Flashbird: Snared Chosen Edge

Contemplate the smooth

surfaced speech,

frisk the word,

stride, run,

fall to overhear

the dried rustle,

a keyboard presses itself.

 

 

The bell rings,

the cat wafer,

arid pudding,

drive deep

on the artery,

jelly rushes

out from the bush,

clings, map to life.

 

 

The tones,

metronome tink,

how do I call for you?

a word fitted freshly,

airy curtain pounding,

fathered

ensnared

collecting crossroads.

 

 

Names are myths

to be released,

wrench them out,

feet hang on

the wooden floor, the

painted oaks spoiled,

elusive reed

rubbing the tip,

may the licorice cup

cease to be called,

thumb strikes

a calling in, a lift

a touch,

a noise

litmus

by extraction.

 

 

Afternoon proceeds

itsy bitsy gray reflections,

antsy dots settle

preserve or react

the froth,

name of some

road

on tired eyes.

the vital spirit.

 

 

Benedict Downing

 

Benedict Downing has written fiction, poetry since his adolescence. He joined local community reading circles, workshops, college literary groups, and ventured into his own. Has published in literary journals like Poetry Life and Times, Danse Macabre, Belleville Park Pages, Crack the Spine, New Plains Review, and The Sentinel Quarterly. He is currently working in his second novel, and other projects. There are two published books written by Mr. Downing. A poetry book “Sidereal Reflux” (2011) and a novel “Epicrisis” (2014).

 

 

Greg Moglia, Featured Author

Mother Never Cries

 

Come over she says I’ll make you a tuna fish sandwich

Lunch with Mother who lives in black and white

Black – Uncle Ado –Cheap bastard – money to him was everything

Black – her friend Nina banished –She sent her sister away to a nursing home

 

Those in black were dead but no tears only anger

About her whites she has an ease

Your father I kiss him once in the morning and once at night

Now, as I bite into her sandwich she comes closer…leans in

 

You know I never cry, not even when my father died

I’m at a loss, what’s this Mom…doubt?

Self-righteous…rigid…you?

 

Did she think, My boy, see what he says

Tell him what I don’t understand

I with never a question about anything…ever?

 

And I think what a strange way

It would be to tell me

I love you

What a strange way

 

 

The Gloves

 

The wintry day says gloves

Walk in the cold rain and it says gloves

Stop for lunch at the Tex Mex and it says

Gloves on the table to pencil my menu selection

The newspaper to read and it says to my spot by the window

The chicken, beans and rice plate and it says life is good

 

Time to go and where are my gloves?

On the table, in my briefcase, in my jacket and nothing

I look up and at the door a man in a sweatshirt holds gloves

Out the door he goes and doesn’t put them on

I see him walk down the block

They could be my gloves

 

I think I’m an old fool these days

I can’t chase him down the block

Maybe the gloves in a place I missed

Might even have left them home

No, he walks out with the gloves that say

Look here, left alone on the table

 

Left alone  and it’s not a steal

He couldn’t just call out – anyone here lose these

Yet I want some sort of answer

Someone at fault…

Someone at kindness

 

The man not quite a thief

Me not quite a victim

 

Greg Moglia

 

Greg Moglia is a veteran of 27 years as Adjunct Professor of Philosophy of Education at N.Y.U and 37 years as a high school teacher of Physics and Psychology. His poems have been accepted in over 300 journals in the U.S., Canada, England, India, Australia, Sweden, Belgium and Austria as well as five anthologies. He is 8 times a winner of an ALLEN GINSBERG Poetry Award sponsored by the poetry center at Passaic County Community College. He lives in Huntington, N.Y.

 

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