A road seldom trod takes you somewhere strange. A shooting star, smoking in your hand, lights the woodland path, portends your axe will soon drip blood. Beyond the pine trail bobs a red hibiscus hood-- grasped in her fleshy grip, a wicker basket, wafting freshly baked bread; some would simply huff, “obese.” And yet, you know these miles too well, smell a wolf, suspect his wiles . . . Through the windowpane of the crone’s cottage, a candle flares. You limp forward, confound the old wound, fog up the glass as you peer in. There, mostly covered by a quilt, too, too much hair! That wicked goat! You splinter the door. Your blade flies through the air. Peculiar deliverer, like a fish gutter, so clever, you free her, free her! wood smoke ghosting the tarn hunter’s moon About the author:
Dr. Anna Cates teaches writing, literature, and education online and has published a variety of books (poetry, fiction, and drama) through www.cyberwit.net, prolificpress.com, redmoonpress.com, and wipfandstock.com. Her full-length poetry collection, Love in the Time of Covid, won an Illumination Book Award. She resides in Wilmington, Ohio with her two cats.
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The clamouring of rooks among the trees reminds me of the sirens on the shore, whose raucous songs were blatant augury, of omens too pernicious to ignore. The scream of sirens on the motorway remind me of the sirens on the shore: a devastating ending to the day. Those birds will seek the car-crash carrion. The scream of sirens on the motorway – a call as bright and clear as clarion – inviting us to seek our own demise. Those birds will seek the car-crash carrion: like Erysichthon, nothing satisfies the calling void. Obsession quantified, inviting us to seek our own demise. The war inside my head is amplified; the clamouring of rooks among the trees. The calling void, obsession quantified, whose raucous songs are blatant augury. Originally published in Fragmented Voices in 2021.
(For when the leaves our summer friends have fallen)
newborn faces up outdoors beneath the trees skysent resonance swishes limbs respond by raising knees Skysent old images haunt me summer is no more angels, fairies sent to soothe me lie dead upon earths floor more falling ever daily the ground is gold and red brown dead veins are crisping revealing that they’re dead Lucifers angels fallen tuatha de danann’s on the mound A jealous god deceived them my god he can’t be sound then some who turned mid fall looked skyward bleak and bare there was no pull cept downward no hope and just despair but then the Cailleach fetched them she winters underground They nurture TREE forever now truth it knows no bounds the leaves they tell their stories, to worms, roots, and a breeze their mission is to nourish new growth for humans ease, and yet how could they do it if they did not know of grief when every angel blossoms when under some-borns sleep Their purpose is for spelling those born with life for hope angels always round us so that we always cope im grateful for the memory from the ground those faithful days I no longer believe in fairys or hawthorns special ways but I’m grateful for the magic of natures tale spun faes Faes=phase
this ghost and me, we’re both mourning the same thing we miss the smell of rain evaporating off hot pavement air conditioner blast shivering against sweaty air fingers sticky ice cream dripping soles melting onto pavement we miss our bodies in the city (Originally published in you are here: the journal of creative geography) About the author:
Meep Matsushima is a poet and librarian. Her poetry has appeared in Strange Horizons, Microverses, Liminality Magazine, and other fine publications. Say “hi” on Twitter @meep_matsushima or read more of her poetry at http://meep-matsushima.neocities.org.
When everywhere is dark & silent - birds have slept in their nest, men have gone to the heaven, sky has been covered by the black cloud with little ashes, animals have taken a rest from hunting, eyes have left the watching mouthes have stopped the talking, legs & hands have hidden their appearances, noises are no where to be found, talk to me then _ I will be waiting for your call beside the river Where I could hear your voice like that flow of water Let us meet in the night, when we could hear our voices loudly & clearly. About the author:
Imam Sarafadeen is a Nigerian poet and writer with a passion for poetry and other literary genres. His works centers on grief, love, and nature and his works have appeared and are forthcoming in Poetry Soup, Baskadia, Words Rhymes & Rhythm, Sychronized Chaos, Academy of heart and mind, Poetry Planet and elsewhere. Sarafadeen is currently studying the English Language at Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto, Sokoto State. Nigeria. He is Imam Sarafadeen on Facebook and 11bamikale on both Twitter & Instagram.
i imagine you as a morsel while i place you inside my needy mouth tasting you before I submerge you… tasting you before i hand your delicate scallop like flesh over to my violent tongue as it swirls you around and around like a merry-go-round in the front of my mouth thrashing you so wildly that your skin starts to tear and flake off, falling upon my curious gums, like autumn debris brushing against my velvet cheeks. my molars grind you into a flattened flesh diluting you with saliva so that you can slide easily down the dark pit of hell where you truly belong About the author:
My name is Hannah Myers. I am originally from British Columbia and grew up in Glasgow. I am studying for an MA in creative writing at UCC. I adore writing poetry, game narrative, flash, scripts and ‘dirty rap’. Authors I am interested in and influenced by are Ludmilla Petrushevskaya, Raold Dahl and Sylvia Plath.
We start each day anew, and now we see how a song, story or rhyme calls towards the silver in the soaring trees with their early gleaming shadows. It is a single line from poetry whispering in the coolness of winter air when it is time for warmth and the days ahead to brighten. Creating a sketch or collage shaping silvery stars with pencils to fill the empty winter skies, we paint with silver, grey and blue for a new and captivating crisp horizon. Perhaps we will decorate our coats with fluorescent colours and glittering threads of silver that will illuminate our snow-covered clothes. And we will find our place in the books we chose. Favourite folklore creatures add their silvery song to our new poems, and their fables and traditions are still and not made to alarm or frighten. We start each day anew, and now we see how a song, story or rhyme calls towards the silver in the soaring trees with their early gleaming shadows. It is a single line from poetry whispering in the coolness of winter air when it is time for warmth and the days ahead to brighten. It became a part of winter as we dream of the distant memories of summer meadows. There is courage found in the stories that we find will enlighten. We speak and sing as freely as the changing winter outdoor scenes with songs and carols to invite in. It is time to celebrate the winter sun and share its wisdom in paper stories we can write in. We start each day anew, and now we see how a song, story or rhyme calls towards the silver in the soaring trees with their early gleaming shadows. It is a single line from poetry whispering in the coolness of winter air when it is time for warmth and the days ahead to brighten. 'Winter Silver' was previously published on the children's poetry website, The Dirigible Balloon.
so they came wandering from the woods hand in hand, the boy younger clothes like torn leaves their hair dry rushes and we broke off harvest dropped scythe and rake crossed ourselves in fear of their green their green skin as true as I stand their strange babble like corncrakes in the stubble thrushes fluting in the hedge refused our bread, chewed raw green beans, like cats lapped water from the hand years on, green no more the boy being dead the girl baptised and godly speech restored - or learned anew - she told her tale: she spoke of bells a river, sunless St Martin’s Land, of tending flocks, a deep ravine - truth or fancy? She married well. Time twists memory to legend - fragments jag, distort like a splintered glass - but this we swear: from somewhere unbeknown two green children came. About the author:
After decades teaching in Scotland and Yorkshire, Lynda Turbet now lives in north Norfolk, where she observes the world from her wheelchair and tries to make sense of it all through writing. Her work has won prizes, has been published in online and print journals, and in themed anthologies. This is the story of the green children of Woolpit, Suffolk, which dates from the 14th century and is depicted in a window of the village church. |
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