3 Poems by B.Z. Niditcch

ON THE METRO

With dark
detectable sounds
puffing on the red line
on West Street
with snow falling
in a leaky roof
on the subway
losing the map
and address
for my gig,
I take out
my pawned sax
from an old
motel suitcase
from another country
and play slowly
in perpetual motion
on the metro
to earn
a few dollars
before midnight
between train doors
as a would be
Anna Kerenina
steps up to take
her life
after hearing
my cadenza
and moves away.


SURVIVAL BOXES

The threshold
of the homeless
in survival boxes
chattering faces
outside the windows
on frozen fields
at the edge of town
dawn chills
sleepers on flagstone
by a row
of the overpowered.


IN THE BREAKDOWN LANE

Traffic in a row
of road rage
in the darkness
of a moldy mirror
at midnight
near a strip club
the star performer
remakes
her lips redder
as a heart beat
stops dead
by a hunky hitchhiker
on the train tracks
with his valuables
on one long leg
and arm
with a record
of forced entry
desperation
as she lets
him in the front
and he drives
her crazy
for food
as he opens
his basket
and devours.

Bionote

B.Z. Niditch is a poet, playwright, fiction writer and teacher. His work is widely published in journals and magazines throughout the world, including:  Columbia: A Magazine of Poetry and Art; The Literary Review; Denver Quarterly; Hawaii Review; Le Guepard (France); Kadmos (France); Prism International; Jejune (Czech Republic); Leopold Bloom (Budapest);  Antioch Review; and Prairie Schooner, among others.  He lives in Brookline, Massachusetts.
   

3 Poems by Tracy Lynn Repchuk

Random Control

Inspired rituals from earthly connections

as hands create, nurture and plant

Joyous celebrations in every occasion

through the spiritual healing of colour.

Random delights enhance and entrance

as life’s story is told

on tiles as varied as mankind

Each able to move and shift to change

the outcome on any given day.

So it becomes a matter of choice -

whether it be dark or bright,

coloured, grey, fluorescent,

with the excitement of the future

under your control

Like a strategic game of chess

you move your piece

into the best position

Not to overcome – 

but to oversee.

Resolutions

I knew it was time

For me to look hard at what I had done

Or not done

At what I wanted to do

But did not do

At the carnage that lay in my wake

Of broken dreams that would have to once again

Be picked up, and scraped off the poured concrete

and confronted.

Unfulfilled, unconscious barriers 

Silently seep through 

and comfortably take their place 

while I continuously walked face first

into the brick wall that is my life.

It doesn’t happen in one day

That - I would have noticed

It is the tiny, insidious little events

Once accumulated to become 

The Mount Everest of reality 

for such paltry desires. 

And as each occurrence strangles

Hope screams

My floral bloom shrinks to the prickly

State of cactus

Living off of shards of water 

Surrounded by breathless air

But still - 

It is a new year, and I will take this

minimalistic opportunity to cast

my shredded net into the ocean

of this game I chose to play

and pray that I once again do not

get caught on life’s discards

so that I may catch my whale.

Serenade of the cicadas

Black-eyed blossoms invisibly 

intoxicate from distant woodlands

where emerald streams of healthy crops cascade along turquoise horizons;

and hints of sun-kissed buttercups invite me to dance.

From a long hibernation I emerge

as buds press against rigid soil  

I swing lazily carving breezes while whispering winds promise spring;

under the covered porch that hugs the house majestically.

Baked peaches torment from sweet sills

and my senses salivate 

anticipating this evening’s delights;

among drones suckling nectar from receptive chambers.

A wind-chapped smile erupts 

to rejoice my favorite season

as lapping waves of sunshine nourish;

and clinking cubes marry tart lemons.

Draping trees fill with the operatic melodies

resonating organs 

debut to a command performance;

where friction and limb triumph.

Heated cardinals and brown speckled jockos meditate

inhaling the heavenly view

I drift outwards;

licking colorful clouds and bands of jade over parched fields.

Handfuls of divine light 

gift-wrap my spirit

until temporal sounds transcend me back;

to the symphonic serenade of the cicadas.

Bionote


Tracy Lynn Repchuk (born 1965) is a Canadian writer and poet. Repchuk is the president and founder of the Canadian Federation of Poets and Editor of Poetry Canada Magazine. Repchuk lives in Burbank, California.

2 Poems by Wanda Morrow Clevenger

every word

it is in the span
of uncensored
long together
long drive home
from lobster and
tall mango drink
meals
that fixes mete
of every word
I ever wanted
to say


outside bird

if time physically stood
still then is at 6:50 AM
in the hum of electric fan
stir of heady bud;
bed covers world buoyant
with dim dawn with
a bird outside trilling 

Bionote

Wanda Morrow Clevenger is the author of This Same Small Town in Each of Us (Edgar & Lenore's Publishing House; 2011). Her published work of 181 pieces appear in 66 print and electronic publications. A collection of poetry is tentatively scheduled for release in late 2013 or early 2014. For access to her blog It's All Just Telling Tales Out of School, visit: http://wlc-wlcblog.blogspot.com/

3 Prose Poems by Adele Kenny

When Everything You’ve Done and Everything That’s Happened to You Is Not What Your Life Is

She’s not sure how her life happened or why—the evidence is contradictory (unwise choices, the illnesses, grief). A goldfinch sings in the pine, its wing a fragile shadow cast through lingering light—the shape of silence.

There are things she keeps from herself—the nightmare she dreamt and re-dreamt until, finally, it meant nothing. The bullet passed through the leaf—the leaf didn’t fall.

The stone circle in her yard and the little house are solid in their places—ringed with water and birds. The sapling she planted is firm in the earth. Her puppy sleeps beside her, tail curled under his small body (the other dogs’ ghosts always close). What else did she want? Things she hoped for already begun—this is all good. Good. And enough.

Even Now

(For My Father)

Memory is easy here, in springtime’s rimless light—and only a little rain to pattern the sky. There’s a faint (perhaps remembered) scent of wild violet. Something sweet that stays. Shadows tumble through clouds. It’s been more than thirty years—your death a grief that only now begins to know its name. All this time, I’ve rebuilt you out of dead leaves and wind, dumb with a feeling that even now, I can’t express—as if that dark were your happiness and you ran to it, years too young to be dead; as if, even now, you might open your hand and reach through time to where I wait.

Of Other

It isn’t now or this patch of blue autumn, light skimmed like milk without substance (its ghost on my lips). Or the way trees darken before the sky, the way light slants through pines (my neighbor’s lamp or the moon). It’s not the way night feels when I walk in March, when snow melts into mud, and I smell grass again; when I know, without seeing, that tight buds open high in the branches.

It’s not the expected order of things but moments of other (when something startles you into knowing something other), and the heaviness lifts inside you.

Tonight, wind pulled leaves from the sky to my feet and, suddenly (without warning) a deer leapt from the thicket behind me—leapt and disappeared—past me as I passed myself, my body filled with absence, with air, a perfect mold of the light gone through it.

Bionote

Adele Kenny is the author of twenty-three books (poetry & nonfiction). Her poems, reviews, and articles have been published worldwide, and her poems have appeared in books and anthologies published by Crown, Tuttle, Shambhala, and McGraw-Hill. She is the recipient of various awards, including two poetry fellowships from the NJ State Arts Council, a Merton Poetry of the Sacred Award, and the 2012 International Book Award for Poetry. A former creative writing professor in the College of New Rochelle’s Graduate School, she is founding director of the Carriage House Poetry Series and poetry editor of Tiferet Journal. Active in readings and in private and agency-sponsored workshops, she has read in the US, England, Ireland, and France, and has twice been a featured reader at the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival. Website: www.Adelekenny.com/  The Music In It Poetry Blog: http://adelekenny.blogspot.com/

2 Poems by Felino A. Soriano

facilitation

of open                        hands

                        flex in the sleeping aggregations of achromatic

devotion

                                                            hands enter gauge of spectral warmth then

                                                deliver

as do smiles’ proprietary

devotion to

                                                                                    exhale oval embraces

Of road in the neighboring silence

restructured celluloid enables

prose of paused enigmas…

                                                                        either of the each rendition of throat/spectral speech

                                                                                    (as does the terminal approach

                                    to

            confiding mathematics: inward into self’s composite interaction²) spoken

contamination is the years’ prior focus:

alone this

silent pathway

            this

diameter of temporal thrust, of the questioning immanent relay, again

the subjective cannot commune among second trusting travelling

                        therefore reconfiguring

analogies enter                                                road of sacred road:

desire among echoes and intertwined

reactions

[Author's note: These poems are from my ongoing collection entitled Of these voices.]


Bionote

Felino A. Soriano has authored nearly five dozen collections of poetry, including the collaborative volume with poet, Heller Levinson and visual artist, Linda Lynch, Hinge Trio (La Alameda Press, 2012) rhythm:s (Fowlpox Press, 2012), and Quartet Dialogues (white sky ebooks, 2012). He publishes the online endeavors Counterexample Poetics and Differentia Press. His work finds foundation in philosophical studies and connection to various idioms of jazz music. He lives in California with his wife and family and is the director of supported living and independent living programs providing supports to adults with developmental disabilities. For further information, please visit www.felinoasoriano.info.

1 Poem by Art Heifetz

Night Wanderers

Like a sailboat striving

To catch the wind,

I shift from side to side.

Each time I get up and return

You awaken too         

As if in loving you

Our two lives have become

Synchronized.

You tuck the paisley comforter

Beneath my chin

And take my hand in yours

As if I were a frightened child

Seeking reassurance

From  his mother’s warmth.

When I slept at Mike and Gert’s apartment,

I listened to their comings and goings

Until I  learned to recognize

Their endless ablutions

And medical complaints.

Light on, light off,

They paraded through the night.

Now I too have joined the ranks

Of the night wanderers

It happened all too suddenly

The evening I looked into the mirror

And found my father’s tired eyes

Staring back at me

With such serious intent

I had to catch my breath

Bionote

Art Heifetz teaches ESL to refugees in Richmond, Va. He has published 50 poems in 5 countries since June. He is an ex-Peace Corps volunteer and retired State Farm agent. Life begins at 66.

3 Photos by Joneve McCormick

Bionote

Photographer: Joneve McCormick, Isla Vista, California.  Joneve is a poet, writer, editor, translator and photographer.

1 Photo by Liu Yu

Waiting: Two Vague Leaves vs A Whole Clear Season

Bionote

Liu Yu, a native of Gong-an, Hubei Province, used to work as an administrator at Jingzhou Poeple's Bank of China before retirement. Now she enjoys playing huapai, taking pictures and cooking for her family. Publication credits include Hubei Daily and Collection of Biographical Sketches of Advanced Financial Workers (Hong Kong).

3 Poems by Laurence Overmire

Autumnal

the clap of trees

withering in the dusk

the sad dropping of emaciate leaf

secrets whispered in a desolate wind

we cannot understand

nor touch the sorrow

the tramping of feet

the crush of sticks in dust

life’s travails mocked

in timelessness of starlight

the unheard voice

lost in a moment of breath.

Crisis

What seemed so great

in the moment

was

in the scheme of things

very small

Only death and its

incumbent couriers

merit the attention

of so strict a life’s

expectancy

And then, and only then

in the calm eye of the storm

can one see

clearly

that which was forbidden

was only a temporary latch

on that pearly gate of

Knowing.

Earthtones

There are times in a life

When words fail

Like rain to a gutter

Waste away

The crying of clouds

Thunderously exhausted

Gray pillows no comfort

The head too hard to find

Solace

In the repellant crust of

Stone.


Bionote

Laurence Overmire is the author of the recently released The One Idea That Saves The World: A Call to Conscience and A Call to Action. He has had a multi-faceted career as poet, author, actor, director, educator, and genealogist. His award-winning poetry has been widely published in hundreds of journals, magazines and anthologies worldwide. Overmire is an advocate for peace, justice, human and animal rights, and the environment. www.laurenceovermire.com

3 Poems by Fide ERKEN

Flower  Language

flowers have miraculous colours
they send us love with their perfumes;
a different language have flowers

even if i learn all the languages in the world
it won't be possible for me to tell about love
as well as fragrant flowers

i smell love watching their colours
and want to say "i love you"
in the flower-language to my lover

In a Daisy Field

I'm rolling in a poetry field, Where so many daisies abound, A soft breeze bringing their mist. I'm smelling them, Satisfied with watching their White, yellow appearance, So I don't need to write a poem. Then your name is echoed Amongst the petals, Spreading this wonderful sound All around the waving daisies. It's enough to hear The most beautiful name I've ever known. We smile to each other, Me and the daisies. Walls

The World of complex ideas,
different faiths,
little tolerance,
mostly, lack of complaisance

Look at the flowers with every colour,
full of love, together
flowers have easily climbed over
all the walls!

Bionote

Fide ERKEN was born in Bursa, in 1967. She spent the first seven years of her childhood in Trilye, a pretty village of Mudanya. Then she came to Bursa with her family. She finished primary, secondary and high schools in Bursa. After high school she attended the department of Industrial Engineering in Middle East Technical University. After finishing the prep and first classes there she left that school and entered the department of English in Uludag University. She was graduated from this school in the year 1991. She's still been working as an English teacher in Bursa. Fide Erken says that poetry is in people's nature and that she first was tempted by this emotional current in primary school. She stepped the beginning leading her to further points in poetry by having two awards in poetry competitions when she was in high school. Some of her poems were first published in Öner art magazine and in a local newspaper journal. She's been taken attention with her English poems for some years. Her poems have been published in some internet sites and magazines. The fluency in her poems she writes integrating love of people and nature determinates her place in the poetry world. Fide Erken is married and has two daughters.

3 Haiku by Arunansu Banerjee

haiku 

1.

eyes of crow

a rickshaw-puller

by the road

2.

rose

in the breeze…

waiting for you

3.

how many spring nights

would you remain this distant

winter’s moon

Bionote

Born and brought up in Kolkata, Arunansu writes poems out of passion. Has been contributing to online journals as The Peregrine Muse, Here and Now, etc. More of Arunansu’s poems can be read at http://www.arunansub.blogspot.in/ A keen photographer, he likes enthusing poetic images with visuals. His photographic blog is http://www.arunansu-myphotos.blogspot.in/

1 Poem by R. S. Deese

Road Runner

Heaven or the promised land
Eternity or soon
Once I spy the vanishing point
I'm out of this cartoon
Beep beep

Bionote

R.S. Deese grew up in Claremont, California. After earning his bachelor’s degree in history from UC Berkeley, he traveled to East Asia, where he taught English Composition at Nanjing University in China. He first came to Boston University to study poetry and then returned to earn his PhD in history in 2007. He currently teaches 20th Century World History in BU's College of General Studies. His work has also been published in Agni, The Berkeley Poetry Review, Endeavour, MungBeing, New Times Los Angeles, and The Quarterly.

3 Poems by Joan McNerney

SeaScape I

Hearing waves from a distance and
feeling sea breezes brush our faces,
it seemed a century before we
came to the ocean.

So blue and bright to our eyes
its rhythm broke chains of
unremarkable days.

Over cool sand we ran and you picked
three perfect shells which fit
inside each other.  Swimming away in
that moving expanse below kiss
of fine spray and splashes.

With clouds cumulus we drifted while
gulls circled the island.  Together we
discovered beds of morning glories
climbing soft dunes

SeaScape II

Let's dive in ocean hiss swish
riding with bluewhales, bluewaves.
Brush of foam and windy ripples
sunbeams chasing quicksilver fish.

Floating through our shining world
fragrant clouds, feathery clouds.
We weave one arm after another
wearing bracelets of salt pearl.

SeaScape  III

My mind is an ocean
where swimmers, surfers,
sun worshippers cavort.

Long salty hair
held between
their teeth.
Flourishing
wild flowered gowns
…streams of silk
    waves of taffeta
    splashy lace.

They sail through
my watery face
combing my eyes
whispering in my ears.

Alone, under a pointillist sky.
Gulls flying around me.
Black waters touched by
moon of vague prophecy.

Bionote

Joan McNerney’s poetry has been included in numerous literary magazines such as Seven Circle Press, Dinner with the Muse, Camel Saloon Books on Blog, Blueline, Vine Leaves, Spectrum, and three Bright Spring Press Anthologies. She has been nominated three times for Best of the Net. Four of her books have been published by fine literary presses. She has recited her work at the National Arts Club, New York City, State University of New York, Oneonta, McNay Art Institute, San Antonio and other distinguished venues. A recent reading was sponsored by the American Academy of Poetry. Her latest title is Having Lunch with the Sky, A.P.D. Press, Albany, New York. 

3 Poems by John M. Bennett

Sinking Mirror

,seeping ,closing ,clawing

,caving ,runting ,nodding

,negging ,aiming ,roiling

,flaming ,towelling ,gagging

,ising ,gaming ,noming

,torquing ,clouding ,yetting

,iffing ,blaming ,cleaning

,stinking ,claiming ,latheing

,loaning ,dogging ,mocking

,marking all the ladders

all the lathered mouths

all the ticking necks

tumbling in the faucet stream

bound to glory

bl

dic e

k own

lob stor

enfogic

....sur.............................. .   .    .

olvido

the ssorted sshadow chimess a

cor nur mured where my lap

ssed th ought’ss a crissc

raw  ))meaty foot mile((  ah

dang led russt ling in the d

rain my ssee med t haw

a ss pelt leaf de lettered

ssp ring deletreadoss loss g

ritoss in son deadoss la ssom

bra del ssissmo  ]]ful

minante[[  “sslept beneath the

dusst” the towerr ssplit the

tongue lathered toward the f

inal para graph  )sseeping

ssailing ,sstinging greasse( 

was the wind a fork ?

Bionote

John M. Bennett has published over 400 books and chapbooks of poetry and other materials.  Among the most recent are rOlling COMBers (Potes & Poets Press), MAILER LEAVES HAM (Pantograph Press), LOOSE WATCH (Invisible Press), CHAC PROSTIBULARIO (with Ivan Arguelles; Pavement Saw Press), HISTORIETAS ALFABETICAS (Luna Bisonte Prods), PUBLIC CUBE (Luna Bisonte Prods), THE PEEL (Anabasis Press), GLUE (xPress(ed)), LAP GUN CUT (with F. A. Nettelbeck; Luna Bisonte Prods),  INSTRUCTION BOOK (Luna Bisonte Prods), la M al (Blue Lion Books), CANTAR DEL HUFF (Luna Bisonte Prods), SOUND DIRT (with Jim Leftwich; Luna Bisonte Prods), BACKWORDS (Blue Lion Books), NOS (Redfox Press), D RAIN B LOOM (with Scott Helmes; xPress(ed)), CHANGDENTS (Offerta Speciale), L ENTES (Blue Lion Books), NOS (Redfoxpress), SPITTING DDREAMS (Blue Lion Books), ONDA (with Tom Cassidy; Luna Bisonte Prods), 30 DIALOGOS SONOROS (with Martín Gubbins; Luna Bisonte Prods), BANGING THE STONE (WITH Jim Leftwich; Luna Bisonte Prods), FASTER NIH (Luna Bisonte Prods); RREVES (Editions du Silence); NEOLIPIC (Argotist); LAS CABEZAS MAYAS/MAYA HEADS (Luna Bisonte Prods); BALAM MALAB (Logan Elm Press); LA VISTA GANCHA (Luna Bisonte Prods); THE SOCK SACK/UNFINISHED FICTIONS/MORE INSERTS (with Richard Kostelanetz; Luna Bisonte Prods); T ICK TICK TIC K (Chalked Editions and White Sky Books); THIS IS VISUAL POETRY (This is Visual Poetry); EL HUMO LETRADO: POESÍA EN ESPAÑOL (Chalk Editions; 2nd ed. White Sky Books); ZABOD (Tonerworks); TEXTIS GLOBBOLALICUS (3 vols.; mOnocle-Lash Anti-Press); NITLATOA (Luna Bisonte Prods); OHIO GRIMES AND MISTED MEANIES (with Ben Bennett, Bob Marsh, Jack Wright; Edgetone Records); SUMO MI TOSIS (White Sky Books); CORRESPONDENCE 1979-1983 (with Davi Det Hompson; Luna Bisonte Prods); THE GNAT’S WINDOW (Luna Bisonte Prods); DRILLING FOR SUIT MYSTERY (with Matthew T. Stolte; Luna Bisonte Prods); OBJECT OBJET (with Nicolas Carras; Luna Bisonte Prods); CARAARAC & EL TÍTULO INVISIBLE (Luna Bisonte Prods); LIBER X (Luna Bisonte Prods; CUITLACOCHTLI (Xexoxial Editions); and BLOCK (Luna Bisonte Prods).  He has published, exhibited and performed his word art worldwide in thousands of publications and venues.  He was editor and publisher of LOST AND FOUND TIMES (1975-2005), and is Curator of the Avant Writing Collection at The Ohio State University Libraries.  Richard Kostelanetz has called him “the seminal American poet of my generation”.  His work, publications, and papers are collected in several major institutions, including Washington University (St. Louis), SUNY Buffalo, The Ohio State University, The Museum of Modern Art, and other major libraries.  His PhD (UCLA 1970) is in Latin American Literature.

Poetry Pacific Chatroom: Topic 1: Is Poetry really dying?

Introduction

As poetry practitioners, we certainly have many concerns about this pseudo profession. Legitimate or otherwise, these concerns of ours must, we believe, be shared by many poetry enthusiasts, including literary theoreticians, teachers, students and readers as well as poetry writers/editors/publishers, although with varying degrees. To address these concerns, we begin to introduce one poetic topic for online discussions on the first day of each month, hoping to generate some readerly interest and even critical attention. While we welcome everyone to drop by our chat room to make a casual comment, throw in an email, or write a serious essay, we will publish any written response that we think might be informative, inspiring or intriguing to our reading public. Even if there is no verbal feedback at all, we will nevertheless feel delighted if the topic can make someone stop for a moment to ponder over it. (Editors of Poetry Pacific)


The Observation

One of the greatest poetic paradoxes we are facing today is this: while people are still as ready as before to express themselves verbally in certain poetic way, they have become extremely reluctant to read poetry, let alone pay to do so while there are various other free forms of entertainment available to them. On the one hand, there are writers willing to contribute thousands of hours and/or dollars to the publication of their poetry books, or pay dozens, even hundreds of dollars, just to get their single poems published by a vanity press; on the other, there are poems as good as, if not better than, any masterpieces by a major figure in literary history or a Nobel prize winner, which few would pay a few bucks to buy or download the publication where such poems appear. Indeed, we are living in a world where there seem to be far more poetry manufacturers than poetry consumers. With more poetry writers than poems, more poetry books or journals than readers, and more poetry publishers than editors, poetry has become a true gift-economy. Ironically, free as these gifts are from the very hearts of poetry writers, they find few eager receivers, nor are they often duly appreciated, even if many of them may have cost whole lifetimes.

The Question

Is Poetry really dying like our Hero, or already dead like Nietzsche's God?

you comments on or responses to this topic are welcome in the box below or at yuans@shaw.ca!

Call for Submissions: Why, Or Why Not Poetry Pacific?

Among thousands of online and print publications of literature/poetry already available to writers and readers, why, just why Poetry Pacific??

Well, succinctly put, Poetry Pacific is unique in two most significant ways:::

I. Poetry Pacific offers the most possible freedom and convenience to you as a poetry submitter::
You can submit any number of poems of any kind, any time of the year in any manner you like: previously unpublished or otherwise (insofar as you still hold the copy/publishing right); single or multiple, individually targeted or simultaneous, online or via snailmail, although we may prefer considering 3 shorter pieces at a time pasted in the body of an email. It would be kind of you to mention PP as a writing credit, but please do not feel obliged to do so, nor will we bother you with any other requests.

II. Poetry Pacific tries to give you the most and longest possible literary exposure and reputation::
Your work will enjoy human longevity. Although PP has an extremely humble start, it is to expand into a serious publishing enterprise. At very least, it is a 2-generation program, which will naturally last much longer than hundreds, and even thousands, of other literary outlets.  As time goes by, PP will introduce more special features to attract readerly attention. PP believes that its editorial emphasis on word's worth rather than on Wordsworth will eventually win the wind.

That being so, then just why, why not Poetry Pacific?

For more, please see PP's Submission Guidelines on the right side.

your poetic work is always more than welcome at yuans@shaw.ca!!