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Poetry by Erik Estabrook
Be Aware
sucession of nothingness
where do I begin?

timid thought seekers
crushed by a whim

to proceed into the casm
or avoid my own imagination

to become aware finally of what and how we ran into doubt

to begin this blossoming that turns to horror
as day into night


be aware that in my conscience
its the only thing thats right.


Interpretation

I stood awake staring at my shadow
has my shadow become me

all that I once knew thrown into desparity

I shake off my emotions
and mold them just right
but my design is broken my belonging out of sight.


Erik Estabrook I'm a poet who is always seeking a higher level
of vocab, internal knowledge, and flow in my poems.

My poems all represent who I am.
Poetry is a chance to free my mind for me.
Being a writer is a blesssing I don't take for granted. Poetry by Mike Berger
A DREAM COME TRUE

It was cherry. No dings or dents.
No rust spots. It rested on cinder
blocks. The tires still had air. The
upholstery was worn but clean.
Better yet, no oil spots. Beneath
the dust the paint was still bright.

I dreamed of owning one when I
was in my twenties. With school
and a wife it wasn't to be. Still I
hungered to get behind the wheel
and lay a patch.

At last I have the chance to fulfill my
youthful dream. I dickered hard for that
sixty-seven Mustang. And now it's mine.
I shook and trembled as I took my
first drive. It wasn't the excitement.
You shake a little when you're
seventy-nine.

BOX IN THE ATTIC

Mom slipped away quietly in her
sleep. Dad grieved.
He sat alone at the window looking
for her to come home.
Pain bruised from his dark blue eyes.
It took two weeks before he
was gone. He died of a broken heart.

He wasn't a demonstrative man. I
rarely saw him hug his wife. He wasn't
effusive with tender words either.
He loved her deeply you could tell by
the look in his eyes.

I found an old box in the attic. Opening it,
there were a bundle of letters. They were tied
to gather with a bow.

They were letters to my mom from her husband
while he was serving in France. I read the first
letter and was taken back. Passion dipped
from every line.

I never knew his love was so deep. He missed
her and thought his heart would break. He said
water was hell; it wasn't the carnage all around,
war kept the two of them apart.

Mom kept every precious word; I didn't together
with a deep blue ribbon. She hid them away,
perhaps thinking I would read them someday.


FROGS

The little pond is lined with
stately cattails.
They poke and make
holes in the sky.
Lily pads sleep upon
the placid surface.
A trickle of water cascades
from the pond.

On the shore and old
Cottonwood tree spreads
its arms to shade the scene.
Patches of light wiggle
tickling the shadows.

Deep blue water beckons
a swim. It looks so good
on a hot summer day.
AH! Skinny dipping.

It dozen frogs strike up a
serenade. A huge old bullfrog
sings the bass.
Little leaf frogs singing a soprano.

The frogs don't seem to mind
me sitting here conducting their
chorus.

MANAGEMENT DECISIONS

I'm applying for a patent. My invention
should revolutionize the executive decision
making process. It will remove the subjectivity
from those difficult decisions. Executives
will no longer have to rely on hunches
or play the odds. It's simple and easy.
All you do is go to your computer and
type in your question. You can then leave
the rest to the computerized Ouija board.

ROTTEN CHERRIES

WHAP! !
The kitchen window resounded.
I rush to see
what had happened.
Flopping around haplessly a blackbird
lay on the deck.
It was struggling to right itself.

Under the old cherry tree
blackbirds were devouring
fermented black cherries.
They squawk incessantly.

Those blackbirds were getting drunk.
How did I know?
Several were trying doing loop-d- loops
and flying upside down.

Mike Berger is a retired PhD psychologist.
He worked as a therapist for 30 years. He
freelanced during those years. Today he
claims to be bright, articulate, handsome
and extremely humble


Poetry by Peycho Kanev
perfect night

the ants swing violins in the
dirt and the spider is silent and
calm;

all the belly dancers swim in the
deep blue see
and the fish cry under the water and
all the poets write poems about
death
but they never come even close

here is only this dim light from the
lamp
here is this bottle of marvelous red
blood
here is the beginning of the end and
the life again
and the dark
again

the whole ocean is preposterous
and dull;

the flowers dance in the dark;

the death is the biggest
allegory.

scream in the afternoon

the sun is high again
and it looks to me like enemy,
outside
in the hot street
an old lady stands by the curb
under the shadow of a tree
and she looks like my mama
and she looks like your mama
I ask my self where my luck is.
it has ran away like a river of sweat
in this hot summer afternoon
and the old woman is gone
and the sun is about to set
as I wait
as I shiver
thru the endless day
and thru all the wasted loves
I fell asleep again
and this poem become
silent for ever.

               tragedy

I am sleepless now and in the night
I watch through the window the dieing
of the leaves:
my girl is gone
and all the candles of our love has burned
down like everything else is burning down,
eventually,
I want now some good drink in my right
hand and some big bone in the other
or maybe a knife or old razor
but at the end
the sun comes up and everything else
loose its meaning and
purpose.

Peycho Kanev is 28 years old. He loves to listen to sad music while he drinks
slowly his beer. His work has been published in Word Riot, Gloom Cupboard,
Poetry Cemetery, Nerve Cowboy, The Chiron Review, The Guild of Outsider Writers, Spoken War, Side of Grits, Southern Ocean Review and many others. He loves to put the word down and not talking on the cell phone for days. He is nominated for Pushcart Award. He lives in Chicago. Alone.

"His new poetry collection which is collaboration with the poet Felino Soriano and the Editor Edward Wells is out now and can be found at Amazon.com”

Link: http://www.amazon.com/r-Peycho-Kanev/dp/0979129494/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1245405775&sr=8-1
 Poetry by Holly Day
The Plan
oh it’s love, he and I are like
that cat and dog in the movie that get lost
but by sticking together despite immeasurable differences
manage to find home again. He is the dog
and I am the cat, and this
is not just because he’s a boy and I’m a girl
but because he is big and angry-strong-faithful
and I hate getting wet.
and it will last forever because we look
just like Disney’s Cinderella and Prince charming and even like
to sing to each other while we’re driving like
all those blond-haired actress dark-hared actor teams
from the ‘50s so how
could we go wrong?


The Quilt
I cut squares to fit together: bits
of old clothes, my son’s jeans
my husband’s flannel work shirt
a stained bedsheet. This is the measure
of my life, all that has come before.
This is important.
I sew the bits of cloth together
weave scraps saved from family haircuts
into the stitching, plastic from trick-or-treat bags
a little girl’s sock with the heel worn out.
I don’t want to forget this.
The tail of a mouse the cat brought me.
A piece of dog collar. A red medical waste label.
A string of baby teeth. The last page of a novel
my ex-husband wrote. The first page
of the journal my second husband kept.
All this is important. I don’t want to forget.


Rain Check on that Cup of Coffee
It had been so long since I’d had a dream about Christ
That it kind of took me by surprise when He
Appeared at the foot of my bed, floating
A couple of feet above the shag carpet in that way
He used to when He used to be a regular
Guest in my college dorm apartment.
He used to talk to me a lot, back then. This time, though
He just stared at me from across the length of my Amish-made quilt
His eyes so sad and sorrowful that I honestly felt
That I had done something wrong. “Can I get you something?” I asked
Because even if I am some sort of sinner, whatever, I don’t really know what kind
I am always polite to houseguests.
Jesus, He used to talk to me, and maybe
He would still, if I didn’t have a man asleep in bed next to me
But Jesus is just so damned polite I think
He was afraid of waking my husband up.

Holly Day is a travel writing instructor living in Minneapolis, Minnesota, with her husband and two children. Her most recent book is Walking Twin Cities (Wilderness Press).


Poetry by John Grey
BRIDGE TOO FAR?

Magic carpets. Europe.
Superman flying.
Some things I think of
when crossing a bridge.

You’re driving,
slow and cautious.
A bridge is unnatural to you,
nothing like a road.
With every nudge of the brake,
you imagine losing control,
crashing through the barrier.

Eskimos. Paratroopers.
The rings of Saturn.
Anything can pop
into my head
as we reach the
bridge’s zenith
and there’s nothing
but air on either side.

That’s the exact moment
you declare, “God I hate bridges.”
You don’t know that
you also despise
The Red Baron, crepes suzette,
and Champion the wonder horse.

But don’t worry.
We’ll be back on dry land soon.
And home.
Some place we both can arrive at.

YOUR NEWSPAPER

If anyone asks
“Having a good day?”
you could just hand them
the black and white broadsheet.

Or if they inquire after your health,
you could point to the headlines:
“Death, disease, famine.”

“How’s the family?”
could be met by
the innocent slaughtered
in the train explosion,
the massacre at the refugee camp.

But you just reply,
“Nothing ever changes.”
And you keep your newspaper
to yourself..
- Hide quoted text -

ELEANOR

Your face streaks like lightning
through a foul march wind.

On a gray shore,
ocean recedes,
your pale skin arises.

It's always the same:
your voice, that wailing wind,.
mother-of-pearl and blood
bubbling in my mouth.

In the trembling of a crazed dusk.
you float across dunes,
a sour half-dream,
a vigil, deceitfully,
always you.

Rain falls, takes prisoners,
in cramped rooms
with cracked window views
of who must be out
on a night like this.

STEADY DAYS

Am having a great time being unknown,
with the skeptical tea-kettle and the winsome curtains,
the random solitude of shelves and window screens,
of kitchen chairs and the insoluble steadiness of
early morning radio singing its alphabet to my hearty ears,
while sadness struts the turquoise turrets of the telephone.
Am bedding down with my own utterance, haven't
talked to anyone since the clown on stilts in last night's dream,
sitting before the window just cruising, or roaming
the parking lots of hinge and plank and refrigerator hum.
And stars come out with their impossible zeroes,
the insane language of their infinities.
And I watch the moon in all its imperishable indifference
scanning the earth for all who someone night want to love
were it not for the mocking heart, the disbelieving brain,
the sickly subterfuge of every nerve end extant.
Am considering a move to the bedroom.
Am imagining a flight to Jupiter.
Am coming out stronger with my weaknesses than ever before.
An overhead plane gives the sky a little of its own medicine,
shreds of smoke, jesting lights, as heavier than air
gets the monkey off its metallic back.
And a truck rattles by, more wheels than Beethoven has notes.
And look at that women under the street-lamp, her discontent
a passionate shade of red while mine is an egg-yolk yellow.
Am having a conversation with the Ides of March,
the Lord of the Flies, the pick of the litter, the land of the free.
And all the while, planks and letters and wind are
coming up the path.
Circles knock on my door. Straight lines answer.

JOHN GREY: Australian born poet, US resident since late seventies. Works as
financial systems analyst. Recently published in Connecticut Review, Georgetown Review and REAL with work upcoming in
Poetry East, Cape Rock and the Pinch. Poetry by Kristine Ong Muslim
Dear Friend
by Kristine Ong Muslim


Happiness is the closet under the stairs;
its whimpering gets muffled
when the door is closed.

And when you finally open the door,
did you find what you were looking for?
Or did the screams become more stifled than before?

Dear Stranger
by Kristine Ong Muslim

Why do you fall in love
with unstable objects, let them wobble
on their tiny wheels and thin stilts?

And when you dunk them in water,
are you not surprised at being
empty-handed after that?

The Urban Project's Land Reclamation Site
by Kristine Ong Muslim


Two worlds interspersed--one paved, the other
a bulldozed sinkhole. The land has lost its
contours; the weathering has been prevented.
In the beginning, this is how the planet has been:
all flatness, with only a skyline to encroach.

An occasional wild grass sprouts among
the discarded rubber tires and steel drums.
The surface of the puddle ripples
with the approach of road machinery.

The Urban Project's Pedestrian Underpass
by Kristine Ong Muslim


Built for strangers,
the walkway sings
footfalls: split my shale,
trample my concrete open.

Kristine Ong Muslim my publication credits and recent acceptances include more than seven hundred poems and stories in over three hundred publications worldwide, such as Bellevue Literary Review, Narrative Magazine, The Pedestal Magazine, and Turnrow. I have been nominated three times for the Pushcart Prize and received several Honorable Mentions in Year's Best in Fantasy and Horror.
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