Linda M. Crate- A Poem

stranger in the room

 

there is a room outside with locked doors

I always stumble into its branches, thorns

have overtaken it and serve as master of

the keys when I reach for the silver keys I

am met with bloody palms; I see you within

happy without me and it aches my very soul

to know we that were once thick as thieves have

all this distance between us, you are the most

sophisticated and eloquent bloom and I am but

a wild rose overlooked by everyone even you it's

sad to know that this room will outlast us

but neither of us will be happy for you impaled

me with too many thorns and I invoked too few;

it's discouraging when two friends become strangers.

Neil Ellman- A Poem

Woman IV

(after the painting by Willem de Kooning)

Mother

vampiric bride

holiest of the holy

whore

let me suckle at your breasts

and feel your love

and you feel me

upon your lips

shivering between your thighs

and yours on mine

so much contempt

conceived in love

and born to loathe

what you desire

and have become.

Neil Ellman lives and writes in New Jersey.  His poems, many of which are ekphrastic and based on works of modern art, appear in numerous print and online journals throughout the world, from Australia to Zimbabwe.  The latest of his eight chapbooks, Convergence & Conversion, is now available from The Knives Forks and Spoons Press.

Brian Rosenberger- A Poem

Out of the sky

From the heavens,

bringing hell

not so much fell

as targeted its prey

herald of nightmare

spawned some light years away.

Silent night

wrecked by the sound

of a shooting star downed

prelude to screams to come

as the saying goes

any landing you can undulate away from . . .

so much for one small step

so much for one giant leap

so much for humanity.

(Previously Published in "No One In Space Can Hear You Scream" (Print- March, 2011)

Russell Streur- A Poem

How we learned to talk on Mars

 

The hard thing was when we met the red ones was that their breath could go on a long time but none of their words were to us more than one sound at a time. Ya ka wa na ha was not like Ha ka wa na ya at all. It took years but then was not hard at all. One sound: one word: one joy. Cut out all of the noise and all of the do not know. Made sense once you slowed the pace and turned the sound down in your head. Like that and quick, tell you, fast. Then what we said we could hear. Like that, quick and tell you fast one side up in airs clear or one side in mud and knots. Whoo. Talk and hear at the same time, through ears and skin and eyes. We went to bed a lot and slept well and swam in lakes and stayed young and had fun and ate good food and made each one of us big and great and smooth and smart like ace of hearts come up all the time in hands yours and mine. Ka wa na ha, you know. Like that and more, lots, shine and shine with the moon and sun and one star of us all, tell you. Fast. And slow, when slow is best. Those red ones are hard to see for sure and true and tell great jokes and have tongues that know how to kiss. Whoo too, ka wa ha. So we learned ha, hard way one to ten and on and on to now, worth it all the time.

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