October 2015 | back-issues, poetry
To Jack Kerouac
I: Winter
darkness descending:
clouds don’t understand sunlight;
keep your freezer stocked.
II: Spring
budding flowers urge:
pushing leafy envelopes;
mail someone your love.
III: Baseball
freshly mown diamonds:
mechanics sculpted sharply;
fulcrums equal hits.
IV: Summer
heat cascades fiercely:
men revering bikinis;
watch but don’t disturb.
V: Autumn
crispness ascending:
clouds reproached about sunshine;
harvest that last glow.
by Christopher Stolle
Christopher Stolle’s poetry has appeared in more than 100 magazines in several countries, including Labyrinth (Indiana University Honors Program), The Plaza (Japan), El-Shaddai (Singapore), Poetechniciens (England), Ultimate Ceasefire (Australia), the Tipton Poetry Journal, Flying Island, and Recursive Angel, and in three anthologies (In Our Own Words: A Generation Defining Itself [volumes 1 and 4; 1997 and 2002] and Reckless Writing [2012]). Poet’s Market entries noted him as a contributor to various magazines (1997–2000), and he has also published two nonfiction books with Coaches Choice: 101 Leadership Lessons From Baseball’s Greatest Managers (2013) and 101 Leadership Lessons From Basketball’s Greatest Coaches (2015). He works as a book editor and lives in Richmond, Indiana—the cradle of recorded jazz.
October 2015 | back-issues, poetry
We’re fading mirages spent
by father times lease.
As we wait to balloon
to the neon sky,
In a haze,
day after day,
from twilights
dawning depths;
the sunrise bakes.
The slumbering horizon
awaits remnants
of earths scattered
souls to reunite with us.
When antiquity phones,
this world will yawn,
and it’s inhabitants
will slip into
their dormancy;
You slip into your
time capsule ruin
underneath the soil.
No matter what,
you’re a limited
release casted
by the tar cloaked angel.
You order your silhouette
to waltz back into
the atmosphere;
but in the end,
we’ll still be
drinking our dust.
by Chris Ozog
Christopher Ozog is a 23 year old writer who resides in Ann Arbor, Michigan. His work has previously appeared in Burningword Literary Journal, The Commonline, and Crack the Spine with work upcoming in Hello Horror.
October 2015 | back-issues, poetry
Archaeopteryx, the early bird, lies petrified
as generic admixture, in stone under glass in
a splay decidedly crude, its rude wings
akimbo and talons curled –
denied the contemporary luxury to choose
in which frozen indignity to remain.
by Alleliah Nuguid
Alleliah Nuguid is from Fremont, California. She received a BA in creative writing from Northwestern University and is currently pursuing an MFA in poetry from Boston University. Her poems can be found in Permafrost, The New York Times Learning Blog, and the anthology Poets 11, among other places.
