medias res smash cut in for punchline set-up never explained
deer and hound look startlingly similar splayed disemboweled by side of road
just leave cardboard stay in collar – puppeteer’s hand
assemblies should be fool proof… they had to add stickers
darting flame reflected appears to battle itself carnival glass
Only Illusions
one windmill rests exhausted, lifeless out of breath, bushed
walls press in close quarters become trash compactor
in the stage directions, bolded: everything goes wrong!
old school squib discharges none of painted noise for him… real, loud, messy
morning dew fog over rolling plains car with hood up
Summer Sky
roads closed ahead under construction recalculating rerouting
beside lavatory just grateful to be seated
rabbit tracks are diminutive – look hard
The prayer plant… Is flowering?! …The prayer plant is flowering!!
squirrel on high bar don’t tell him because has no wings is not flying
Jerome Berglund has many haiku, senryu and tanka exhibited and forthcoming online and in print, most recently in the Asahi Shimbun, Bear Creek Haiku, Bamboo Hut, Black and White Haiga, Blōō Outlier Journal, Bones, Bottle Rockets, Cold Moon Journal, Contemporary Haibun Online, Daily Haiga, Failed Haiku, Frogpond, Haiku Dialogue, Haiku Seed, Ink Pantry, Japan Society, Modern Haiku, Poetry Pea, Ribbons, Scarlet Dragonfly, Seashores, Time Haiku, Triya, Tsuri-dōrō, Under the Basho, Wales Haiku Journal, and the Zen Space.
You can find more of Jerome’s work here on Ink Pantry.
I’m on a half-lit street where feral cats chase rats from Norway
and a pawnshop window is hawking stuff I recognise
and sirens roar somewhere off stage
and alleys smell of piss and cheap whiskey
and I hear voices but don’t see faces
and the bar’s so dark there’s no seeing from the outside –
I feel at risk and I’m loving it.
Our Guru
He was more of an impediment than a teacher. A leech if you must know. Not a guide. And an expert only in helping himself to the contents of a fridge. Of course, in his own head, he was the master. But, in my kitchen, he was no more than a free-loading brother-in-law.
“But he has nowhere else to go,” my wife implored. “There is always Katmandu,” I replied. For someone so thin, he could eat like a hyena. For someone so hairy, I had to wonder why my blades went missing. And the constant presence of him sitting in the lotus position in the centre of our parlour was off-putting.
A coffee table would have been far more attuned to the rest of the furniture. “I am a parent of your mind and soul,” he told me. I prefer that my parents be older than I am.
He stayed with us for six months, by which time even my wife had had enough. He never offered to help with the bills. And he had long since transcended household chores. She advised him to move some place where his eastern wisdom would be more appreciated.
He liked to quote from the Upanishad, how the word “guru” is split into gu, meaning darkness, and ru, which dispels it. If only I were a guru myself. I could have dispelled him on the spot and how the darkness would have lifted.
I’m Corralled by an Uncle at a Family Gathering
The unfunny bounce off my ears. Sad jokes scatter across the ground like beer cans.
No uncle, I’m not embarrassed. Nor am I the snooty one in the family. I like a laugh as much as the next man… as long as that man is not my father’s brother.
I’ve heard folks say that comedy is tragedy plus time. Your tragedy still has years to run.
Spring Rain
So it’s drizzling. It doesn’t bother me. The trees lap it up Why shouldn’t I? Warblers sing through it. Egrets shrug the droplets off in style. To the waxwings, it’s a bath that keeps on giving.
The weather can’t dampen mating season. For the male crane, courting season is short. Every dip of the neck is doubling important. The strut, the dance, the fanning of feathers, has consequences for all the cranes to come. Same for the female. She hunkers down in that low-key rainfall, to watch the show, succumb if the performance meets her approval.
Early spring is where life struggles forward and death falls back on wintry habits. March winds blow into April. Boughs dribble water into up-and-coming buds. My face is cold. My clothes are damp. Nothing here for comfort. But the spirit is appeased.
The Abandoned Lover
She’s terrified of wind yet there she is on her porch steps, trembling, shivering, as a blast of northern air whips against her body.
She’s afraid of water, yet she dresses all in white, walks out into the pond as mute as the swans.
Ice is even worse, It could crack at any time. But there she goes, barefoot, ignoring the danger signs, crossing the winter surface one chill at a time.
She’s fearful the snow will bury her but she waits beneath the overhanging ledge. Or that the hungry wolves will carry her off. Yet she walks slowly in the direction of their howls.
She doesn’t want to die. But it’s the weather of impending doom. And she’s a woman after her own heart. That’s where the culpability lies.
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in Sheepshead Review, Poetry Salzburg Review and Hollins Critic. Latest books, Leaves On Pages and Memory Outside The Head, and Guest of Myself are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in Ellipsis, Blueline and International Poetry Review.
You can find more of John’s work here on Ink Pantry.
There is something about this song, there is some thing about this song sung live in Berlin, there is something about this song sung live to an audience who maybe weren’t alive to hear the beginning & yet they all still remember how the foretelling went. There is
something about this song sung along to by an audience who may not even be old enough to see when what was foretold came to pass. There is something about this song written in Berlin, that was performed there a year later, that may have remained just another pop
song until it was Live Aided into prominence. That, two years after that concert, was performed on a stage backed up to the Berlin Wall so that the audience on both sides could hear it & then, two more years on, remembered the song as they attacked the Wall & brought it tumbling down.
& some years after that, back in Berlin, Bowie is brought to tears when he realises the audience he is performing in front of is made up in equal parts of those, the seen & un- seen, who sang along with him from both sides of the wall & who added a new chorus, “the wall must fall.”
Mark Young was born in Aotearoa, New Zealand, but now lives in a small town in North Queensland in Australia. His most recent book is the downloadable pdf, XXXX CENTONES, available from Sandy Press.
You can find more of Mark’s work here on Ink Pantry.
The Red Line clitters and clatters and clutters along from Howard Avenue with its genuinely frightening demeanour and dark dangerous corners.
The train clumps along through Rogers Park to the Loop and then to the terminus at 95th Street,
A different world entirely from the one you enter at Howard
If you know anything about Chicago.
The train is a mechanical beast rocking back and forth
Flinging passengers willy-nilly in existential patterns.
It’s December in all its Christmassy glory,
And the others and I are wrapped up in our Chicago-y fleeced winter coats that bulk us up and turn us into shapeless pathetic blobs.
As the Red Line rattles southward,
All us human beings including me stare at nothing,
Avoid all dangerous murderous explosive incendiary eye contact.
Staring blankly, emptily, staring at nothing, their and my faces as seemingly empty as the vast ocean.
They and I stare at nothing.
They and I think nothing.
They and I stare aggressively impassive.
I am sitting while others younger than I stand because in their eyes I am Methusaleh—ancient, tired, glancing boredly at my watch that says 9:13 PM.
The raucous clattering of the train worms into my ears and wipes them clean,
Attacks my senses and destroys them.
A young woman enters at Belmont and grasps a strap in front of me.
Her blue jeans sparkle with silver beads that wind like sacred snakes up and down her legs.
She hangs onto the strap and joins the others and me in staring at the edges of the universe, seeing the origins of life, the remnants of the Big Bang.
She wears a black mask, but above the mask, her eyes strike glimpses of something beyond.
Accidentally (or not?) her booted toes touch the toes of my clunky antediluvian shoes that I bought ages ago at Dr. Waxberg’s Walk Shoppe on Dempster Street with its infinite miles of strip malls and fast-food nirvanas.
The toes of her boots barely touch the toes of my old Dr. Waxberg specials, worn through so many hundreds of miles,
And send a bolt of electricity that storms through my ancient sunken body and leaves me
Gasping.
Christopher Johnson is a writer based in the Chicago area. He’s done a lot of different stuff in his life. He’s been a merchant seaman, a high school English teacher, a corporate communications writer, a textbook editor, an educational consultant, and a free-lance writer. He’s published short stories, articles, and essays in The Progressive, Snowy Egret, Earth Island Journal, Chicago Wilderness, American Forests, Chicago Life, Across the Margin, Adelaide Literary Magazine, Blue Lake Review, The Literary Yard, Scarlet Leaf Review, Spillwords Press, Fiction on the Web, Sweet Tree Review, and other journals and magazines.
You can find more of Christopher’s work here on Ink Pantry.
What should I ask for, when my birthday is knocking on the door? I’ll get lots of love and blessings, and tonnes of gifts for sure!
A new dress will be ready for me, which I’ll wear happily I’ll paint the town red with my friends and family
No, I’ll not be an ordinary girl, though just for twenty four hours, I’ll turn into a fairy, with my hands full of stars
All these dreams still keep me awake when my birthday is knocking on the door But THEY say I am no more a kid, celebrating birthdays are childish ideas, which THEY don’t like anymore
I am growing up at the speed of light, and this is my nineteenth birthday, here the problem lies Now I can’t show my excitement, just for an ordinary day, when I first opened my eyes!
Navratra is an emerging poetess (writer), public speaker and artist from Jaipur, India. Her poems have been published in various national and international journals like Sahitya Kunj, Indian Periodical, Ode to a poetess, Spillwords, Setu Magazine, The Criterion and elsewhere. part from this, she is very interested in the thrilling trips of the country and the world and likes to write spontaneously on various subjects according to her observation.
Getting up in the morning I’d rather be canoodling with a stranger in my dreams But work isn’t going to wait for me As I push the duck feather pillows away My bones ache with the strain of age I would rather spend the day Numbing my mind with soap operas And stuffing my face with chocolate Instead of going to meetings Filling the bath with soap and water I am exhausted As lavender and vanilla permeate my senses The urge to call in sick increases But the hot water does little to ease my woes Because the routine itself drains my energy Work, home, friends, and so on The same pattern, the same people, I’m tired of this routine, I’m tired of my life, I’m sick of these walls. I’d rather be somewhere else. These thoughts fill my mind As I sink further into the bubbles Trying to escape from another round Of self-loathing and regret.
The Beach
Charcoal sands is my only company As I stare down the icy blue ocean
Flowing as the wind skinny dips in it Whilst my thoughts are elsewhere
Wondering how many people have stood In this sand admiring nature’s landscape
How many breaths have been inhaled here? Questions without any answers
As I pick up a pebble and throw it I wonder if my lover is across these tides
This beach is my anchor In the chaos of my pursuit to find love
An action some people spend a lifetime on But I know regardless of the outcome
I can always walk on this sandy panacea Without sadness and without judgement.
K.G. Munro is an author and poet. Here are a few of her writing credits: Oddball Magazine, Poetry Potion, Scarlet Dragonfly Journal, Splendeur Magazine, Green Ink Magazine, Feversofthemind and so on.
Let me think One word To talk about the day. Let me feel One feeling To talk about the night. Let me draw One drawing To colour life. I dwell in my garden I attain The university of imagination. Let me be one lesson That rethinks the ambition Of escaping time Running away With the modern cobweb. Being me Is the true Unselfish desire. It does not create misfortune On the less fortunate ones and Every possible door greets Everyone.
Sushant Thapa is from Biratnagar, Nepal. His fourth book of English poems is going to be published by World Inkers Printing and Publishing, Senegal, Africa and New York, USA. Sushant has an M.A. degree in English literature from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India.
The myth has happened in darkness of forest, near the old druidic altar with the stone. It was foggy then, shrouded in last summer. Here a fawn was born at dawn and morn – no woe!
Near the spring that belonged to the moony grove, naiad Arethusa is sitting on grass. Artemis – the soft goddess without trouble. It is the dreamy time for the Blue Hours.
The Utopian time is coming with charm. The naiad is musing about nightingales. They were known and famous in the whole land. Their song – for the sake of dazzling paradise.
Arethusa was not a mortal being. Artemis is resting now, only dreaming.
Arethusa and Alpheus I
In the grove where the druid’s fire sparkled at last evening, the Naiad dreams of the righteous, dear, beauteous time. The glade should be cleaned up after the amazing meeting of the Olympic gods and goddesses last pretty night.
The logic of Arethusa dreams of deductive wings. At the edge of forest the God Alpheus is waiting for the Naiad and apollonianly propitious mind. Having stroked the forest-like fawn, she is to him – coming.
He has hunted for wildcats at midnight with fancy – here. The love for her is such fabulous, gorgeous musing about the ontologically perfect Golden Fleece. The love is lost delight and only stardust of feelings.
She should become his amaranthine wife – the virgin. for life in depths of unending artemislike timbers!
Arethusa and Alpheus II
If dear Arethusa miswedded, she would sully tender crystal soul. She is going home quickly – away, dreaming of scintilla of the morns.
Don’t pick musing flowers of my hope! Leave me alone and my wizardries! Moony paradise seems to be lost. The naiad escapes soon from the forest.
On ship towards Ortygia-island, she meets the captain, former pirate and three divers with pearls in their hands. They want to dream and sleep, it is late.
The captain remembers the midnight storm. Naiad’s homeland becomes indeed lost.
At the sea II
She must find motherland in exile. Legendary seagulls are flying. The country of sailors is the sea. The waves of Poseidon are dreaming.
She can praise the morns – the charming dawns, full of celestial spirits of spell. The dreameries rest in new homeland, which shimmers over the meek vessel.
Despite this Artemis´ forest lives, where stags and does dance, muse forever. She thinks about the ambrosial tears. She listens to choir of pearl divers.
Naiad begins praying to Artemis just in the most Apollonian ways.
The prayer senso stricto
Owl from the grove listens to prayer. The most propitious and gorgeous words. Let moony star-like memories fly! Goddess sleeps in alluring forest!
Your roe is so appealing and grand! Your hedgehog is handsome, good-looking! Your bear is so cute and delicate! Your squirrel is so fascinating!
Enrapture the beauteous diamond! Beguile the splendid – classy agate! Enthrall the angelic emerald! Allure the bright – divine sapphire!
The wings of birds need to enchant world. Star of philosophers – next to owl.
in Dreameries
Arethusa embellishes a dawn, bewitches the fantasy of the moon with ravishing, resplendent stars, becomes bucolic dreams of the gods.
She is such a good, cute Eden. or an apollonian Arcadia land that was eternally Promised, as the mirth of Eudemonia.
Be charm fulfilled such epiphany! It is from an ontology – child. I wish you were from eternity. She would be the perpetual stream.
Sempiternity is immortal. Her stream-becoming is eternal.
At the oracle
God Alpheus was at the Pythia. He needed a plethora of feelings. She looked at the ancient amphora. Eudemonia would be clear in dreams.
The oracle wanted to help them yet Pythia, having drunk, told the pure truth. She told: The Naiad was on the isle. She is spring – such a heaven, so blue.
Pythia wrote for Apollo poetry about dreamiest mysterious from wind, as well as of stolen Golden Fleece about apollonianly soft mirth.
Long live an eternal oracle! May poems be the most delicate!
End-sonnet
The poem is an obol. The nightingale is singing. The naiad needs from live more. The lover is new dreaming.
Styx – river of destiny. The God would be the river, through the dreamed eternity. They become philosophers.
I love the stoic sparklets of Arethusa – naiad, and of the brave Alpheus, so beautiful is the time.
I want to finish sonnets, in dreams of the Grecian myths.
Paweł Markiewicz was born 1983 in Siemiatycze in Poland. He is poet who lives in Bielsk Podlaski and writes tender poems, haiku as well as long poems. Paweł has published his poetries in many magazines. He writes in English and German.
You can find more of Paweł’s work here on Ink Pantry.
Wine country returning to Napa and Sonoma too Camping to teach kids about safety in their rooms Smart Home new service for the groom Southern Oregon’s leaf strewed Kazoo California’s wine country is bouncing back to-do Larger than life instaurations of the sun at noon Super powers of skin multi-sensory to bloom Three generations sail through the Greek taboo Camouflage armour identity of course Be good win big in Alaska even drunk Suppose now it did happen would he bleed remorse? The Hearse on the Cross-Gun Bridge with a sleeping Monk Haulage rope mud choked bottled Carron Horse Only circumstantial odour from a Skunk
Sonnet CCLXXXXIII
Unshed tears were not dropping in her Gin Sad plight Golden Rule Cajole Philosophical assertion control Faint sent of urine on her skin Butterflies don’t play Violin Hand-Maids of the Moon patrol Bristles shining wirily around the May-Pole Seated crossed-legged smoking a Coiled Pipe in Berlin Reign of uncouth stars plot Shadows lay over her Blindfold Corps rising salt white from under a Robot Loom of the Moon’s old Stench of his Green-Grave Gut Augur’s rod of ash Centerfold
Sonnet CCLXXXXIV
Little pool by the rock’s music Bold as brass delicate high jump Soft clinging white aristocrat slump Her very heart in a limerick Gnawing sorrow now she is sick Cry nicely before the Stump Stole an arm around her rump Impetuous fellow strength of a hick Spit fire blue in the face clever She tickles tint tots’ Brains Saying an un-lady like thing to the server Long slow kiss after the Champagne Wisk well like white of eggs forever She wanted his ball having won again
Sleepy Whale 485
Relinquished his post arch wine Ten Seconds surface of her land Contemplate suppressed grand King Street smells of pine Frequentative erroneously swine Pleasures derived with literature at hand Drank jossers silence contraband Supervision pantomime sign
Sleepy Whale 491
Her neonist wears an Opal Ball-dress to write Improper overtures from men Writing on Tortoiseshells with Pens Lines between shutters light Frost- bound coachman arrives to night Drawn the limit of ten Her caves in silk hose with them Insulting any lady’s double-envelops white
Terry Brinkman has been painting for over forty five years. Poems in Rue Scribe, Tiny Seed. Winamop, Snapdragon Journal, Poets Choice, Adelaide Magazine, Variant, the Writing Disorder, Ink Pantry, In Parentheses, Ariel Chat, New Ulster, Glove, and in Pamp-le-mousse, North Dakota Quarterly, Barzakh, Urban Arts, Wingless Dreamer, LKMNDS and Elavation.
You can find more of Terry’s work here on Ink Pantry.
You are an enjoyable juniper! You are a pleasurable bush! You are an agreeable poplar! You are a delightful spruce! You are a gratifying cedar! You are an amusing birch! You are a diverting corn! You are a bonny pine! You are a lovely palm!
Your sepal be alluring! Your petals be delightful! Your stamens be appealing! Your carpel be graceful! Your corolla be good-looking! Your filament be pretty! Your ovary be stunning! Your ovule be foxy! Your anther be ravishing!
You honour starlet-like dreamland. You admire moonlet-like mirror. You exalt moony fairyland. You deify moonlit enchanted rose. You praise starry gingerbread house. You glorify starlit forest. You apotheosize comet-like spell book. You magnify spherical tower. You gratify sunny Ovidian sword.
Pawel and the Neoceltism. This poem is a dreamy manifesto of the Neoceltism, the spirit in which Paweł has created his English poesy.
You can find more of Paweł’s work here on Ink Pantry.
