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POET'S NICHE . . .

new poems posted every few weeks

RAISON D'ETRE
March 7, 2017

I have lived a life, fair by me
But the journey has been pained and long
The color which once filled my world
Has dulled like some forgotten song
I wonder when the days grew dim?
I've wandered far too long
In dreams that trump my lust for life
Raison D'etres vivid prong
But you destroyed my trudging
With the color of your eyes
Cause everywhere you look and touch
My ambivalence does die
I care not why or how
I care only that you can
I want to see the world like you
With color, sound and hope so grand
So, I'll follow every step
And be there by your side
If I can't find my reason for life
I'll watch yours until I can

Damian C. King
Van Nuys, CA

LOVE’S LOSINGS
March 7, 2017

Passage of breath before brain stores what’s said:
unhampered hints, blood’s rush, carouse, hair’s tousle,
plenteous meet of mouths, not overtried or denied.
Against the world, flush heart alone was shield,
though, so unguarded, we later dealt
the truth of selves – gestures turned to habit,
platitudes exchanged, false excuse,
resentments, subtle entailments of sly ruse.

When much is gone as though much had not been
and memory lies waste in canceled books
and I in search scrape with broken twig
what mind puts mind to, the branch itself
erasing as it seeks, for courtesy I underwrite
this debt, poeticizing love I half forget.

Harvey Steinberg
Lawrenceville NJ

SERENADE
February 10, 2018

It wasn’t that toothless, lecherous old goat in Rome
with the wheezy accordion, who seemed to only serenade
and who tried to steal kisses from pretty girls. It was back
in Ohio, our usual haunt in the blackest booth. I couldn’t
read the damn menu. We just sat for our anniversary,
an empty table, no pasta, no lighted candle, no romance yet.
Where’s the bread and olive oil? Like a familiar, reliable
engine, our chit-chat idled: our day, our kids, reminiscing
our wedding, you reshuffling our guest list again after
twenty-eight years. A firefly came blinking, serenading
in slow, glowing pulses. Thinking it was a spider, menacing
ninja repelled from the ceiling, I brushed it from your shoulder –
so gallant! but with immediate regret as we ordered;
I sought it out and there it flew, crooning for another couple.

Daniel David
Berlin Heights, OH

A COLLISION OF HEARTS
February 10, 2018

Did you ever --
not to use a trite expression --
   fall in love with someone upon
   coming right up to -- and smashing --
those degrees of separation and
finding none --- So the closeness
is there
upon you
This kind of encounter
   explosion and you reel
and know he is reeling too and gasping
for air
amidst the world going on
around you.

Amie Ilva Tatem
Staten Island, NY

OMAR KHAYYAM
February 10, 2018

What to do is muddled on week-ends.
From wine, I mostly get sick.
I get fat on bread.
And thou . . . you are a little sweaty, my dear.
“It’s the poetry that counts,” we agree.
There’s no way to plagiarize the Rubaiyat, we add.

So Sally and I manage over to the couch
inspirited, fisted with cold-beaded cans.
Right soon we get horny love over and done with,
to punch in TV remote visions
“Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and -- sans End!”

Then what the hell,
my moving finger hits some buttons, and having
punched, punches on.
We missed the good part,
so that’s that,
but hey there! don’t cry.

Just shows you, there’s no good way
to plagiarize the Rubaiyat.

Harvey Steinberg
Lawrenceville, NJ

A RIVERY DAY
January 5, 2018

They drew a line across the trees,
The egrets diving up the river,
Riding currents we could not see
As they plunged through the air,
So thick to them, so fine to us
We could only feel it hurrying past
Or when we dashed along so fast
We had to be careful not to stumble.
It was that racing that set us apart
From those standing still, and so the birds
Separated themselves from us at last.
They left our thoughts until this day
When we chose to look back.
I like to think that we have control
Of the atmosphere in this way,
That we can decide whither we’ll go
Or if we’ll stay and judge if the currents
Are ones we’ll ride or fight against,
Even swimming upstream if we choose.

Millard Davis
Dunnelon, FL

HARSH EPIPHANY
January 5, 2018

Mahler’s resurrection bells resounded
a bit prematurely at the concert
I went to the other night. Astounded
by prescient bird calls, I swooned, a convert
to eschatological broodings. Boy,
was I surprised by my awakening -
not to horizons of heavenly joy,
but by godless Verizon forsaking
me with a beeping cell phone! “O believe”
the chorus intoned, imbuing each word
with harmonies to heal wracked souls who grieve.
But how could I believe what I’d just heard?
Was I delivered by chorales that spell
salvation just to heed a bagatelle?

Frank De Canio
Union City, N J

THE NEWS
January 5, 2018

I stand at the microwave at breakfast and think,
“I want to call up the world,
speak with all mankind out there,
womankind too,
over the phone, one vast conference call,
unify joys, mollify grievances,
deter war, delegitimate fear,
gather, in one swoop together,
ancestors, progeny, animals unlike us,
transcendentally everything.”

Then the beeps announce
the coffee’s reheated,
my toast is on ready,
my apprehension says
the Sunday Times
is perched on the table
to scatter the world.

Harvey Steinberg
Lawrenceville, NJ

“1948-1959”
December 12, 2017

I’m a Doo-Wop-er,
There aren’t many of us around,
Not because of the sound,
‘cause many are under the ground.

But not me,
I’m here to stay,
Merely temporarily!
Harmonizing,
Vocalizing,
As though it was yesterday!

C’mon.
Sing along with me.
Your favorites and mine,
‘til the end of time!

“You’re A Thousand Miles Away”,
“Earth Angel”,
“Speedo”,
“Sincerely”,
I love you all so-so dearly!

Peter LaVilla
Sunny Isles Beach, Fl.

HUM
December 12, 2017

In the silence of the night
I am no longer me
No longer a man
But a collection of woes
I sit, in judgement
In fear
In pain
In silence
That which most take solace in
I cannot have
For all that waits for me
Is my decomposition
I must have life
Loud, brilliant, distracting
Perhaps a little conversation
petty, vain, sultry
Or at least some music
Any kind really
Even just vocals
A bird's song?
Maybe just some noise?
To keep me alert, awake
Or a hum
Please God, a hum

Damian C. King
Van Nuys, CA

LAST DAY
December 12, 2017

I take for granted there’ll always be
Vacation summertime by the sea.
It’s been a constant throughout my life
From parents, friends and since then with wife.

At sixty years I have less than more
Vacations left for me by the shore.
And still I never grow tired of,
For I feel never to have enough.

I know someday it may be alone
That I return to this comfort zone.
No friend or family will remain,
And only ocean to soothe the pain.

Why thoughts so morbid when sun shines bright
With ocean waves rolling left to right?
For surely I will be back next year.
Why contemplate what may not be near?

Perhaps because when tomorrow comes,
I leave behind surf and sand and sun.
Vacation annual’s at the end,
Another year till return again.

Raymond HV Gallucci
Frederick, MD

PALAZZO PITTI
Novermber 18, 2017

On the Palazzo Pitti payphone (a dearth of art near the men’s room),
after the operator’s “pronto,” static cleared, roar of the Atlantic,
five thousand miles between us, naively awed how our voices carried
intimately through wires, satellites, we described our vistas, our
respective hemispheres: in Florence, a Renaissance, I’d just gawked
at Raphael’s tondo, Madonna of the Chair, Mary and fidgety toddlers,
Jesus and John the Baptist. Did these boys throw tantrums?
Mary glared from the canvas, perturbed, “Won’t you tend one?”

In Ohio, a surrealist’s vision at ninety-five degrees, Dali’s watches
would melt (I recall a flaming giraffe): the garbage truck caught fire
during our conversation, I am certain, the result of spontaneous
combustion; the driveway impassable, no Vacation Bible School
for the kids – just as well as our son posed disconcerting
questions on the logic of Noah, arks, floods and longevity.

Daniel David
Berlin Heights

HIS DESK
Novermber 18, 2017

She stood by his desk
head slightly bowed   eyes down
as she waited for him
to get off the phone   He looked so
competent   a detail-oriented manager
On top of anything
that came across his desk
She waited
shifting from foot to foot
in too-tight shoes
Her long-ish black wig
caused her head to throb but she got it
because he was so much younger
and married – as she was
but she wanted to present to his eyes
a pleasing sight to rest on
for those few minutes
that she had to stand at his desk
with a question.

Amie Ilva Tatem
Staten Island, NY

October 30, 2017

The aging Artist
what does she have to say…
what’s the pattern for her design
can she speak of her anger at the madness around her
can she paint the dark, whirling passions
can she speak of her understanding of the fragility of life
can she speak of her frustrations
     of no longer being able to fight the daily battles
can she speak of her understanding that the children will fall
     she can’t pick them up
     they have to create their own design
can she speak of her understanding of the pain of the wars, the inequalities, the injustices
can she speak of her understanding of the small pleasures
      of laughter, dance, music, love, a child’s smile
can she explain that together this is the design

Sonia Stark
Hackensack, NJ

WOODLAND STREAMS
October 30, 2017

You were wondering just the other day
If I were out to walk along streams
And looking into the blackest water
That I could find just to see if I
Could look in deeper simply by trying
To overcome the natural darkness
That come to waters when in a woods
Where rotting acids are taken in
As a matter of necessity, as if choice
Were not to be had so I was using there
What I had and then trying to look in
On what was deeper and maybe better
Than the surface film that might cover up
Without even knowing what it was hiding.

Millard Davis
Dunnelon, FL

DON’T GO GENTLY
October 30, 2017

Would you rather go
Calmly like the snow,
Or with memory
Of a crushing sea?

Ghosts seem seldom seen
If they died serene.
Most of manifests
Come from violent deaths.

Spectres who replay
How they died that day
Aren’t asleep in bed
Or perceive they’re dead.

Those who weren’t prepared
Likely felt quite scared.
Trauma from accursed
Death must be dispersed.

If there’s afterlife,
May require strife.
Peaceful ones who passed
Leave naught left to last.

Raymond HV Gallucci
Frederick, MD

HADRIAN
October 30, 2017

Little soul, you who will now
go off to places pale and barren, tell me –
how’s a man’s life measured? Do I pass?

I modeled discipline, killed
skillfully, ruled well.
Kept Rome in splendor. Walls fortified,
tall arches gleaming.
The Jewish rebels crushed.

Only happiness eluded me.
Yoked to a tart-tongued wife;
love swallowed by the sea’s cold throat.

In the end, what matters?
Have I won?
I have an empire, an army,
but no partner in my bed, no son
to give my crown.

Alison Stone
Nyack, NY

note: The first two lines come from a poem by Hadrian: “Little soul, wandering and pale, guest and companion of my body, you who will now go off to places pale, stiff, and barren, nor will you make jokes has had been your wont.

THE HUNTER
October 11, 2017

The hunter sees all that moves
As game to shoot –
Blood in the sky and creeks
Behind bushes and distant peaks.
The hunter and the hunted
Are bound by ancient ruthless
Rules of plunder
With no sense of natural wonder,
The glorified hunter
Seeks his prey
And creatures of the earth
Must pay his price and die
For the thrill and reward
From a bow or the bullet.

The rhino's horn
Sawed off for men
To feel manly again
And elephant tusks are hacked
For the carver's tool.
Oh yes, a reason
For every treason.

This time an albino deer
Is brought down
By a 10 year-old.
It's quite a catch
To talk about
Among his peers
At school today.

Bill Katz
Hartford, CT

THE SUBLIME
October 11, 2017

There was a moment when all obsession,
a maelstrom swirling about my head fell
away, an intoxicating irrelevance. A splendid,
instinctual logic took hold in the vortex,
the doctor’s waiting room. I found my footing,
dipping, rocking, tiptoeing about, cradling
my daughter, her limp, delirious misery, little
cub, fawn, kit, little chimp, limbs clinging, curls
and febrile brow crushed against my neck.
The weight of her helplessness was, simultaneously,
beautiful and terrifying (nevermind Romanticism’s
sublime) waiting for the diagnosis, a peek in furious
ears, wincing at grape syrup, her small sighs of sleep.

Daniel David
Berlin Heights, OH

SHARED BREADTH
WHOSE AIR IS IT ANYWAY?
October 11, 2017

The air you breathe
From where does it come?

How far did it travel
to get to your lungs?

What land did it visit;
what sea did it glide?

To avoid the Sun
in what cloud did it hide?

So…down from the sky,
or…up from the ground?

Is my next breath yours,
ours, both and or none?
And when you exhale
where does it go?

Joseph W. Neumayer
New Hyde Park, NY

A ROCK ‘n ROLL SONNET
September 29, 2017

A rock ‘n roll sonnet,
Is a bonnet,
It’s food for the head,
Doggone it,
Written by muses
Who are now dead.

Petranka wrote of Dark Ages,
Medieval Times,
Shakespeare gave us beauty and love
In fourteen lines,
Browning and Whitman,
Milton and Keats,
Wrote with heart and soul,
Sonnets alas rock ‘n roll.

Peter LaVilla
Sunny Isles Beach, Fl.

WORTH
September 29, 2017

The woman with the cropped dyed blond hair
mini dress and stilletto heels
paced up and down
on the tiles of the casino bathroom
phone to her ear --- she yelled, her voice shrill
"I need them this weekend!"
Women came and went
toilets flushed faucets spouted
someone was mopping the tiles
around the pacing woman in stilletto heels
"That's not enough!"
Her voice got louder --- the heels clicked faster
"We're worth more." The beat of the heels was staccato
the voice of the woman was hoarse as it resounded
throughout the ladies' bathroom
As women came and went --- she stayed and paced
"We're worth more", she whispered, her voice breaking ---
"We're worth more."

Amie Ilva Tatem
Staten Island, NY

ARACHNE
September 29, 2017

Every story starts
in the body.

A need felt.
Filled

or thwarted.
Pushed from the belly,

passions
string themselves out.

Lies unspool
their sticky silk.

Warp, woof
the crisscrossing threads.

Betrayals shimmer over intricate
patterns of loss.

Who can turn away?
Caught in the myth’s weave,

the listener – immobile,
rapt.

Alison Stone
Nyack, NY

THE POMPOUS POSSUM
August 24, 2017

Posit once the pompous possum
Who had praises heaped upon him.
Could he ever hope to blossom
Into more than fossil flotsam?

What about the squalid skunk
Who was always told he stunk?
Maybe could escape his funk
By pretending he was drunk?

Finally the fervent frog
Deep in thought upon his log,
Might he seem a bit agog
To be gone from boring bog?

Raymond HV Gallucci
Frederick, MD

WHERE I AM FROM
August 24, 2017

No one thinks I am American
My mirror is my name.
In quiet moments it reflects a tree,
or a lake whose surface I must fracture
to find roots.

How many times have I been asked
where I am from?
It is not enough to say,
“I am from a place where the wind
has no road.”
They want to know its origins.

Christina Turczyn
–Midland Park, NJ

ROSES TO STARS
July 26, 2017

In the spring I held a quivering crystal star in the satin soft heart of my blossom and when the morning came to shoo the night I tenderly, reluctantly relinquished the warmth of my star and wept wistful golden tears of dew into the early earth in hopes that she would soon return…

Mark Ellis
Syracuse, New York

LOVE IS LIKE
July 26, 2017

Love is like the ocean,
Full of promises and devotion,
Where ripples turn into waves,
Bringing happiness and emotion.

Love is like a new born child,
Bright-eyed, contagious-smile,
Pinky-fingers, twinkle -toes,
A button-nose, the color-rose.

Love is like an Eternal Spring.
Love is my everything.

Peter LaVilla
Sunny Isles Beach, Fl.

I KNEW THERE WAS A WAR
July 4, 2017

I knew there was a war
because we used ration books
I didn't know that children
were dying elsewhere
I knew there was a war
because there were blackout drills
my father was a warden ---
and wasn't the darkness fun!
I didn't know that children
were dying elsewhere
I knew there was a war
when I heard the radio news
over and over -- that fateful day
about a Pearl harbor and I walked
up to strangers on the sidewalk --- repeating it --asonly a four-year old
could -- because of my sister Pearl, of course
We were all doing fine --- my mother let me
tear pages from the ration book for corn flakes ---
I didn't know that children
were dying elsewhere.

Amie Ilva Tatem
—Staten Island, NY

CALIGULA
July 4, 2017

If I’m not safe,
no one is safe.

My meat poisoned;
now, like rain,

let blood wash clean
the streets of Rome.

Little Soldier Boot, my ass.
No part of me is small.

Only a fool
can’t see I am a god.

Sisters, lovers, rivals, senators…
so many ways

to make a body tremble.
So many little deaths.

Alison Stone
—Nyack, NY

TECHNICALITIES
July 4, 2017

Technical reality
Must pre-empt legality,
Lest become a fallacy
We’re assuring safety.

When regulate by letter
Despite all knowing better,
Become aid and abettor --
Just a sad enabler.

When politics the reason
To perpetrate malfeasance,
“Legalities” make pleasing
Façade behind to hide.

So honest must step forward,
Denouncing the untoward,
No matter if feel cowered.
Let conscience be their guide

Raymond HV Gallucci
—Frederick, MD

MARBLE PORTRAIT OF A MAN
(originally identified as Julius Caesar)
June 17, 2017

No fame, no venerated name.
No gold-bloated purse. No army
honored to die for my whim.
I’m a nobody, only notable
for the broad forehead, narrow chin,
and long, scrawny neck that mirror
his face more closely
than any blood kin.

Play up the resemblance,
I ordered, and the artist
did his work so well,
no viewer can be certain
if the sculpture shimmers
with my own or borrowed light.

Alison Stone
—Nyack, NY

1939: FOR BILLIE HOLIDAY
June 17, 2017

Proud voice
surfacing
like nothing
they had ever known,
beyond the calla-lily
blood-white cold
of dormitories, stars
turning soundlessly to stone,
you sang,
from the rising river in your
bone
until there was nothing
until there was nothing
to fear
but depth
dangerous and beautiful

Christina Turczyn
–Midland Park, NJ

RICHARD BURNS HIS DRAWINGS
May 29, 2017

That’s a nice one, I tell him.
Yeah, but I cut her legs off, he says,
shoving her excited arms through the black doorway of the potbelly stove.

Wow, I say, peeling another from the stack.

We’re on stained canvas chairs in his studio.
Graybearded and smudged, his thick body bends to the light.

There’s a lot happening in the torso, he nods. I love the breasts.
But I drew her neck too long. And her head’s a little small. Flames
fan her away, charcoal fluttering to ash.

His mouth lengthens, eyebrows fly into pink creases.
This one I could work. Bring out the contrasts.
Deepen the values. Strengthen the lines.

Yes, I say. There’s something in that gesture. The way she’s turning, looking. Beautiful!

            It’s cheap paper, he says. It’ll disintegrate in twenty years.

            Twenty years? Hell, I’ll take her.

But no. She goes into the fire.

Henry Hughes
–Monmouth, OR

“ROMANCING ROMANCE”
May 29, 2017

I like pasta,
I like beans,
I like butter,
On top of my greens.
A dish of jello
Red or yellow,
Topped with roasted nuts,
Or, melted marshmallow,
Happy-happy, happy fellow.
A beautiful woman,
Candlelight and time,
Chilled glasses,
Sparkling wine,
Soft music,
Whisper-like conversation,
A kiss on the lips,
Great expectations.
Happy-happy, happy fellow.

Peter LaVilla
–Sunny Isles Beach, Fl.

NO TURNING BACK
(Based partially on the movie “Sarah’s Key,” about the Vel' d'Hiv[er] Roundup of Parisian Jews in July 1942 by the French police, collaborating with the Nazis[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vel'_
d'Hiv_Roundup])
May 11, 2017

If you turn on your own,
It’s an evil you’ve sown
That you carry alone
Once your crime becomes known.

With the Vel d’Hiver
France conspired to wear
Nazi swastika bare
And promote their despair.

At some traitorous word,
Fellow citizens were
Gathered into a herd
And in squalor interred.

The unlucky survived
To be shipped half-alive
To where “Arbeit Macht Frei,”
There to finally die.

France forgot how in past
They to guillotine cast
Their aristocrat class
Like the Jews Nazis gassed.

They repeated their sin
When to Nazis gave in
With their own citizens.
Shamed themselves once again.

Raymond HV Gallucci
Frederick, MD

A FEW STEPS BEHIND HIM
May 11, 2017

They used to walk as a couple
   hand in hand
   or hand through arm
And sometimes she'd rest her head
on his shoulder as they shared a laugh
   they used to laugh so much
Approaching the ice cream store now
he strides before her
and she tries to keep up
   Big with child --- a frown on her face
   and he is talking
flinging the words back at her
over his shoulder --
How can she answer ---
   a few steps behind him?
And why are they both frowning?

Amie Ilva Tatem
Staten Island, NY

THE OSEBERG BURIAL SHIP, AD 834
May 11, 2017

Whose women’s bones were these, you wonder.
Which one the cynosure,
which the acolyte? A queen? Asa?

Crushed, scattered beneath centuries
of stoneweight and earthmound, I know
these two, sheltered in my ribs.

I yielded to carvers’ blades, suffered
slam and hammer of builders who bent
and bound my oaken curves.

I heard oxen protest, shriek of horse,
whimper of pet dog. I bowed
with the weight of women’s luxury.

I suffered the rocky drag to earth’s grave,
where robbers pillaged and now
you pick my scattered bones.

My wooden breast heaves deep
for breath to tell my tale.

Ann Taylor
—Woburn, Mass

BLANCHE DANIELS
April 16, 2017

Driving off without her
should have been a warning
but he doubled around
and came back
They laughed togetheryet neither really found it funny
Should I have been driving?
her mind grappled
and from then on -- she did
and he accepted that
and she wept
Then the phone call
and hearing him angrily saying, "Blanche Daniels",
again and again --
"There is no Blanche Daniels here!"
She wept --- and he didn't notice
"Happily ever after...?"
fifty years two healthy people
She wept
and wept --- and he didn't notice.

Amie Ilva Tatem
Staten Island, NY

FLOW ©
April 16, 2017

My weakness for sweetness,
I can outgrow,
If, by mutual agreement,
The calories are low.
Carbs and starches
Are a pain in my arches,
But nothing can compete
To the additives in meat.
It seems silly to own a car,
If you don’t go very far.
Walking and jogging to keep fit are
Healthy and wise, and not so bizarre.
Yes, sometimes there is a need to know,
Than simply going with the flow.

Peter LaVilla
–Sunny Isles Beach, Fl.

DREAM'S LONG RIVER
March 17, 2017

If you want to know if there is love after war,
ask the sea. The sea has no grammar.
The sea is breath.
The sea
does not judge.

Cast a stone beneath its surface.
Think of water as your lover.
You will need to dive to that starless quiet
far beneath waves and their skin
where birth and death embrace.

What is right or wrong?
Ask the sea.
Ask dark, silent rivers of sky.
Ask blood.
Look for the difference between shards
and green glass,
survival and living.

Christina Turczyn
–Midland Park, NJ

KILLING PAINS
March 17, 2017

How did I kill him?

It was a pan:
I held tight and as he turned
In the kitchen – wham! -
I panned him and he learned!

No, it was a pen:
The long reach of writing extends
And letters hurt in their furious way -
So RIP, life ends.

Rather, 'twas a pin:
Three inches of stainless steel,
Sharpened to the finest point
Then through the eye and up till…

A 'pon
Killed him – he wandered into one -
Like entering a fairy story -
Time, time, time struck like once upon…

Of course, it was the pun:
Simple and deadly, groaning like a lover,
Wishing he had not heard she would be a nun
As he keeled over.

James Sale
–Queens Park, Bournemouth BH8

WHEN IN ROME
February 24, 2017

(The“Five Good Emperors” of the Golden Age of Rome were Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian,Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. They reigned from 96 to 180 C.E. Rome fell to the Visigoths in 410 C.E., 120 years after Aurelius died.)

Quite well before it fell, Empire Rome went through a spell
Of five of finest emperors, who brought a Golden Age.
From Nerva to Aurelius, of glories still they tell,
But aftermath of slow decline, what might it ours presage?

The five spanned nearly century when Rome was at its height.
Our country, over twice as old, can claim such a quintet?
Perhaps on four from Rushmore most agree without a fight,
But have we missed the fifth, or are we waiting for him yet?

Though one can argue that we peaked at end of World War II,
Since then we haven’t won a war and watched our strength erode.
With Vietnam, Korea, Middle Eastern bugaboo,
And Presidents inept except the one from Hollywood.

The timing of our slow demise suggests that F.D.R.
May well have been that fifth of ours, so clock’s been ticking since,
Allowing us one hundred seventy till we depart
From strong position we once held to insignificance.

Raymond HV Gallucci
–Frederick, MD

CASHING IN
February 24, 2017

Small and slight
a fedora on his head
   in one hand a cane
He shuffles along
   and with the other hand, he pulls
a shopping cart laden
past its capacity --
past the toppling over stage
Small and slight
he shuffles along
   moving the cane resolutely
   before him
and dragging the cart
full of bottles and cans stuffed into garbage bags --
behind him.
Only two more blocks.

Amie Ilva Tatem
–Staten Island, NY

She wrote: Love is happiness
He wrote: Passion is eternal
She whispered: My knight in shining armor
He whispered: I’m a lucky guy
She smiled: “Yes, I do”
He smiled:    “Yes, I do”
She thought: I’m no longer afraid
He thought:    I promise to fulfill my vows
She laughed: I traded Mrs. in for Mommy
He laughed:    I have become my father
She reflected: I am content
He reflected:   I noticed a silver hair in my beard
She sighed:    Grandma is such a beautiful word
He sighed:      I caught my first sea bass today
Afterthought:   I love my husband like it was the first day
Afterthought:   I’m still that lucky guy

Peter LaVilla
–Sunny Isles Beach, Fl.

BLACK DRESS BLUE
February 8, 2017

Your painting, Black Dress,
on a chair below my swan light.
I study its trim and sway
shared with the man who blames you
for his limp disgust, his dull rot.
But it’s not black, I say. It’s blue. Those butterflies
we saw sun-fluttering the pine prairies,
drinking wild lupine the fire revived.

In Sunday’s scorched afterlight,
you dress quickly and drive home
for his birthday. There, yes, I see the shadow
of arrival, of almost dark when you wear the night
for us. There in the supple strokes of warm oil,
the narrow velvet valley. Deep down,
I imagine all our bright parts look this way.

Henry Hughes
–Monmouth, OR

FORSYTHIA
January 15, 2017

Now January,
unassailable ice, snow,
bleakness of winter,
on my usual wont,
I am prepared
for largo, but here
is allegrissimo,
astonishing jubiloso.
The forsythia blooms!
Coveted in spring,
a brilliant, yellow reprieve,
neither mustard nor ochre,
no pigment mimics its hue.
Obviously I’m happy
to discover these petals;
still, I cannot dismiss
my apprehension
of perverse orbits:
the sun moves too close,
the earth tilts too far,
an augury, the skewed
trajectories of men,
arrogance rouses
blossoms from sleep.
I am bewildered,
forsythia confused.
Who contrived these tidings?
Who spread the rumor?
Apple and cherry follow,
then lilacs’ violet,
and certainly crocuses
will push too soon.

David Sapp,
–Berlin Heights, OH

REFLECTIONS
January 15, 2017

I know about clocks,
words,
scrambling an egg,
driving a car.

I can scan a sonnet,
recognize Beethoven’s Ninth
and for a while, knew God,
then didn’t.

Love was a moment of faith
easily crushed or whispered away
like a smoking field of dandelions
ripened too soon.

Learning all this
was easy or hard
depending on good weather
and a mourning dove’s song.

But none of it matters,
for the crumbling nest
and lilac’s wilt
has told me that spring is gone.

Beth Staas
–La Grange Park IL

FOR THOSE WHO SCREAMED
(Based on the movie “The City of Life and Death,” about the “Rape of Nanking” [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_Life_&_Death])
December 7, 2016

For you of the bleeding heart
Condemning U.S.’s part
In dropping atomic bomb,
Why think you that we were wrong?

Perhaps it was justified
For all those Chinese who died
When Empire of Japan
Devoured that ancient land.

Because all Nanking they raped
(Atrocities few escaped),
And left less than half to tell
Of horrors they spawned from hell.

It took the United States
(Because of Pearl Harbor’s fate)
To finally retribute
Behavior beneath a brute.

So you with the hearts that bleed,
Whenever next feel the need
To fling on U.S. more mud,
Remember who drew first blood.

Raymond HV Gallucci
Fredrick, MD

CHAIN REACTION
December 23, 2016

The driver behind her
   went into cardiac arrest
   slamming into her rear
   with such force
that his front end crumpled
causing her car to plow intothe car in front
   (considerably smaller than hers)
Seeing the fire
she was able to push open
the door and fall out
leaving her purse behind
and spraining her ankle
   the driver in back was dead
the fire was put out
Four people lived
one sprained ankle
   And so it goes on the stage of life ---
End of the drama for some
   Intermission --- for others.

Amie Ilva Tatem
—Staten Island, NY

MOTHER NATURE
December 17, 2016

Hurricane
Thunder
Lightning
Wind
Tsunami
Tornado
Hail
Sleet
Snow
Pollen Galore
Too Hot
Too Cold
Too Humid
Storms
Floods
Earthquakes
Mud Slides
Flurries
Rain

SOME MOTHER!

Maxwell Schwartz
—Freeport NY

THE KING OF KINDERHOOK
November 28, 2016

Toasting to Martin Van Buren,
A robust singer to those who knew him.
His campaigns were strong with sing-a-longs and rallies,
Votes back then, were meticulously tallied.
Intimately he spoke Dutch.
He enjoyed opera and theatre very much.
Always dressed impeccably
Having to turn over two tiger cubs to the zoo, dreadfully.
Retiring to the Lindenwald farm, growing potatoes on his lot,
Passing away before a political comeback he could plot.
A phantom, his story fades, a horse riding away, on a fierce trot

Todd Saukko
—Commerce Twp, MI

PROACTIVE LULU
November 24, 2016

Hello, I will introduce myself, my name is Lulu,
Although I am very pleased to meet you,
I do apologize if I seem distracted,
Perhaps you will think I have overreacted.

I am determined not to gain much weight,
To become full-figured I would hate,
If I become corpulent I will be in peril,
Be I domesticated or be I feral.

Although I look cute when I am chubby,
And though it does please my handsome hubby,
I must stay svelte, I must stay scrawny,
I will face danger if I am big, if I am brawny.

If I should eat too much, if I should over-indulge,
If I should develop a wobbly tummy bulge,
I will have no time to scream or cluck,
I will be totally **** out of luck.

They will come for me, I know they will,
They will come for me, and they will kill,
I will no longer be cute, feathery, and perky,
I will just be another Thanksgiving turkey.

By Julie C. Judes
—Glendale, WI

ODE TO A SWAN
Published October 2016

It was only a moment, maybe two or more
That captured me and held me its prisoner
For all that day, and the next and the next.

So slowly, and elegantly I have never been seized.
It was the power in the beauty of a single swan that
Overpowered me, its regal neck a gesture

Of grace and dignity in a roadside pond filled
With common ducks and geese, who could
Never capture one’s attention like the smooth

White feathers of the swan, the sun lighting them
Like a rare treasure, newly found, and who with ease,
Swept its legs backwards and swam the circle of pond.

Shari Morrison
—Santa Fe, NM

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

TEDDY, FOR SENTIMENTAL REASONS
August 2016

The asthmatic boy, who loved to draw birds and insects,
He once gave a speech with a bullet shot in his chest.
Eyes teared up during world war one,
Omnipotent plane crash that killed Quincy, his beloved son.
Drove out his fires,
Oyster Bay was where he retired.
Rough riding gun, a statesmen admired
Enough to fuel his presidential desires . . .

Todd Saukko
—Commerce Twp, MI

APPROPRIATE WORDS
August 2016

Then what can be said?
He was never late
She was
But what a thing to remember
they're both dead
Something noble
should be said
He loved good wine
She never respected him
How can that be said?
Instead -- Didn't they look well together!
no children
their legacy cannot live on
What legacy?
They died as they lived -- fast driving
him drinking
she berating him
then off the cliff
Something noble should be said at the service ---
But what?

Amie Ilva Tatem
—Staten Island, NY

A LESSON FROM ICARUS Published Summer 2016

…for he did fly,
wings stretching to the sky,
his sinew and strength
matching rhythm and pace
with mallard and goose
on a warm summer day.

And we did love,
our limbs lustrous with sweat
in the fading mist of tomorrow,
knowing that we, like Icarus,
didn’t fail, but simply arrived
at the end of glory.

Beth Staas
—La Grange Park, IL

LUST IN HIS HEART
Published Summer 2016

he hunches
in his
wheelchair
black gloved
hands
propped on
silvered
circles
both ankles
Velcroed
onto black
foot
rests
he watches
a blond
girl
strip off
her
sock
and wiggle
her
toes

Sheryl L. Nelms
—Clyde, TX

KINDNESSES
Published Summer 2016

I was feeding the birds today
reflecting on your kindnesses
how my food helps keep them sustained
yet you do the same everyday
for me you keep me fed with love and attention
keeping my need for adoration contained
It's you who blesses me with crumbs
like the sparrows I see
making sure I'm healthy and well with generosity
A true Angel of Mercy
I never return to my bed
starving for provisions
you are what God provided for me to love
better than I could've ever envisioned
I am your bird
you are my generous hand that feeds
I'll return forever to your kindness
because you're all I'll ever need

Jason Compte
—Cranbury, NJ