Poetry by Vivian Bolland Schroeder

Phenomenon

The world turns.
Morning breaks.
Night falls.
Nothing's damaged.


Recollection

I don't remember why we were convulsed
With helpless laughter;
What I do remember is
Trying to wipe the lemonade we managed to upset
From your favorite red dress.

{Poems by Vivian Bolland Schroeder}

One Piece by Michael S. Morris

A Cat's Cradle

What was her name...?
But I could not remember...
saying, she was my goddaughter

But I hadn't been back
in thirty years and lost
touch with all those from home

Even though we had telephones
the transmissions across continent
soon ceased and a holy bond broken

We were by the ice cream freezer
two old acquaintances transmigrating
memory from west to east

In our youths, from the same burg
ending up in the same burg, hugging
whenever we crossed paths, saying

Have you seen, have you heard from--
our territories of remembrance
a cat's cradle between our hands

{Poem by Michael S. Morris}

Poems by Peter Layton

The Newness of These Wounds

I still see you in the mirrors of this house.
You somewhat shyly looking.
Your smallest amount of vanity showing.
Which
I'll keep with me.
And the house's mirrors retain you too.
They seeking
around the dust corners the
now quiet quiet left behind items on shelves,
the mum locket, diary, keys
perhaps left discarded, strewn.


Saying Wham

I love to touch the
lusty swells and curves of
a corvette.
And its heavy throated engine ready
to jump to my tamped down foot.

I'll feel
like I'm made of money now,
the engine racing at my touch.
One of the few times I've felt rich is
in the tight contours
of this beautiful beast.

And the cops feel it too,
snapping on their flashing red blue
Christmas tree lights.
Lighting up the road.
I'm lit up.
They'll annoyingly ply me with questions.
Difficult ones deep and philosophic,
Is this your car?


Iron Rust

This place is
exacting
where the run X'es of steel girders
dance
over the pituitary gland of river below.

The air sings.
There are wavering curtains of noise
boulder held waves of tumbling water I
wish so much to stay here
so hold this unanswerable moment.

You in the glass of what I have remembered,
the better almost perfect days
shook loose
to now.

{Poetry by Peter Layton}

On Father and Child

Honor your father and your mother,
so that you may live long in the land
the Lord your God is giving you.
{Proverbs 20:12}

Listen, my son, and be wise,
and keep your heart on the right path.
{Proverbs 23:22}

God sets the lonely in families,
he leads forth the prisoners with
singing; but the rebellious live
in a sun-scorched land.
{Psalm 68:6}

May your father and mother be glad;
may she who gave you birth rejoice!
{Proverbs 23:24}

An Excerpted Piece by Jeremie Guy

Miss You, An Excerpt

I'm sick with your image, yet I refuse to take aid,
I cough up a red goo every day,
For my heart is filled with your love,
I have a fever every night,
For the thought of you makes me warm,
My migraines test the walls of my skull,
For you are all that fills my head

{Poem by Jeremie Guy}

One Poem by Zachary Foster

Ditch Digger

Working all day in toil and sweat
With a pick ax and shovel in the dirt
Is a young ditch digger.
Laboring in the broiling sun
And heat radiating off the grass,
The young man breaks into the sod
And throws the clods of dirt
Into a heap of earth nearby.
By his calloused, soil covered hands
He earns his bread and keep,
Not by his wits
But by strength of will
He makes his living.

{Poem by Zachary Foster}

Summer Fruit

strawberries

the best I can say
is that you’ve got to know
what you’ll eat in the morning
the night before.
I can’t give you any specific examples,
like cereal or eggs or waffles.
the only direction I would offer
would be to eat breakfast before noon.
after that, you’re on your own.
you know who you are when you read this:
you’re the same person who is typing it up right now.
if you eat strawberries, make sure they’re
red.

{Poem by Richard Lopez}

Elegy For Lucille

Elegy For Lucille

Free now, you slip away
beyond familiar stars.
Leaving us to search
among the hues of spring,
the gentle wisps that stir
long summer evenings, and
in the brilliant orange skies
of crisp autumn mornings.
There, and in winter sunsets,
we will find you,
sweet, peaceful soul,
and together remember.

{Poem by George T. Raach}

A Piece by Dan Flore

the conscious scalpels

the conscious scalpels
doctors that cut viciously in the street
believing their moisture is glue
to stick themselves with washable options
places to cleanse their embattled drama once winter love
charisma exudes from their motion
but it itches their fast treading sun glare on skin
the knives get broken
by the pouring hail
the doctors drift into asylums of wonder
their winter love turns into fall
then finally a burst of paths, purples and mornings without nights
there on a wooden road
everything grows

{Poem by Dan Flore}

A Poem by Mary Ann and Bryan Battle

Somebody

Is it right to love somebody?
Is it right to really care?
Is it right to share your dreams, your hopes, and all your prayers?

As she turned to me so slowly and she said to me, “Goodbye.”
As I stood in the doorway with a tear rolling down my right cheek
I asked myself, is it right to love somebody?

Is it right to love somebody?
Is it right to really care?
Is it right to share your dreams, your hopes, and all your prayers?

As she turned to me so slowly with tears in her eyes
and she said to me so softly,
She said to me, “Goodbye.”

As I stood in the doorway with a tear rolling down my right cheek,
I asked myself, is it right to love somebody?

We think we know somebody, but we really do not know him
or her at all.
We learn of them when we are all standing tall.

Everybody is somebody.

{Poem by Mary Ann and Bryan Battle}

A Piece by Sarah Macolino

Autobiographer, An Excerpt

Waiting with your pen and your yellow legal pad for the words of your life to catch up to you.

With a sigh, you realize that they have slipped away already and you throw your pen to some place lost and your paper to the side. You rise from your bench and walk down the road (slightly dusty because it hasn't rained much). You give a little cough because your asthma feels as though it wants to rise above its medicated subservience. You hear a hum as though a bus is coming up behind you and you scurry crookedly to the side of the road, but there is no bus.

How did you get here? You were all set to become the most successful autobiographer on the book market today. You set out from college with a smile, a slight limp from a rugby injury, and a degree in English. You set up an attic room that you were sure would soon fill with your copious notes, as did the garrets of all true writers. You knew that as soon as you lay down for sleep, words would crowd your mind until they exploded from your fingers in a flurry of typewriter keys. The pages would pile until you wept with what you wrote.

Then, as you lay on your cot – because all writers have cots in their garrets – you realized something terrible and shattering.

You don't know how to write an autobiography.

You waited with slightly shaken confidence for something to occur, as it always had before. At the end of three days, you coughed a little bit and left your chilly garret for the warmth of the sunshine and the hustle of human bodies flowing along the heated pavement outside your building. You got a cup of coffee at the next café over and waited a bit nervously, staring at the blank paper, which, so inviting before, now seems to hold something hopeless.

And you waited there, in that café, for something to happen so that you could write the story of your life.

Now you have left your pad behind and you wander aimlessly, thinking detachedly of your garret, so artistic and so meaningless. You love to write, you've always known that, but you've overlooked your lack of story and now look where you are. Your coffee-saturated stomach lining groans and sloshes, your writing muscles are slack and rubbery with disuse.

I Remain