January 2017 | poetry
I swear I can feel the grass
extend myself out, reach to touch
pet and adore, show my affection.
Light makes me marvel
all those photons busy working;
a free painting every second.
If my hope were tangible
I could easily say
it lives in times of quiet
blessed by a hummingbird
beating its wings.
Penney Knightly
Penney Knightly is a survivor of sexual abuse; themes about that are often found in her work. Her poetry has appeared in Broad Magazine, Big River Review, Dead King, Ink in Thirds, and elsewhere. She lives with her family on a sailboat in the San Francisco Bay, where she writes and makes art. She tweets @penneyknightly and shares on her blog http://penneyknightly.com.
January 2017 | poetry
The little ant stood on the edge of
the curb, to avoid being stepped on
and looked down,
as the city crowds shuffled by,
faces clinched to another
average day.
And someone noticed the little ant,
on the curb’s edge – and shouted
to the ant, “Jump! Jump you little fucker!”
It’s tough out here.
Tony Walton
Tony Walton is a Caribbean writer living in the Cayman Islands. His works have appeared in Storyteller Magazine, Moonkind Press, Whisperings Magazine, Mountain Tales Press, Out of Our Magazine, Poydras Review, Poetry Bay Magazine, Burningword Literary Journal, Wilde Magazine, Nite Writers Literary International Literary Journal, Tiny Moments, Avalon Literary Review, Iceland Daily, East Lit Literary Magazine, Boston Poetry Magazine, Eunoia Magazine, Olentangy Review, Carnival Literary Magazine, Verity LA, Phantom Kangaroo, Tincture Journal, Star 82 Review, Seltzerzine, Literature Today and Morphorg Magazine.
January 2017 | poetry
suitcase.
it is better than an empty closet,
for it encourages thrift
and reminds us
that we can, indeed, slam
those rosewood doors,
a cautious sanctimony
tucked in the scarves
of the accomplished
and inarguably well-spoken moms
who told us of regrets
we ought not to strive for.
escape.
and reach as lost stars do.
the clothes on our backs
flapping in light autumn sweat.
ready to be folded
again, near public showers.
Kristine Brown
Kristine Brown is a freelance writer and editor located in Southwest Texas. Her writing has been featured in Forage Poetry, In-Flight Literary Magazine, Dulcet Quarterly, Thought Catalog, Journal of Asian Politics and History, and Sanglap: Journal of Literary and Cultural Inquiry. While her work is driven by research, Kristine aims to expand herself creatively through poetry and prose. She experiments with writing at her blog, Crumpled Paper Cranes (http://crumpledpapercranes.com).
January 2017 | poetry
A Brand New World
Strange cracks evaporate,
buckle like a sky that has forgotten
its blue. Clouds
crawl off the floor, point
accusingly at stars swearing
they are innocent as a bathroom
mirror. Three leaves send up smoke
signals, invitations to tomorrow’s mess.
Of Onions and Umbrellas
Parallel creatures of hanging,
droplets are their common denomination.
Production vs. repellant. Necessity
will decide as I stand in abandoned
doorway. Surrounded
by solace, I waver
between kitchen cabinets and countryside
pathways. I inhale
freedom-scented winds from both sides.
I wonder if I held
a match between my teeth,
would I spark, change
the weather or the world?
Midnight in Central Park
Clock tolls, harsh tones
of deadline’s passing. Old contracts
now void; New contracts, yet to be
inked, lay stagnant on conference-room table.
The squirrels and pigeons have spent hours
painting protest slogans on posterboards,
now firmly fastened to limbs
graciously donated by the trees. Morning
will find a feral picket line rising
with the sun. Let the tourists try
and cross. A mouthful of human nuts might be
an interesting change of pace. Thoughts darken
as demands are prepared for release. Select
branches have been branded, stand ready
for wind’s first liberation movement. Seeds and
crumbs to be bickered over, most will be fodder
for the camel-cracking straw: Respect. Less
smoking. The flowers feel brown tint
is a terrible shade to bloom. No stilettos. The grass
is wimpy, sparse at best, already aerated enough.
Absolute banishment of Alka-Seltzer.
Some urban legends need not be
granted acreage for daily testing by teenagers.
Mandatory permits for artists and musicians. The
ability to hold can or conversation does not make
a Monet or Missy Elliot. Little reprieves
that might make the daily doses of drunks and
muggers bearable. The last
[semi]natural wildlife in this city is crying
out for compromise.
Dawn comes, as do the villagers. Both storm past,
ignore flurry of fur and feathers, paws and wings.
These mindless migrants remain
too blinded by their own
desire to beat the rush, to make the train.
A.J. Huffman
A.J. Huffman has published thirteen full-length poetry collections, thirteen solo poetry chapbooks and one joint poetry chapbook through various small presses. Her most recent releases, The Pyre On Which Tomorrow Burns (Scars Publications), Degeneration (Pink Girl Ink), A Bizarre Burning of Bees (Transcendent Zero Press), and Familiar Illusions (Flutter Press) are now available from their respective publishers. She is a five-time Pushcart Prize nominee, a two-time Best of Net nominee, and has published over 2600 poems in various national and international journals, including Labletter, The James Dickey Review, The Bookends Review, Bone Orchard, Corvus Review, EgoPHobia, and Kritya.
January 2017 | poetry
Trade-in
Through shoes with cardboard soles that sport a clownish grin, my blackened toes flash like rotten teeth. Crows, spooked from the pizza box atop the trash, hurl their curses from the wires on high, to the concrete canyons of misty light.
Chalk colored piles with dark swirls,, like rippled custard, dot the box, and I wonder at the absence of odor, as I lift the lid. One piece is better than none, a find at last, and some fluff for a bowel that growls.
Sitting on the curb, my breezy feet to face, I figure that I have had worse, and smack the pizza down. Time to nap, I scan the shadowed doors about, and see my pick is occupied. A lumpy blanket squeezing hair, with weathered boots parked aside.
Removing my flaps of shod I waft to the shadowed lee, do a trade and carry on.
The crows are quiet as sin.
By The Sea
Arching its neck over the undulating highway to feed from the other side, an orange dinosaur fittingly forms a gateway for my passing, a secrete portal to new things in a world of vivid color. In awe of this unexpected find, I smile and look aside at the jungle flashing by. Along its face smiling heads of scaly creatures look out to welcome me. Huge friendly eyes, shaded by leathery furrowed brows, seem to say, “What took you so long?”
Turning to Bill to share my joy, I exclaim, “After all the looking, I have finally found it!” Bill is undisturbed to part from his muse and turn his mask of calm my way. Simply meeting my eyes, he knows, yet he needs not say. Turning back to his muse and calmly tooling the little VW through the herds of prehistory, Bill drives on.
In the back seat Rocky laughs and says, “Danny tried to set me on fire.” Looking back between the seats, I see that Danny has lit a cigarette, its blood red swirls of smoke flashing tracers from the rear window sunbeams. Immune to Rocky’s claim, Danny returns my look and shrugs. Rocky immediately forgets his outcry but likes the attention anyway. Scrunched together, excitement in their eyes, like Bill, they are watching. I watch too. And together, the miles suck us in.
***
For a moment the late autumn sea leaves me a child standing in the middle of an empty slate dump, grey expanses running to steep hills of leafless timber. Then, I am here again, as slate grey seas kiss a cumulous scattered sky.
Danny squeals and dances in the surf while I and others sit in the sand, our sneakers wet by his dance’s reach. Suddenly across the tableau of what seemed untouchable for so long, a string of pretty girls parade, all enjoying the ancient interest of our smiles, yet bemused by them a stitch.
Wildwood by the Sea blesses our short stay as another portal begins to close. Still whooping and high kicking the curled white froth, Danny does not see. Grinning at this sight, like a silent monk, I wait. It will not be long now.
Charles Hayes
Charles Hayes, a Pushcart Prize Nominee, is an American who lives part time in the Philippines and part time in Seattle with his wife. A product of the Appalachian Mountains, his writing has appeared in Ky Story’s Anthology Collection, Wilderness House Literary Review, The Fable Online, Unbroken Journal, CC&D Magazine, Random Sample Review, The Zodiac Review, eFiction Magazine, Saturday Night Reader, Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, Scarlet Leaf Publishing House, Burning Word Journal, eFiction India, and others.
January 2017 | poetry
Setting the Landlord on Fire
Let me explain something first.
This was by mistake.
Although I remember a motivational speaker
saying something about how there are no mistakes.
And it was only his face.
I was trying to do a circus trick.
I was drunk.
He had a giraffe shirt on
so I couldn’t miss him.
I spit the vodka aflame into his face
and he had a beard
and mustache—had—
and fell back
into the Christmas tree,
which wasn’t my Christmas tree,
because I’m not Christian
and I don’t own a saw.
I’m Saami,
which is a people
of genocide
and maybe this is the first time you’ve ever heard of us,
in this poem
about my landlord
rolling around
in the thorns
or whatever
of silver and gold
classic-meets-mod
orbs and beads and crucifixes
that unfortunately
do stick in backs
and he didn’t die
or even get wounded
that badly.
It was more embarrassment.
Like every time I go to the slot
and put the check in
and realize I can’t even hear it
hit the bottom.
I don’t even have the satisfaction of that.
The EMT Instructor Shows Us a Video of a Man Falling to His Death
There is, of course, absolutely nothing
to be learned from this.
Other than I should have spent more money
on the college.
Except this isn’t really a college.
It’s more of a basement in need of a shave.
The man keeps falling in the video,
mostly because the instructor keeps playing it
and laughing and he looks like
he’s eaten people’s dreams his whole life.
Not the man falling. The man falling
looks like nothing. He looks like a flash
of flesh. He is nameless and he’s not
nameless and I look at the teacher
who doesn’t teach who looks like
he was eating a dream last night,
all night long, in his insomnia,
and I wonder what happened
that made him think he can do anything,
say anything, and have no repercussions.
Negaunee
It’s a city.
You’ve never heard of it.
It was New Year’s Day.
You’ve never heard of that either.
It’s a day in the U.S.
where everyone commits suicide.
I’m defining Negaunee for you.
I can’t explain New Year’s Day.
It’s too complicated.
It’s sort of like Christmas
but with more syphilis.
We went out to go shovel
but the shovel was buried
under ten feet of snow,
because I come from a place
where we have to shovel
a hole up to the sky,
building a ladder
so that we can crawl
out of our homes
up onto the snow banks
where the crows are waiting
to eat our eyes. But if you’re fast,
you’ll eat theirs first.
Typhoid Donald
for Kevin Simmonds
German wonder crook,
wintered why
the talk to the lot of us
could be so lethal,
and yet, even told that,
we know,
and don’t even wonder.
Not the women, not the men,
not even when the blood
legs its way over to us.
We turn
and blink and four years fly by
on our new island, walled and chained.
Ah, Donald,
from the Gaelic, ‘ruler of the world.’
We hear your magnificent
hard rule
of pus and drool.
Ron Riekki
Ron Riekki’s books include U.P.: a novel (Sewanee Writers Series and Great Michigan Read nominated), The Way North: Collected Upper Peninsula New Works (2014 Michigan Notable Book from the Library of Michigan and finalist for the Eric Hoffer Book Award/Grand Prize shortlist, Midwest Book Award, Foreword Book of the Year, and Next Generation Indie Book Award), Here: Women Writing on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (2016 IPPY/Independent Publisher Book Award Gold Medal Great Lakes—Best Regional Fiction and Next Generation Indie Book Award—Short Story finalist), and And Here: 100 Years of Upper Peninsula Writing, 1917-2017 (Michigan State University Press, 2017).
