We might not have come if we’d considered
thirteen degrees for seven hours, every muscle tensed,
bladders engorged. Last year, we didn’t sing
U2 songs with a dozen college kids from Ireland
or watch thirty-somethings from Barcelona
swallow grapes whole at six p.m., the Spanish New Year,
and we couldn’t have comprehended the sound
of one million voices counting back from ten
until ours were lost among them. Last year,
we were only two people watching on TV,
but we had one bathroom apiece, and hot chocolate
cradled against our bellies like tiny radiators.
Melissa Fite Johnson’s poetry has appeared in such publications as I-70 Review, The New Verse News, and Inscape Magazine. Her first collection, While the Kettle’s On (Little Balkans Press, 2015), won the Nelson Poetry Book Award. Melissa and her husband live in Kansas, where she teaches English. Her website: melissafitejohnson.com.
Wednesday, December 30, 2015
Tuesday, December 29, 2015
High School Pep Band by Melissa Fite Johnson
My flute part never sounded like the song
on its own. When I practiced,
my brother poked his head in my room,
asked if I had any idea what the hell I was doing.
But with the band, the flutes’ voices
soared higher than even the trumpets’
bold balloon squeaks.
The trumpets—and indeed the trombones,
saxes, tubas, even clarinets—
none of them questioned our worth.
We had each other’s backs. We had to.
At the basketball games, we held a kind of
nerd power. No one said much
to us in classes or the halls, but they
loved us at games. They yelled
the words to every song. Together we lifted
those boys, high as the cheerleaders
somersaulting into the air. We were
part of something on those nights.
We were really in high school.
On Mondays we were back to visitor status,
stepping aside to let a row of letter jackets pass.
Melissa Fite Johnson’s poetry has appeared in such publications as I-70 Review, The New Verse News, and Inscape Magazine. Her first collection, While the Kettle’s On (Little Balkans Press, 2015), won the Nelson Poetry Book Award. Melissa and her husband live in Kansas, where she teaches English. Her website: melissafitejohnson.com.
on its own. When I practiced,
my brother poked his head in my room,
asked if I had any idea what the hell I was doing.
But with the band, the flutes’ voices
soared higher than even the trumpets’
bold balloon squeaks.
The trumpets—and indeed the trombones,
saxes, tubas, even clarinets—
none of them questioned our worth.
We had each other’s backs. We had to.
At the basketball games, we held a kind of
nerd power. No one said much
to us in classes or the halls, but they
loved us at games. They yelled
the words to every song. Together we lifted
those boys, high as the cheerleaders
somersaulting into the air. We were
part of something on those nights.
We were really in high school.
On Mondays we were back to visitor status,
stepping aside to let a row of letter jackets pass.
Melissa Fite Johnson’s poetry has appeared in such publications as I-70 Review, The New Verse News, and Inscape Magazine. Her first collection, While the Kettle’s On (Little Balkans Press, 2015), won the Nelson Poetry Book Award. Melissa and her husband live in Kansas, where she teaches English. Her website: melissafitejohnson.com.
Monday, December 28, 2015
Apology by Laura Lee Washburn
I tell my nephew, I’m sorry
about your crazy grandma.
My mother will be pleased to know
he doesn’t ask which one.
That was some messed up shit,
he says. How’s grandpa, I want to know.
They’ve both lost it, he says.
I live far enough away to learn their dramas
late or not at all and I’m really sorry
truly that she spent four days crying
on the couch, her face scratched,
the dog in city custody, quarantined,
that my nephew cried, that my father cried,
that she lied, that she turned her
own chocolate lab over to animal control
because who does that, who calls the city
because the dog was playing and your
heads bumped even if you are moving soon
to Florida to a retirement village and you
just don’t want to deal anymore
with things so big and messy like the yard
or a pool or a garage full of tools or your
two year old dog, or all these meds. And
pretty soon, if she can ever get down there,
she’ll sign her husband over, too. I send
my nephew a picture of a reindeer hat
because he shows me his creepy eye with antlers ink.
That’s it. I go out and look at the crocuses
that aren’t dead yet, but only a little frayed from snow.
Laura Lee Washburn is the Director of Creative Writing at Pittsburg State University in Kansas, and the author of This Good Warm Place: 10th Anniversary Expanded Edition (March Street) and Watching the Contortionists (Palanquin Chapbook Prize). Her poetry has appeared in such journals as Cavalier Literary Couture, Carolina Quarterly, Ninth Letter, The Sun, Red Rock Review, and Valparaiso Review. Born in Virginia Beach, Virginia, she has also lived and worked in Arizona and in Missouri. She is married to the writer Roland Sodowsky and is one of the founders and the Co-President of the Board of SEK Women Helping Women (https://www.facebook.com/sekwhw).
about your crazy grandma.
My mother will be pleased to know
he doesn’t ask which one.
That was some messed up shit,
he says. How’s grandpa, I want to know.
They’ve both lost it, he says.
I live far enough away to learn their dramas
late or not at all and I’m really sorry
truly that she spent four days crying
on the couch, her face scratched,
the dog in city custody, quarantined,
that my nephew cried, that my father cried,
that she lied, that she turned her
own chocolate lab over to animal control
because who does that, who calls the city
because the dog was playing and your
heads bumped even if you are moving soon
to Florida to a retirement village and you
just don’t want to deal anymore
with things so big and messy like the yard
or a pool or a garage full of tools or your
two year old dog, or all these meds. And
pretty soon, if she can ever get down there,
she’ll sign her husband over, too. I send
my nephew a picture of a reindeer hat
because he shows me his creepy eye with antlers ink.
That’s it. I go out and look at the crocuses
that aren’t dead yet, but only a little frayed from snow.
Laura Lee Washburn is the Director of Creative Writing at Pittsburg State University in Kansas, and the author of This Good Warm Place: 10th Anniversary Expanded Edition (March Street) and Watching the Contortionists (Palanquin Chapbook Prize). Her poetry has appeared in such journals as Cavalier Literary Couture, Carolina Quarterly, Ninth Letter, The Sun, Red Rock Review, and Valparaiso Review. Born in Virginia Beach, Virginia, she has also lived and worked in Arizona and in Missouri. She is married to the writer Roland Sodowsky and is one of the founders and the Co-President of the Board of SEK Women Helping Women (https://www.facebook.com/sekwhw).
Wednesday, December 16, 2015
Blowing Leaves by Howie Good
Devoid of anything even close
to resembling a fresh idea,
I’m hunched in front of my laptop
and staring out the window
at a man in a foam baseball cap
and an Army fatigue jacket who,
as if emboldened by the barbaric yawp
of his backpack leaf blower,
walks with a forward lean
into the long shadows of late afternoon,
an incautious conjurer inspiring
the last raggedy remnants
of summer to get up and dance.
Howie Good’s latest poetry collections are Bad for the Heart (Prolific Press) and Dark Specks in a Blue Sky (Another New Calligraphy). He is recipient of the 2015 Press Americana Prize for Poetry for his forthcoming collection Dangerous Acts Starring Unstable Elements.
to resembling a fresh idea,
I’m hunched in front of my laptop
and staring out the window
at a man in a foam baseball cap
and an Army fatigue jacket who,
as if emboldened by the barbaric yawp
of his backpack leaf blower,
walks with a forward lean
into the long shadows of late afternoon,
an incautious conjurer inspiring
the last raggedy remnants
of summer to get up and dance.
Howie Good’s latest poetry collections are Bad for the Heart (Prolific Press) and Dark Specks in a Blue Sky (Another New Calligraphy). He is recipient of the 2015 Press Americana Prize for Poetry for his forthcoming collection Dangerous Acts Starring Unstable Elements.
Tuesday, December 15, 2015
On My Return by John Grey
It's not what I expected on my return.
My boyhood home hadn't changed
one slap of paint, one poster on the wall.
Those left behind felt most comfortable
in nothing ever moving on.
It all was where I left it.
That made the love so much easier.
All the hopes, the promise, the beginnings, were intact.
Even ones that ended badly.
Fingermarks, books in shelves,
old letters in drawers, ceramics on mantles,
even the clock that hadn't worked in years -
those were the bearings of a life.
Back to such normalcy,
I sat at the table with familiar faces
discussing how life ought to be.
Mother said, we can clean now, varnish,
even move furniture around.
I tried but was of no help
because I could imagine no other house but this.
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in New Plains Review, Perceptions and the anthology, No Achilles with work upcoming in Big Muddy Review, Gargoyle, Coal City Review and Nebo.
My boyhood home hadn't changed
one slap of paint, one poster on the wall.
Those left behind felt most comfortable
in nothing ever moving on.
It all was where I left it.
That made the love so much easier.
All the hopes, the promise, the beginnings, were intact.
Even ones that ended badly.
Fingermarks, books in shelves,
old letters in drawers, ceramics on mantles,
even the clock that hadn't worked in years -
those were the bearings of a life.
Back to such normalcy,
I sat at the table with familiar faces
discussing how life ought to be.
Mother said, we can clean now, varnish,
even move furniture around.
I tried but was of no help
because I could imagine no other house but this.
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in New Plains Review, Perceptions and the anthology, No Achilles with work upcoming in Big Muddy Review, Gargoyle, Coal City Review and Nebo.
Sunday, December 13, 2015
Your Recovery by John Grey
I can't get away from them -
TV, the internet, twitter,
even talk around the water cooler -
celebrities have assumed the role
of the center of the universe.
But then you call me =
you're out of hospital.
At last, news sends me a gift.
It doesn't care who's dating who
or wearing what designer dress.
I can imagine you seated on your patio,
family around you,
setting sun drenching your face.
You're coddling a wine glass in your wrinkled hand.
You're distanced from the superficial
by a canyon of heart and mind
The wine, I'm sure, tastes like the earth and growing,
like the land that spreads before you,
a family history in blades of grass and fences.
A smile plays out
beneath your warm farm-girl eyes.
You doze, contented, with the past around you,
dream a year not yet lived.
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in New Plains Review, Perceptions and the anthology, No Achilles with work upcoming in Big Muddy Review, Gargoyle, Coal City Review and Nebo.
TV, the internet, twitter,
even talk around the water cooler -
celebrities have assumed the role
of the center of the universe.
But then you call me =
you're out of hospital.
At last, news sends me a gift.
It doesn't care who's dating who
or wearing what designer dress.
I can imagine you seated on your patio,
family around you,
setting sun drenching your face.
You're coddling a wine glass in your wrinkled hand.
You're distanced from the superficial
by a canyon of heart and mind
The wine, I'm sure, tastes like the earth and growing,
like the land that spreads before you,
a family history in blades of grass and fences.
A smile plays out
beneath your warm farm-girl eyes.
You doze, contented, with the past around you,
dream a year not yet lived.
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in New Plains Review, Perceptions and the anthology, No Achilles with work upcoming in Big Muddy Review, Gargoyle, Coal City Review and Nebo.
Saturday, December 12, 2015
Great Blue Heron at Powder Mill by John Grey
The great blue heron's startle
is not the quick dart of the song sparrow
to the nearest bush..
Nor is it the crow's high caw
or the chickadee's Morse Code trill.
It doesn't flap noisily into gear
like the mourning dove
or join the pigeons
in high-tailing it up to the upper eaves.
It's almost dusk, late summer.
The pond is brown, the weather dry.
The heron stalks unseen fish,
moving slow, deliberate.
One long thin leg unfolds forward
like a ballerina in slow motion,
the other pivots in the mud.
It doesn't see me as other birds do.
Still sensing water's seismic shift with thin, sharp beak.
I fill the corner of an eye.
Its feathered crown rises,
wings gradually fill the horizontal.
It doesn't so much fear me
as appreciate that it and I are fated
to never occupy the same lush feeding grounds.
No hurry in its takeoff,
merely a gentle flap, an arcing of the neck,
a graceful lift,
a measured glide over the tree-tops.
So much for the slow, ambling, earthbound gait
of the rest of us..
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in New Plains Review, Perceptions and the anthology, No Achilles with work upcoming in Big Muddy Review, Gargoyle, Coal City Review and Nebo.
is not the quick dart of the song sparrow
to the nearest bush..
Nor is it the crow's high caw
or the chickadee's Morse Code trill.
It doesn't flap noisily into gear
like the mourning dove
or join the pigeons
in high-tailing it up to the upper eaves.
It's almost dusk, late summer.
The pond is brown, the weather dry.
The heron stalks unseen fish,
moving slow, deliberate.
One long thin leg unfolds forward
like a ballerina in slow motion,
the other pivots in the mud.
It doesn't see me as other birds do.
Still sensing water's seismic shift with thin, sharp beak.
I fill the corner of an eye.
Its feathered crown rises,
wings gradually fill the horizontal.
It doesn't so much fear me
as appreciate that it and I are fated
to never occupy the same lush feeding grounds.
No hurry in its takeoff,
merely a gentle flap, an arcing of the neck,
a graceful lift,
a measured glide over the tree-tops.
So much for the slow, ambling, earthbound gait
of the rest of us..
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in New Plains Review, Perceptions and the anthology, No Achilles with work upcoming in Big Muddy Review, Gargoyle, Coal City Review and Nebo.
Friday, December 11, 2015
Embrace by Mitchell Krockmalnik Grabois
Her embrace broke my neck
She weighed only ninety-four pounds
but each ounce was purely intense
Her husband had threatened to kill her
He suffered from psychotic jealousy
She focused only on her survival
and had even forgotten her son
She still loved her husband
a foible common to abused women
She owned no pets
She was afraid of the dark
She hid books behind books
in her son’s bookcase
Her husband didn’t believe in women
reading books
He didn’t want her to speak to
or even look at
other men
There were men in books
She woke frequently in the middle of the night
to check for rabbits in her garden
She stopped when she and her husband were evicted
If she were murdered
she told me
she would come to my roof
in the form of two swans
necks entwined
Her embrace was powered by desperation
My only armor was
my good intentions
The sinews stood out on her arms
Her skin was blue
but she’d concealed their hue
with flesh-colored make-up
This was the third time
I’d had my neck broken
once when I was playing college football
the second when I was driving drunk
My doctor says that a spine was not designed for this
level of abuse
Mitchell Krockmalnik Grabois has had over nine hundred of his poems and fictions appear in literary magazines in the U.S. and abroad. He has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and The Best of the Net for work published in 2011 through 2014. His novel, Two-Headed Dog, based on his work as a clinical psychologist in a state hospital, is available for Kindle and Nook, or as a print edition. He lives in Denver. He works at combating his own ego, as Ego is the source of Greed, and Greed is destroying our world.
She weighed only ninety-four pounds
but each ounce was purely intense
Her husband had threatened to kill her
He suffered from psychotic jealousy
She focused only on her survival
and had even forgotten her son
She still loved her husband
a foible common to abused women
She owned no pets
She was afraid of the dark
She hid books behind books
in her son’s bookcase
Her husband didn’t believe in women
reading books
He didn’t want her to speak to
or even look at
other men
There were men in books
She woke frequently in the middle of the night
to check for rabbits in her garden
She stopped when she and her husband were evicted
If she were murdered
she told me
she would come to my roof
in the form of two swans
necks entwined
Her embrace was powered by desperation
My only armor was
my good intentions
The sinews stood out on her arms
Her skin was blue
but she’d concealed their hue
with flesh-colored make-up
This was the third time
I’d had my neck broken
once when I was playing college football
the second when I was driving drunk
My doctor says that a spine was not designed for this
level of abuse
Mitchell Krockmalnik Grabois has had over nine hundred of his poems and fictions appear in literary magazines in the U.S. and abroad. He has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and The Best of the Net for work published in 2011 through 2014. His novel, Two-Headed Dog, based on his work as a clinical psychologist in a state hospital, is available for Kindle and Nook, or as a print edition. He lives in Denver. He works at combating his own ego, as Ego is the source of Greed, and Greed is destroying our world.
Wednesday, December 9, 2015
Light Confession by Maril Crabtree
Talk to me
about your night fears.
How you keep the light on
beside your bed,
hoping you won’t wake
and feel the familiar terror.
How you sleep
on your side, turned away
from the window, knowing
they could come through anyway.
How your dreams
are the only things that save you
from your own dread.
How ready you are
to plunge into the undiscovered
day, into whatever is on
the other side of night.
Maril Crabtree’s most recent chapbook is Tying the Light (Finishing Line Press). Her work has appeared in journals such as Kalliope, I-70 Review, Coal City Review, Main Street Rag, and Third Wednesday, She previously served as poetry editor for Kansas City Voices. More of her work can be seen at www.marilcrabtree.com.
about your night fears.
How you keep the light on
beside your bed,
hoping you won’t wake
and feel the familiar terror.
How you sleep
on your side, turned away
from the window, knowing
they could come through anyway.
How your dreams
are the only things that save you
from your own dread.
How ready you are
to plunge into the undiscovered
day, into whatever is on
the other side of night.
Maril Crabtree’s most recent chapbook is Tying the Light (Finishing Line Press). Her work has appeared in journals such as Kalliope, I-70 Review, Coal City Review, Main Street Rag, and Third Wednesday, She previously served as poetry editor for Kansas City Voices. More of her work can be seen at www.marilcrabtree.com.
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