View Issue vol. 12, no. 3
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.
Earl Bradford – Equinox on the Ice
David Du – I hear Scot will move from Halifax
Harry Garrison – Composition In Rectangles!
David Mac Eachern – Soul Fulfilling
Mike McFetridge – How Do You Do It
MooseDuck – Wild Wing: Defender of the Pond
Richard S. Payne – “I learned to be a driver”
Memel Pound – Astronomer’s Bones
Nathaniel S. Rounds – Tradition
The Lovers
Poem by Janet Brush
The rock—
____solid, firmly rooted,
____immovable, indestructible.
The sea—
____endless, constantly moving,
____changing, grey to blue to white foam.
Like lovers,
____these two are inexorably bound.
The rock, steadfast,
____waits for the sea to return,
____to caress it, enfold it
____in cold, white arms.
But each caress
____erodes a tiny particle.
Slowly, relentlessly,
____the sea consumes it.
Until one day,
____the rock will crumble,
_____and be swept away,
_____to rest forever
_____in its lover’s arms.
Wild Wing: Defender of the Pond
Poem by MooseDuck
Born in 1990s, New to the Sport.
Different then the rest, He Stands out.
Energetic, outgoing and Master of the Deke.
Stares down the Enemies at the Pond.
Defends the Home against the Enemies.
Be it LA Kings, Detroit Red Wings or Vancouver Canucks.
Ducks Fans call him the Defender.
Others call him Son of Donald.
He is best in Sports Mascot Worldwide.
Boosting Morale of Fans and Children alike.
He cares for the Ducks and Ducks Fans in Community.
Ocean’s Rage
Poem by Susan Moxon
Ocean heaved frothing water forward,
Wind wailed and helped hurl the water too.
Rows upon rows of breakers battered the shore.
There it strewed piles of wet seaweed
With the relentless crashing of water.
I stood braced, safe on land,
Away from the terrifying sea.
so now we know
Poem by Scott Lynch
Mom (my Mom), as mothers do,
knew the sad truth early on
she figured that like thumb sucking ,
childhood asthma, and mullet hair cuts
I’d grow out of it
my middle son, Kevan Arthur
he of visage and voice
made the enigmatic diagnosis
using the evidence at hand
knowing the habits of squirrels,
woodchucks, beavers and muskrats
familiarity with red-winged black birds,
nuthatches, chickadees, cardinals
crows, blue jays, ring-necked pheasants,
grackles, loons, mergansers (and their mates)
was damning enough
far too much time spent
communing with the woodland folk
but the penchant for poetry was the kicker
all signs pointing to just one conclusion
Dad’s a “Disney Princess”
he’s like a protagonist in a fairy tale movie
so there you have it
‘nuf said
Composition in Rectangles!
Poem by Harry Garrison
Equinox on the Ice
Poem by Earl Bradford
Gurgles & Grunting River
Shifting, Ice Rumbling…
Shadowy Men drop lines
Through holes into darkness –
Evening Bonfire crackling,
The Moon a Smouldering
Ember…
Shudder to step out
Onto the lake –
Together
Haiku by Jim Hoyle
Rainbow in a drop
hanging on a blade of grass
holding Earth and Sky.
Astronomer’s Bones
Poem by Memel Pound
Our glasses rest
on astronomer’s bones,
under Ptolemaic stars where
ancient nations’ sky stories,
their tongues cut from the vault,
drink bitter water and
eat government cheese.
Ullaktut,
the three still hunt
and he is still up there,
Nuuttuittuq,
who never moves;
at rest
with the bones.
Tradition
Poem by Nathaniel S. Rounds
Drop down the anchor.
Drop it down. Look
At the relentless waves.
The anchor
Is a hangman’s noose
By another name.
If you set it down
Your boat’s as good as sunk.
Adherence to old ways
Is a willful death.
Told You So
Poem by Rod Stewart
I like lists, but lists don’t like me,
They shake a scolding finger
“How forgetful, you can be!”
I’d gladly scrunch their nagging
And toss them to the wind,
But alas, their scribbled mental jabs
Have often saved my hide,
You see, it’s either
“Why, thank you Honey!”
Or unfolded they would deride
“Ha! You silly fool!”
And decimate my pride.
They are my fate, my oracle,
Through my silver years,
To coax my daily fumblings
With fewer sighs and tears.
16th Street
Poem by Richard Collins
Birmingham city – a city of friction
No Black cops, no Black firemen
Criminal comments by Governor Wallace
A man whose views should have been abolished
The Baptist church was a rallying point
Against segregation – which served to disjoint
Integration was met with resistance
A city of Whites who were turning to violence
Wallace wanted a “few first class funerals”
I wonder, did he mean four innocent girls?
Blown through the air like little rag dolls
With 22 others injured and mauled
Four fiends responsible – it took fourteen years
To put one in jail for killing Carol McNair
Another 25 just to charge two more men
They say this is justice, I say – think again
The cops knew the culprits after two years
But the sobs and the cries were not wept with White tears
How Do You Do It
Poem by Mike McFetridge
How do you do it, prolong your life?
Asked the sad man to his sad wife;
How would I know? Was her reply;
Ask so-and-so, he should know why;
So he asked his old friend,
Who was much older than him,
To discover the secret of longevity, and of vim;
His friend just chuckled,
When the question was asked,
And he answered the question
Quite politely and fast,
“Don’t worry, my friend”
Was his simple reply,
“Worry will kill you,”
He said, with a sigh.
Soul Fulfilling
Haiku by David Mac Eachern
Exposed by growing
As personal endurance
Contents of one’s heart
Eyes of Knowing
Poem by Blynn Teeft
Caring
Kind
Gentle
Big
and
Knowing
Scary
It’s true
“I learned to be a driver”
Limerick by Richard S. Payne
I learned to be a driver
in my Dad’s Studebaker.
It was an automatic
and it sure felt like magic.
A thrill bumper to bumper!
I hear Scot will move from Halifax
Poem by David Du
I still remember when we initially met
At OHF – you asked me
To autograph my book “Journey.”
I still have memories of talking about
The poems of Wang Wei,
Enjoying noodles at “Floating Bread” cafe
And discussing it very happily.
I appreciate you helping me to climb
A high mountain –
Translating The Great Way that connects to
The Dao, from Mandarin.
And I more admire you having a splendid,
Perfect wife Norma,
But I understand this is your Karma.
Goodbye my friend, when I go walking along
A street where you had lived
Would I recall the days we worked
With each other for a great job –
The Pulse of Wang Wei?
Goodbye my friend when I am crossing
Some old places, even a DD coffee bar,
Would I think about you revising my English
Poetic style or teaching me pronunciation?
Goodbye my friend I know I will return
To my old life style – to joyfully watch
The sun submarine under the lonely horizon
And write some poems of the moaning wind.
Spring
Poem by Jasmin Stoffer
We are slowly waking up
The sun provides more than light now
The warmth defrosts the ground
Feet are bare on the moss and mushrooms
We walk quietly through infant crocuses
Planting every step with bulb and seed
And birds follow closely
Waiting to see what is left behind
The air smells fertile
And the wind carries hope around us
May we enjoy this season in peace
May we praise Spring and all her glory
May we return to earth
Barefooted
Time Out
Poem by Elzy Taramangalam
Earnest invocation of standards
Make me stop the scribbles
Indifferent to the songs in the heart
I silence the songbirds in the head
with a glint of cruelty.
Line up lyrics against the wall
Like misbehaving kids
And feed them the rubble in the mall
In a dark ceremony
Hammering connections with stygian charm.
Hopes pinned on unsettling easter rising
Prime lines and glory on stand
Lift disappearing certainties
Together in sudden ballooning strangeness
A life nobler than the fears large.
Open Heart Forgery 