tinfoildresses

Dear Readers,

It is hard to believe that we are coming up on the anniversary of the magazine's inception! It has been such an honor to publish so many wonderful poets! I hope you enjoy this new issue as much as I enjoyed putting it together for you! Thank you again for taking the time to read this journal and for helping to create a commune where we can all come and drink in words.

Sincerely,

Heather Ann Schmidt

                                                                                  Sarah Ahmad

Sabotage

Conspiracy without the local hands

Carried out and delivered

Acquired collusion breaks down

Suffering the uncontrollable reaction

Wept into the match-box

Confession of a pending act

Imprisonment of the destroyed pieces

Serving the persuaded entourage

Transfer that benefits the question

Dismissal of pleas unanswered in failure

Inability to examine disasters

continue to offer the final prayer.

                                       C.B. Anderson

Drift

Coiled light, the bindings of an afternoon:

panoptic secrets still too young to share,

all borrowed from the vacant annex at

the wax museum.  Flowers having sex

with one another, bees the chaperons...

her patience toiled inside the empty cup

in front of her, contained for now, but just

a sigh away from mounting past the brim.

So would he come, or would he stand her up

as she sat waiting there?  And if he showed,

would there be music, promises, and frank

appeals to higher purpose?  If there were,

then would discordant notes or broken vows

or tainted motives stain the air?  And was

he real, or a mere figment of his non-

imagined prestidigitation?  Could

she live without a future as for years

she'd gone about her life without a past?

Though not the measure of a perfect day,

much better had she faced unquestioned answers.

The curdled clouds pile up in hard relief

against the limpid blue, but underneath:

their edges soften in a drifting haze

that gathers hour by hour; and just a tease,

gray filaments of virga nearly close

the distance from the livid nimbus bruise

to insubstantial world below, before

vanishing in the drier air -- not lost,

but held in escrow till they reappear,

unsummoned, droplets on a cheek unkissed.

Bob Baker

Sandy Benitez

The Fear of Wolves

Mothers always worry 

for their children.

But the fear is different

when it comes to daughters.  

Will she love her skin, 

have self-confidence, be 

independent, or trust herself.  

The greatest fear is the pack

of little boys circling the 

playground.  Wolf cubs unaware 

of anything but play and mock 

snarling. Their claws and 

canines sharp but unassuming.

One day, that will all change.

Once they mature, catch the scent

of a woman on a careless breeze.  

The wind will taunt with vanilla

musk, lavender, and wild strawberries.

But the most enticing scent will be

the pink peony between her thighs;  

bleeding its nectar as it blooms.

All That Remains

(for Sophia Rose)

I bled in so many ways that day.

Everyone bleeds but only mothers

hemorrhage. The pain never seems

to go away, no matter how much

motrin the doctor recommends.

It's been 12 days since sorrow

reintroduced herself to me.

I know her name by heart this time.

While the world mourned the loss

of Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson, 

I cried in silence.  Same shock. 

Disbelief.  Different reason.  

I waited for the clock to stop ticking.

To feel a flutter.  A baby's cry.

But there was none.  I yearned to hear

her heartbeat again; a hummingbird flapping

its nervous wings.  My womb her flower.

She was not just a fetus.  Non-viable.

Sophia was my child.  A little girl

who would never blink or blow kisses.

I only knew her for 17 weeks.

God created the world in 7 days.

Chaplain Teresa told me that God is love.

And that is all that remains.

                                        Harry Calhoun

Sleeping on the couch

 I could smack every pillow

beneath me tonight

and curse every black cloud

that will rise tomorrow morning

but we argued

and while the nimbus threatens

inside us I am above

smacking and want to be

above cursing. The pillow beside you

is where my head wants to be

just not where it is right now,

but the thunderstorm intruded.

It has always passed and

I pray and write this because

without you I have

nothing

left to do

Horrorshow

when I was thirteen my parents

would let me stay up late

watching Chiller Theatre

and one night at 3 a.m.

just near the end of the double feature

just as the werewolf was changing

a cat jumped onto the sill

outside the window and yowled

and I almost jumped out of my skin

forty years later I’m driving home

and my cell phone rings

and my mother is dying

and two days later is dead

and so it goes, cruising along

aware of the horrorshow around you

but mostly able to ignore it or pretend

it’s happening to someone else

until something jumps into the window

or the phone rings at rush hour

and suddenly you remember

that real horrors are the reasons

they make movies

and the element of surprise

from the trivia of the cat’s appearance

to the enormous oversight that nobody told me

my mother was ill

can startle you, shock you,

even make you nauseous.

Wildfire in spirit

last night my black Lab and I sat

under a bright full moon on the same deck

and together sniffed at a pitchy plastic scent

in the air

I woke this morning

the TV said the odd smell was from wildfires

near the Carolina coast, near the extinguishing ocean

and borne on freaky winds

so Alex and I sat on the deck

in the sultry smoke of August

early morning darkest since last October

breathed deep and tried to see

beyond the lawn into the darkened trees

it was good to breathe clean air

we experienced the wildfire without harm

sniffing it was like sensing a ghost

Youth meets the growth toward old age

briars snagging our ankles

stickers stuck in our socks

we dance on, removing the tiny barriers

tripping and slipping up the hill

to gather berries

now the overgrowth makes it hard

to reach and pick the fruit

but we keep trying

everything is still snagging

and tripping but

we have learned

to dance around it

and oh how we dance

and not just around briars and brush

and not just around death

life

finally

we have learned

to dance

with you

I forgot to make her happy

 Wine has its alcohol,

subsumed at its best in an avalanche

of flavor and nuance and change

and I became and we became

pure alcohol that without the sweet

impurities became tasteless

and toxic and I forgot

my equivalent of the winemaker’s craft:

balance, the alcohol more a side effect

of the fermentation, the beautiful craft

of bringing out the happy glow

in the cheek of the fruit

                                                    Nicelle Davis

The Tree Judas Chose

was some ornamental thing—shape of a kidney—flowers veining over

its short and red-twisted trunk. Spent his

morning watching the long

tongued carpenter-bees

suckle its blossoms.

            As the Redbud wept its violet blooms, he caught the drops

            in his mouth—bruised their petals with his

            teeth, searching for that hushed

            light. Ate until his

            stomach ached  

                        from the bitter juices. Lips stained blue, he began to vomit

                        a mellifluent river. The ground softened by his

                        currents, turned to flesh. He built a body

                        from this golden earth— a face

                        that resembled Jesus.  

            Before he could kiss the honey lips, a swarm of flies began

            to drink the shape away. Their wings shining

            like silver coins tossed into the air. He

            devoured them in an attempt

            to taste sweetness.

When he jumped, his soul broke into a thousand pieces—an army

of snakeflies humming—a chorus of apologies dying

in small increments—like a lesson in letting go

learned one fall at a time. 

When I knew / I love you—

My aunt paid for the Honeymood suit at the Ramada Inn—

its chlorine Christ-

ened whole-pool and hurricane jets kicking up the sent

of disinfectant

as our Legs, high stilts, held the house of our naked above

water. The only

time of my wedding I felt self-conscious of the bulge—twisting

gut, baby,

more excited for us to have sex than I, shaking, branch-armed—

the push of birds

migrating in the shape of trees—shadow of approach. We drank

soda-pop

from flutes to simulate adulthood. I wanted for you to want me

separate from child,

while child wanted past me to you—my stomach rippling in

response to

the warmth of your hands.

Morning after, disoriented—

lifting the covers I snuck into the adjacent room to levy my own

reassurance that all-

things can be controlled. A mound of bodies stacked and pulsing,

screaming at

the insurmountable possibilities of pleasure, my favorite fantasy—

but—instead

was you with every woman brought up in conversation. Outside

the promise

of rain was spoken by thunder—a sincere vow to strip mortar out

from walls.

Fetus rolling in the waves within me—tempest. Mounting threats

—world about to

come down—I felt the touch of weather like a thing fresh born.     

Ryan Fox

THE OLD MAN AND THE STREAM

As I drive home there are many sounds, but I hear nothing.

For I am in deep thought, thinking of the man who made me.

I think of him often, but today more than others.

I pull along side a stream, shut off the engine of my car and exit.

I step on the mud-covered embankment and inhale the aroma I have missed.

To many the smell of muddy waters and fish remains are foul and grotesque.

To me it reminds me of the Old Man in his glory.

I gaze off into the creek and I see him as clear as day.

The water rises up to his waist, while his hat slightly covers his eyes.

His hanker-chief is tied tightly around his neck absorbing beads of sweat that have

traveled down from his brow.

He reaches into his vest for his daily dose of cancer, when his rod bends into an arc.

As he reels in the beast, I whisper:  “I miss you.”

As the wind picks up my body becomes numb with Goosebumps, and I say,

“I love you too.”

“He is with me.”  I say to myself as I bid farewell to the waters.

I head for home in silence passing the scenery he may have seen on his “Farewell tour.”

Tears come to my eyes but I don’t cry.

Instead I smile and laugh, because today is his birthday.

For his gift I show him how strong I have become.

He is with me whenever I need him, and having him there brings me happiness.

                                         Howie Good

LEFT LANE MUST TURN LEFT

There was a time I might’ve enjoyed the tang of truck

exhaust following me home, or the boarded-up windows of a

discount liquor store. Then tick-borne diseases in fitted

choir robes climbed down from the scaffold and disappeared

into the crowd. I sat on the curb heartbroken. In theory

every sequence of moves ought to be reversible. But

somewhere it’s always the summer after mom died, and

raining, and the rain is passing notes to us through a

slit in the ground.

WHAT THE TELEVISION SAW

Fire splashed up at us. Please don’t yell at me, I said.

No amount of coaxing could get the canary lying on the

bottom of the cage to sing. I’m not yelling! she said

loudly. What looked like snow or ashes were scraps of

paper on which good deeds had been recorded. The fireman

remembered it as a turquoise building, with its pants

around its ankles. Guns sang. Someone covered the holes

in the screen with electrical tape, but night still got

in. We held each other. The fireman raised his ax. The

television stared back at him in awe as a crown of flies

revolved on his head.

REPAIRING THE WORLD

Out on the jetty, it’s suddenly evening,

the Atlantic as jittery as a tentative apology

and the sky beginning to bruise.

I close the book I bought in town at Tim’s,

a used life of Maimonides.

Repair the world, he commanded us,

but the gray gulls swirl upward,

dead souls caught in a spiral wind,

and in a sudden hurry, I leap

from rock to dim rock toward shore,

where, by now, it’s also too dark to read.

                                         Carol Lynn Grellas

Recollections of Summer

For breakfast we’ll lift the birch

boughs and see a deity among

the leaves. Me and you

beneath a veil of sunlight─

a cryptic message like beauty

in the watercress or the way

her casket marked an epiphany

amid opium and lace. I saw Mary's 

face when you titled your head

and said, “If we’re not careful

we could fall in love again”.

But I’m a prisoner quarantined

in dreams where secret prayers

are born. It wasn’t easy to save

you. You were always Cleopatra,

threading  grass between your teeth,

but you never taste the lightness.

I hear the peacocks cry; their wings

hidden between the magnolias.

It’s unnerving here, inside a little

patch of sunshine where this window

makes me think of you and the wind

just another voice saying goodbye.

Cruel, is the memory of candles

already blown and sitting here

somewhere beside you where my

view has turned to earth.

Poet Song

You are the sleep that finds the night

and all of night that lifts to day, you are

the way from here to there, with love

inside a Sunday prayer. You are the book

all ribbon-wrapped with whispered pslams 

heard everywhere, beneath the tiny maidenhair

you are the parsley growing free, 

you are lost and found in me, before a wingtip 

brushed the sea. You are the shades of daffodils 

with trumpets flared on golden hills

you are the blooms on windowsills

and porches trimmed with sconces hung

with clappers chiming one by one

you are the doorways in and out,

a hundred poems to write about, uncountable 

trees in camphor green with fireflies glowing

in aubergine. You are the labyrinth of hide

and seek, you are my only winning streak

You are the sparkling crystal bowl

that holds a sip to cleanse my soul.

                                  Robert Henry

Underwater and Breathing through Straws

(for Clint)

He couldn't afford cotton swabs

and if you've ever tried to clean

your ears with a kitten's tail, then

you understand his frustration.

But it wasn't dirty ears or lack of

money or even burning scratches

from pin prick claws.

It wasn't even the dusty noodles

falling apart as they boiled.

It was the grasping at stardust,

And coming back with tufts of

nothing by the handfuls. 

---

Currently Untitled #6

He daydreams about

flowing hair, and

how she twirled

with bubble wands.

She's lying beside him,

focused hard on

the gaping

pupils,

trying to watch

his soul

from the

outside.

Whispering,

"Does it die with

the body? Is it

dead already?"

He coughs blood

on her glasses

and she

blinks. 

                                         Christie  Isler

Shawn Sundance Leckey

Summer Seed

As the brave sunflower

Shamelessly lowers its head

And takes a death bow

The sun maiden’s song

Lulls into the last pentameter

Warm breeze changes

Golden days fall

And sun lovers 

Begin to weep

The winter witches enslave

Brutal harvest plows

Scavenging and tilling down

The forgotten

Breakfast with Merrick

A cool late summer breeze

Pulses through the window screen

In the hour when indigo

Begins its trek westward

The sleepy eastern horizon

Dawns a soft red glow

Merrick is awake

Babies speak and gestures

Say its time for nourishment

I prepare fruit and cereal

He begins to feed himself

A moment later

He bites the cheerio

And pushes the other half

Into my sleepy mouth

                                   Carla Martin-Wood

When I was Liberty Moonbeam

When I was Liberty Moonbeam

gypsy-skirted wonder

love beaded barefoot child

of morning gloried flowers

I wore a clover crown

plaited into red curls

and I ruled 

strawberry fields of forever

with a whole tribe

of sisters and brothers

who believed

in tambourine tomorrows

love, peace, freedom

and Alice B. brownies

even our heroes 

falling in the wake

of assassins’ bullets

and a war that wouldn’t go away

didn’t dull the optimism

of every tie-dyed sunrise

when life was a summer 

of love in that enchanted Wood-

stock of a new Tree in the Garden

we were out to change the world

with our brave new promise

swaying together in mystic unity

to Pearl, who sang down power

with her whiskey colored voice

as Jimi’s guitar

shot electric through our blood

and we could overcome

anything

today at the supermarket

I park in the handicapped space

knees not what they were

see Smack Jack Jones

old head still grows his own

grey hair flowing half-way down his back

he grins at me, remembers

when I was Liberty Moonbeam.

A Pacifist Visits Arlington to Explain

"Gonna lay down my sword and shield/ Down by the riverside/ Ain't gonna study war no more."

-- Down By the Riverside, Traditional gospel and protest song 

Barely September,

and the prematurely fallen

skitter in brief review

’cross diligent grass.

Golden, they are

and too soon leaving 

barren arms 

of sycamore and oak.

I never marched to war,

but marched against it; 

yet, here amongst cold regiments of stone, 

stand humbled 

by these thousands of the fallen,

who came to peace at last

through gates of war.

I honour them,

though told I had no honour,

who proudly marched with signs

instead of guns

whose battlecry was always

Bring them home!

They never knew

I loved them, every one.

Nor knew my tears

each time a soldier fell,

seeing it needless loss,

a bootless hell,

vexed by the mortal cost,

and that this world can't coexist

in peace.

Brave soldiers 

in a cause that was not mine,

I pray you each held close

a thing divine,

before death closed your eyes,

a thing you loved

more than flag or country,

or frail life,

that where you are

you study war no more.

                                             Nicole Mayes

Those Days

I miss those oh so simple days…those I can’t wait to get out of school & get out of these school clothes so I can go outside & play days…those I rock rough & tough with my two afro puffs & my one braid on the side days

Those mama used to pop me on the knuckles with a brush when she was doin my hair cause I wouldn’t be still days

Those red light green light, duck duck goose, simon says, mother may I, hid & go seek, and tag days…those bubble gum bubble gum in a dish, no Way am I being it days…those damn…I can’t wait to grow up & move out on my own days…those never felt alone cause there was always someone there days

Those I’ll lay down but no way am I closing my eyes & takin a nap days…those chasing the ice cream truck down the block days…those it’s too hot so we gotta take the cap off the fire hydron just to get the block popping days

Those waking up early on Saturday mornings to watch cartoon days…those I can’t wait to go to school to play Oregon trail days…those no belt today go outside & pick a switch days…those never thought I’d miss those days

Those days…when we used to play power rangers on the playground & I always had to be the purple ranger…I used to be pissed cause they always made me be a ranger who wasn’t even real, but now would I wouldn’t give to be back at lebaron on that merry go round invisible sword in my hand being the purple ranger again

Those days…like those days when I used to be carefree and fearless…like sitting on the roof of our two story house in Flint when I was like six & somebody snitched & mama came up stairs and beat the shit outta me

Back when the only thing I had to worry about was beating doctor robotnic so I could move on to the next level

Those days…I miss those days when the magic 8 ball & mash told my entire future…I’m still waiting on my mansion

I miss those oh so simple days…like as simple as writing on a piece of paper do you like me?...check yes, no, or maybe & passing it to your crush & him passing it back after he checked maybe, which you were consent with cause that was as good as yes

Those days when captain planet was the hero & you just knew that he was gonna take pollution down to zero…those days when I couldn’t wait for pinky and the brain to take over the world & it was obvious that Patty Mayonnaise should’ve been Doug Funny’s girl

Those days when I just knew that me & K-Ci were meant to be & “Forever My Lady” was all about me…back when Bel-Air was the place to be & Will Smith was the prince to see

Back when Nickelodeon used to be the shit with…Allegra’s Window, Gullah Gullah’s Island, Camp Walla Walla, Rimba’s Island, My Brother & Me, Cousin Skeeter, The Secret World of Alex Mack, Are You Afraid of the Dark, Clarissa Explains It All, Hey Arnold, Rugrats, & All That

Those days…like if I could just get my hands on a time machine, the only place where I would want it to transport me would be the 90s…jus so I can be a kid again…because in hindsight…like Bryan Adams said…Those were the best days of my life 

                                                     Eric Miller

Cinema

On a palette of swirling black, white,

and gray images, a parade of actors

and actresses march and carry me

off to a former time.

Some I have never seen; others I saw

in the twilight of their careers. Yet,

there is a comforting familiarity about

them all, even if I am watching them

for the very first time.

These are the stars on whom the eyes

of my parents shined. It was about them

and

the characters they played that my

parents spoke with an affinity filled with

excitement and appreciation. I see my

mother, happy and animated, as she

recreates her evening out for me.

I know that I immerse myself in these old

films, not so much for the films themselves,

as much as I enjoy them in their own right,

but for the memories they stir of my parents,

memories which help me appreciate the

influence they had on my life: my thinking,

my mannerisms, and my regrets.

These swirling black, white, and gray images

of early Hollywood are my personal Rorschach

inkblot test.

                                    Sergio Ortiz

Topography

 this is my story

and place of birth

a wheelchair

a body wrapped in a sack

a childhood jerked around

like an unwarranted curse

and the stubborn useless desire

 for a pair of tailored hands

 climbing up my thighs

                           Marc Pietrzykowski

Following Ghosts Upriver, 2

Grinding up through the Cumberland gap

in a rented panel truck

stuffed with boxes of wine and oil,

umbrellas, socks, all the detritus

plucked and condensed from

the Kuiper belt of objects

drawn into orbit by the force of our habits

and our habits’ habits;

grinding up from Atlanta

and its nest in the piedmont,

from a New City full of nothing

but a surging tide of options

and derivatives, upon which floats

all the usual trophies desired

by souls who believe money

the fruit of all good. Atlanta is no

sprinting maiden stopping

for golden apples, nor is Hippomenes’

golden youth alive in the sun;

no, it is there, in the stall

at the edge of the crowd,

the one selling souvenir fruit

painted gold, and silver too—

that is where Atalanta lives,

and she carries water and food

in to the merchant, suffers his rapes

and belt, dreams of killing him,

taking over the stall, bronzing his organs

and placing them among the wares…

And so we grind up out of her lap,

over the piedmont, through the gap

into Tennessee, the same verdant, endless

ripple of ridges dusty, pocked soldiers

once stumbled home over,

bred between, built clapboard churches

and radio towers upon,

learned to sell fireworks and horses along...

the truck rocks and strains going up,

rocks and hums going down,

lulls us both but we are together

in America and so each take turns

jarring the other awake. On the plateau

we nod at horses dappling the late

afternoon fields, listen

to preachers shouting about God

and Liberals, about Just Rewards

and Welfare Queens, about the many

Righteous Wars they believe themselves

to be fighting. Night is sudden,

or we missed the last light wink off,

and the trucks take over, headlights

meld into serpents, erupt from

behind crests ahead, blast the interior

of the truck cab and drag boxy shadows

along your sleeping face. Alone

in America, on our way home, Kentucky

and Ohio and Pennsylvania

announcing themselves

from the shoulder, spreading varieties

of highway greenery and cardboard hotels

before us, we have only to stop

and stretch out beside

a gas pump, watch aging motorcyclists

adjust their pants, offer

money to the young cashier, her face

a coiled snake ready to strike,

to understand: we are not alone

in America, or anywhere else;

we are not even ourselves,

but then we get back in the truck

and begin to move again

along the road, to forget

that you and I are fictions,

and then faith creeps in like mold

and the stories start to tell themselves,

and we are: almost there,

hoping we have left behind

Atlanta, the piedmont, all the things

we once drove toward.

                   The child

cries out in the night not

to see if his mother still exists

but to remind himself that he does;

so it is with the highways

of America, each car a cozy bed

sliding over monsters too slow

to catch us, every mile

another cry meant to dispel

the blind and murderous night.

Thank You For Showing Me The Way Home

--for Ashley

There's this man, and he's telling us about

another man whose memory was blasted

apart, every six seconds he restarts, the world

is new and it's 1956, because it started then,

his endless loop.

The story sets me sprawling along

fevered byways, neuronal speculative

storms, impossible things, like:

how could it ever

come to pass

that I no longer recognize

your face, in summer slanted light,

whispering to me, smiling softly?

My own brain is already damaged enough

from love that I cannot even think it,

I may as well fail to recognize my own

body surrounding me.

And so, because it may, in fact,

come to pass that my brain is blasted

and left in less exotic shreds, I've come

to offer you

these words--not much, I know,

but that's what I have to give, and before you

were my life I had

not even such a little thing

as a poem

of love.

                                                      Derek Richards

homesick on kelly street

the scent of rain on hot pavement

is the open window aroma

of kelly street

where her wounded perfume

continues to vibrate off the pillows

where an empty fifth

of cheap whiskey

rolls lazily across the floor

the maple-tinged lipstick

of a french quarter prostitute

stains the gallon of milk

souring in the refrigerator

a reminder of lost walks

filthy tongues

tasting of loneliness

and where is the symphony of sirens

bouncing sharply

between alley walls?

where is the cool shine of a switchblade

gripped by nerves

thrust into a caress against the weak skin

of trembling throat?

the stutter barks of wayward dogs

serve as beacons for the starved

a meal still fresh

and disguised as trash

i sort through her old photos

a life preceding kelly street

long arms tan and clean

my eyes remain tired, dry, red

blood fiction

our mother never loved you.

so you decorated streetcorners,

my leather jacket

jesus christ

of miracles, cigarettes and pretty girls.

i would point to you

that's my older brother,

he's tough, cool,

everyone loves him

except our mother.

she never taught him manners,

how to tie his shoes.

never fried him bologna with mac and cheese.

so you wrote poetry about the hustlers

and junkies and thieves,

the jazz of winter saxophones

and summertime cannibals.

i would read your words and think

that's my older brother

he's smart, deep,

no one else deserves him

except our mother.

she never got to name him,

argue with his lost soul.

never offered him direction

with addresses of home.

i always wanted an older brother.

you were perfect.

you never existed.

                                                  Kimberly Ruth

Unfortunately, it is never yesterday

Yesterday I met my husband in a bookstore.

In the poetry section.

We talked about truth-

filled words of a man with two

names and how cool it would be to live

twice.

He invited me to join him

for a cup of coffee and he confessed

that he did not know the answer to war.

It was raining outside.

He pointed out a puddle on the ground

and we fell asleep talking

as silent figures made love.

Today, I walked out of a bookstore

swatting at a fly.

                            Christina Querrer

On My Fortieth Birthday

In forty years the world did not transform

on my account. It continues to revolve

on its foundation, plodding inconsolably along.       

I thread my poems into its seams, hoping

my sutures will keep. At times

it seems too much, the overflow

of anguish: tsunamis, earthquakes,

volcanoes. It might as well be the rapture

and I might as well have gone with the sinners,

dealing with stolen property, selling my body,

murderous ploys against myself.

The hands that planted, the body that loved—

all metrically defined by unconscious

celestial ordinances. In forty more years

I hope the rainforests will still be wild

despite all this anguish and thunderous waterfalls

rouse the silence and men humble                             

themselves to its willfulness, as night and day

humble themselves to each other

all in sequential order. In forty more years

may I continue to burn sage for my worries,

eat berries covetously and chant during

rainstorms. When I depart, may I mourn

my everyday clothes.

                                       Louisa Spina

OCTOBER VALENTINE

Trace the steps of death

All the way

Back

To the cage

Where life squeezes you into flesh

Pressing memory

Like an iron

That burns

Desire.

Checking for a pulse?

This tone has flat lined

Into the future.

Ready for

The Quiet Sacrifice

Hurry now

the sun is racing up 

toward the sky line

rose pink

your flesh

crimson

like your blood.

I hold you

as

rosary beads

of perspiration

pray down the sides

of your face.

Surrender.

Your are mine

forever.

Free again.

To love the way

You breathe

and

loving you, loving this

I am hungry again.

Tender and warm

I like my steak grilled

Just a flash

Of fire.

Searing life.

No animal can challenge

My appetite.

Tooth and nail,

I WILL find you.

A cross if you choose,

Or we can just

Swap tents.

                                                                        MOTHER VISITS IN OCTOBER

  The wind was busy

slapping summer against

my window

all night

 Autumn drove her

   green

  to the curb.

  While,

 Nature’s guardians

 frisked her 

  for any contraband.

 Orange and yellow

 Red.

 Her cheeks flushed,

    As she turned her back

      In defiance of her mothers hand.                                                                   

                                       Andrew Taylor

Colour Me In

Cassettes made

together alone

you’d sit on the ship’s chest

phone to ear having cooked

smoking relaxing         a natural position

your perfumed room

a nest a sanctuary      away from

domestic strife

Stevie Nicks on your mind

she’d have coke blown up her arse

borrowed sweatshirt   Royal Corps of Transport

borrowed denim          Levis

small feet painted nails

tucked under

I’d read about Damien Hirst

in The Observer magazine

together yet alone

until gone midnight when

we’d share a drink

you’d take the pen

and

colour me in

Double Yellow

Substance 1987 River Dee the bottle green MG

walled city tidal charts in back pockets consumed

by season songs a need to be found reassured

rescued driven away from childhood countryside

to light filled one-way systems seeking other rivers

where we’d row peaceful in the gaze of youth turning

photographed hand in hand parked on double yellow

lines skipping smiling ripping parking tickets into bits

Shellshock 1987 Albert Dock city fringes token gesture

Dock Road driving back to Bootle lunchtime Hugh Baird

knowing the role he played dual carriageway traffic lights

South Park War Memorials glassed basketball courts walks

to the Strand meeting Jonny fresh from Building Studies

second-hand ‘Power Corruption and Lies’ 19th birthday

Llandudno heart breaking naïve guesthouse windows lit

by carriage lamps pier battered by the sea garage forecourts

sanctuary before the 24 hour opening age chocolate Coca-Cola

4 Star Queensferry 1970s traffic jam the turn for Wales

1963 1986 counting stars canal bank escapades 4.00am light

enough for morning walkers Tithebarn Lane route home fresh

dew coating The Delph St Thomas’s salmon coloured sandstone

lanes awoken by hedgerow birds tales of newspaper delivery ink

stained fingers early morning lone time same faces same places

walks along The Pads to the Old School cabbage fields

undeveloped Rainbow Drive unable to leave for the single bed

for you to drive through the racecourse and back to Bootle

                                                  Serena Tome

Play Date

 I forgot to pay the light bill.

Darkness slowly begins to walk across the room.

Strangely, a little girl appears.

We light candles,

            drink tea on the patio,

                        play in the rain,

                                    and ignore the dirty dishes in the sink.

The electric company says my power will be restored.

                                    I feel sad.

I fear we will not see each other again   until I am old,   

                        when I become her once again.

***

When Shadows Dance

 I walk along a sidewalk,

whistling in concert with the wind,

as leaves sweep against my feet.

Day and night change shifts

as shadows dance around me.

I wonder if death will come this way.