View Issue vol. 8, no. 4
ISSN 2369-6516 (Print)
ISSN 2369-6524 (Online)
You can also read the poems by scrolling down or clicking the titles.
Click the author’s name to view a short biography (if supplied) and other poems by that author.
Georgia Atkin – Physics of Falling in Love
Normand Carrey – The Sound and the Fury
Ella Dodson – Wild Blackberries
Jennifer Graham – Child’s Eyes
Harry Garrison – Nova Scotia Tartan
Jari-Matti Helppi – His True Love’s Dress
David Mac Eachern – Tune the Heart
Harry Wayne Mah – Why is the sky blue?
John McLeod – Three Short Poems
Steven Osborne – O Web of Beauty
Graym Stewart – As Time Passes
Ryan Taylor – The Undisclosed Fear
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Child’s Eyes
Poem by Jennifer Graham
Sometimes, a young man walks by
And he looks at you with his eyes
And he looks at you with his eyes
And he looks at you with his eyes
Sometimes, a man walks by
And he looks at you
And he looks at you
And he looks at you
Sometimes, a man walks by
And he looks the other way
And he looks the other way
And he looks the other way
One day, a man walks by
And he looks at you, with his big blue eyes
And he looks at you, with his big blue eyes
And he looks at you, with his big blue eyes
And he is the reason you stay
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O Web of Beauty
Poem by Steven Osborne
O spider web of beauty,
You stand out above them all.
When the rain falls down
It crumbles and it falls.
A creature with eight legs
Will spin all day and night.
When the morning dawns,
O what a beautiful sight.
A web spun to perfection,
A web for all to see,
A web that catches food,
How it amazes me.
Strong to a gentle wind,
Strong to a light touch of a hand.
How mysterious is the web;
Sometimes hard to understand.
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Exhausted
Poem by Trisha MacNeil
My energy follows
one step behind.
Its ghostly outline
a reminder
of my best version,
long dead.
I stutterstep then pause
hoping to merge,
to form a new me.
It dissipates like mist.
I trudge along alone,
and exhausted.
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Tune the Heart
Poem by David Mac Eachern
In breath of moment, once again begin
strumming by courage, to thrive and win
Valued excursion, a script for the show
impelled with resolve, even loving ever so
Star to lead, singing victory is mine
holding pace, a root growing as vine
Despite all grief filled scenery we meet
exclusion of confusion, humming a poised beat
Wilful emotion, as my words can say
having meaning together we rise, no sway
Much like fire inflamed in soul’s appeal
such music true beauty, passion to reveal
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your silence stands there like a
peacock,
chest pulsing
dressed defiantly
dressed for the best
and
moving towards
the slanted walk to a
secluded solution
but keep going
i’ll watch the back of you
twist and churn, unyielding
calves puffed
soberly
lucky to be the one
to get away
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The Undisclosed Fear
Poem by Ryan Taylor
you sit to my left
right nearly always
not knowing that here we are
watching a show
netflix you say
people binge watch whole series
in a day
you’ve never,
have that chance
you have,
bed ridden
kids were away
most of the weekend
but its sunday now
and you’ve never binged
netflix
till you had surgery
a five and half inch scar
clearance
they put you under
twice, for clearance
a type of cancer
at 24
did they remove
it all
all wonder
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goose (ed)
Poem by Scott Lynch
avian
deportment
every new day
honking a thrill
in long flight
solace
is given
a skein
at a time
artfully
exposing
design
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His True Love’s Dress
Poem by Jari-Matti Helppi
Slim was the taper
of his true love’s dress
that she wore,
traipsing a flighty foot
with a satin scarf leading
her wildflowered dance
like a lover’s breath flow;
inhaling, exhaling upon her neck
with movements classical
that met a breeze,
feeling further out to tend to toes
that launched a ballet flight
with a winged scarf,
landing them soft and slim
as mayflowers
to the musical meadow’s lark
as he breathed a longing soft
to the warm welcoming taper
of his true love’s dress.
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As Time Passes
Poem by Graym Stewart
The world is not as I was told.
No sunny days which I behold.
It’s hard to picture what was love.
Two black Ravens, one white dove.
Some people change.
It isn’t right.
The empty rain.
A lonely night.
The simple legs which I walk on.
Quickly taken, all but gone.
Nothing more to say but He,
Left me without a man to lead.
I prayed to Him,
Through teared up eyes.
Cursed by sin.
Spread only lies.
Was it time for me to lose.
From what power could one choose.
The only life I thought I had.
One crippled man, the greatest dad.
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The Sound and the Fury
Poem by Normand Carrey
Why are you all mournin me, I am here, touch me,
feel my dim agony, I am furious but it runs away
when I come to grab it, it grabs me
makes me say and do things that are rooted
in the universal 2 stroke piston memories
that bedevilled my youth so well in a mechanical
time, anti-freeze, oil stained rags, the viscocity
of the fluids in my figurin brain, devoted to fixin
and paintin other people’s motorcycles, Don Richer,
Gates Chamberland; I remember the motorcycle
don’t remember the face, the sound that drove it away.
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Nova Scotia Tartan Printed Circuit Board!
Rectangle Poem by Harry Garrison
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Vacant Eyes
Poem by Cathy Hanrahan
She sits on the boardwalk, passing time
Melancholy eyes sublime
A tired tin cup shakes for benevolent bread
Scruffy worn blankets act as warmth and a bed
Her rough skin a ruddy mix of patches of brown
sallow mouth showing smile lines, no frown.
A destitute girl in a decadent world
We see the shell, we don’t see the pearl.
His reflection surprises then leaves him confused
As crowds of people pass by, amused
He’s certain he’s the same as he has ever been
Despite the fact he’s fresh out of rehab again
Glazed vacant eyes you can see right through
No sense of shame for what he won’t do
A delinquent young man wanders on to the street
He feels invincible, we see defeat
Reflections of Hades in the eyes of street life
Pushing against limits of desperation and strife
Adrift on the sea we call humanity
Compassion swept away in the waves of apathy
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Three Short Poems
by John McLeod
Bee and thyme
Heidegger’s cool grave
A buzzy flyer harvests
A droplet
Reef
new crab arrives
coral senses
its decline
has slightly slowed
Zirconium Fire
Lurid winter dawn
Invisible asteroid
Hanford meteor
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Wild Blackberries
Haiku by Ella Dodson
Thorns guard midnight drupes
Nature claims blood sacrifice,
Payment for sweet fruits.
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Why is the sky blue?
Poem by Harry Wayne Mah
if you pumped me
with CO2
I would be
unhappy too.
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The Physics of Falling in Love
Poem by Georgia Atkin
It made no sense, we agreed,
but like many things
it happened
anyway.
We looked up
at the stars in the night sky,
wondering
if we ourselves were anything more
than pinpricks of light
in somebody else’s
night sky,
and how on earth
these dazzling spheres
remained adhered,
fixed firmly to the edges
of empty space
without falling in.
We decided
it must be a mixture
of gravity and giddy flight,
so we each took a giddy breath
and held each other tight.
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A Special Love
Poem by David Du
A grey hair mixes a dark hair,
His chin is shining in the sky.
It looks a picture,
But, I see the tears dropped in it.
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Winter Poem Two
Poem by Art Bouman
Time is an orange
It’s about how its skin is shed
On the other hand however
Space is organically unpredictable
Like an orange on the other side
Of a black hole
Constantly ebbing and flowing in flux
As the eastern ranges, which roar in anger at
The ranges down under the deep blue sea,
But yet my dreams are
like all other things
locked in frost
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Leader, is someone, important.
Leader, is someone, who is brave.
Leader, can be voted in!
Leader, can change, the rules.
Leader, can be anyone.
Leader, can keep the peace.
Open Heart Forgery 
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