UTC (GMT/Zulu)-time: Wednesday, February 5, 2020 at 19:04:44

Pittsburgh Wed 2:04:44 pm New York Wed 2:04:44 p.m. London Wed 7:04:44 pm Tokyo Thu 4:04:44 a.m.

This place filled with wind—
Begin here dear traveler.
Your true heart awaits.

Kate Bowers is a writer based out of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the United States. During the day she works as a technical writer/grants coordinator for private philanthropy in the second largest urban school district in Pennsylvania where there is plenty of poetry to be found.

Her favorite flavor is peppermint. Kate drinks both coffee and tea, but without cream in the latter and definitely with cream in the former. No sugar in either, thank you for asking though.

I woke up this morning wanting
to write a poem,
but nothing came.
Just the restless on and off tap
of thoughts.
I searched for something telling
in the dregs of my coffee,
but carelessly drained the last of its grit.
I watched Sun get higher, striding into day.
She wrapped herself in deepest rose, draped in a shawl of amber.
I put on faded jeans and a billowy blouse to greet her.
Still no bright ideas.
I did last night’s dishes
and thanked them for the meal.
Breaking bread with those seated,
drifts of conversation dearly departed,
Just hearsay in an empty chair.
Should I sign up for a poetry prompt?
Find Insight in my inbox?
Could I beg, steal, or borrow?
I searched along the shore
just like Anne Morrow Lindbergh.
Shells, salty lips, a solitary walk,
a rusty spigot to wash it all off.
I sat down at the table,
and spread out the tome.
There, I found Inspiration
defined as both insight and inhalation.
So I filled my lungs and picked up my pen
and found it filled with jet-black ordinary.

Ellen Rowland writes poetry and creative non-fiction and is the author of Everything I Thought I Knew, a collection of essays about living, learning, and parenting outside the status quo. She and her family live off the grid on a tiny island in Greece.

“a gift of jewels”

draped in cloth of red silk,
she is the jewel of the dawn;
her eyes match the morning mist.

ancient words were chanted rapidly,
their hum a chaotic comforting.
gold rice matches gold thread—
and suddenly two becomes one.

“turned out to be rocks”

red tinted hands fade,
their colour a whisper
of perhaps better times.

soft words are spoken;
a tragic attempt at
gluing back a vase.

the hum is no longer,
filled instead with spite.
an undone gold thread—
and one becomes two.

Maanasa Epuri is a senior in high school who writes in her (rare) spare time. Born and raised in America, she tries to include her Indian heritage in her writing. When she’s not writing, she can be found watching crime shows or eating chocolate.

Female shoppers
bounce past greeters.
They wear clothes
made by Chinese.
Obama came here once;
no one believed it.
Men have shorts,
tank tops and tattoos.
Briefs flash when
their jeans ride down.
They bring pets held
by leashes. A guy with
a turtle doesn’t hurry.
Dogs don’t bite.
A parrot clutches
a male shoulder.
It could be fake.
Walmart calls itself,
“The safest place
to take your child.”
Meanwhile, siblings
fight in the aisles.
Anything goes.
Otherwise,
people of Walmart
can buy online;
America won’t see
them in their glory,
shopping at superstores.

Sarah Henry is retired from a newspaper. She lives and writes in small Pennsylvania town without distractions. She does not own a cat.

clusters of john’s-wort,
toadflax and wild teasel –

names uninviting
but the colors
ask me in

John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in That, Dalhousie Review and North Dakota Quarterly with work upcoming in Qwerty, Chronogram and failbetter.

(After Su Dongpo)

I know that we live
in a world of chance.
When the sun sleeps,
the stars dance.
The moon arrives at night.
Is it surprised by the
lack of light?
But such foolish speculation
demeans my imagination.
Here below, leaves shiver
along the ground.
Will-less in death, they’re
dressed in appropriate brown.
In summer, they thought
life was gay,
but it only seemed that way.

Geoge Freek is a poet/playwright living in Belvidere, IL. Although these poems are inspired by ancient Chinese poetry, they are entrely original comositions. George’s poetry has recently appeared in Gray Sparrow Journal; The Adelaide Quarterly; The Chiron Rview; and Green Light . His plays are published by Playscripts, Inc. and Lazy Bee Scripts.

If god did not create
the universe, the thought
of him was at least enough
to call it to our attention.

Anthropologist Joel Savishinsky’s first attempts at poetry happened in the Canadian Arctic. While trapping and caribou hunting with native people, he contemplated his frostbitten toes, and began to write a few lines in his field journal’s margins. Since then, poetry has helped him to stay warm and ease life’s pain.

Found some old poems
written when I was a university student,
thought myself being smart
inside a dusty library,
where silence camouflaged loneliness
and ignorance. Books smelled
of aged pages, over thumbed-
nothing like my old poems
that reeked of a plastic bin,
which sat quiet as a coffin
for years, but no resurrection,
just a grave robbery
motivated by boredom
and a new interest in recycling paper.

Richard LeDue currently lives and teaches in Norway House, Manitoba, Canada, where the winter nights are long and cold. This is why he writes so much poetry in the winter months, but he also hates the heat, so the summer months also prove productive. It is almost a guarantee that any of his work that speaks of nature is based on pure hearsay.

She gazes upon an aperture unfolding, holy

Through walnut limbs,
the sun glistens
an unsuppressed view floats through an eyelet

a button for her thoughts
newly washed and drying just beyond the vineyard
their stays sway over sun-bleached decks of schooners
floorboards waxed in honey
mellifluous, ripe
waltzing…

her husband’s woody hands upon her hips
upon her lips
ripening mellifluous
she dandles infants from pedicels under the olive tree

through an aperture of a walnut tree
the scent of white cinnamon sands
and notes of jasmine
the aroma of bread, butter and buttons…

lingers

A Mexican-American poet residing in Fresno, CA, Kimberly Vargas Agnese loves walking barefoot and spending time outdoors. She believes that the sacred is as close as a human’s breath and enjoys playing the Native American flute. To read more of Kimberly’s work, please visit www.bucketsonabarefootbeach.com.