Nandita Samanta writes

Mind Games 

In a dystopian mind--
thoughts are like stars 
that collide with each other
and shoot hot fumes.

Corrupt hunger, truthful intent,
latent impulses, groping axioms
a mess of stress
one would ask for confusions less.
Guts in knots and
the brain is mush. 

Moments felt,
moments understood
binding grievances
pave the way for
unfettered thoughts
to have their say.

Brevity speaks
a thousand words,
bivouac of life stands
on a million swords.

The undeniable weaknesses
whisper, the bravest intentions
undeciphered, remains
the codes of a layered mind.

 -- Tomasz Alen Kopera

Joanne Olivieri shoots

Joy V. Sheridan writes

Dawn Light

Dawn light, moonlight
In finest reverie
See how dappled golden
Are those sentiments
Between you and me
In a vacuum of fright
She puts the world to right.

So who is this beauteous Queen?
With emerald and stone she is seen
Why? She is glorious morning
When songbirds caress the day
And in her array
Is an arrow sheaf of desire.

Long has she tasted the rays of Aries,
Such is the sentiment of fire,
Dawn light in dappled furore
Sheds a distant tear to the moon
Which hides behind
A rainbow shaft of dew.

See how the mirage dances,
First the one step of ancient grey,
Then to the beginnings of day,
Bringing in a chorus of dancing girls,
All lights with lustre of pearl –

Now! Glimpse what is below
The rainbow majesty of the Queen
Why? Can that be a cat
Who longs to be seen?
Such a perfect purr needs one to say
She is the loveliest of gifts
On a summer’s day
So now! Expect the unexpected
And greet it too
With a sibilant and loving heart;
It is the music
To dawn light and the arc.

 Red Sunrise -- Ken Bushe

Carl Kaucher writes

Sophia (wisdom)

She emerged from the bus

right in front of us

gracefully flowed into the park

and though it was getting dark

she was like a flower in bloom

at high noon

She was a song of eternity

a compassionate divinity

a maritime maiden of Maine

free spirit filled of delight

and at first sight, when the blues began

she atoned a summers day in Acadia

and established the heavens again

she traced the foundations of love

and has mingled her wine with the sea

She wore a prayer flag in her hair

and a spiritual music permeated the air

as she danced the village green without a care

rapt in a serenade that began before time

fashioned its sinuous flesh around our souls

and the songs of experience played

seasons of streets carved years upon her.

She was dancing freedom's tapestry,

sun catching, drifting and dreaming

like a shaman child all native wild,

blossoming sweet heroin eyes

she had the left hand of God

in her right pocket

and her moves seemed scriptural butter

like a fluid earth mother

A poetic breeze blew off the harbour

and the puffins gathered in her honour

whales sang a sweet rhyme sublime

by the island at the end of time

for Wisdom was the first to doubt

and that's how the world came about

and I was simply passing by, in a sigh

as portions of the universe

flowed from her

like words encrypted

with the genesis of bliss

Sophia -- Greg Spalenka

Iulia Gherghei writes

Another kind of spring

Death in your vision was so appetising
So voluptuous
Oh, yeah, yeah.... With her charms inciting us to sin, to commit savage debauchery
Oh, yes, yes, poet,
You deceive yourself and us too with nymphs wearing their scythe as a laurel crown
Their thighs billowing sweet angles and
the candied nipples anxiously waiting your slave kisses
Poet, what are you describing here it is not death
Only another kind of spring
Oh, yeah, yeah...

The poet answered with a smile

Lady Death -- TK Miller

George Anderson writes

Blueberries

Around noon
we head for the CPR tracks
with pint buckets
to pick the wild sweet berries.

Within twenty minutes
our work is done.

I think of as a child
how we placed our ears
on the steel rails
in anticipation of
the afternoon train.

How our crazy cousin Cooper
would crouch on an overhanging pier
near the abandoned apple canning factory.

The stainless steel Dayliner thundering past
Cooper inches from death.

I think of how our brother Bob
died tragically
after slipping down
a flight of stairs at school
& doing his knee in again

our memories of him terribly alive
as we scatter his ashes around
my grandmother’s house he loved
& visited each summer in Nova Scotia.

Now back home in Oz when I eat blueberries
I think of Bob, the long defunct Dayliner

Cooper hanging on the pier for dear life
the wonderful clanging & hoot of the train

as it flattened our coins clunking into Aylesford.

 --Ron Visockis