Seeing an Old Friend Off on a Summer Evening by Daniel Skach-Mills

Rockery with Waterfall Lan Su Chinese Garden - Portland, Oregon

Seeing an Old Friend Off 

On a Summer Evening

Lan Su Chinese Garden—Portland, Oregon

After Wei Feng

Waterfall is flowing.

Summer air is still.

Over tea, our talk about Li Po

and Du Fu lasts long.

How eloquently Wei Feng put it when he said:

Poetic minds complete the greater elegance.

Cicadas keening, crickets chirping,

we pass the hours, dawn till dusk,

with ease.

Infrequent visits

make parting even harder. 

Will lakes and mountains find us enjoying 

the quiet pool of one another's

company again?

The snowmelt of age— 

who can restrain it?

Though I close my gate 

securely behind you,

years still enter

and leave.

© Daniel Skach-Mills

Daniel Skach-Mills

Daniel Skach-Mills’ poetry has appeared in Braided Way, Sojourners, Sufi (Featured Poet), and Kosmos Journal. His book, The Hut Beneath the Pine: Tea Poems, was a 2012 Oregon Book Award finalist. A former Trappist monk, Daniel resides in Portland, Oregon, where he has served for fifteen years as a docent at Lan Su Chinese Garden.

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when the earth shall disappear by MK Kuol

 

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when the earth shall disappear

After Amirah Al Wassif

when the earth, this earth, shall disappear

and the head of the last god skewered

next to its rotting corpse,

a new world will be ushered in

a new world where fishes would survive in the dry

a new world where birds won’t need wings to fly

a new world where flowers would be loved

for more than their beauty

in that new world, we shall dance with the stars

on the palms of floating sky,

ride on the back of the moon and make love

on a bed made of bloated clouds

while leaning on the sun.

when the earth, this earth, shall disappear

and the last tyranny is skinned alive

and seared in the urn of his own lies

a new world will be ushered in

a new world where war will be a myth

confined to history books

in that world, no parent will endure

the biting ache of burying their child

as its dwellers will only die of old age.

in that world, you will not have to put on

your tv and stiffen at the sight

of children starving in gaza.

in that world, grief will be a mere word

in dictionaries for something forgotten

and unlike the poets of this world

in whose poems grief is a worn cliché,

poets of that world will only write

of flowers, of coffee, of sex, of skies…

in that world, we shall not know of lack.

call it luck but we shall reap not where we sowed

but where, like birds, our beaks rip in.

in that world, no heart will know of tears

and of fears as the stings of sorrow and of death

shall be rendered impotent forevermore

in that world, the only price for anything

and everything will be a wish:

we shall all have all we wish for

when the earth, this earth, shall disappear

© MK Kuol

MK Kuol

A Pushcart Prize nominee, MK Kuol's work has appeared on AMNLY, D'lit Review, Rough Diamond Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. His true loves are deep conversations—most of the time with himself, Arizona JJ's music, coffee, moon-gazing, and reading. He tweets (rarely) @mk_kuol14. 

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SON ALONE by Duane L. Herrmann

Eugene Golovesov

SON ALONE

I wish I could feel grief

at my mother's passing

or appreciation

for her love and care,

but I don't.

Though I discovered,

in her last week,

that she did care

about me,

and that changed

my perspective

and saw her pain,

her damaged soul,

that I was born into,

I only feel relief

even after these years

that she's now gone,

that our contact

is over.

My father, on

the other hand – 

I miss him still

after more than half

a century.

He was kind.

He showed he cared.

He was glad, I know,

that I was his.

What might have been

if he had lived,

grown old,

become granpa,

become companion

to his grown son?

I'll never know.

I'll never know....

© Duane L. Herrmann

Duane L. Herrmann

With degrees in Education and History, Duane L. Herrmann has work published in print and online, in fifty-plus anthologies, over one hundred other publications (Gonzo Press, Tiny Seed Literary Journal, Page and Spine, etc), plus a sci fi novel, eight collections of poetry, a local history, stories for children, a book on fasting and other works, despite an abusive childhood with dyslexia, ADHD, cyclothymia, an anxiety disorder, a form of Mutism, and now, PTSD.  

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God, the Puppeteer by Smitha Vishwanath

 

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God, the Puppeteer

They say God is a puppeteer
holding all the strings.

He decides when to put someone on stage
and when to pull them back.

He breathes life  and stands back watching
As each puppet comes alive.

He gives each a voice and allows choice
Like an experiment in a controlled environment

He lets his puppets make decisions
a few variables in an equation

The puppets sing, dance and make merry,
until the end of their journey

When the strings are pulled
and the show comes to an end

Different acts, different timings,
different stories, different endings

Like the movies, a few blockbuster successes
some terrible failures, some memorable

Some forgotten, even before the curtains close
some horrifying, some tragic

the director and the producer, two-in-one,
watches closely from above

and makes a note- it’s called Karma
determines if the actors get another chance

in the limelight, on the stage
and the role they get to play in the next production.

© Smitha Vishwanath

Smitha Vishwanath

Smitha Vishwanath’s poems are found in several International online publications, including Thieving Magpies, Spillwords Press, MasticadoresUSA, Silverbirch Press, Borderless Journal, and other noteworthy anthologies. She has received many awards and honors from Spillwords and has been nominated for Best of the Net. She received the Reuel International Prize in 2022. Her poem, 'Out of Order' was nominated for the Pushcart Prize. Smitha is the author of Coming Home (2023). She co-authored a book of poems, ROADS : A Journey with Verses (2019). You can follow Smitha on her blog: https://smithavpennings.com.

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Reading Richard Harbor in a Rented Cabin by Jason Ray Carney

 

Sasha P

Reading Richard Harbor in a Rented Cabin

Reading Richard Harbor in the parlor of our rented cabin,

Listening to 40-somethings discuss a kitchen remodel

As philosophers might debate epistemology,

Or theologians grapple with the problem of evil:

Murmurs of seriousness about tile,

Oven hoods, and paint quality,

Contracts and renovation budgets--

A never-ending conversation undertaken with the

Seriousness of monks in robes pondering the mind of God.

I wonder why God allows 40-year-olds to discuss kitchen appliances

While children are pulped by military technology,

And a holocaust of factory farming silences

The groans of fearful mothers, whose suckling litter is ripped from them,

Clubbed and dragged away to the slaughterhouse

It is time to go into town,

Close my Richard Ford,

Browse the stores, and see my reflection mingled with theirs

On windows, stenciled lettering, ethically-sourced

Coffee beans and used books Written across my frowning, tired face.

© Jason Ray Carney

Jason Ray Carney

Jason Ray Carney is a Senior Lecturer in Literature at Christopher Newport University. He is the author of Weird Tales of Modernity (McFarland, 2019) and a contributor to the Los Angeles Review of Books.

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Your World by Sushant Thapa

 

Jill Wellington

Your World 

It will see the daylight. 

It will grow like tulips. 

It will be a prophetic song. 

It will be a prayer of someone. 

It will cast its colors, 

It will splash like luscious mud. 

I am keen to fallen Mimosa flowers 

At your feet. 

You are the statue of faith. 

I trust in showing you reverence. 

These words are expensive 

If they make you literary slave. 

One hand ties, the other shakes. 

Journey is a go, 

And turn to reach. 

Your world will be born one day. 

It will have its belly laughter.  

The grass will tickle it, 

The scent of the flowers will make it drunk.

 

Your world will find its world. 

© Sushant Thapa

Sushant Thapa

Sushant Thapa is a Nepalese poet who holds an M.A. in English from Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, India, with nine books of English poems and one short story collection to his credit. His poems are published at The Kathmandu Post, Trouvaille Review, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Outlook India, Corporeal Lit Mag, Feed the Holy, Masticadores USA,  Indian Review, etc. He is an English lecturer in Biratnagar, Nepal. 

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