National Poetry Month by Mark Danowsky

A reminder call
to write each day

and to read
what we love

and we should
heed the call

as well we know
we should

not need this
nudge this

token slice
of time

this celebration
of all we know

we wish
to cherish

to savor
to cheer

and we do
our best

but it is hard
to show up

to show love
for our labor

to let breathe
our open wounds



Mark Danowsky is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of ONE ART: a journal of poetry as well as Poetry Craft Essays Editor for Cleaver Magazine. His latest poetry collection is Take Care (Moon Tide Press, 2025). He curates Stay Curious on Substack.

A Black Notebook by Steve Klepetar

In my imagination I was in Berlin,
riding a tram through the pale afternoon,
the buildings whispering history
through cracked paint.
I carried a black notebook filled with names—
not of places, but of moments that refused to die:
my father’s laughter in a language I never learned,
my mother’s silence when she heard rain.
A street musician played something half-forgotten,
and I thought it might have been the national anthem
of a country that never existed,
one where pigeons ruled the boulevards
and clocks melted into puddles near the Reichstag.
I bought coffee from a woman
whose eyes flashed like the ones in my dreams,
and she said, you’ve been here before, haven’t you?
I wanted to tell her about the snow
that fell in August once,
how it covered the tracks between memory and desire,
but my German collapsed into smoke.
That’s when the tram stopped, and everyone filed out
into a sky that smelled faintly of lemons and loss.
I followed them, hoping someone might turn and wave me home.



Steve Klepetar lives in the Berkshires in Massachusetts. He is a contributing editor for Verse-Virtual. His poems have appeared widely in the U.S. and abroad and have received several nominations for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net.

Running into My Husband’s Dentist and His Dog on the Golf Course by Terri Kirby Erickson

My husband’s dentist has this giant
poodle named Ned that sits as still
as a statue on the golf cart seat, his
profile regal, his fur flapping in the
breeze as they blow by my husband
and me on their way to the next hole.
It must be nice not to have a dentally
challenged room-full of patients to
deal with on a fine spring day when
the sun is casting its rays of light all
over the place, as bright and happy
as a sparkler. We’re pretty carefree,
too, since only a few of my husband’s
golf balls have flown into the woods
and we just saw a great blue heron
standing in a shallow pond among the
detritus of other golfers’ errant shots.
And it occurs to me that the dentist
and his furry partner look a lot alike—
both lean and fit with the admirably
erect posture of professional athletes
or generals, yet there is no look at me,
look at me flash about the two of them.
They are just a kind man and his well-
behaved dog, enjoying a round of golf
and waving at a patient and his wife
who are grinning at him right now with
teeth he doesn’t have to pull, fill, or clean.



Terri Kirby Erickson is the author of eight collections of poetry, including The Light That Follows Us Home, which will be released by Press 53 in the fall. Her work has been widely published and has won numerous awards, including the Joy Harjo Poetry Prize and International Book Award for Poetry.

Haiku by Gareth Nurden

The goals
I never chased
Dreamcatcher



Gareth Nurden is a haikuist from Newport, Wales and has had several hundred pieces published in nineteen countries worldwide in journals such as Under the Basho, Tsuri-Doro, Kokako, The Heron's Nest and more.

Bridges by Russell Rowland

The Swift River, taking with it
whatever it can carry, bringing nothing back—

along with my adult daughter,
I crossed dry-shod by means of a footbridge.

Bridge boards bore the weight of our passage.

I heard our quartet of feet
thump also on a lengthier span. It stretched

from Baby’s bath and bottle hours—her dad
green at both—to this traversal,
and to thoughts of a present little girl at home

with her father, the husband of my daughter.

I mean a bridge that will carry the four of us
to the indiscernible further bank,

across time’s own eponymous Swift River.



Russell Rowland has helped judge high school Poetry Out Loud competitions in New Hampshire's Lakes Region.

In the Memory Care Unit by Martha Christina

the first snow smelled like white crayons
eight nine ten eight nine ten
those coats are watching me
yesterday I lost the red petunia
All the outside doors are marked Exit,
my sister says, but I can’t get out.



Martha Christina has published two collections: Staying Found (Fleur-de-lis Press) and Against Detachment (Pecan Grove Press). Her work appears in earlier issues of Red Eft Review, and recently in Star 82 Review, Crab Orchard Review, and Tiny Seed Journal. Born and raised in Indiana, she now lives in Bristol, Rhode Island.

Roughage by Martha Christina

What my mother
called the family
of greens she
stabbed with her
fork. She ate
with determination,
as though this might
be her last meal.
She had survived
what was known then
as a fatal disease, but
she emerged from its
fever, no longer able
to love. Pretend
you care, her mother
instructed, but even
before her illness,
my mother was not
a pretender. She
went on eating.



Martha Christina has published two collections: Staying Found (Fleur-de-lis Press) and Against Detachment (Pecan Grove Press). Her work appears in earlier issues of Red Eft Review, and recently in Star 82 Review, Crab Orchard Review, and Tiny Seed Journal. Born and raised in Indiana, she now lives in Bristol, Rhode Island.

Eternal Life Samir Atassi

The last time I saw you
in this world, it was in the darkened living
room. It was about
three in the morning when,
half passed-out
on the couch, I heard the rickety front door
fling open, followed by your unsteady foot-
falls and, close behind, a heavier tread.
She was the largest angel I’d ever seen
you lead home, over a hundred pounds heavier
than your heart,
easy.
She had to turn herself side-
ways to fit through your narrow bed-
room door, like a hulking cherub trying
to squeeze her bulk
past the gates of heaven. But,
always the gentleman,
you went in first.



Samir Atassi lives and works as a librarian in Cleveland, Ohio. He holds an MFA in Poetry from Ashland University, and his work has appeared in various publications including River Teeth, Painted Bride Quarterly and Sontag Mag. He was also the featured poet in the inaugural SLANT Forum.

Ringtone by Howie Good

I’ve a habit – an unfortunate one,
according to others – of leaving
the house without my cell phone.

Later I’ll run into someone who’ll
say, “I’ve been trying to reach you.”

Exactly.

Battered by coastal winds, stalks
of beach grass bend like commas

in a sentence that doesn’t need any.



Howie Good is a widely published but little-known poet.

at first by Matt Borczon

          -for Dana

I blamed
a deviated
septum, blamed
the nightmares
left over
from the war,
you blamed
the alcohol
and my restless
twitching, my
screaming out
whenever a
helicopter flew
over the house.

its been
15 years
and we
no longer
sleep in
the same bed

and I
no longer
remember if
this was
your idea
or mine.



Matt Borczon is a nurse and recently retired from the United States Navy. He lives and writes in Erie, PA. He says some days he wins and some days the war wins.

Snowplow Driver by Terri Kirby Erickson

He swears to his wife that snow hits
the ground with a scraping sound, none
of that silent night stuff most people

talk about in a winter storm.
After a heavy snowfall, when families

are still sleeping, he'll be clearing
the city’s major arteries, coffee cup
in one hand, steering wheel in the other.

He could drive his plow blind,
but keeps his eyes on the road in case

a deer decides to leap from the woods,
or an irate citizen jumps in front
of his truck, insisting his street needs

clearing first or he’ll have your job,
which as far as the snowplow driver

is concerned, he is welcome to try.
But it feels good to make the roads safe
for people whether they appreciate it

or not, though his dreams are often
filled—even on summer nights—with

the scrape, scrape of his plow, the wet
pavement shining like a warrior's
shield everywhere his blade has been.



Terri Kirby Erickson is the author of eight collections of poetry, including The Light That Follows Us Home, which will be released by Press 53 in the fall. Her work has been widely published and has won numerous awards, including the Joy Harjo Poetry Prize and International Book Award for Poetry.

Spoor Reader by Rose Mary Boehm

I am an intrepid tracker.
Hunting. I read broken twigs,
indentations in soft mud,
finding the fleeing crab
across endless sandflats.
I read my woman’s salty skin,
snail trails of dried tears.

I fear the hot jungle nights,
soft voices wafting in through
open windows.



A German-born UK national, Rose Mary Boehm lives and works in Lima, Peru. Author of two novels, eight poetry collections and one chapbook, her work has been widely published mostly by US poetry journals. A new full-length poetry collection is forthcoming in 2026. https://www.rose-mary-boehm-poet.com/

Damselflies by Tamara Madison

Young girls gather at stage door,
feet turned out, their own
worn toe shoes in hand,
eager to capture autographs
on sweat-stained satin.
My mind is full of the one
I have just watched float
across the stage, a fine-bodied
flying thing so light
I could almost make out
her wings. I think
of the short life of a dancer's
career, a fleeting span
like that of a hummingbird,
a dragonfly, a moth. My child
was one of those girls
fluttering around stage doors
as the dancers exited, drawn
like damselflies to the light
of each dancer's singeing flame.



Tamara Madison is a California native and retired educator. She is the author of three full-length volumes of poetry, Wild Domestic, Moraine (both from Pearl Editions) and Morpheus Dips His Oar (Sheila-Na-Gig Editions), as well as two chapbooks, The Belly Remembers (Pearl Editions) and Along the Fault Line (Picture Show Press). Her work has appeared in the Writer’s Almanac, Sheila-Na-Gig, One Art, Worcester Review, and many other publications. Read more of her work at tamaramadisonpoetry.com.

Father and Child, Alone by Joseph Mills

In the dream, my father sits by himself
against the back wall. The room is full.
People are in pairs and small groups,
but he is alone and clearly lonely.
When I wake, I call to make sure
he’s okay. I know his life has become
a series of doctors’ appointments,
each one like the checking of a lottery ticket
to see if the numbers mean anything.
He says he’s fine although surprised
by the call since we talked a week ago.
I explain the dream, the feeling I needed
to check in, and he says he hopes I have
more dreams like that and so will call
more often which makes me feel shitty
although he doesn’t mean it like that
(I don’t think). I say I will, regardless
of what dreams may come, and I mean it,
at that moment, and he knows I do.
I have good intentions, most of the time,
and perhaps that’s what it comes down to
for parents, the belief in good intentions,
despite experience, the small comfort
they still come to their children in dreams.



Joseph Mills is on the faculty at University of North Carolina School of the Arts. His most recent collection of poetry is The Holiday Cycle (Press 53).

Circles by Ruth Holzer

Even among the expats
you were treated as second-class,
not a member of the inner circle,
never invited to those famous parties
with actors, directors and couturiers.
Excluded from their escapades
but subjected to their tales.

No matter how it had been spent,
sprinkled with what small random pleasures,
when the day ended
you had to return by yourself
to the arched doorway
that bore a lion’s head biting an iron ring
and spend the night
picturing the people you loved
loving each other instead.



Ruth Holzer is the author of ten chapbooks, most recently, On the Way to Man in Moon Passage (dancing girl press). Her poems have appeared in Blue Unicorn, California Quarterly, Freshwater, POEM, Slant, Thema and elsewhere. She is a multiple Pushcart and Best of the Net nominee.

No Show Snow by Terri Kirby Erickson

In the deep South, when we go to sleep
with the possibility of snow and wake
to the sound of disappointment in the form
of pelting rain, we should be compensated,
in my view, with fields of blooming bowl
of cream peonies, each flower fully formed,
every petal softer than cashmere, the color
of snow mixed with clotted cream. Sadly,
there would be no ice-covered hills for kids
to slide down on their sleds, no men made
of snow. But think of the fragrance—rich
and powdery—of so many peonies at the
pinnacle of their beauty, how miraculous
it would be for thousands of flowers to
appear all-at-once, overnight. Bees would
shed their winter jackets and feast among
them, delirious with nectar. Deer would
stroll through them as rabbits zig and zag
with wild abandon, unseen by predators.
At least it would be something more than
brown lawns and bare trees, the skies gray
as gym socks. If not snow, let there be this—
multiple fields of cream-colored peonies
glistening with drops of cold winter rain.



Terri Kirby Erickson is the author of seven collections of poetry. Her work has appeared in “American Life in Poetry,” ONE ART, Rattle, The SUN, The Writer’s Almanac, Valparaiso Poetry Review, and many others. Her awards include the Joy Harjo Poetry Prize and a Nautilus Silver Book Award.

In 7th Grade Music Class by Elya Braden

          Listen to the story told by the reed, of being separated. / “Since I
          was cut from the reedbed, I have made this crying sound….”
          ~Rumi, The Reed Flute’s Song

I longed to float on hollow notes silvering up
to heaven, to dance in the high, thin atmosphere
of grace like swallows swooping outside my bedroom
window. Instead, I inherited the tarry sorrow

of my older brother’s hand-me-down clarinet,
conduit of lack and desperation. I practiced for hours
in my solitary bedroom, walls crawling with flowers,
as if I’d dreamed a jungle of security in a house

all open doors and border crossings. My brother’s
fingers intent on exploration, determined to pluck
my song from sealed lips. As I fingered secret melodies,
my lungs expelled each insult into reed after reed.

That year, I learned salvation didn’t live in winning
first chair, couldn’t hide in a crawlspace under the stairs
where, under flashlight’s flickered beam, I inked myself
into erasure, breath caught at the grasp of hand on door.



Elya Braden is a writer, mixed-media artist, and editor for Gyroscope Review. She has authored two chapbooks. Her full-length manuscript, Dragonfly Puzzle Box, is forthcoming from Sheila-Na-Gig Editions in 2026. Her poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, and Best New Poets. www.elyabraden.com.

Unhurried by Steve Deutsch

Snow this morning.
Flakes as big
as oak leaves flutter
in the eddying air,
as if their appointment
with the ground
might wait.

I watch them
from a window
that overlooks
a small porch
heavy with
garden tools—
artifacts

from a forgotten season.
I sip a third cup,
warm in the warm house
and curl up
in my easy chair—
looking no farther ahead
than lunch.



Steve Deutsch is the poetry editor of Centered Magazine and was the first poet in residence at the Bellefonte Art Museum. He has been nominated for the Pushcart and Best of the Net Prizes multiple times. Steve is the author of six volumes of poetry. One of those collections, Brooklyn, won the Sinclair Poetry Prize.

The Pusher by Ace Boggess

The neighbor with dementia wants what she wants.
I go to five or six shops to find it,
even then a close approximation: Slim-
Fast milkshakes—wrong flavor,
but will do—I come to learn her family rations
like a week’s supply of oxycodone tablets.
When she asks, I have no idea she overdoes it,
overdoses in greedy abandon,
a delight without the rapture.

One junkie recognizes another. We do
what we can to help as long as it doesn’t rob us,
leave us short. I’ve been out of the scoring game
for years, didn’t expect to become
my neighbor’s SlimFast connection, diet-drink hustler.

The next day, her granddaughter
comes knocking, lets me in on the situation.
We share a laugh about it, but I can’t help
looking back at my addiction &
how far I was willing to go the one time
someone stood between me & my drug.



Ace Boggess is author of seven books of poetry, most recently Tell Us How to Live (Fernwood Press, 2025) and My Pandemic / Gratitude List (Mōtus Audāx Press, 2025). His writing has appeared in Indiana Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Hanging Loose, and other journals. An ex-con, he lives in Charleston, West Virginia, where he writes, watches Criterion films, and tries to stay out of trouble. His first short-story collection, Always One Mistake, is forthcoming from Running Wild Press.

Surgeon General Warns of Epidemic of Loneliness by Ace Boggess

We wade through shallow ends
of empty pools & crowded rooms.
Our heads drip onto our phones.

Who are you? says the stranger,
a lusty god on his lips.

What are we to each other?
says the lover
as she turns away
the first of many times.

Our partners move to another town,
parents fade in twilight,
children were never born
to play the blues on a red guitar.



Ace Boggess is author of seven books of poetry, most recently Tell Us How to Live (Fernwood Press, 2025) and My Pandemic / Gratitude List (Mōtus Audāx Press, 2025). His writing has appeared in Indiana Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Hanging Loose, and other journals. An ex-con, he lives in Charleston, West Virginia, where he writes, watches Criterion films, and tries to stay out of trouble. His first short-story collection, Always One Mistake, is forthcoming from Running Wild Press.