View Issue vol. 12, no. 1
ISSN 2369-6516 (Print)
ISSN 2369-6524 (Online)
Scroll down to read all poems, or select the poem title to go directly to that poem. Select the author’s name to view a short biography (if supplied) and all poems by that author.
Melissa Boland – Ode to Duncan’s Cove
Earl Bradford – Lady from Budapest
Marilyn Challis – Polar Vortex Begone
Tim Covell – Life Drawing Lesson
Scot Jamieson – Ultimately, we have to ask “What IS ultimately?”
David Mac Eachern – Public Harmony
Memel Pound – An Immigrant Land
Duck in the North
Poem by MooseDuck
Duck in the North
Distant land in Finland.
Honing his Skills.
Focusing on the game.
Visualizing the game.
Visualizing Scoring.
Visualizing Assists.
Speed knows no limits.
Flying across the ice.
He brings joy to all Fans alike.
Land of Winter, his name holds weight.
Held
Poem by Nathaniel S. Rounds
The pinecone
Was pliable, inviting
Both protection and
Concealment within a
Closed hand
A hardy substitute for
Floral bouquet where
None could be had
And
While it could not open
When watered by tears
It still offered
Consolation as confidant.
Coming home
Poem by Sara Moginot
Milk stains across the breast of my shirt
laundry unfolded
dishes, not washed
the scent of no-longer-newborn lingering.
A dent in the floor
homage to a 28 oz can of stewed tomatoes,
dropped.
I walk through the door of motherhood
smudged fingerprints shroud the entrance
black marks rise along its frame
a smile peers through dried snot
an offering of half-eaten banana, smashed.
One stinky kid kisses another
Beauty
2021
Haiku by Harry Garrison
Twenty Twenty One
resembles an open book,
a true page turner!
The Cardinal
Poem by Jasmin Stoffer
There has been a cardinal at my feeder
His brilliant red feathers
Standing out in the snow
He is so shy for something so beautiful
But he comes everyday at the same time
Just after dawn when the light is still young.
He flies from his perch in the trees
To the feeder by my window
So I wake up early to watch him eat,
We share our breakfast in silence
Together, alone.
He’s like a woodland secret
Coming out only if you put in the effort
Of waking so early
Some say he’s a messenger from God
A reminder that someone
Is still watching over me.
I think he’s a reminder from Mother Nature
That even in the bleakest winters
Spring will come again in her brilliant colours,
And breakfast is the most important meal
Of the day.
Public Harmony
Haiku by David Mac Eachern
Reading times as art
The pictures of circumstance
Minds in a display
Love
Haiku by Georgia Atkin
I could offer you
all the words in the world, but
only one matters.
Why I Wrote this Poem
I’ve enjoyed writing sonnets in past February months, exploring the different rhythms and rhymes of love in all its forms, but this year I wanted to distill that into something smaller and more powerful. I’m eternally grateful for my loved ones (family, friends, and cat!), and this haiku is for them.
Polar Vortex Begone
Haiku by Marilyn Challis
Green sprigs peep through lawn,
Southern winds thaw frozen leaves,
Hope on horizon.
It’s 2021
Poem by Mike McFetridge
It’s 2021,
Are we gonna have fun
Like we used to have
When we were young(er)?
It’s 2021,
Yeah, it may be no fun
‘Cause we are older now
And no longer young(er)!
It’s 2021,
But we are not done
We are still here…
Time has not yet won!
Winter Pond
Poem by Rod Stewart
Youthful Februarys well spent
With other winter-nauts,
Our mumblings muffled
By itchy knit scarves,
Iced stiff as paddles
From dripping noses.
We wobbled, nearly immobile,
Within a sweltering cocoon
Of Sears one piece space suits,
Squirming and clawing
Past whistling rusty barb wire,
Toward yonder farmyard crater
Clothed deep in winter linen.
Brazen and bobbing
With shovels and skates,
We shaved away the cream
And bullrush stubble,
Our steel razors
Swift and arabesque,
Our swan-like grace
Only slightly marred
By feverish sticks
Clashing over a puck,
As memory
Must imagine.
Ode to Duncan’s Cove
Poem by Melissa Boland
Life Drawing Lesson
Sonnet by Tim Covell
The model stands nude in a classical pose
Surrounded by poseurs who gaze at the flesh
Then struggle to capture on paper twin roes
Through outline and shadow from instruction fresh
No talking ensures a modest division
And pencils that scratch the rough lines of the skin
The only sound made in this conversation
Between the artists and the subject they gin
The challenge and dare gets the model the cash
The sketchers who paid reach the edge of their skill
Undaunted, they’ll be back to scribble more trash
And someday a good sketch if that’s muses’ will
A customer buys the work not knowing this:
The tensions behind the work ‘Milkmaid in Bliss.’
Ultimately, we have to ask,
“What IS ultimately?”
Poem by Scot Jamieson
Sweet are the unescaping scenes
memory endears to us
once cherished in the company
of trusted, trusting ones we loved.
The great-grandfather-elephant beech
that once in Camp Hill Cemetery grew
that had the sky within his reach
yet responded to one’s passing through,
the hurricane tore up, laid flat
in the hour of its gargantuan heaves,
the only hour I’ve heard trees scream
at fierce air thick with shreds of leaves.
What can be trusted to endure?
Indeed, I wonder, what is trust
when everything existing’s insecure?
But memory selects and quietly just
befriends our hearts, their little musts.
Soothe
Poem by AJ Warren
pinched and frayed
fractured and flayed
a stab to the brain
a split second of suffering
inconceivable and incomprehensible
here one moment
gone the next
pain is so fleeting
except when it’s there
sharp sensations leave you seething
then, confused, you stop the bleeding
there’s no advice
for someone in struggle
they’ll grapple and strain
then pain becomes memory
there’s no secret recipe
time ticks
and then you’ll blink
and
An Immigrant Land
Poem by Memel Pound
It’s an immigrant land that stands
and flaps its flags and wags its tongues
at the sons of the ones who were here
It’s an immigrant land that holds the folds
of its banners and stammers
its cries of bias and fear
It’s an immigrant land who builds and fills
the rivers and raises the dams
to flood the blood of the wild
It’s an immigrant land that dares put the tears
in its flag with the fragments of war
On the ones with the need to feed the child
It’s an immigrant land that dangles the dreams
To a world that unfurls to show the unfair
Then denies the cries of the ones who would stay
It’s an immigrant land with the hand that is full
And says to the weary worn world
We’ll take no immigrants today.
No Door
Poem by Richard Collins
Inundated in a dated sect, under purview
Consecrated hatred through course cables in the brew
Millerism schisms, ant hill kids beneath the floor
No nickel sulfide saviours draping 1884
Jackboot brutish arching marching thither, dark depute
Cabling efts like wefts through clefts of every new recruit
Crawlers wiring trawlers in the corners to implore
Join the pseudo carpenter inside but there’s no door
Lady from Budapest
Poem by Earl Bradford
In from Mid-Winter Darkness, she
Entered steamy Cafe, Isolated…
Shedding her Animal Pelts –
Lethargic in Corner I maundered
Over Latte, windows shivering as
Flurries unfolded… Seduced by her
Dusky Eyes darting Mirth across room –
Her Suitcase was Gore-Tek,
European Airline Tags Strung from
Handle – her Mouth a Garnished
Apricot…
Different
Poem by Lorie Morris
I am not like you.
I will never be you.
I am just me.
I am just different.
Open Heart Forgery 