Decadent Dessert

By: Mary Kiser

 

Night shrouds his winding sheet over day,

And stars ogle at his dissolute display.

Intemperate invitations from cities clothes

Offer licentious lights like beacons that bellow from below.

His omnipresence entices prurient purpose,

And derides the sun's intrusive housewife circus.

Night forbids churches, parishioners, nuns, and the like.

He desires debauchees who spit in the style of debutante polite.

There can be forgiveness in the honest fright from Night.

Day is just another lie in crowned right.

 

 

Universe of Love

By: DLH

Universe of Love

 Our love is like the universe

It’s forever lasting

We might have black holes

Sucking up all the bad moments

Until they explode into arguments

But as time goes by we build

Beautiful and fascinating planets

These represent our good memories

While our children shall be galaxies

And they shall build planets like we have

Then this cycle shall continue forever

Man to Cyborg

By: DLH

Man to Cyborg

 Why do I have feelings?

They’re just worthless emotions

That us stupid humans have

So I shall sacrifice

My love, caring, etc.

And become a emotionless machine

Not having these inferior feelings

So I can’t go through pain

And put others through it

 

Love Fading

By: DLH
 

 Love Fading

 

 Our love fades each day we talk to each other

We push each other away to escape the pain

Each day worse than the last

My love for you is slowly becoming hate

Why won’t you make things better?

Do you want someone new?

Or do you want us

It’s all up to you because I’m here to stay

But maybe I’m just something temporary

You say you give up on this

I leave forever hurt

Wishing I could give you the things that you want

But I guess you just didn’t want me

 

 

 

Consumption

By: DLH

Consumption

 The sun is going to sleep

And the moon is rising

The dark side of the night arises

They come to corrupt you

But it’s your choice to fight it or join them

They give you everything you want to consume you

They will make you a slave of the night

You will never be able to escape their grasp

They will use you until you are useless to them

Then leave you confused and lonely

Unable to recover from this curse they have given you

You will forget who you were

And become a ghost in a shell

 

 

 

My Skin, is

By: Shanice Green

My skin, is

too dark to be seen, but not too dark- not to be missed

 

only considered a good thing when-

 

it is doing a “good thing” like-

 

going to school or driving the speed limit-

 

to a job I have held longer than the last six months

My skin, my skin, is a sore thumb-

sticks out on paper from the Jessicas-

 

the Carys-

 

the Wendys-

 

long before I step into the room

 

their eyeballs etching confusion deep into my skin

My skin- my skin

like, are you in the right place?

 

did you make the right turn?

 

the Cosmetology Department is at the other campus.

 

 My skin- my skin- my skin- my skin-

is what separates me from you

 

it is the reason I avoid certain streets- subconsciously-

 

praying to my God that the cop car following behind me-

 

for the last seven blocks-

 

is a man or woman who shares, my skin

 

My skin, my skin, is ugly!

 

or at least that is what I would think when my mother would try to buy me-

 

a black Barbie-

 

that was supposed to be-

 

the same as the white one-

 

except with fewer accessories-

 

most of which-

 

was “sold separately” – which meant

 

that she would have to spend twice as much money to equal what the white doll had-

 

for the low, low price of $19.95

 

but the sign on the shelf read – “Rollback Special”

 

so in essence, it would have cost $10 more?

 

too much math- she’d just settle and buy  me the white one

 My skin- my skin- my skin

is confused!

 

all of these white celebrities in the news

 

The Angelina Jolies

 

The Kim Kardashians, and her sister-

 

and her sister’s sister-

 

and her sister’s

 

sister’s sister-

 

and her sister’s

 

sister’s sister-

 

and their mother-

 

and their father-

 

all paying good money to be “bronzed” or “blackenized”-

 

as people of my skin would put it-

 

adopting and birthing black babies is probably the trendiest way of saying-

 

I am not a racist

 

My skin- my skin-

my skin, my skin- my skin-

 

is tired.

A Bird in the hand

By Sarah Ethridge

 

I look at the little bird sitting in my hand

It’s small and delicate and silent.

I look at a thorn bush there sit two birds.

They are fat hearty and singing.

The little bird in my hand looks at me then at the two birds.

“What do you think they can do for you that I can’t?

“Well” I answer “They are big and strong you are small and weak.

“I’m only as weak as you make me” said the bird in a small quiet voice.

“So said the little bird you would crawl through thorns to get to them,

when you have a perfectly good bird in your hand.

I looked at the birds again and the size of the thorns.

“But they can do so much more for me”

The little bird sighed and shook its tiny head.

“You must see past the size of something before you can measure its worth”.

I stopped looking at the big birds and started looking at the small one.

Thoughts came pouring into my mind and I was startled when the little

Bird began to grow in my hand.

I looked and smile and the little bird smiled by “I told you I could grow”.

“But how I questioned the little bird?”

It smiled “I am an idea and an idea is only as small as you let be”

So little bird was right I didn’t need stronger birds I just had to feed my

little bird, my little idea for it to grow.

Broken Beauty

By Darrin Mack
Made from the bowels of darkness
and entangled in emotion -
misunderstood - the true epicenter of confusion
slowly beating, trying to follow the pace of life.

Light hidden in the midst of darkness
battered and bruised but yet still beating,
still keeping hope alive,
aging year after year as the sands of time churn.

Obtaining new scars with every passing moment,
leaving it fragile,
but even in the deepest darkness, light shines.  
Through every little crack and cranny,
there is a beckon of hope and true beauty.

Matters of the heart help redefine the world,
making the foolish wise
or finding beauty in a broken heart.

Poem: "Let me Say Before I Go"

By Sharon Browder

Before I’m lost to time and the South

I want to say I was here.

I loved the half light of a day sliding into night.

I want you to know before I leave

That I liked the old southern towns along the Savannah River.

I loved the formations of geese in the North Carolina sky

And the snake-necked egret at the edge of a marsh,

And the pungent smell of puff mud.

I came to love my life right here.

Fell in love with the browns and greens and the color of moss.

But the color of the leaves in late October

Near the Blue Ridge are not to be missed.

Poem: The Two Roys

by Richard Fowler 

July, 1969 --- The last photograph of my brother was artlessly

 taken by our grandmother who insisted 

that more than half of the composition include the kitchen ceiling.

For all its faults, the picture takes nothing 

away from the arresting gaze 

of the tall, tanned, confident subject, relaxing 

with a cup of coffee with our wall-eyed grandfather.

I was just getting to know him after a long siege 

of jealousy and the misunderstandings natural to siblings 

born seven years apart.

Just starting to like him.                                                                    

Just starting to admire him.

But the needs of war trump the needs of family.

---The Two Roys was my family’s reference to the picture. My brother was named after my mom’s dad, Roy Beard, who made no secret that my brother was his favorite grandchild.  When Roy’s plane went down that October, grandpa went into a tailspin of his own and had a stroke. It’d be another 12 years before he died but he was more than halfway there, already.

Poem: Coffee Pot

Photo by Stuart Miles

by Ali Carnevale

Always utilized

Picked up, put down

Burping, steaming, pouring

Hard at work making more.

Finally a break from being pushed around!

Back at it going from one colleague to another.

Sit down to do my job crying brown caffeinated tears.

Again another demanding interruption

Passed from one to another.

Back at work making more

The cycle never ends.

Poem: "Good & Evil"

Photo from Sloopie

by Ali Carnevale

The dark closes around me

suffocating

The wet sticky coldness that makes me shiver

holds me with hard leather restraints

Prisoner  

Shoving  me down

Threatening me with beaten memories

A keyhole glowing

The sneaky flicker on the tip-of-your-tongue thought

Growing bright orb

Memories of smiles, flashes of shotgun bursts of laughter

Surrounded in light

Pulsating, lifting, opening of hope

            ...The opposite direction of dark

Poem: "Rupert Creach is my Brother"

Photo by Anna Game

By Tom Stearns

Maker of those fine jams and jellies,

Made of re-constituted catfish whiskers.

He drives a 1965 pistol blue mustang convertible

With his side-kick Leon the Giant.

Leon weighs well over 300 pounds.

He smells of butter.

The vehicle tilts.

Rupert Creach is my brother.

He is six foot and two mighty inches.

Glory be, can he run and jump,

And that crazy jelly…man o’ man!

I saw my brother fight three men and a wombat

With his busted arm literally tied behind his back,

And I do believe he had mononucleosis at the time.

I do not recall who won;

His arm healed kinda crooked.

Cat Poems

Photo by Gidion Lubbe

Apache_____________________________________________________

by Sawnte Posley

The life of a cat is a dull one.

Wake up.

Stretch.

Patrol the house.

And then I sit.

Right outside of my owner’s door thinking, “where is the food?”

She comes out and I follow her.

I hear the ruffling of the bag;

The sound of the food hitting the bowl.

Poems: "21" and "Wrongful Deed"

Photo by Xedos4

by Kyle Manigault


21

Dear Khalil,

As my eyes close

I hear you whisper

"Don’t cry. I’m fine.

We will meet again"

But again seems too long.

I miss playing ball together.

I always win, remember?

You say I cheat,

And really I do.

I lost score, and say I’m winning,

Since you’re gone,

I can’t play anymore.

Once my time comes,

We will play again.

This time God's keeping score.

WRONGFUL DEED

My first and last name

Will always be murderer.

I fear for what might

Happen in my future.

I didn’t meant to kill him,

But Jack Daniels assisted me

To walk down the evil path.

I don’t remember how the knife got in my hand.

I don’t remember how the blood got on my skin.

But I’m sorry for becoming

What I am not:

A monster.

"Awake" and Other Poems

by Shawnte Posley

Photo by Worradmu

Awake

I’m being lifted.

Strong hands haul me like a sack of potatoes.

I’m taken from where I was to another strange place.

I am on a mattress.

It is wet and I can feel the floor beneath it.

Thick chains wrap around my ankles and wrists.

I am tied down.

The smell …

Urine, feces.

I don’t like it here.

"The Last Breath Before Coma" and other Poems

Photo by Stuart Miles

by Savannah Cosby

Last Breath Before Coma

Furious stomping:

out the house

down the stairs

and around the block

to the “PIGGALIE WIGGALIE”

as the voice in the speaker declares itself.

The magnitude of his speech

is a lull as I stand

staring at the pharmacy isle.

Which one will it be?

The ibuprofen isn’t lethal enough,

too much liquid in Nyquil,

who even knows if the Sudafed could cure this disease.