Three Poems by Leilanie Stewart

Landmass

 

 

There is a lone                                 stack

standing out at sea,                         a sad

promontory that’s                             jutting

beyond the riptides.                         I often

watch it and wonder                         why

there’s only one,                              because,

surely if it was formed                     by erosion

there’d be more along                     the coast

This is a desolate beach                 to walk along

and when I go there by                   myself, I try to

imagine that under the       surface of the water

the cliff and the stack are touching, holding

onto one another through the swells, and

though the peaks and troughs will do their

damage, what is under the surface will

never be erased, and never be separated

 

 

 

Snowball Effect

 

I’d like to introduce you to

Miss Lauren Tide

She came all the way

From Greenland

And is planning to stay

for a while,

an epoch perhaps.

 

She’ll be bringing along with her

Miss Tundra, Miss Glacier

and Mister Permafrost

 

She was forced to emigrate

from her home, up North,

by convection currents-

hot air brought on by CO2

 

She’ll cool the seas before her,

Push the Gulf Stream further south

 

It’s a waiting game now

for the snowball to come

She’ll wipe out the arrogance

of humankind, with one swipe

from her terminal moraine

 

 

Clam Diggers

 

It’s funny

how when I was little

I used to wear clam diggers

to pick cockles

Some people called them

pedal pushers,

but I never wore them

on a bike

 

It’s sad now

that the beach in which

I wore pedal pushers

to pick cockles

has been closed to the public,

for commercial use,

by proper diggers,

not clam diggers,

for cockle digging

 

 

 

Leilanie Stewart is one half of a writing couple - the other half is Joseph Robert. By day she runs creative writing groups for teenagers and by night she writes and promotes her work at spoken word events in London. Her poetry has appeared in magazines and anthologies in the UK and US. More about Leilanie's writing can be found at www.leilaniestewart.wordpress.com

Two Poems by Michael Lee Johnson

Even as Evening

 

Even as evening

approaches night-

dandelions shake

dust loose from their yellow-

a robin pulls

the last red worm

from the moist,

but callous

ground,

shadows fade, flake,

into fresh fall night-

small creatures

with trumpet

sounds dominant

the adjacent

woods.

A virtuoso!

 

 

 

I am Looking for Something

 

I am looking for something-

desperate within the shattering

of green glass, Coca Cola bottles made

entirely from grass, bark, corn husks.

Between rain, grey clouds, a spot of sunshine

cast on a shadow's fear-

green grass sprouts, not grey bark

nor branches dead.

Truly, I am telling you,

I am looking for something-

not the specking of rain

on my windshield,

nor the wipers that

habitually sling the drops

away, left, then right.

I am looking for something.

Exploring deist compared too theist

I was confused, an academic note

on the side plate of my day.

I believe in a God, but perhaps my God

is just an auto mechanic.

I think God is wrapped in a 4-leaf clover

sinless, searching Illinois farm lands for something.

Not in commercials, billboards, sales pitches, on the highways,

nor in text messages, double negatives hidden,

or the static of cell phone drama.

I find my Savior in the bluebird,

grasslands, scattered trees, slightly out of range.

Bring me a fluffed pillow, Wal-Mart special,

a dream of wine, vodka mixed orange

in a season lacking reason,

the bluebird flies.

Everything dreams and flashes away-

I tell you something, I am looking

for something.

Savior bluebird.

 

 

 

 

MICHAEL LEE JOHNSON lived ten years in Canada during the Vietnam era:  now known as the Itasca, IL poet.  Today he is a poet, freelance writer, photographer who experiments with poetography (blending poetry with photography), and small business owner in Itasca, Illinois, who has been published in more than 750 small press magazines in 26 countries, he edits 7 poetry sites.  Michael is the author of The Lost American:  From Exile to Freedom (136 pages book), several chapbooks of poetry, including From Which Place the Morning Rises and Challenge of Night and Day, and Chicago Poems.  He also has over 69 poetry videos on YouTube.

Links:  http://poetryman.mysite.com/.  http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/promomanusa

https://www.youtube.com/user/poetrymanusa/videos

http://bookstore.iuniverse.com/Products/SKU-000058168/The-Lost-American.aspx

http://www.amazon.com/The-Lost-American-Exile-Freedom/dp/0595460917

Two Poems by Smita Sriwastav

Echoes of a Dawning Morn...

filigree dawn
is a latticework of sunbeams~

fragmented to be
scattered into reflections
in the glance of
peppering drops of dew.

clouds are a crotchet
of burnished oranges
swirling pinks
and breathy purples;

while a moon is
a remnant silver sliver
that lingers as a sigh
of nostalgia in today's face.

pole star
rubs sleep-worn lids to slip
beneath blankets to escape
mischievous rays,
its lethargic form cuddled
into marmalade pajamas.

sunflowers awaken
from drooping stalks to simper
while with erased haziness
of mist from cheeks of glass panes,
morning matures on
rejuvenating aroma of hot coffee...



Harlequin Whispers of Night Sky...

moonlight is
a soothing, serene drizzle;
starlight sparkle of
sepulchered memories,
constellations crotchet
a refulgent veil.

stars wink
ancient anecdotes in
ambiguous stardust scribbles
within blackberry silence.

psychedelic sighs
echo in abeyant moments,
as photon whispers
knock on indifferent eardrums~
too entranced by moon's serenades
to interpret them.

Smita Sriwastav is an M.B.B.S. doctor with a passion for poetry and literature.  She has always expressed her innermost thoughts and sentiments through the medium of poetry. A feeling of inner tranquility and bliss captures her soul whenever she pens her verse. Nature has been the most inspiring force in molding the shape of her writings. She has published two books and has published poems in journals like the Rusty Nail ( Rule of Survival)and Contemporary Literary Review India (
spring lingers),four and twenty, Paradise Review, Literary Juice, Blast Furnace and many more and one of her poems “Unsaid Goodbyes” was published in an anthology called ‘Inspired by Tagore’ published by Sampad and British Council. She has written poetry all her life and aims to do so forever.

A Poem by Jenny Qi

The Magnificent Capacity of Two Fireflies

When stars flicker out, you want
to believe in reincarnation.

Maybe in another life, you’ll be
a firefly, and I’ll be a moth

following, drawn ceaselessly

into your light.  Or perhaps

I will chase you like daylight,
follow from the in-between.

Or I’ll become a firefly with you

so in untainted darkness, you’ll find me

still believing the wisdom

of white flames and gas.

Jenny Qi is a PhD student in biomedical sciences in San Francisco, which is a fancy way of saying she’s putting off adulthood by pretending to cure cancer.  In her spare time, she draws science cartoons and writes for Synapse. Her essays have been featured in Huffington Post and The Atlantic,  and she has published poems in various journals, including the vanderbilt review, Tabula Rasa, and The Quotable. 

A Poem by Jack T. Marlowe

low down at high tide

 

 

angelfish,
your tran-

sendence

plays

hard to get

when life

overflows:

 

an angry

sea of bills

and bad

news, the

tears of

dull razor

blades

castaway

poems  

and dirty

dishes

 

and now
the toilet

overflows

and my

thoughts

stink of

the ocean

tireless

and

heaving

 

the angelfish

stoic, as

i languish

alone in the

drowning

hours

 

angelfish 

angelfish

sing for me

 

as the 

undertow

of every-

thing

 

drags

me

 

d

 o

  w

   n 

 

 

 

 

Jack T. Marlowe is a gentleman rogue from Dallas, TX.  A writer of poetry and fiction and a veteran of the open mic, his work has appeared in Handful of Dust, Rusty Truck, Bone Orchard Poetry, Napalm and Novocain, Zombie Logic, Tendril and many other zines (both online and in print). Jack is also the mad editor of Gutter Eloquence Magazine (http://www.guttereloquence.com).  

 

A Poem by Neil Ellman

Fish

after the statue by Constantin Brancusi, 1930

In the far-fetchedness of my life
as if a fish
I swim in violet-colored seas
and green the canyons
with my breath.
  Nothing has substance here
nor birds have wings
the rivers flow from mouth to source
and I return to the place
where I was spawned
  someday to crawl from river to land
upon on my knees through time
and mud-dark shores
to that place of prophecy
where a fish becomes a man
and man remains a fish
and I must swim upstream until I die.

Nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, Neil Ellman writes from New Jersey.  More than 850 of his poems, many of which are ekphrastic and written in response to works of modern and contemporary art, appear in print and online journals, anthologies and chapbooks throughout the world.

A Poem by Dawnell Harrison

Star-Flanked

The star-flanked sky
shoulders a cloudless night.
Violet waves of fog pour
in like sheets of rain
igniting the streets
with a colorful tenderness.

Dawnell Harrison has been published in over 100 magazines and journals including The Endicott Review, The Journal, Fowl Feathered Review, Jellyfish Whispers, The Bitchin' Kitsch, Vox Poetica, The Tower Journal, Queen's Quarterly, and many others.  Also, she has had 4 books of poetry published through reputable publishers titled Voyager, The maverick posse, The love death, and The fire behind my eyes.  Furthermore, she possess a BA from The University of Washington.