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| Chris F |
© Casey Quinn
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| Pixabay |
The River
I remember back in Idaho
Decades ago, my daddy
Would sit on the front porch in the evening,
Smoking a cigarette,
And listening to the Snake River.
We couldn’t see it from our house,
But he knew it was there.
Now, as I sit on the back steps,
Thinking of him,
I watch the tide grow higher,
See the stacks of clouds on the horizon
Turn pink, layer by layer,
And listen to the endless call of the sea.
I can’t hear him,
But I know he’s here.
from Searching in Circles (Kelsay Books, 2025)
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| Rose Anna Higashi |
Rose Anna Higashi is a retired professor of English Literature, Japanese Literature, and Poetry who lives in Honolulu with her husband, Wayne. She writes a haiku every day and publishes a monthly blog, “Tea and Travels” on her website, myteaplanner.com. Her poems appear in a variety of online and print media, including Poets Online, whose editors nominated her for the Pushcart Prize. Kelsay Books is scheduled to publish her third volume of poetry, Searching in Circles, in 2025.
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| Vladimir Srajber |
MAPLE SYRUP SADNESS
I’m awake in the middle of the night again.
Grab my glasses, book, and then
I head to the living room to read.
As I make my way, my thoughts stray.
Sadness comes.
I don’t cry but try to put the thoughts away.
His essence is slipping drop by drop,
like the maple syrup at the bottom of the jug,
Thick, smooth, sticking to the edge of the lip
before it falls.
I hold on, waiting, not wanting to waste any of it,
the sweetness that fills my soul,
the hugs, his fluid words of love.
I banish the aggravation of repetitions.
Dismiss illogical declarations.
Employ compassionate lying.
Now it’s the middle of the evening.
Reading will help mask the feeling
of my maple syrup sadness.
Until I finally fall asleep,
knowing that I’ll keep and savor
his fleeting intellect
for at least another day.
Published in Life Under Construction, A Caregiver’s Journey Through Dementia (2025)
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| Ann Favreau |
Ann Favreau is a retired educator who lives in Venice, FL. She is President of the Suncoast Writer Guild, Inc. She has self-published eight books, gives presentations to local women’s groups and loves sharing her work with others.
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| Abhiram Prakash |
Instructions for Feeding the Holy
Begin where you are. Do not wait for clarity. The holy is not persuaded by certainty; it listens for what trembles.
Step outside. Let the weather touch you. Watch how the sky keeps changing without apology. This is not a metaphor. It is a practice.
Feed the holy by tending what is small: washing a cup slowly, calling the name that has gone quiet, resting when the body asks instead of when permission arrives.
When grief comes, and it will, do not rush to improve it. Sit with it like a relative who has traveled far. Grief carries a language you may need later.
Remember: survival is not failure. Joy does not betray suffering. Caring for yourself is not retreat but a way of staying.
Feed the holy by choosing what steadies you when the noise swells. By practicing kindness even when it costs you speed or certainty. By lighting what light you can and letting it be enough.
This is not a cure.
It is a practice.
Some days, practice is enough.
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| David Anson Lee |
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| cottonbro studio |
Baileys Spiked Coffee
The old gentleman sits by himself
in the dimmed light
at his favorite corner table in the jazz club,
keeping warm on a bitter, cold winter night,
and listening to the trio play,
All the Things You Are,
a sensuous and tenderhearted song.
And that’s just fine by him.
It’s a piece he liked to play on the piano
when his arthritic hands didn’t betray his efforts
to bring to life Jerome Kern’s lovely melody.
It’s this piece that reminds him of his wife
who passed away two or three years ago.
Although, now, he’s not entirely certain.
Often, he can’t recall how long he’s been alone
and that’s when, he feels her presence,
and he thinks she may not have left at all.
It’s in these fleeting moments
that he hears her voice so clearly
that he finds himself speaking out loud to her.
And now, in the last year or so, he sees her
for just a moment. Usually it’s late at night,
sometimes she’s sitting in a chair,
looking at him from across the room,
or she’s passing by the bedroom door.
I should talk to someone about this,
he finds himself saying aloud
as the trio takes the lush, intricate music
for an improvised walk around the room.
I’ll make an appointment next week
and talk to the doctor, he thinks
as he sips the last of his drink
and sits back and is carried away to a time
when the air was warm and his wife was near,
just as she is now, sitting close to him,
listening to the music, and keeping time with her translucent hand on the table near his.
(First Published in Front Porch Review)
© Terry Allen
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| Terry Allen |
Terry Allen is an Emeritus Professor of Theatre Arts at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, where he taught acting, directing, and playwriting. He directed well over a hundred plays during his thirty-eight years of teaching. A few favorites include: Candide, Macbeth, Death of a Salesman, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, and The Threepenny Opera. He is the author of five poetry collections: Monsters in the Rain, Art Work, Waiting on the Last Train, Rubber Time, and Preserving the Past for the Present.
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| Юлія-Марія Повх |
The Mountain’s Child
It began when I was young,
taken from the city
and placed upon her rocky spine.
Though many, with conviction,
call her wild—fierce, untamed,
a place children should fear,
I knew her only as mother.
When my lungs burned
from cigarette smoke,
from tar that stained the confining walls,
she unbound me, reaching deep into my chest,
clearing the stagnation,
drawing long, deep breaths from me,
returning air scented with pine and rain.
Clean. Alive.
When my ears ached
from the assault of curses, shouting, and rock ‘n’ roll
rattling through the halls,
she soothed them,
her breath a soft touch upon the leaves,
calling forth a choir of sweet melodies,
lifting me above the chaos.
When the stench of liquor
on his breath
lapped at my cheek with the promise of attack,
freezing my limbs in silent terror,
she unfurled herself,
a fortress of bark and greenery,
branches bending like arms,
hiding me within the canopy of her trees,
where no one could follow,
where I grew wings.
When my body shrank to hide
from anger,
from fights, the uncooked hamburger
thrown across the room,
she lifted my spine,
tilting my gaze from the floor to the horizon,
anchoring me with the weight of her presence,
roots sinking deep beneath my feet,
so I could rise,
tall, steady,
unbroken.
When my belly ached from TV dinners,
mashed potatoes shriveled to crust in the corners,
cranberry sauce collapsed into gelatinous goo,
she eased the pain with clover and honeysuckle,
nourishing me with blueberries,
with trout pulled fresh from the stream.
When the absence of a loving embrace
and the uncertainty of their return
weighed heavy on me,
she held me in the hollow of her hidden caves,
reminded me of strength,
let me etch my name into her living heart,
where it would remain.
Not a hardened crown to be feared,
but a mother of endless embrace,
she breathed life into my lungs,
smoothed the jagged edges of the noise,
gave me wings to flee the predators I knew,
showed me how to rise and stand tall,
fed my hunger,
quieted my trembling fears.
In the curve of her arms,
I was wholly, unshakably loved.
© Krystal Gauley
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| Krystal Gauley |
Krystal Gauley is a poet and creative nonfiction writer completing an MA in English and Creative Writing. Her work is rooted in landscape, memory, and embodied encounters with nature, exploring emergence, stillness, and personal transformation through breath, presence, and relationships with the natural world.
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| Dmytro Kormylets |
I’m a stranger in this land
I’m a stranger
A stranger in this land
I’m where my neighbors think I’m sick
My relatives are distant
And we never seem to meet
No one called me Mister
I’m regarded as a tramp
They passed me daily without even a smile
I think I’m a stranger
A stranger in this land
How did I get here?
Voluntary or by will
I try to remember
But the image won’t stand still
I think I’m a stranger
A stranger in this land
My cousins are a few
Their gravestones are many
I think I’m a stranger
A stranger in this land
I walked many miles
A willing smile aboard
I want somewhere to shed
To shed this awesome load
But no one seems to care
I think I’m a stranger
A stranger in this land
I called out my very name
But no one recognized it and
That confirms that indeed I’m a stranger
A stranger in this land.
© Dennis Williams
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| Dennis Williams |
Dennis Williams is a writer and Poet from Rural St. Catherine, Jamaica. He is looking forward to a good “publish 25”. Dennis is deeply grateful to all the editors of magazines and journals who saw his work, took the time to read and appreciate it, and then included it in their prestigious publications. He would like to give a big shout-out to the editors of Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Academy of the Heart and Mind, Literary Heist, Active Muse, Rundelania Magazine, and Literary Cocktail Magazine for helping him bring his dream to life.
Chris F The Last Sentinel There is one leaf left on the bare-limbed tree, coppered, thin, refusing the fall. The others let go, to wind, t...
