Mike Maggio

Out of This Earth


There’s a narrow path along the railroad tracks
I follow to a small station.  I ask the stationmaster,
who looks like Carl Jung, what time the train 
for Duluth leaves.  He strokes his white mustache 

and ponders.  The train departs at twelve, he says.
I’m not sure if he means noon or midnight.
It’s now 3:30.  You could take the big bus to Duluth, 
he says, but you’d have to have a certificate 

stating you’re in good health.  I see my father-in-law, 
who’s a surgeon, on a bench reading a newspaper.  
He doesn’t seem to have heard the stationmaster.
I hear a loud blast and rush out to the platform.  

Some boys are shooting a shotgun at the pigeons.
The stationmaster comes out and yells.
Either he or I throw a rock at the stupid boys.
The rock ignites the dry grass.  Or did the boys 

do it?  They flee the flames, and so do I.
I enter a shack and arrange old boards
against the open slats so the boys can’t see me.  
In the back wall, there’s a small wooden door,
 
about three feet by three feet.  It’s your turn, 
says the woman dressed as a nurse.  She’s opened 
the small door and waits for me to enter 
the narrow shaft.  I refuse, I tell her, to crawl in.  

I’m now inside the shaft, tearing at the loose 
earth, digging and worming my way up.  I surface 
in a graveyard, gasping for breath.  On the gravestones, 
I see no names, no dates, only the last words the dead
 
leave us.  The stone beside me reads: Out of This Earth.



Copyright 2024 by John Bradley

John Bradley’s most recent book of poetry is Dear Morpheus, The Glue That Is You (Dos Madres Press).  A frequent reviewer for Rain Taxi, he is currently a poetry editor for Cider Press Review.

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Perchance to Dream

After reading the news, I dreamt of destruction
as if I’d been there.  Nothing is as it should be.
For instance, a country claimed to investigate itself
with pious transparency in the fog of war.
Using precision ammunition made in factories,
men killed aid workers with unerring accuracy.
But the country said there must be some mistake –
 
in war it’s too hard to know when we’re awake.
Besides, people die from natural causes,
like the ones sheltering in that hospital.
But this must be something I dreamed,
before the day unfolded like a tablecloth
to cover the rubble, the amputated limbs,
and the $18 billion in F-15 fighter jets.

Only drama without movement, 
said Simone Weil, is transcendent.
Nothing is as it should be; it must be a fake,
this dream, from the ivory gate in Homer's epic
and just not to be trusted, or else I’m complicit,
for I’d rather contemplate the solar eclipse
and dream of the coming invasion of cicadas.   

Copyright 2024 Bonnie Naradzay

Bonnie Naradzay’s manuscript will be published later this year by Slant Books.  Three times nominated for the Pushcart Prize, she leads weekly poetry sessions at a day shelter and also at a retirement center, all in Washington DC. Her poems have appeared in AGNI, New Letters, RHINO, Kenyon Review, Tampa Review, EPOCH, and other places. In 2010 she was awarded the University of New Orleans Poetry Prize – a month’s stay in the Dolomites, in Northern Italy – in the castle of Ezra Pound’s daughter, Mary.  Her web site is www.bonnienaradzay.com

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nocturne en plein air

islanded by nightfall, 
she forages for questions without answers 
under a canopy embroidered in stars,
a balsamic moon lanterns her 
silhouette's steps along winding footpaths 
blanketed in evergreen and spruce..

so careful not to leave a trail of crumbs 
this time for animals, two or four 
legged, she shrouds her hollow eyes
with a hood in sweatshirt grey, 
a unisex alternative to classic fleece, 
a red herring for the pack lurking, 
still lying in wait, ready to huff and puff 
and blow their privilege down on her.

when the ghost butterflies swarm, 
forming a halo above the sleepwalker, 
flickers of light threaten her anonymity 
from the bandwagon of bards with fangs
for keystrokes, wholly intent on eclipsing 
her persona, a portrait of truth 
with more tall tales, fables, and lies.

Copyright 2024 by Michele Evans

Michele Evans, a fifth-generation Washingtonian (D.C.), is a writer, high school English teacher, and adviser for her school’s literary magazine. Despite always wearing the color black, she is fond of blueberries, blue hydrangeas, blues musicians, and Blue Mountain coffee. purl, her debut collection of poetry, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press in 2025. You can find her at awordsmithie.com or @awordsmithie on Instagram.

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Choices

Morning greets with 
Joyful anticipation
When life was Simpler
One choice
choose 
One
Sweater,
Just one
Which one?

Crouch 
Looking into
That drawer
Sunshine spills
Illuminating its contents

Pluck 
One sweater
Plenty
Of time
Having arose early

I think of 
Friends I’ll see
And smile
I want to look my 
Best
This first day

Oh no, lots of time has passed
Anxiety builds
Calm myself
force myself
To choose

Just one
Only One
A Special
One
From this
Low drawer contents
Neat pile
black- too dismal
charcoal gray, light grey
Maybe charcoal
I like charcoal 
Reminds of sketching
Still
Too somber
Hmm
Then 
Forest green 
Beckons

Darn!
Now I’m running late
jump up
Crap!
Hurry up!
Grab curlers 
Those Clairol
Orange and green
Heat on counter
Scoot into shower
No makeup
just tame those frizzies

Will mom drive-
yes! 
Still late
Don’t know my new homeroom
pop into
Any classroom
Gee, room full of youngsters
Mentally challenged
I’m Enthralled by 
gentle
Teacher
Woman with glowing brown skin
Even in my dream
I wonder why?
Why is it pertinent  
A Woman
And Of color?
Sitting there I am still in my curlers
Hoping no reprimand
For violating
School rules
A boy smiles 
At me
I smile back
He glows
Teacher smiles 
At me
Lesson ends 
As I walk by her lectern

She looks down
fetches
pink spongy curlers
Clasps them into
Her hair!
Says
My action
Breaking the rules
Encouraged her to also 
We exchange smiles
Partners
Women 
in solidarity-

I made two choices 
That day

Copyright 2024 Lynne Grossman

Lynne Grossman is an artist and writer who strongly believes in using the arts for healing and social justice. She has published nonfiction, poetry, and flash fiction in the anthologies: The Light Between Us-True Stories of Healing Through Creative Expression, Poems of the Super Moon, and Flash! Short Short Stories by Pen Women (The Pen Women Press). Her essay and other poems have been published on websites such as Split this Rock Organization’s blog: “Blog this Rock” for the theme  Poems of Resistance, Power, and Resilience. Lynne has given many poetry readings including as an introduction to the special evening of poetry led by then Poet Laureate of Virginia Sofia M. Starnes. Lynne was an invited reader for “The Celebration of African-American Poets of Washington, D.C”. She is a retired Speech-Language Pathologist and Hearing Therapist. Lynne holds degrees from The University of Virginia: B.S. Speech-Language Pathology, M.Ed. (Concentration: Audiology).

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German Expressionism-Max Pechstein 1881-1955
Nude Figure 1920
Graphite on paper

As my head crushed the pillow,
My last thoughts were of a nude
I had seen in the National Gallery.
Not of her ample breast,
Nor the exhibit label,
But her eyes glancing to one side,
Reckless strokes of graphite
Pulling me near….

She tore the paper and asked me to step in,
I said, “Sure,” with a grin.
I leapt into the frame
With no thought of being tame.
Those glancing eyes,
Looking side to side,
“Let’s do it here in plain sight.”
“Let’s do it here in black and white.”
Shocked by our intention,
The young and old
Took flight to another dimension. 
As she and I started to dance, 
Her eyes always in that glance,
Came the gallery guards
With little Hitler mustaches,
Their jack boots making crashes,
Kicking in pictures
That seemed anti-fascist.
We ran into the background 
Where by boots and eyes we couldn’t be found.
The guards goose-stepped by, 
We clinging together on the ground
Not making a sound.

I opened one eye  
And from my pillow 
Looked at the time.
The rhyming had stopped.
I closed my eye,
The room being dark,
Hoping to rejoin the dream’s arc

Copyright 2024 Dennis Price

Dennis Price is an unpublished poet, who by day earns money making sawdust and is a husband, father of two adult children, and a cat lover.

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My Mothers Are Ladybugs

Carnivorous guardian angels slip
through window cracks in search of
gnats or half empty 
glasses of juice.

Their razor mouths chew
the dust of fitful sleep.  
When I wake,
my mind is neater for it.

They swarm around the bed
post and under pillows—bold 
soldiers, red, orange, black
caught in my doze.

I waste my buzzing days stuck 
in the nectar of grave possibility.  
I hum to the raindrops 
of a music box.

a silver beetle, “Ladybug, lady
bug, will you be mine?” It plays
its lullaby, “You are my sunshine, my 
only sunshine.”

The drizzle slows and 
slows until the sound winds
down. Then a thousand bubble 
wings form a shield around my rest.

I twine two spiky arms around
my own round middle, roll my bug self 
over, and fall back under 
it all.

Copyright 2024 by Sally Huggins Toner

Sally Toner (she/her)is a writer and high school English teacher who has lived in the Washington, D.C. area for over 25 years. She is a Pushcart nominee whose poetry, fiction, and non-fiction have appeared in Northern Virginia Magazine, Gargoyle Magazine, Watershed Review, and other publications.   Her first chapbook, Anansi and Friends, from Finishing Line Press, is a mixed genre work focusing on diagnosis, treatment, and recovery from breast cancer. She is presently completing an MFA at the University of Georgia in narrative nonfiction. A recent empty nester with two grown daughters, she lives in Reston, Virginia with her husband. You can find her at sallytoner.com, salliemander70 on Instagram, and on X at @SallyToner

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God Calls

God speaks in Her own voice,
raspy from cigarettes
and tequilla shots.


“I hear you’re feeling down,
She says, “You want to lie, 
under the bedcovers and drown.
One more teacher shot,
another six-year-old
with a gun in their hands.
You can’t stand 
the sound
when the gun goes off.”


God sighs, tucks her top
into her pants. Her face
has crows feet. Eons
of disease, war – poverty –
will do that to you –
even if You’re God.

“I watched a fish trapped
in plastic die last night,”
She says, “You gotta have
a thick hide. Or it becomes
too much. I’m used to
schools of fish dying.
But that one fish really
got to me.”

God wipes away a tear,
quietly, curses polluters,
for a long minute fumes
against the outrages
of Her children. But, She 
doesn’t create a scene.
That’s not Her jam.

“Maybe this is all a dream,”
God says, “from which we’ll
soon be awake.”
Or, She adds, shutting Her eyes,
“this is our long tortured sleep.”

"God Calls", by Kathi Wolfe. Copyright, 2024: Kathi Wolfe

Kathi Wolfe, who has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, is the 2024 winer of the William Meredith Poetry Book Award. Her most recent poetry collection is The Porpoise In The Pink Alcove.

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Stymphalian Shadow

        Oh Artemis,
goddess of the hunt,
why do you sic
your pet on those

	who have done you no wrong?
Be gone Ares,
god of war,
stop

	the Stymphalian shadow.
Break its wings,
catch its beak,
let it writhe forever

	against a prison of cork.
It escaped a pack of wolves
only to sweep across the valley
destroying olive trees

	and peace.
Then the laughing dove
wakes me from my unsettled slumber,
“No, no, this is mine!” he cries, his breath

	rattling jasmine out of the air.
And the Stymphalian shadow
passes over the dove.
Lo, watch, as orange blossoms

	stop dancing for the moon
	when fighter jets
	pierce the night
	with metallic poison.

__________________________________________



Copyright 2024 by Lucy Koons

Author’s Note:In Greek mythology, Stymphalians were man-eating birds with bronze beaks and sharp metallic feathers. They dropped poisonous dung and launched feathers at their victims. Their feathers could pierce both iron and bronze armor but, if a person wore cork, then the Stymphalians’ beaks would get caught in the cork, rendering the metallic birds impotent. This poem was inspired by the dreams I would be awakened from in Beirut when a neighboring country’s fighter jets would suddenly appear, fly threateningly low above the roof of our apartment building, and “buzz” the city.]

Lucy Koons is a Virginia native who has lived abroad for more than 20 years. She began her career in communications on Capitol Hill. Overseas, Koons worked at The American University of Beirut and Georgetown University in Qatar. Her favorite activity is going on adventures with her husband and daughter.

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I Dream 

I'm peeking out at the sliver of light
Visible because the crimson blanket
Draped over the standard rectangle
On the side of our backroom bedroom
Tries to cover a narrow concrete alleyway
Where the sound of a passing animal
Skittering across the makeshift fence
Of stacked green plastic panels which lie
Onto chain link usually standing firm to
The minuscule weight of a squirrel or cat
But on this still overcast Friday morning
I see in the long finger of brightness
A horrific sight a cylindrical object
Rumbles by in the low hazy gray sky
As if being towed by armored tank
I hear a shattering explosion not far
Away how can this be I am in America
I shrink back pulling my blanket closer
And listen for another heavy blast on
What should be an air of Pacific cool
I believe I'm in a war zone unsettled
The click of the clock radio wakes me
To caffeine fueled banter of two hosts
I am relieved it was only a chimera yet
Disturbed that somewhere in the world
This is someone's reality every day

Copyright 2024 by Don Kingfisher Campbell

Don Kingfisher Campbell, MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University Los Angeles, taught Writers Seminar at Occidental College Upward Bound for 36 years, currently a Board Member of California Poets In The Schools, publisher of Four Feathers Press, and host of the Saturday Afternoon Poetry reading series in Pasadena, California. For awards, features, and publication credits, please go to: http://dkc1031.blogspot.com

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