not
To relinquish summer
To smoke-silvered November

The crying song of geese
Curling clouds in the skies
And in the margins of my dreams
Autumn lingers long



November, 2014

November with its penitential air
It's faded shutters of sun

Melancholy lady
carrying a candle
flickering through the fog



Untitled

The Golden rope of September
tugs at summer's sleeve
Time to pull her over the hill



Susan Dale's poems and fiction are on Kind of a Hurricane Press, Ken*Again, Penman Review, Inner Art Journal, Feathered Flounder, 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 as part of the Barometric Pressures Authors' Series (Kind of a Hurricane Press).

A Poem by Rick Hartwell

All Aquiver

Standing still to watch
various vibrant birds
tremble within the pines,
flirting their lives away,
fluttering branch to branch,
contesting each bough,
then breaking away, hesitant,
only pausing to feed on
bugs within the bark,
fueling up for mating.

Topping this frenzied activity,
growth tassels track the arcing
progress of the sun towards winter
as a low grazing hawk explodes the tree.

Rick Hartwell is a retired middle school (remember the hormonally-challenged?) English teacher living in Southern California.  He believes in the succinct, that the small becomes large; and, like the Transcendentalists and William Blake, that the instant contains eternity.  Given his druthers, if he's not writing, Rick would rather still be tailing plywood in a mill in Oregon.  He can be reached at rdhartwell@gmail.com

A Poem by Ken L. Jones

As Frail as a Snowflake

Winter sunset frozen to a deep blue
Above the high mountain meadows
Whose iced field trails
Are like yarn and needles
And have a most elegant fizz
And upon them reindeer
Skedaddle as their hooves tap out
Lullabies that sound
As if they are being played
On an Irish harp so butter tender
That only a fairy could pluck it that way
All upon this most perfect of December days.



For the past thirty-five years Ken L. Jones has been a professionally published author who has done everything from writing Donald Duck Comic books to creating things for Freddy Krueger to say in some of his movies.  In the last six years he has concentrated on his lifelong ambition of becoming a published poet and he has published widely in all genres of that discipline in books, online, in chapbooks and in several solo collections of poetry.  

A Poem by Scott Thomas Outlar

Ballerina of the Sky

A Blood Moon
Lunar Eclipse
smiles in the skyline of a predawn morning
with rampant fervor building to a crescendo
of age changing ramifications.
The signs of the times spark with vibrations of
electromagnetic transfiguration
as metamorphosis of the spheres spins in full effect.

Tides shifting . . . pivoting . . . pulsating
with a sideways advance,
crisscrossing in a dizzying twirl
from a high spot in the heavens
downward into my wide open heart;
beating in harmonized accord
with the nexus core
across eternity
and the infinite abyss
one inch at a time
closer to you . . .
closer to me . . .
closer to eternal answers . . .
closer to the truth
of reality's ultimate grasp of reason.

The existential energy source
of perfect Veritas
sparks across the Elysium heights
where I seek solace
in the blue/black canopied sky
which is lit up with pillowed comfort
as the symphonic stars sing out
in an awesome conductive opera
of God's sweet lullaby,
mimicking the initial word
of creation as it was first manifested into form.

A miraculous spontaneous generation
of divinity orchestrated inspiration,
intuitively embedded in the blueprint
of our collective DNA signature,
is woven like a synchronistic web and
sent Earthward to fill our souls with wonder as the
satellite signals play out in a rotating orbital dance.

The ballerina of enlivened rock dust
rolls across the gravitational ether
in astrological intoxication,
smiling out across the vaccuumed void
with a Cheshire grin of deeper knowingness.
As within, also without;
as above, so below.
Awed in mesmerized transient grace,
we watch patiently throughout the cycles
as these ageless planetary seeds
take root in dark matter,
mature, sprout wings and grow.

Scott Thomas Outlar hails from the heart of Atlantis where he kneels atop intricately designed rugs woven from prediluvian cloth, praying to the Holy Spirit Vibration for courage, grace, humility and discernment during this epic time of history at the edge of a new epoch.  When not caught up in such passionate fervor, he spends his time writing such things as poetry, essays and rants.  His work can be seen at Dissident Voice, Common Line Journal, Oracular Tree, Daily Anarchist, and Ascent Aspirations.  

Two Poems by Joanna M. Weston

The Tenant

a spider has woven
its spiral web high
above the stairs

silken filaments
that rise
and fall with
the movement of air
as I go up or down

the long curves
of white have blurred
to grey with dust

it shares my house
pays no rent
but adds beauty
to the stairwell



Held in Forever

the year turns in my hands
from snowdrop to bluebell
through daffodil and rose
spinning pansies into chrysanthemums
and copper and gold maple leaves

I want to hold the year
so that each petal remains
distinct as the moment
of the wind's caress
each stamen waiting for a bee
in that second when sunlight cuts
shadow and a finger touches my skin
with the colour of the season
imprisoned in a cup of petals

Joanna M. Weston is married, has two cats, multiple spiders, a herd of deer, and two derelict hen-houses.  Her middle-reader, Those Blue Shoes, published by Clarity House Press; and poetry, A Summer Father, published by Frontenac House of Calgary.  Her eBooks found at her blog:  http://www.1960willowtree.wordpress.com/

Three Poems by April Salzano

Tender Hooks

The queen has eaten herself
alive.  Her drones wait
for instructions that do not come,
smell the absence.
Rearing chambers are constructed,
royal jelly fed.  Brutal battle for the throne
begins between the first two to emerge, each
willing to die rather than do the thankless
work of the colony.



After the Rain

The birds call through last rumbles
of thunder, worn-drunk, wet,
undaunted.  Early dark is as welcome
as hydrated relief of corn stalks, weighted
and unified in sudden saturation.
White noise of steady mist does not know
one man's crop from another man's field,
blends seamlessly into woods that are
transformed into tropical for an evening
as the next front approaches.



The Road to Autumn Road

has been raked raw.
Patterns emerge in the dust of the dying
leaves that for a month held
intermittent beauty, cloaks of colors
deterring thoughts of coming
cold.  Stored chlorophyll is bartered
for water until the forest stands
naked and nondescript.




April Salzano teaches college writing in Pennsylvania where she lives with her husband and two sons.  She is currently working on a memoir on raising a child with autism and several collections of poetry.  Her work has been twice nominated for a Pushcart Prize and has appeared in journals such as Convergence, Ascent Aspirations, The Camel Saloon, Centrifugal Eye, Deadsnakes, Visceral Uterus, Salome, Poetry Quarterly, Writing Tomorrow and Rattle.  Her first chapbook, The Girl of My Dreams, is forthcoming in spring, 2015, from Dancing Girl Press.  The author serves as co-editor at Kind of a Hurricane Press (www.kindofahurricanepress.com)

A Poem by Kelley White

I Remember Tree

branches sky a bird's nest bird feathers falling moss lichen dry stone what my father said I listened he told hawk sky the pellet the owl dropped that one caterpillar twisting on a thread silk thread the little pines stunted by wind the great rock grown blueberries I showed you the place where the mountain opened to sky above the lake forever forever bear track moss swamp feet wet and the walking all the brook barefoot down to the village and I remember I do not forget climbing crawling on hands and knees on ice all that lived in that world below ice and cold air what mittens touch and ice you how beautiful ice looked in the days of love did we do that did we make ourselves climb the same path day by day at dawn how many days that gift you gave me before love deep in the forest forest the same path everyday you gone but the picture walking away from me down the hill snow to the broken down house the house abandoned the broken windows roof darkness almost but colors colors of carnival glass around the bowl of the meadow sky you going and legs sinking into snow my big boots dog under the house cat waiting on the hill the small birds fences wire and the meadow sinking into trees the small creek that only flows in spring the rock bed the quiet the quiet tent with mosquito net there by the brook that big open night and the dark trees waiting my mother what she did not know running the night wet grass in a white nightgown birds birds cricket what makes the night sound hawks

Pediatrician Kelley White worked in inner city Philadelphia and now works in rural New Hampshire.  Her poems have appeared in journals including Exquisite Corpse, Rattle and JAMA.  Her most recent books are Toxic Environment (Boston Poet Press) and Two Birds in Flame (Beech River Books).  She received a 2008 Pennsylvania Council on the Arts grant.

A Poem by Sunil Sharma

Raven

A raven drinking
Out of a small puddle
Formed rudely,
On a tar road in the
Suburban Mumbai,
On a rainy afternoon,
Blending well with the
Darkness around;
Its bobbing neck,
Giving a queer kinesis
To the little fractured pool
And the otherwise static scene.

Mumbai-based, Sunil Sharma, a college principal, is also widely-published Indian critic, poet, literary interviewer, editor, translator, essayist and fiction writer.  He has already published three collections of poetry, one collection of short fiction, one novel and co-edited five books so far.  His six short stories and the novel Minotaur were recently prescribed for the undergraduate classes under the Post-colonial Studies, Clayton University, Georgia, USA.  He is a recipient of the UK-based Destiny Poets' inaugural Poet of the Year award -- 2012.

Two Poems by Paul Tristram

A Great Spotted Woodpecker

How very lucky I am indeed
to spy your woodland bouncing course
as you grasp at vertical tree bark
and entice me into a sudden
quick-footed game of hide-and-seek.
Peekaboo-ing at me from around
the other side of the tree trunk.
Beautifully Regal, Novel and Majestic
in your mask and cloak of ebony
and ermine with a tantalizing
touch of red to add a splash of magic.
Oh, a Springtime day has never
been wasted if I get to see you
in person or to hear you a-drumming.
Ah, it warms the cockles of my heart
to see your lovely colours a-shining.



Tawny Owl

Something instinctively pulls me sideways
from the gentle afternoon pathway,
through the bushes and thick undergrowth,
inwards to the heart of The Forest of Dean.
After awhile the intricate entanglement
holding my focus captive around my legs
stops fighting and gives way
and there before me lays a silent and dark
green Cavern of trees, massive and majestic.
The many trunks coming down uniformly
in sentinel columns to a mossy ground,
a veritable patchwork of shades and hues.
there is a strange almost spectral feel
created by the scattered bursts of sunlight
shooting through the living canopy above
to the ground like Heavenly arrow shots.
Just off centre heaps an old greying, broken,
twisted tree whom holds my gaze magically.
I step forward towards it and a stick snaps
beneath my trespassing boot, the sound of it
rises up and echoes across before me.
A Tawny Owl falls silent from the old tree,
circles up in a brown and white flecked
arc and beats slowly off in that direction.
As I watch I feel an ancient stirring within me,
I have learnt something profound and magical
here today, a seed has been birthed within me.

Paul Tristram is a Welsh writer who has poems, short stories, sketches and photography published in many publications around the world, he yearns to tattoo-porcelain bridesmades instead of digging empty graves for innocence at midnight, this too may pass, yet.  You can read his poems and stories here:  http://paultristram.blogspot.co.uk/

Two Poems by Martins Iyoboyi

Through Brambles

Through brambles rears the
Flowered eye, blushing in
Sun's coaxing shimmers.  Pollen
Suitors ride in winds to woo,
Clasp in soft embraces.  And
Now narrow path had been the
Route of passage, frustrating hopes,
When by ripening lights, the
Ruddy bud greets the dawn.



Raindrops

Raindrops beat upon the rooftops
Of the mind, pebbles smear toilsome
Strains in alleys where fear roamed wild.
God is hard to come by here, for
In shrill dizziness, cowhide drums
Beat retreating steps to heavens' gates.
The universal mind consumes midnight summons
Of judgment, sensuous peaks cleanse
Burdened debts cascading to matter.

Half-dead hearts, led to servitude
Accuse peace-halls of impotent eyes.
The gross will stands amidst fueling strife,
With lengthened cobwebs gathering vim
Caked upon the world's conscience.

Poet, dramatist and author, Martins Iyoboyi was born in Nigeria.  His published poems have been published by Zone, Bending Spoons, Flask Review, 63 Channels, International Zeitschift, Contemporary Rhyme, Munyori Poetry Journal, Rhythm, Tenemos, MotherVerse, Poetry Cemetery, Boyne Writers Group, Chiron Review, The New Verse News, Collective Fallout, and Hat.

Two Poems by Sarah Flint

Chewing the Bladderwrack

Samphire, she said, is green and good
and tastes of the mud reek creeks of the marsh
where oyster catchers call in dusk's pall.

But, she said, brown bladderwrack is better
infused with iodine and ozone from the sea's soul
and plucked from the tide's fingers as it falls.
It has the flavour of shells, pounded shingle and krill.



Perfume

I will make a box.
A box that comes from the dirt,
that is molded by crackling frost and parching sun
and that smells of wet soil after rain.

I will make my box from
the bark of Eucalyptus
with a lid of quilted hosta.
It will be lined with satin magnolia
and have hinges of antirrhinum.

I will embellish my box with
the eye of viola
the tooth of sumach
the claw of pyracantha and
the tongue of digitalis

I will put in my box
a drop of the blood of euphorbia
the heartbeat of helianthus
the sigh of gypsophila and
the breath of Daphne

I will keep the box in a dark and cool place
for several weeks until
it rots and withers away
And then I shall press it between my hands
until the sap runs
and from this liquid
I will make a perfume that only I understand.



Sarah Flint loves to get soil under her nails, twigs in her hair and to put interesting words in an interesting order.  She has had some of her more poetic word combinations published online.