Motel Dweller’s Pathos. A Poem by Samuel Strathman

by

 
Four walls,
a TV,
and a bed
is all a sulky
loner needs
for a sojourn
in the sticks.
 
Eat Bugles off
your fingers,
lick the crumbs
under the covers.
 
The second storey
window has a view
of the frenetic energy
beaming from the pool,
corporeal flow.
 
*
 
A stroll around town
is a chair
being forced down
your throat
with a rake.
 
*
 
Back in your room,
the blinds are closed,
television on.
 
Catch the late-night
feature about sea
urchins in space.
 
Actors in outlandish
tin foil costumes pinwheel
like toads clenched
to twine saucers.
 
*
 
The cider is good,
but the days drag
by when there’s no one
to drink with.
 

 

Author Bio
 

Samuel Strathman is a poet, author, educator, and co-editor at Cypress: A Poetry Journal. Some of his poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Rejection Letters, The Honey Mag, Ice Floe Press, and elsewhere. His debut chapbook, “In Flocks of Three to Five” was published by Anstruther Press (2020). His second chapbook, “The Incubus” will be in print this fall (Roaring Junior Press, 2020).
 
 
 
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

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A Wintry Postcard of Manhattan in Motion. A Poem by Richard L Weissman

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Last night, this homeless needle-eyed buzzard
with time-wearied, deep-chiseled features
bleak hovered shivering relentless
round warmth of the 86th Street Station’s Lotto shop.
His blue cold, street-grimed fingers
printed paper coffee cup and shivering kaiser roll
so I gifted him my old black winter coat.
This morning he nodded mid makeshift hovel,
in under twelve hours,
my coat was transfigured,
tailored to perfect fit his junk-torn world.
 
The downtown 4 train floats effortlessly this morning,
fast neath black plaster peelings of ceiling,
ever winding above rat poisoned third rail tracks
all warps into backdrop as downtown mountains up.
Crescendoing dark scent of hungry ghosted greed
as drab suited Wall Streeters hibernate (like bears)
till New Year’s in.
Simultaneously, this life-worn Euro-trashed chic
eyes me with contemplative melancholy,
her scar marred beauty
cracked mirroring
our Maiden Lane drama
of bleak mediocrity.
 
 

 
Bio:
 

Richard L Weissman has written fiction since 1987.
In 2000, his theatrical play, “The Healing” was selected by Abdingdon Theatre for a staged reading Off-Broadway.
Richard is the author of two Wiley Trading titles. His second book, Trade Like a Casino was selected as a Finalist for the 2012 Technical Analyst Book of the Year Award.
 
In 2016, Mr. Weissman completed his historical novel in the tradition of magical realism, “Generations”.
 
In 2020 his poem, “Mountain Bird and Loquat” was selected as the grand prize winner of the Florida Loquat Literary Festival.
 
In addition to hosting, “In Our Craft or Sullen Art” – a biweekly poetry radio talk show, Richard participates in live spoken word events throughout the U.S.

 
 
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

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Pools of Longing. A Poem by Sara L Russell

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Pools of Longing: July 9th, 03:11am. Editor’s note, I believe the Lockdown on swimming pools in UK, has temporarily been lifted & it is now possible to book in advance a time slot, however, the way things are going on there at present, it’s anybody’s guess how long it will last

 
 
That it might come back to me, that sweet sensation,
When i would reach out my arms across the cool light blue ripples
and push off from the side.
 
Then would i glide
out across the water, as a white crane glides across the sunset,
as a white cloud hurries brightly on a warm southerly breeze.
 
There are trees
when I go walking; butterflies and wild flowers too. They seem
comfort enough for a short time, in parklands and along the lanes.
 
There are trains
I may never ride on, there are buses I am still rethinking,
There is time enough for drinking in the the cafes and the bars;
 
But oh my stars,
what would I give to go back swimming,
gliding weightless once again, free as the birds that skim the sky.
 
 

 
 
Sara Louise Russell, aka PinkyAndrexa, is a UK poet and poetry ezine editor, specialising particularly in sonnets, lyric-style poetry and occasionally writing in more modern styles. She founded Poetry Life & Times and edited it from 1998 to 2006, when she handed it over to Robin Ouzman Hislop and Amparo Arrospide; Robin now runs it as Editor from Poetry Life & Times at this site. Her poems and sonnets have been published in many paper and online publications including Sonnetto Poesia, Mindful of Poetry and Autumn Leaves a monthly Poetry ezine from the late Sondra Ball. Her sonnets also currently appear in the recently published anthology of sonnets Phoenix Rising from the Ashes. She is also one of the first poets ever to be published on multimedia CD ROMs, published by Kedco Studios Inc.; the first one being “Pinky’s Little Book of Shadows”, which was featured by the UK’s national newspaper The Mirror, in October 1999. (Picture link for Mirror article) Angel Fire
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

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On Never seeing a Blue Whale. A Poem by Bernard Pearson

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If the fetch of death
Should come before
I see you neighbour,
Breaching in the pacific vast,
Forgive me, for in my
Book of Wonders
I once read that a man
Could stand upright
In the tunnel of your veins.
If only we had not stood straight at all
Then the best of nature would ever hear
Whale to whale across
The great, unsullied , ocean , softly call.

© Bernard Pearson

 
 

 
Bio
 

BERNARD PEARSON: His work appears in many publications, including; Aesthetica Magazine , The Edinburgh Review, Crossways, In 2017 a selection of his poetry ‘In Free Fall’ was published by Leaf by Leaf Press. In 2019 he won second prize in The Aurora Prize for Writing for his poem Manor Farm
 
 
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

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Wings. A Poem by Phillip Henry Christopher

by

for Don Yorty

 
1
 
You read Rilke on 15th Street,
oblivious to the traffic,
the disinterested passing by,
the text passing
from your passionate grasp
into the ice-gray grip
of the grim theorist,
full of dedication,
not like devotion
born in the hot bosom
of simplicity,
where poets lie
defenseless
without ideology.
 
I could not abide the contrast well,
the play of opposites
side by side on the sidewalk,
one muse held fast
between them.
 
With a pounding head,
I chose coffee in a plastic cup,
caffeine, and relief
from senses pulled apart
in hot Philadelphia sun.
 
2
 
He reads a thousand years
of suspecting truths
reads for angels
stripped of wings,
choking in the dust.
 
No, not angels…
Human, mortal, cursed…
Like a vision
on wings of wax,
beating relentlessly
against the wind,
striving to rise,
to leave cold ground
for warmth of the sun,
to see in the light
truth shadows distort.
 
And in the heat the poet
is brightly lit for a time,
until the thin seams of wax,
glue binding the act melts…
Feathers gleaned from birds
of all kinds and climes,
wings fashioned like a knife edge
slicing through time,
loose themselves from
the poet’s binding thoughts
to float slowly away,
each in its own direction.
The act ends turning one last
hope-filled look into blinding light
receding into the distance,
then freefalling,
spinning earthward.
 
3
 
That I could hold fast,
freeze the falling poet
one instant,
or embrace him once,
but he flies among clouds
I fear to approach.
 
“Wings” excerpt from a 2017 chapbook, “Pizza and
Chianti; The Philadelphia Poems.
https://www.facebook.com/philliphenrychristopher/
 

 
Poet, novelist and singer/songwriter Phillip Henry Christopher spent his early years in France, Germany and Greece. His nomadic family then took him to Mississippi, Georgia, Ohio and Vermont before settling in the steel mill town of Coatesville, Pennsylvania, where he grew up in the smokestack shadows of blue collar America.Escaping high school, he made Philadelphia his home, alternating between Philly and cities across America, living for a time in Buffalo, New Orleans, Fort Worth, even remote Fairfield, Iowa, before settling in Indianapolis. While wandering America he has placed poems and stories in publications across the country and in Europe and Asia, including such noteworthy journals as The Caribbean Writer, Gargoyle, Lullwater Review, Hazmat Review, Blue Collar Review, Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, Blind Man’s Rainbow and New York Quarterly
 
 
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

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The Lovely Lady in the Ridiculous Clothes & Poems by RW Haynes

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1]
 
The Lovely Lady in the Ridiculous Clothes
 
In a sea of meaningless stuff, that honesty
Fires up the jaded imagination,
Enlivens losing life with lively sensation,
And calls for music, dancing harmony.
So wear that hat, a dashing pronouncement,
Those painted shoes, eye-grabbing things,
And whatever else inspiration brings
To hear wisdom’s ultimate announcement.
The hat, the crazy shoes, your laughing smile,
Are flowers sprung from nowhere, although
Sweet hope requires that they arrive so,
And the light has come, now, to stay awhile.
The music does more than speak: it commands,
And souls step forth and boldly now clap hands.
 
2]
 
Hot Date for The Fiddlers’ Convention
 
Brought against you, then,
An arsenal of betrayals that begin
A catalog of unexpected depletions,
Beginnings to begin once again,
Chaos of incompletions.
 
So chalk this up to the record then,
Remembering themes are just themes,
Not formulas, mathematic dreams,
Just stuff just good for slogans to rant,
Useless epitaphs for grackles to chant.
 
Tune the instrument, tune in the station
Playing the spirit of inspiration.
Let the dance continue hard and fast
Or deep and slow, but let it play on.
Let it go. Leave it playing on at last.
 
3]
 
Behind the Old Church
 
Heavy stone slabs
Shadowed with warning
Echo ominously…
The moon keeps burning…
 
The dead stones emanate
Stupefying cold
Around these graves’
Enigmas untold,
 
And the ravens look down
With raucous disdain
On stupefied despair,
A frozen hurricane…
 
Silent bells boom
And clang,
Time’s malicious
Boomerang.
 
Step right up,
Sentimental slave;
Pour your liquor
All over his grave.
 
 

 
R. W. Haynes, Professor of English at Texas A&M International University, writes various things in prose and in poetic form. His academic specialty is 16th-century England, but much of his work lately has been on the playwright/screenwriter Horton Foote. His recent poetry collections are Laredo Light and Let the Whales Escape published summer 2019 ( for further info see under Categories at this site). He recently wrote a play titled Never Claim a Kill, and he hopes to complete his novel The Songs of Billy Bonstead before Laredo cools off again. Another project in progress is an academic work currently titled The Struggling Spirit in the Plays and Screenplays of Horton Foote. In 2016 he was awarded the SCMLA poetry Prize ($500) at the Dallas meeting of the South Central Modern Language Association

 
 
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times at Artvilla.com ; his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules, Next Arrivals and Moon Selected Audio Textual Poems, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

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Mini Poems Chapter 2 el al by Michael T. Smith.

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Chapter 2


Moving forward, I want my disease to be my companion,

so she can help me write my canon.


Eclipse


I borrowed the eyes of an eclipse,

to wink Eden under the table,


I saw a secret, which is to say –

I didn’t see it:


to borrow eyes from not a friend, but Mother

Nature,


to see what I can’t see unseen.


Gunshot romance


There’s a girl sitting next to me,

belongs in a Tarantino movie.

But I’m not dodging bullets;

I’m only dodging a longshot kiss.


How Terrifying…


How terrifying death is

in the middle of a thought.

My eyes wanted to slam shut

such that they could defend

against what I know not.


Kindness 


Sometimes human kindness

to one another

is so short

 		as to be nonexistent.


Nausea


There is nothing more repulsive

than the smiling photo of a politician

in their ad,

those papers glued to surfaces many,

like a parasite —

those who themselves are but a surface plenty.


Waterfall 


I want my thoughts

to descend

like a waterfall,

such that the droplets form

an image of you.


When…


When every word you’ve used

Too much —

It’s a hollowed word,

	Sans thought.




Word Map of a Cat on a Mat


Putting the indexes out,

I saw the cat,

Sleeping with torso outstretched

While I, unheimlich, rushed to and fro;

On a mat, it sat — in peace,

And I said sighing, what I want is that.

 
 


 
Bio:
 
Michael T. Smith is an Assistant Professor of English who teaches both writing and film courses. He has published over 150 pieces (poetry and prose) in over 80 different journals. He loves to travel.
 
 
 
 

Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules and Next Arrivals, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

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PALM LEAVES. A Poem by Abigail Ayornu

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The beautiful leaves lingering like a genius
With its branches having an earring
As the fruits ripe
Her appetite whets to eat the fruits of her labour
Is like a youth springing to maturity
With all her sparkling features
Having hairs on the stem is natural
As it unveils the beauty of womanhood
Not to talk of the roots
Having meritable feets
Standing in one location
Trapped in the middle of the forest
 

 
 
Bio: Abigail Ayornu is a Ghanaian and student of the University of Cape Coast offering B.A English and linguistics. She is a writer of short stories and has recently written poems for 2020 namely: Palm leaves et al.
 
 
 
 
 
 
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; his publications include
 
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules and Next Arrivals, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
 
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)

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