Two Poems by Melissa Mason

Uncategorized, Winter 2016-17

You’re Innocent When You Dream

 

You look so innocent when you dream,

with the pale yellows and baby blues

swirling and caressing the curves of your head,

your neck,

your shoulders,

your hips,

gently comforting your busy mind.

 

Cool pillow absorbing your thoughts

and maybe your tears.

Your eyes flicker, your lips part,

roll over and your breathing slows.

Nothing can touch you.

Nothing can harm you.

 

You’re innocent when you dream.

 

Flowers - By Remizov, Alexei Mikhailovich / A. Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts / Culture Images / Universal Images Group / Rights Managed / For Education Products Only

Flowers – By Remizov, Alexei Mikhailovich / A. Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts / Culture Images / Universal Images Group / Rights Managed / For Education Products Only

Stress Flowers

 

 

Eyes closed.

Deep breaths.

Drag and curve and dip.

Twisting grey lines

folding in on each other,

whispering across the page.

Their gentle pitter-patter

tickles your ears,

your hand gracefully guiding,

forming beauty only chaos

can grow.

 

 

Melissa Mason is an English major with a focus in Creative Writing and an Art minor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. She hopes to be anovelist one day, though she also enjoys writing short stories and poetry.

Photo credit: Flowers. Fine Art. Britannica ImageQuest, Encyclopædia Britannica, 25 May 2016.
quest.eb.com/search/525_2905622/1/525_2905622/cite. Accessed 24 Jan 2017.

Ain’t No Keeping a Good Child Down

Uncategorized, Winter 2016-17

 

Paul Grams

July, Kate Greenaway's Almanack For 1895 1894 Greenaway, Kate / SuperStock/ Universal Images Group / Rights Managed / For Education Use Only

July, Kate Greenaway’s Almanack For 1895 1894 Greenaway, Kate / SuperStock/ Universal Images Group / Rights Managed / For Education Use Only

 

My gramma was the meanest lady     ever

lived     scare brother and me right half to death

to hear her     never she hug you lessen you

been good all day     she make you go to be

alone while brother heard the story out

the storybook     and you gon hafta wait

for brother tell you later     find it out

my gramma when she strop us makes us     wait

hands on you ankles while she think how bad

what you don done don hurt she feelings     ever

so often she gon see you run wrong way

through Elma yard cross town     and brother too

sit on the sofa look     at books all day

gramma so mean     we darent even put her in

them fantabulous stories we told     when we kept in

 Paul Grams set out fifty years ago to be a famous writer, never got close, and spent 30 years teaching in the Detroit Public Schools. He has kept writing in the basement all these years.

 

Photo credit:

July KATE GREENAWAY’S ALMANACK FOR 1895. Fine Art. Britannica ImageQuest, Encyclopædia Britannica, 25 May 2016. quest.eb.com/search/107_3352693/1/107_3352693/cite. Accessed 20 Jan 2017.

We Buried a Cat Today

Fall 2016, Uncategorized

Elizabeth Trach

We buried a cat today.

Cat mummy / G. DAGLI ORTI / De Agostini Picture Library / Universal Images Group / Rights Managed / For Education Use Only

Cat mummy / G. DAGLI ORTI / De Agostini Picture Library / Universal Images Group / Rights Managed / For Education Use Only

We brought him home from the neighbor’s yard, where we found him stiff and cold, paws unnaturally curled and raised as if to fend something off. His teeth were bared a bit, but his eyes were closed.

A snow shovel wasn’t bier enough for what was so recently a purring, warm thing, so I brought up from the basement a cloth,

a green curtain that I had sewed long ago and which had once hung in the dining room of the Red House, where we fed babies with plastic spoons and marked time with small colored candles in cakes.

Now that’s buried too, wrapped around the cat whose body suddenly made sense again as we rolled him over and he looked like he was sleeping.

“He doesn’t look scared any more,” said the boy as we tucked in his friend and carried his body to the hill behind the fence,

stirring up papery orange leaves as we went.

We scooped fistfuls of light, silty soil over the bundle, and I felt how soft the dust was, falling through my fingertips,

while the girl whittled a stick with gritted teeth, scraping away the bark in short, sharp strokes.

She would not let me touch her.

As the boy and his father gathered stones to mark the spot, she broke the silence with a snap and plunged the stick into the earth above the grave

and walked away

past the silent beehive, so lately humming with purpose and now empty, a Roanoke of wax and honey abandoned and left for us to interpret as we will

We buried the cat at dusk,

and as I closed the gate behind me my eyes were already adjusting to the dark.

Elizabeth Trach is a writer and editor living in Newburyport, MA. She earned her M.A. in Creative Writing at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. She also sings in a band, grows almost all her own food, and occasionally even cooks it. You can catch up on all her adventures in extreme gardening at

 

Photo credit: Cat mummy. Photography. Britannica ImageQuest. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 25 May 2016.
http://quest.eb.com/search/126_3734116/1/126_3734116/cite. Accessed 17 Oct 2016.

Three poems by Leah M. Hughes

Fall 2016, Uncategorized
The Ramones: Photo by Roberta Bayley/Evening Standard/Hulton Archive/Getty Images) / Evening Standard / Hulton Archive / Getty Images / Universal Images Group / Rights Managed / For Education Use Only

The Ramones: Photo by Roberta Bayley/Evening Standard/Hulton Archive/Getty Images) / Evening Standard / Hulton Archive / Getty Images / Universal Images Group / Rights Managed / For Education Use Only

Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame 2002

Wouldn’t Joey Ramone have loved
to have lived to see this?

Wouldn’t he have circled the day,
written down the address,

even if the driver with the boys
were coming to pick him up

again and last and on time
to be inducted into the Rock-n-Roll

Hall of Fame?  Probably
the first time he’d ever visited.

He would have I bet you
lay flat on his back on the carpet

of the condo his manager bought
him when the cash ran like a trout stream

knowing it wasn’t your handprints
they were after:  no gold nude

for the mantle, or a globe or Victrola.
Not even money or a gold record —

“Man,” he would sit up thinking,
“they just want my guitar.”

Pulchritude

You’re sexy as hell the guy on the next barstool
said. I wanna know, how’s that sexy? It’s hot?
Cicero knew it in Claudius Pulcher, so grotesquely beautiful
out from his saffron dress, from his headdress,
from his Cinderella slippers and his purple ribbons,

from his dereliction, from his lust.
You’d dress me up like a tart
or in a little devil
costume, complete
with horns and pitchfork,
and then say you’re hot.

I’d dress you up like a fireman.
And I’ll be on fire.

Call It History

In tragedy, you die.
In comedy, you marry
Tell me, who wrote this system?

Considering the options,
I killed parts of myself
every time I said I do,

which was never funny
particularly when I did not anymore.

No bliss outside of marriage –
the system directs out of decency,
preferring the conjugal
to lusting adulterous or flirting.
Yes, even the flirting.

What about – you marry for comedy
and divorce to be born
again, twist of sacrament?

Call it history.

Leah M. Hughes is from Dalton, Georiga.  She attended Oglethorpe University, Georgia State, and Queens University of Charlotte. She educates and writes in the metro-Atlanta area, where she enjoys copious reading, her three dachshunds, gardening, and live music.

Four Haibun

Fall 2016, Uncategorized

Pat Tompkins

MATSUO BASHO (1644-1694). - Japanese poet. Scroll painting by Watanahe Kwasan. The Granger Collection / Universal Images Group

MATSUO BASHO (1644-1694). – Japanese poet. Scroll painting by Watanahe Kwasan. The Granger Collection / Universal Images Group

Note: Haibun, originally a Japanese literary form, combines prose and haiku. Usually the prose suggests a story or journey, and, as with haiku, the prose should be succinct, concrete rather than abstract, leaning more toward imagery than narration. What’s key is that the haiku, which does not need to follow the old 5-7-5 syllable “rule”, works with the prose without repeating it. The haiku can serve as a juxtaposition; and, although it is often last, can appear elsewhere in the piece.

 

The Coconut Cake Lady

 

A woman twice my age approached me at the bakery while I waited for my order. “You don’t know me and I don’t know you,” she said, looking somber. “Would you buy me a piece of coconut cake?
My eyebrows probably gave away my surprise at this very specific and, at eight in the morning, peculiar question. Who eats cake so early? I said, “Do they even have coconut cake today?” I peered at the display case: cheesecake, a chocolate torte, strawberry tarts, and looming high, the four-layer extravagance feathered with white flakes.
“Yes, they do,” she said with enthusiasm. A card noted the price: the most expensive item. She didn’t look homeless, just shabby. Her cardigan’s Fair Isle pattern was blurred by wear and seemed heavy for June. I handed her the money. “Thank you so much.”
I took my raisin toast and coffee to the patio, my Saturday morning treat, as I read the newspaper. The bakery’s coffee wasn’t as dark as I like, but there was cream and free refills, plus real butter and decent marmalade. For an hour, I could pretend to be the type who splurged on fancy coffee drinks and rich sweets, even though I ordered plainer fare.

As I paged through the paper, I wondered: Did I look like an easy mark? Her cake cost more than my items combined. Consider it a good deed. Anyone desperate enough to ask for cake deserved it. You can’t get what you want unless you ask for it, right?
It’s not enobling, dwelling on the cost of things. I went inside for more coffee. The cake lady sat with an empty plate and espresso cup. She said, “I would have paid for the cake with a check but they wouldn’t take it without the manager’s approval.And the manager isn’t in yet. It’s ridiculous. I’ve been at my bank 22 years.”
I gave her a thin smile. Who writes a check for cake? You must think I’m really dumb.
Later, I realized what bothered me: fear. Fear that I’d end up like her, alone and poor in the city, begging for a treat.

she walks with a cane
among quaking aspens
early November

 

                    ***

 

Camera Obscura

 

Not a modest man, Eadweard Muybridge, he of the weird spelling, often signed his negatives Helios. Sun god. Some god. And he dubbed his mobile darkroom, horse-drawn wagon or chariot, “Helios’s flying studio.” To capture action, most famously a running horse, all hooves off the ground—he shot a series of stills.
An early name for what we call photography was “sun drawing”. Monsieur Daguerre gave his name to his craft. Writing with light, with an echo of fancy and fantasy in photo. Can we believe what we see or is it a trick of the light? Or a manipulation of the image (cousin of imitate), sleight of hand? Solar print. If we can’t count on the sun—sunrise/sunset—what can we rely on?

technology
conquers the art of drawing:

is handwriting next?

                    ***

 

Mauna Kea

It’s May in Hawaii yet I’m wearing a knee-length down jacket, hood up, and padded gloves because it’s also 35 degrees and windy atop this inactive volcano. An elevation of nearly 14,000 feet and absence of light pollution make it one of the best accessible places on Earth for viewing the night sky.
Near the equator, this view encompasses the northern and southern hemispheres. A simple pivot brings me the Southern Cross and the Big Dipper in one place. Although only a few thousand feet closer, the stars appear much nearer.

navigating
by starlight
how far can you go?

 

                    ***

Paving the Road to Hades

The ancient Greeks are always with us. Developed as a painkiller, morphine, a derivative of opium, was named for Morpheus, Greek god of dreams. Heroin was intended to be a non-addictive substitute for morphine. name, from Greek heros, refers to a godlike character with great power. Unfortunately, heroin is highly addictive and more potent than morphine. The German pharmaceutical company Bayer marketed it in 1895 as an over-the-counter cough suppressant; it remained a Bayer trademark until World War I.

losing a war
by missing the enemy
camouflage

                    ***

Pat Tompkins is an editor in the San Francisco Bay Area. She discovered the haibun form a few years ago and has published in CHO, Haibun Today, KYSO Flash, and other publications.

 

Photo credit: MATSUO BASHO (1644-1694). – Japanese poet. Scroll painting by Watanahe Kwasan.. Fine Art. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Web. 10 Aug 2016. http://quest.eb.com/search/140_1628600/1/140_1628600/cite

 

 

Cafes

Fall 2016, Uncategorized

Sarah Diamond Burroway

Picasso's Tea Time 2003 Patricia A. Schwimmer (b.1953/Canadian) Acrylic Painting Details: 2003 - acrylic Artist Details: Schwimmer, Patricia A., 1953, Canadian

Picasso’s Tea Time 2003 Patricia A. Schwimmer (b.1953/Canadian) Acrylic Painting Details: 2003 – acrylic Artist Details: Schwimmer, Patricia A., 1953, Canadian

Go for tea, hang (another) moment.
Embrace.
Throwback 1993:
Then, still so much love.

A bookstore, an art studio—
Spots fill up fast.
Inspired by traditiona
Japanese tea,

 

Sip, and totally Zen out.
It’s ridiculously adorable moments on
Instagram,
Facebook or

Twitter.
A photo of your friend.
2015, the first time…

          2015, The First Time.
     
    2015,
     
    Us.
On social media
Celebrating through the years.
Get in on the fun, honey.

 

 

 Sarah Diamond Burroway is a Kentucky writer. Her essays and poetry are included in the Women of Appalachia Project. Her plays and monologues have been produced in New York, California, West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky. She is pursuing her MFA in Writing at the Bluegrass Writers Studio at Eastern Kentucky University.

 

Photo credit: Picasso’s Tea Time. Fine Art. Britannica ImageQuest. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 25 May 2016. http://quest.eb.com/search/107_3349530/1/107_3349530/cite. Accessed 11 Aug 2016.

Wine-Colored Butterflies

Summer 2016, Uncategorized

by Melissa Mason

 

leaves flutter
across the ground
like the butterflies
that used to flap
their wings against
your stomach
twirling and whirling
at the sight of her
lips her hips
her eyes
butterflies wreak havoc
at the sound
of her voice
mention of her name
butterflies sit
heavy and waiting
eager to flap
and flutter
and churn
your stomach
butterflies reserved
only for her

 

Melissa Mason is an English major with a focus in Creative Writing and an Art minor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. She hopes to be anovelist one day, though she also enjoys writing short stories and poetry.

Photo credit: Scanning Electron Micrograph (SEM) of wing scales of a Red Admiral Butterfly (Vanessa atalanta), magnification x 450 . Photography. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Web. 15 Jun 2016. http://quest.eb.com/search/151_2519448/1/151_2519448/cite

The Old Goddess

Summer 2016, Uncategorized

by Muhammad Kasule

 

She had a certain pink rose blush
That youthful look they like to see
All eyes were set on her
But that attention’s never free

The hottest dancer at the bar
A goddess to onlookers below
Happy that she’s the star

Happy that they love the show

This was back when she was pretty
When she could hold a genuine smile
Back when she loved life in the city
When waking up was still worthwhile

Started hanging with the attention
3 gents who dealt out blow
They gave her a bit but forgot to mention
The icy stab of craving snow

Cause soon she needed it pretty bad
Cold chains won’t let her go
Biggest smile, you know she’s so sad
She’s giving a blow for batch of good blow

Her body became her main income
A.K.A, more money for dope
Slowly turning her body more numb
Soft eyes abandoning hope

Started taking on some loans
She’s gotten in pretty deep
The only furniture she owns
Is the news on which she sleeps

Look how far our goddess fell
Collecting needles from a bin
Her life’s become a living hell
Now that money’s running thin

Hated choosing between the cold and dark
Getting fucked up or food for the week
Coldest nights were those in the park
Hoping they still wanna mess with antiques

Cause let’s be honest, she’s now 38
Makeup can’t cover her broken skin
Throws in the towel, Life’s not getting great
Doesn’t care what ditch she ends in

Not worth it to smile through the pains
So when she decides to call it a day
She does it with coke choked up in her veins
Letting the waves wash her away

She reminds me so much of myself
Many decisions I hope she won’t make
I too was a dancer, from the top shelf
Before I made all my mistakes

I had that youthful look, you know
A blonde with red lips so lush
A goddess to onlookers below
With that familiar pink rose blush

Muhammad Kasule is from Uganda. He is studying physics at Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts.

Photo credit: Joanne Woodward from the trailer for the film The Stripper / Wikimedia Commons.

 

 

My Enemies

Summer 2016, Uncategorized

by Adam Maarij
 

My enemies don’t scare me
I have walls that keep them at bay
The spikes
The cannons
And the river that surrounds me keep them wary and away,

 

And even if they poison my waters
Or the air I breath
Or the food I eat
my body has become immune
And maybe a bit too strong
But
Enemies are less dangerous than friends
Because friends have the key to your castle
your walls are worthless
Your mines will be harmless, and the cannons silent

How can I lock out dangerous friends, when I have given them a key?

 

Adam Maarij was born in Iraq and immigrated to America at the age of eight. He attends South High school in Worcester, Massachusetts, and enjoys soccer, running, reading, writing, and procrastinating.

Photo credit: JERUSALEM: ROMANS, 63 B.C. – Roman soldiers under the command of Pompey the Great assault the northern wall of Jerusalem with a battering ram while Jewish defenders resist from the battlements, 63 B.C. Line engraving from a 17th century edition of Josephus’ ‘Works.’. Fine Art. Encyclopedia Britannica ImageQuest. Web. 8 Jun 2016.
http://quest.eb.com/search/140_1664325/1/140_1664325/cite

 

Breathe

Summer 2016, Uncategorized

by Jason Elford

Annie Owen / Robert Harding World Imagery / Universal Images Group/ Rights Managed

Annie Owen / Robert Harding World Imagery / Universal Images Group/ Rights Managed

A weight of worldly anxiety settled in last night
our insides chilly,
he proselytized fear
declared his presence.
We cracked, crumbling foundations
       
    language shattered
outside, inside
two and one entangled
       
    fighting
a battle without violence
       
    riding astraddle of moment shadow dueling
swiftly silent,
immersed in the other
we breathed
two and one fragmented
with a breath, feeling
a weight lifted
labels disintegrated
and language gauged freely.

Jason Elford writes short fiction, poems, and novels. His work has appeared in The Machinery and STOPGap. He lives in Calgary, Alberta.

Photo credit: Budhhist prayer flags fluttering in the wind, Darjeeling, West Bengal, India, Asia . Photography. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Web. 9 Jun 2016. http://quest.eb.com/search/151_2565855/1/151_2565855/cite

 

Sisyphus

Spring 2016, Uncategorized
SISYPHUS. - Drawing by Sir Edward Burne-Jones (1833-1898 / The Granger Collection / Universal Images Group

SISYPHUS. – Drawing by Sir Edward Burne-Jones (1833-1898 / The Granger Collection / Universal Images Group

by Mohamed Elmaola

This massive stone,
Leaves my palms dried like palm leaves.
So calloused and jagged.

My heels seek inertia.
Gasping for secure dirt like a javelin toss.
Leg fibers long for lasting fortitude.

My back aches.
Pain pulsates as I plead like a preacher.
Ammonia and iron droplets glaze my torso.

I thought I had charm.
I thought I was king.
I thought I could chain fate.

O my ego!
How I once held you like a firstborn,
And now deny you like a bastard.

Yet despite the stone Death, himself, destined to descend.
It is not the weight, alone, that summons the most sweat.
But the moment before it falls which fuels my feeble fingers.

She is that moment,
Between sheer strength
And irrevocable devastation.

She is that moment,
That requires each knuckled muscle.
Each stressed vessel.

She is that moment,
In which I am eternally devoted,
In which I am eternally doubtful.

She is that moment,
That preludes a sorrowful symphony.
That warns my eventual mourning.

She is that moment,
That painfully liberates me.
For it is only when I fail that I am free.

She is that moment,
That binds me to the push of an inching boulder,
A stone Death, himself, destined to descend!

She is that moment,
That unconquerable moment,
That I pray I feel before I fall.

Mohamed Elmaola studies psychology and entrepreneurship at Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts. He is interested in education reform, and he runs an organization called the Worcester Soccer House that offers free soccer clinics and classes in life skills to youth.

Photo credit: MYTHOLOGY: SISYPHUS. – Drawing by Sir Edward Burne-Jones (1833-1898).. Fine Art. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Web. 10 Mar 2016. http://quest.eb.com/search/140_1639275/1/140_1639275/cite

Two Poems

Spring 2016, Uncategorized

by Sophie-Louise Hyde

Editor’s Note: These verbatim poems were crafted in response to witness testimonies following the riots across England in 2011, which began after a young man was shot and killed by police officers in Tottenham, London. These pieces focus, specifically, on the experiences of individuals in Birmingham, England.

AUGUST 10: Members of the local community lay flowers where three people were killed after being struck by a vehicle in the Winson Green area on August 10, 2011 in Birmingham, England. Police have launched a murder inquiry following this. The three people were struck by a car after reportedly trying to protect shops from rioting and looting in Dudley Road.

 

August 10th 2011             

 

Street steps to face tramlines beneath
Birmingham New Street.

Shut down because of fire, and
loads of smoke at the station–

not riot related.

At the scene of a cannabis farm that
the police have found, but it’s
more like a ‘plant’. People are
getting silly now. My heart
goes out to

                      the families
in Winson Green, not out of
sympathy but out of respect
for saving our country.
Tariq Jahan deserves an OBE, or
he should receive

                                   a knighthood.
‘Tariq Jahan: A Very Brave Man’
is trending in the UK as the Asian
communities weigh up
how to react to those who
killed them.

Candles mark the spot. Loads of
police, and the media for three Muslims
who were looking after their own
community; human nature
leading to-–

Murder. A very brave man
has sadly lost his son.
This is not human nature, but
the work of mere animals; to
commit a hit-and-run away! A
candle–
 

lit vigil marks the spot and
emotions run high, as
police are given extra time
to quiz the 32-year-old man accused of
murdering three men in
Birmingham.

An inquest is due to be opened tomorrow.

                                           

 

On Monday Night

 

Smethwick, on Monday Night. Where a Sikh thanks @wmpolice
for the retweet about ‘the UK’s first ornate temple’
being under threat at 12.45am,
following a peace rally in Winson Green.
Social media online, the spirit of people,
virtual or after is amazing. Digital
communities form lines across
t-shirts with it.
Videos going viral promoting a total mixture
of races, religious protests and marches,
of Blacks, of Asians, and Whites
on Monday night.

*
Smethwick, on Monday night.
The Guru Nanak Gurdwara stands, and spirits sing.

Sophie-Louise Hyde is a PhD candidate at Loughborough University, U.K. studying the techniques of verbatim in poetry in order to create a new body of work that demonstrates practice as research. Her other interests include experimental poetry and collaboration across art forms. She is also the founder of online creative writing and publishing platform. The Student Wordsmith.

Photo credit: Three Killed In Hit And Run During Birmingham Riot. Photography. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Web. 10 Mar 2016. http://quest.eb.com/search/115_3872217/1/115_3872217/cite

 

My Projects

Spring 2016, Uncategorized

 

by Rachel Ravelli

 

PHOTO TWJ

PHOTO TWJ

My Projects

My overcrowded black on block on blended tans
sterile hospitalized crystalloid hallucinogens
lead wanderers of my fragmented projects away
in the back of an ambulance I say hello to them,
they nod lightly, greeting me with the same indifference
as the kittens I abandoned because mom and I
were running low on food and they were eating my dinner
I spoon-fed them with empathy, transparent
as translucent drugs in my soul dry uncultivated soil
where sore feet of Spanish Harlem and Ghana tie
into snow and summer salt holding out their palms
saying, thank you Lord Jesus, for bread and for wine
I cannot touch but feel each day in my native projects
where children stalk written streets after midnight,
pearly white eyeballs thick in blood-shining lines
blossom out of their stay-put matter and hair,
the long thick dark hair I use to carefully weave every silhouette
I have loved-–
the dusty roads of my projects,
the winding steps of my projects,
the graffiti marking the retaliation and creation of my projects,
I am a soft sound chasing their midnight, a passerby
in sullen stories of how Danielle failed French,
moved to New York City to do hair
and to escape Donny, her father who sold women for cars
and smoked dope with his son Josiah who punched Izzy
in the humid elementary school cafeteria stale grilled cheese
for stealing his birthday watch and calling him a faggot;
Izzy shuddered, snorted, and shoved him onto the wet napkin floor,
and Principal Ganem who stormed through grabbed them both
with his oversized hairy hands gold in rings,
grappled them until they caved into small green wobbly seats,
pocket-framed their startled brown eyes,
pulled the walkie-talkie out of his black work pants
and slammed it so hard on the chipped wooden table
they both cried in unison, holding hands
as Principal Ganem screamed in silencing
acceleration that they’d work at McDonald’s,
become degenerates like their lifeless off-the-boat parents;
I sat hands neatly folded lips pursed measuring
the exact minutes, velocity, days, kilometers, volume
knowing I’m so bad at math
because Ms. Capanelli never stays after school
because after school was the time to be followed
by two hooded men 2.8 miles through snow
back to my projects
my disheveled
unshoveled
disregarded
unshaven
you-don’t-need-no-goddamn school bus
projects, who laughed
as I became more nervous
as they asked why
I’m so scared
as I reply that I am not scared, I am not scared
but please go away I can’t take it anymore
I have real homework to finish,
my mom is making me read The Grapes of Wrath
because she thinks elementary school literature is too immature
but I don’t trust a word she says
because last night she bought furniture she can’t afford
that doesn’t fit into my project’s apartment shrinking away
from dirt, mice, and dust catching on fire in her hair
as she bites her nails till they bleed screaming,
“Don’t let them take me!”
and I know there’s no one there because grandma told me
she makes up stories in her head sometimes,
but The Grapes of Wrath is a story
like my projects the dustbowl my dying kittens the loose screws
in the doorways of my schools and my poetry
are all stories that may be real or something I made up
one day, lying in my projects
cold on a moldy boulder in my projects
in December waiting and waiting forever in my projects
for snow to melt over all of us.

Rachel Ravelli is a fourth year student at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, studying English and Psychology. She writes for the Massachusetts Daily Collegian and has been featured in multiple publications, including Quick Brown Fox and Caesura.

A Brutal Kind of Leaving

Uncategorized, Winter 2015-16

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by Lana Bella

 

             

tufts of wool,

red signals amid blue whims

of careless fingers,

she is a moving trajectory

holding on to my hand,

on the roads I’ve walked many miles

staring into men’s eyes,

bemused at their sadness,

 

PICASSO: LES DESMOISELLES. - Pablo Picasso: Study for Demoiselles d'Avignon. Watercolor, 1907. The Granger Collection / Universal Images Group

PICASSO: LES DESMOISELLES. – Pablo Picasso: Study for Demoiselles d’Avignon. Watercolor, 1907. The Granger Collection / Universal Images Group

her hands, 

holding the tea cup now,

avoiding the lipstick trail splaying 

to disappointment,

her lips, 

careful to sift through

the loose tea leaves and tepid water,

giving pause where

the weight of sighs is chained

to the bottom like anchors,

 

clicks of joints announce

her clumsy push from the table,

I turn back,

fastening still to the length of her city,

but it seems I am looking 

to a distant place 

where all past recedes to,

 

old souls float near each other

as if asleep, pale, dark faces,

all beautifully shaped,

exploded like dandelion plumes in wind,

and yet,

I am no longer welcome there,

for the woman I love most is wearing all

the bodies I left behind–

Lana Bella has published in many literary journals and has a chapbook forthcoming from Crisis Chronicles Press. She divides her time between the USA and the coastal town of Nha Trang, Vietnam. As a Featured Writer, she is willing to correspond with poets seeking advice on matters related to writing and publishing. She may be reached at lana.bella@rocketmail.com.

 

Photo credit: PICASSO: LES DESMOISELLES. – Pablo Picasso: Study for Demoiselles d’Avignon. Watercolor, 1907.. Fine Art. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Web. 16 Dec 2015.  http://quest.eb.com/search/140_1646718/1/140_1646718/cite

Keep Listening

Uncategorized, Winter 2015-16

by Mohamed Ali Elmaola

 

Motorway toll booths. TRL LTD./SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY / Universal Images Group

Motorway toll booths. TRL LTD./SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY / Universal Images Group

I know you know the routine too.
The glass shield mechanically regresses to its hidden holster.

You give me your price.
I silently complain.

I pay you regardless.
I pay you for your pleasure-less act of passive passage.

No smiles where there is no joy,
No words when there is no time,
No eyes when there is no person.

I grunt as I lunge forward.
You sigh as you take it in.
I give.
You press.

Our hands meet.
And the enchanted exchange has ended.

There lies no love
In your purely constant and repetitive business.

you transiently turn,
To the next customer,
My begging, soulless successor,
That awaits his turn at the toll booth.

Mohamed Ali Elmaola is a sophomore studying Psychology at Clark University, Worcester, Mass. He is also the owner and co-founder of the Worcester Soccer House, a program that offers free soccer clinics to young people.

Photo credit: Motorway toll boothsEncyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Web. 14 Dec 2015.
http://quest.eb.com/search/132_1311852/1/132_1311852/cite

What the World Could Be

Uncategorized, Winter 2015-16

by Kayla Zenk

 

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Masks Created by Tomea Fiorenzo, Italy, Cortina d'Ampezzo (Belluno), Private collection/Mondadori Electa / Learning Pictures / Universal Images Group

Masks Created by Tomea Fiorenzo, Italy, Cortina d’Ampezzo (Belluno), Private collection/Mondadori Electa / Learning Pictures / Universal Images Group

What if

we could all

surpass

our insecurities.

                 What are you hiding from?

 

There is love to be.

 Superficialities.

 Are like a blockade.

Take them down.

Or will we ever

reach

that point.

 

        Will it ever be?

 Or have we forgotten

 what is most important,

what it is

we are here for.

 

              I’m trying

         to show you.

Kayla Zenk is an English major at the College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Mass.

Photo credit: Masks Created by Tomea Fiorenzo. Fine Art. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Web. 16 Dec 2015. http://quest.eb.com/search/135_1589003/1/135_1589003/cite

La Nevada/The Snowfall

Uncategorized, Winter 2015-16

 

by Anna Liebling

 

La Nevada

 

Mi anhelo por ti es como la nieve–

cae levemente, pero acumula cada momento

con la intención de quedarse un rato.

Me enfrías los huesos y los puntas de los dedos,

y me haces ansiar el calor de tu aliento,

que es visible en el aire frío y me recuerda a

espirar.

                         Snow Covered Mountain Framed By Snow Covered Evergreen Trees Against A Blue Sky; Lake Louise, Alberta, Canada

                         Snow Covered Mountain Framed By Snow Covered Evergreen Trees Against A Blue Sky; Lake Louise, Alberta, Canada

 

The Snowfall

 

My longing for you is like the snow-

it falls lightly, but accumulates every moment

with the intention of staying a while.

You chill my bones and my fingertips,

and make me crave the warmth of your breath,

which is visible in the cold air and reminds me

to exhale.

 

Anna Liebling is a former Clark University student now completing a degree in Environmental Studies at Naropa University, Boulder, Colo.

Photo credit: Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Web. 14 Dec 2015.
http://quest.eb.com/search/312_675353/1/312_675353/cite

The Essay

Fall 2015, Uncategorized

by Sasha Kohan

 

Like speak I can if write I could, easily come
the essay would.

Building the tower of Babel. Photography. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest.  

Building the tower of Babel. Photography. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest.  

To spell the what I paint out words —
to light from shadows, and thoughts
or birds.

Bursting of minute hands full my gray mind,
fragments or phrases without which I’m blind.

The letters a little feel some like their sound
(sinking up floating shapes or in the ground)

but made of what are they
and do they stick how?

Gilt so my voice is and thin is my head —
to ever cling possibly voice can what’s said?

Shall it I string like a drag through wood dense?

There’s a sky in no ink
and no pencil in sense.

 

 

 

Contributing editor Sasha Kohan is a student at Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts, pursuing a degree in English and Screen Studies. For more of her work, see http://www.sashakohan.com.  

 

Photo credit: http://quest.eb.com/search/132_1241113/1/132_1241113/cite

Bitten

Fall 2015, Uncategorized

by Tom Matthews

 

Close-up of a suture held in a pair of forceps. / Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest.

Close-up of a suture held in a pair of forceps. / Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest.

A dog bit me once. And dragged me on the ground. Scraping skin against asphalt. And they all asked, “Well, whose fault was this?” Surely not the dog’s. He was guarding his territory. He was in the right, in his head. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and I felt his sharp white teeth dig into my leg. The stitches healed the holes. And as I think of that dog tonight, I can’t help but sympathize with it, for it was brave in a moment of danger. And to this day I am fond of dogs, even after feeling the deep bite of that Rottweiler’s teeth.

And you’ve shown me your teeth many a time: laughing, crying, or singing in rhyme. I come knocking at your door just to see it once more. Will you open up and present it to me? Or sink them in and scrape my skin across asphalt for whose fault none other than my own, for I, and the stitches, will reap what I have sown.

 

Contributing Editor, Thomas Matthews, is a Senior at Clark University where he majors in English, specializing in Creative Writing and Journalism.

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Photo credit: Web. 15 Sep 2015. http://quest.eb.com/search/132_1273072/1/132_1273072/cite

These Are Dark Times For Robots

Summer 2015, Uncategorized

by Cara Yacino

 

Victor Habbick Visions / Science Photo Library / universal Images Group

Victor Habbick Visions / Science Photo Library / universal Images Group

I was born into an iron world
assembled in the winter of ’93 and proudly
Made In America.
My wind-up heart has more horsepower than a Mustang
and it’s twice as reliable.

I’m not the only one.
At any given moment there are seven billion
glazed glass eyes and stretched iron smiles
on any given street–
manufactured sleepwalkers.

We pretend we’re flesh.
“Social justice” “Family values” “Empowerment”
prevent mass mechanical malfunction and
distract us from the rust.

We tell our iron children stories of the past
a distant time when human meant more
and upgrades meant less
as we bask in a monitor’s pale blue glow.

Hearts have fragile gears and many cogs
that whirr and spin and sometimes
jam.
We search for thrills
yet we fear the junkyard.

Yesterday,
I slipped on a patch of ice
that my ocular module missed.
Wires frayed and sparked under silicone skin
and there it was, a drop of red.

Sometimes I wonder who wired my circuits.
I was born into an iron world
without an iron care to give
and yet I bleed.

 

 

Photo credit: Humanoid robot, artwork. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Retrieved 17 Jun 2015, from

http://quest.eb.com/search/132_1212265/1/132_1212265/cite

Port. Man. Teau.

Summer 2015, Uncategorized

by Nick Porcella

 

  1. PORT

WILKS'S AIRTIGHT PORTMANTEAU

WILKS’S AIRTIGHT PORTMANTEAU

The world’s been portmanteau’d
By phones with eyes and fruit;
Not to mention androids, who were
Supposed to take a different form.
And the corners of rooms now
Read to you, flamed and kindled.
Padded rooms and glaring dooms.
So many numbers replacing numbers
Bar codes bearing heavy loads—
Never ending, never bending,
Always trending, forever sending,
Generations generations generations.
The world’s been portmanteau’d
By silver screens and things called memes,
By applications, Abbrev.s, sugar and spice—
Technology’s nice.
The world’s been portmanteau’d
And no longer has a face.
 

  1. MAN

We’ve reached port, Man, too!
Screams the captain, O Captain, mine.
No names on a ship, only faces.
Ghoulish faces, grotesque faces—grotesque
Faces front and says to us
We have reached port, Men!
Calling to us, zombies of the boat.
Months-long journey done and
We have reached port.
O my Captain, I wish you knew our names!
There is a man with a name,
John Proctor’d and calling for John Proctor.
All you can say is that we have reached
Port, Man. We have reached Port, Man.
We have reached port having been together
For long months, wrought with scurvy
Fraternity and bleeding from orifices.
You rats! We’ve reached port! Leave, Man, too!
Go away! Why do you stare at me so?
“Because it is my name!”

 

  1. TEAU

Natalie Portman, too.
Why, she’s pretty and she knows things.
She has a face and she has a name,
She has a soul—
Named Natalie, Natalie Portman,
Natalie Portman does not deserve pronouns.
So from now on, she, er, Natalie Portman
Gets no pronouns!
Natalie Portman was walking one day
Down the block, it was Wednesday, when
Natalie Portman saw Natalie Portman’s reflection
In a cold mirror.
So Natalie Portman, looking at Natalie Portman,
Too, saw Natalie Portman’s image and
Smashed the window into a million small bits.
Natalie Portman worried that Natalie Portman
Was now cursed, forever cursed. Natalie Portman
Cried and cried and cried and cried and cried
For Natalie Portman.
Natalie Portman has a name! Natalie Portman
Has a name!
Natalie Portman is not a portman, nor a portwoman.
But Natalie Portman does have a name.
Natalie Portman does have a name.
And that is more than I can say for the rest of us.

 

Nick Porcella studies English at Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts, and intends to teach high school. His passions include Herman Melville, rap music, photography, and writing. He is completing a memoir, Getting to Say Goodbye. See more of his work here.

Photo credit: WILKS’S AIRTIGHT PORTMANTEAU, OPEN, 1867. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Retrieved 17 Jun 2015, from http://quest.eb.com/search/300_660054/1/300_660054/cite

Jimi

Summer 2015, Uncategorized

by Tim Farrell
 

HENDRIX PLAYS AT ISLE OF WIGHT FESTIVAL, 1970

HENDRIX PLAYS AT ISLE OF WIGHT FESTIVAL, 1970

And the rocket’s red glare–
his rifle of peace
captured the distortion of
bombs bursting in air.

Brow creased and jaw clenched,
arm locked around the stock,
he triggered the explosive notes
behind the Star Spangled Banner.

Woodstock, where
Jimi’s battle took place.
On stage he played
For the land of the free,
and the home of the brave.

 

 

 

Tim Farrell is a poet and an artist in various media. He currently is exploring the medium of glass at the Worcester Glass Studios in Worcester, Massachusetts.

 

Photo Credit: Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Retrieved 17 Jun 2015, from http://quest.eb.com/search/158_2445670/1/158_2445670/cite

Drowning in Poetry

Summer 2015, Uncategorized

Drowning in Poetry

by A.J. Huffman

 

Superstock/universal images group

Superstock/universal images group

Pages crest like waves, crash
against my feet.
The tide is rising, swallowing my conscious
thoughts.
The words run
together, pack tight, soggy grains
in child’s pail
I hope to flip them over, build
a castle or fort
to crawl inside.  Instead the moat grows
fins, teeth.  I am
trapped inside my own creation,
searching
for remnants of letters that might fit
to frame a bridge.

 

 A.J. Huffman is a widely published poet. Her new collection, Another Blood Jet, is available from Eldritch Press.  She is a three-time Pushcart Prize nominee and is the founding editor of Kind of a Hurricane Press. Her email is poetess222@live.com and her press site is at www.kindofahurricanepress.com. As a featured poet, she welcomes correspondence from other Journal writers.

Photo credit: Small Bridge and Beach. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Retrieved 22 Jun 2015, from http://quest.eb.com/search/107_293793/1/107_293793/cite

Ash Wednesday

Summer 2015, Uncategorized

by Jessica Hoops

 

They tell us we are made of dust, but I have faith
That I am a being of sunlight, ink, pollen, and steel.
My wings are no longer bleached a blinding white,
The last painted feathers now swirling to the floor
With a motion like leaves that have slipped through

The grasp of an ancient elm’s bony fingers.

People step over them as if they are living things,
Delicate blossoms to avoid trampling underfoot,
But to me, they are already dead, poisoned by the bleach
I soaked them in every week for seventeen years.
My sneakers crush them into the carpet;
My forehead remains unmarked, untouched.

The others crowd around the copper-framed mirror,
Standing on tiptoe, finger-combing their hair,

Admiring the pristine brilliance of their wings.
I try in vain to discretely pluck a feather that
Stains my own with a single brushstroke of indigo

And refuses to be concealed by the folds of my gown.

No one notices anyway, not the feather,
Not the ungainly dance of my fingers across the piano,
Nearly losing their balance on the final chord.

No one can see that my lips remain motionless,
A half formed “we do” ricocheting across the back of my teeth
As my eyes fill with tears for all the wrong reasons.

I am drawn to gazes rather than ashen crosses,
Searching for the essence of what I had fabricated.
My expression does not reveal that I am equally baffled
By the natural hue of the wings folded across my back,
Not sure if they are a glorious bouquet, or a tangle of weeds

That I foolishly cultivated but should have destroyed.

 

Photo credit: Ash Wednesday. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest. Retrieved 22 Jun 2015, from http://quest.eb.com/search/300_256969/1/300_256969/cite

 

 

Godong/Universal Images Group

Godong/Universal Images Group

Adamant Man

Summer 2015, Uncategorized

by Brandon Marlon
 

                  prisma/universal images group

                  prisma/universal images group

Man is the animal believing himself human.
Man is the animal habitually supposing
what sort of animal he is.

Male ontogeny is a tedious process.
Well-endowed, he swings himself wildly
and hacks with a machete across
muggy jungles as if infuriated by foliage,
then urinates circularly to demarcate

his domain; boorish and brutish,
adamant man will have his way
with the world then spit in disgust
at the recently conquered. For this reason

every adamant man must have
an even more adamant mother.

In his hubris, adamant man forges
and welds, asserting his aptitude,

confident in his honed will-to-power
or at least in his heavy-duty leaf blower.
The more adamant man is the more
laughable. Spare a care, will you?
Pity poor adamant man, Adam-the man-the ant.

 

Brandon Marlon is a writer from Ottawa, Canada. He received his B.A. (Hon.) in Drama and English from the University of Toronto and his M.A. in English from the University of Victoria. His poetry has been published in Canada, U.S.A., England, Ireland, Greece, Romania, Israel, India, Pakistan, and Singapore. His is a Journal Featured Writer and can be reached at brandon@brandonmarlon.com.

 

Photo credit: Roman Art. Relief commemorating the victories of a gladiator represented in various struggles with adversaries. Encyclopædia Britannica ImageQuest, Retrieved 29 June 2015 from http://quest.eb.com/search/300_169719/1/300_169719/cite

 

 

American Poem on Public Bus 92

Spring 2015, Uncategorized

by Sam Hutchings

 

America! I do not vaunt my love for you, I have what I have.

                                                                         -Walt Whitman

 

Apparently, I am a Goddamn Fool:
I set all my clocks 10 min premature-

Which must mean I am American-
As the only time I got is the time I
Make myself, & Lord, even that ain’t

Never enuf. & America’s history (a form of time)
Is kinda like a bus if you don’t think about it;

Hard plastic/ nooses/ dirty sneaker prints/ suspicion.
So I feign my boredom & nod w/ that dissonant
Hum, which is sorta like a hymn if you don’t think

About it either. I had an Uncle that would
Ad-lib drunk along w/ the Monkee’s sprightly jangle –

“Take the last train to Auschwitz…” – & so I know
All our history, no matter how hideous, can be
Distilled to song. For a minute I thought it was you

@ the wheel, Harriet Tubman, bruises cuffing your wrists,
Bandana corrallin’ a potent wound & bushel basket

Hair, but this ain’t no Railroad & that makes no sense. & this
Dude to my right looks like Whitman w/ a cigar & belly full of
Vaunted affections. Remember that 5th grade NYC field trip,

& J pissed on the Statue of Liberty? Man, if that ain’t
Patriotic, I donno what is (Cuz I know being truly

American means never holdin’ nuthin back). 
& who knows, maybe I am nuthin’ more than
Another fool God has damned, but so what;

History books & graveyards are glutted w/
Accurate wrist-watches/ jawbones/ & the wise.

I Am Alive & American; so I know my history is
Both this ink which stains my fingers &
This skin which I can never shed.

 

Sam Hutchings studies English and philosophy at Assumption College, Worcester, Mass. His influences are John Hodgen, Gregory Corso, Arthur Rimbaud, and Tony Hoagland.

You, Her, or Me

Spring 2015, Uncategorized

by Sarah Leidhold

                                                                Three women By pablo Picasso, Pablo/State Hermitage / Culture Images / Universal Images Group/all Rights Managed

                                                                Three women By pablo Picasso, Pablo/State Hermitage / Culture Images / Universal Images Group/all Rights Managed

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Globally, one in three women will be raped, beaten, coerced into sex or otherwise abused in her lifetime.
                                                                  -From a report by UNIFEM, the women’s fund at the United Nations.

 

Walk like the wolverine
awaiting attack–
grasp your cold metal keys
like a weapon

in case the bones behind
your knuckles aren’t strong
enough to crack the skull
that’s holding the brain
that’s hatching the plan

to hurt you.

You must be ready.

One in three—
you,
her,

or me.

Restrain your provoking
siren self.
They are easily stimulated.
Every night is

their mating season.

Float just above
the pavement, silent.

Travel in packs;
drape your skirts just
below the come-hither
curves of your ankles.
They can detect fear
in their knowing nostrils–
listen for the crinkle of recognition
and the howl of pursuit.

Slink through the shadows
but avoid the darkness.

Slip ninja stars
into your bra cups
and spray yourself
with skunk musk
instead of perfume.

One in three—
you
her,

or me.

 

Sarah Leidhold, an overzealous student at Worcester State University, harbors a pervasive addiction to both producing and absorbing poetry. She especially enjoys the uninhibited spilling out of inspired sentiments in the all-accepting form of free verse. More of her work can be found here.

Photo credit: http://quest.eb.com/search/525_2913015/1/525_2913015/cite

Casually, Over the Armrest

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

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 by Gloria Cadder

 

it’s not quite ice that stops
plants from flowering
though they still

                   grow for years
ice preserves roadkill
on yellow two-way lines

lampless, lit by moonlight

nothing will thaw
the ice by spring—unless a body
will ignite, release

the blooming bones

 

      Vanitas by Scott Holloway / photo by scott holloway

      Vanitas by Scott Holloway / photo by scott holloway

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Gloria Cadder is a senior at Brandeis University in Waltham, Mass. Her work has appeared in Tethered by Letters, Laurel Moon, Where the Children Play, and the Brandeis Law Journal. See more of her work at morethanamovie.com.

School Pictures

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

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by Dylan Dodd

                      ernest hemingway's high school yearbook photo, 1917 / encyclopaedia britannica imagequest

                      ernest hemingway’s high school yearbook photo, 1917 / encyclopaedia britannica imagequest

Your eyes, they show it.
The expression is synthetic.
Raised brow, awkward grin.
Your usual half-smile that
Only shines to the left is not
Proper. Hands folded, one
On the other, no
Bent fingers or spaces between,
Pressed stiffly on a block
With a less than clever “B,”
Made for infants (and picture day.)
You twist your head until
It strains your neck, chin up.
                                          chin up.
This is how people want
To see you, hair solid
With spray, wearing a shirt
That you will never wear again—
Molded clay in a metal chair.
Wait for the click. Relax.

Dylan Dodd studies English at Worcester State University and loves nature, the arts, and the way life works. More of his work my be found at www.dylantdodd.wordpress.com.

 

 

At the Train Station

Uncategorized, Winter 2015

by Sam Hark

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                                   Railway Track In The Early Morning Mist / encyclopaedia britannica imagequest

                                   Railway Track In The Early Morning Mist / encyclopaedia britannica imagequest

Sam Hark

 

Goddamnit. It’s now 6 past 7. Trains like dirty tin-can caterpillars 

slog inandout of this hollow cocoon of South Street Station.

In front of me a raw flurry of existence flutters by, all glory & madness.

Above me, the footsteps of rain begin their fevered dance, jittering free upon

a slant glass ceiling. Beside me, Sully sits furrowed, lost between the soggy

flaps of an outdated TV Guide (seemingly the last one in existence).

Which (most likely) prompted the existential query that caused his

eyes to bloom like the dusty wings of a moth as he prodded:

if ya could, wouldja’ wanna even know the time of your death?

& on the usual day, one unlike the one I am describing to you here, I would

respond without breath. For I would live out my pre-counted days as the glut King of

Certainty, swilling my red wine from the grandest of goblets like it was rainwater, lazing

upon my gilded throne, gazing with pity upon peasants toiling in muddied fields of

mortality beneath my golden heel. I would tick through this prescription of time as the

sure-sighted surgeon of ephemerality, the true scourge of all obscurity.

But as I previously stated (please see above), this day was unlike the

others that stack higher than an infinite pile of unused TV Guides.

On this day, as the rainwater softly fills my worn boots,

can I come to realize the distinctive grace in the wait for a train

that is all too certain to arrive.

Sam Hark studies English and Philosophy at Assumption College, Worcester, Mass. His influences are John Hodgen, Gregory Corso, Arthur Rimbaud, and Tony Hoagland.

 

The Mountain

Fall 2014, Uncategorized

by Dylan Dodd

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                                    Photo by Wanbin Li

                                    Photo by Wanbin Li

During the spiral climb
A small town begins to shrink.
The summit makes it a model
Crafted well, with near perfect design.
Sounds from below become faint,
Gone when you feel the pressure change.
The air is different up there;
Breathing in won’t make you choke.
Not a trace of pungent perfume,
No flattened skunk on a highway,
No need to worry about
The rancid fog of tractor-trailer tailpipes.
Only newborn air, untouched
By a rushing world below,
Blowing through frosted patches
Of grass and earth. Breathe it in—
Introduce your lungs to a delicacy.
Extend your arm to catch the clouds
That forever ride the wind.


Dylan Dodd studies English at Worcester State University. He loves nature, the arts, and the way life works. See more of his work here

Tending My Grandfather’s Garden, and First Visiting His Grave

Fall 2014, Uncategorized

by Samuel Hark

JDTWJ

JDTWJ

And at this moment, when the rasp sun slices like a sickle through the wisp of scant clouds, I cannot help but think upon the words of that particular peculiar named poet,

So much depends upon a red wheelbarrow glazed with rain. All in truth except for that sweet respite of rain, I muse to no one but myself and the weeds, as I, the green-thumbed reaper, eradicating

the unsightly root-rotted shrubs, heaving their dusted remains in my heavy red-rusted dead wagon, that has no doubt been long depended on, clearing for your stout stemmed thinnings, long since overgrown,

And when I first came to see you, my hands, slicked wet with sweat and guilt, could no longer bear the weightof your absence, with none to keep by your side, expect for

untended flowerbeds that birth none but the blossoms of my dread, but I have since learned that it is best not to dwell, as so much depends on these days that dare to lend me this dust.