View Issue vol. 8, no. 6
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.
Charlie Brake – With the Caressing of Our Lips
M. de Lacey Davidson – Waiting for Augustine
Harry Garrison – Acceptance Is All Right
Jari-Matti Helppi – A Full Life’s Death
Jobin M. Kanjirakkat – On the Trail
David Mac Eachern – Sight to See
Harry Wayne Mah – circle circus of c0nspiracies
Graym Stewart – Trapped Within a Tear
WOTS participants – A Momentary Pause
Return to Top
Pretty Girls
Poem by Anna Gaudet
Even as I sit in bed alone,
I am still yet to be
the prettiest girl in the room.
When no mouths have said delicate words,
And no hands have craved your touch,
The image of your desire
Shatters.
When my colourful thoughts dance around
and my silky smooth ideas resound,
I am but not lovely.
What does it take to be a pretty girl?
For the most alluring of them all,
Have never been,
And maybe
Never will be.
Return to Top
Wisdom Ageing
Poem by Mary Upton
As we age, we grow
Not closer to irrelevance
Yet approach a kinder, gentler way
As pride and pretense go astray
We greet a more authentic day
And in our latent wisdom
We find folly in our bygone vision
When life was so embedded
In an image mirrored
Solely to diminish
Fading to an inauspicious finish
Now we of elder state can relish
Our altered vision of life in truth
And ne’re commit the folly
Of pretentious image
So embodied in our youth
Return to Top
Rose of Sharon Beside a Tombstone
Poem by Jung-Hee Lee
Mr. Mild, I wonder about who you were,
Who would want to keep the Rose of Sharon
near you.
With beautiful displays
From spring to fall,
Your rose of Sharon
Stands by your side.
You, who might have had blue eyes,
Would you know that across the Pacific Ocean,
This Rose of Sharon
is the national flower of Korea,
‘The land of the morning calm’?
You are now sound asleep,
Yet the Rose of Sharon is still near you
Blooming and smiling ever so bright.
Return to Top
Waiting for Augustine
Villanelle by Matthew de Lacey Davidson
When all the books, at last, are gone
(in Newfoundland and Labrador)
the consequence begins to dawn
when libraries are made a pawn
to unspoken motives – to explore
the ways in which the books might all be gone.
Words are contraband. A pyre’s built upon
our psyche. While flames shoot high – an awful roar –
the consequence begins to dawn.
Delighting in the suffering they spawn –
the result: a consummate control’s in store
(when finally all books are gone).
No bedtime tales – no lion – no faun –
no mysteries – no laws – no lore…
and when consequences start to dawn,
Authority prefers to yawn,
and all the more – do they ignore –
protestations that all books are gone
as the consequences well and truly start to dawn.
Return to Top
With the Caressing of Our Lips
Sonnet by Charlie Brake
Love, crave do I not to be a cliché
Albeit, the summertide days I miss
The sun would reverberate off your face
To my mirth, breeding a summertide bliss
My love, you are the sole that I have known
If you lust for me, you are not solus
When near you are not, ever am I lone
You and I are impotent of solace
Due to you, transfixed am I of demise
And, darling, drowning am I in woe
For ne’er anew will I descry your eyes
For ne’er anew will I stifle this throe
With the caressing of our lips, delight
As our endearment shall decimate plight
Return to Top
Trapped Within a Tear
Poem by Graym Stewart
I’m coming back to school,
And still I’m feeling lonely.
Doesn’t matter what I’ve got
If it’s just not feeling homey
A life that’s filled with giving
Things which are all fake.
I question what is living
If it’s only ever fate.
Sometimes it feels good,
The way I can twist these words.
I really wish I could,
Show you scars where it hurts.
I wish the wind would blow,
So I could dance within these trees.
A spirit which can grow.
Into a place that’s free.
It all seems like a puzzle
Trapped within a tear.
Some resort to guzzle,
To numb the pain with beer.
For me, I’m just a smoking man.
Hidden by the cloud.
Coming back to a broken land.
Cannot make a sound.
Return to Top
hand on forehead
at the side of the road
cell pressed to his ear
dejection and defeat in his stance and
bearing
a study in pain
grieving his mutilated automobile
his youth betraying allusion
a first accident
his father’s car
financial predicament
or simply the shock of the smash
Return to Top
Mighty Thor*
*(name changed to protect victim’s identity)
Poem by Rod Stewart
At the age of four,
Likely less, or perhaps more?
My brother and I
Whined fiercely much,
At the critter store,
For that shell with legs,
And not much more
Than our pocket change,
We claimed for sure.
We pestered, promised
Until our parent’s ears
Rang mighty sore,
We pouted woeful
To bring home Thor,
Our hero turtle
Of yet to be, family lore.
Bowled and fed,
His girth had grown
We both had swore
From smashed supper peas,
Thumb squished flies
And worms galore.
“We’d saddle him soon,”
Dad laughed with a roar,
‘Till brother Dug, without an “Oh”
Thought Mighty Thor
Could heave a boulder
And was no more.
Return to Top
Nobody called you
Nobody told you to open your eyes
However, you turn your head
Staring at the dark sky
You don’t want to submerge yourself
Return to Top
Marvelous man and his company of madness.
The marveling has spurred man beyond what
is seen. We’ve marveled the skies and landed
foot on moon. Once we mistook a weeded path
and stumbled to shore only to find the bluest
of blues. Our marvel dove us deep under oceans
blankets and the tossing of seas. As we lay
across oceans’ bed, with mysteries beneath,
the marvelous flight-bound mammal flocked
nearest our heads. Let us fly, we once said, and
now we soar miles high at speeds the most
impressive of avian would envy. Our eyes saw
and our minds marveled. We are marvelous men.
But our marvel is as deceitful as fateful. We’ve
seen disgust and dismay; have felt jealousy and
pain. We marveled in the face of raging enemies,
and like curiosity-spurred man that outflew the
birds, we’ve answered the call that is often
enthralled upon us by our foe. Our weapons are
loaded with jealousy’s reign; our walls and
gates protect us from those who project against us.
But have we not burdened the masses with the
misstep of few? Our marvel is grand and powerful,
like a loaded gun. We are marvelous men,
unfortunate are those who tread in emotion of rage
rather than love for insight. And off goes the gun
when jealousy and not love has won.
Return to Top
Be not afraid to be yourself.
Come forth and share your soul.
We cannot be but who we are
So let’s rejoice before we’re old!
I cannot weigh my every word
For fear of being misunderstood.
The need is one of discovery
So that my heart turns not to wood!
Having weathered many storms,
Not matter what life may throw,
I shall seek that higher bond
That most mortals will never know!
Return to Top
Sight to See
Poem by David Mac Eachern
Yet to be, what plan can solve
may a start ignite, thus love evolve
Fashioned to impress so feeling can express
with passion in pace, hearts may compress
Living to explore, in style with flare
a sweet display, of course to share
Setting world by design, an image combined
shape of age to come, soul refined
An era of blossoming, garden came through
implanted in season, a solemn vision grew
Return to Top
The true test of my affections
Is not crossing the harbour on a sunny day
Happy crowd celebrating the views
Children sparkling like clichés in the bay
The true test of my affections
Is crossing the harbour dark, cold, fog, rain, night
Freezing spray biting the deck
Enduring this crossing proves my might
The object of my affections
Is not across the harbour, somewhere
But to be crossing, in transit
Somewhere between here and there.
Return to Top
A Full Life’s Death
Poem by Jari-Matti Helppi
Slowly, as a full life’s death
is embraced by an evolving universe
and sent to energize the resolve of sentience,
I, in my miniscule inclusion,
do live to die well within the peace that rises
beyond the fallacies and follies of war
which strive to undermine
the beauties storing the bloom,
in temporal succession,
bursting forth from the feral fields
of aged bomb craters.
Return to Top
The Boxer
Poem by Cathy Hanrahan
Gambling’s bookies ring the roped sidelines
Calling out odds, betting timelines
Greed and opportunity through sweaty ambition
the brutal reality of boxing’s tradition
Aspirations for titles and championship belts
Cries of rigging and cheated results
Through roar of arena and almighty fist
Fast money hollers at the pugilist
Each Boxer a hero in their own hometown
Each one on a quest for the illusive crown
a fighter with visions of sweet victory
and a permanent place, in history.
Gargantuan dreams of acclamation
boxing for belt and proclamation
with nothing confirmed until the final bell rings
and judges reveal “The Decision” it brings.
Return to Top
circle circus of c0nspiracies
Poem by Harry Wayne Mah
Return to Top
The Dreamers
Poem by Lorie Morris
The dreamers, are easy to see!
The dreamers, are the ones with their
heads in the sky! The dreamers, are
always day dreaming!
The dreamers, are ones who will
say, did you say something?
Return to Top
Acceptance Is All Right
Rectangle Poem by Harry Garrison
Return to Top
On the Trail
Poem by Jobin M. Kanjirakkat
Jo brought li’l Spencer
Annie walked India
Spencer’s leash tightened
as he lunged towards India
India too stepped towards Spencer
Still on leashes
Spencer and India
explored each other
with their faces
looked at the woods
perhaps
dreaming of leashes loosening
running to the woods
catching rabbits, making out
crossing forest creeks
running away from coyotes
Leashes tightened again
Jo and Annie resumed walking
and so did India and Spencer
Return to Top
A Momentary Pause
Exquisite Corpse poem by WOTS participants
(Exquisite corpse is an artistic technique from French surrealism, where a group creates something with limited knowledge of the other contributions. In this case, visitors to our table at Word on the Street were invited to add two lines to a poem, but only shown one line before.)
It’s the end of a long, trudging week,
and I have reached the end of a line, at last,
Is this it?
Where do I go now?
I have been travelling for so long,
my words my only guide.
Wandering through the dark forests, my mind
a thousand miles away.
I stopped and heard a bird calling over the far drumlin.
I looked to see what bird it was. What I saw
sent shivers down my spine…
I took another look… Yes, it is; I’m sure of it!
Who should I tell…?
Maybe I should keep it to myself.
Or, like a book, keep my thoughts on the shelf.
Open the book, and you’ll see inside
Some of the things that I used to hide.
I giggled, I Googled,
I left the book on the shelf by itself.
Bought some books, took some pix
And I got some pixie stix!
And if I look to that book
You would look the other way.
At the stars in the sky,
the twinkle in her eye
in the Starry, Starry Night
glittered like starlit diamonds
a case away among the light
of iridescent islands,
Vast seas of indifference among points of personal triumph
and despair
Waves washing against my body
Tides of emotion flooding over me.
The me I thought I knew
when the lost landscape disappeared
a fog gently enshrouding all
like a worn blanket bringing comfort and grace
to the cruel world
Sunshine on my shoulders like fog upon the harbour
Far from the familiar plains, I turn my face to the east.
A momentary pause stills upon me.
I quickly turn away.
Open Heart Forgery 
You must be logged in to post a comment.