George was  late again, darn it!  Mary glanced at the clock:  yes, it was six-thirty; George was due home twenty minutes ago.  How was she supposed to have his dinner ready for him when he came in the door if he was late?  And he was usually so punctual!

     She decided to call his office.  Maybe he’d had a late client?  Yes, that had to be it.  She would  wait a few more minutes before calling.

     She crossed the tiled floor to the pantry.  Darn!  They were almost out of everything.  She tugged at her earlobe for a moment, thinking…Hadn’t she given George a list for the store?  Maybe that’s why he was late/  Perhaps he had stopped at the Safeway to pick up those items?

     It was a long list; she remembered that all right.  They were running low on everything from paper towels to evaporated milk and coffee.

     She was getting hungry now herself.  Maybe she would warm up some soup, just until George got home with everything else.

     She looked in the pantry again.  There was only one can of Campbell’s left:  Vegetable Beef; that was all right, Mary liked Vegetable Beef…

     Late,late,late again!  Oh, George!  She would call the office.  Maybe he’d had a late client.  That had to be it–he was normally so punctual! 

     She lifted the receiver from the wall-mounted landline.  She didn’t hear a dial tone.  How odd!  Maybe that terrific wind two days ago had knocked down the lines.  Her android phone–but, no, that wasn’t working now either for some reason.  She remembered trying to call her sister-in-law to see if George had stopped by on his way home from the office–yesterday, was it?

     Well, what could she do, then?  If George insisted on being late coming home…It was the second evening in a row that he was late coming home.  She told herself not to worry, that worrying was silly.  George always told her that she was silly to worry so much about everything, especially all those awful headlines.

     Mary retrieved a small saucepan and turned on the back burner.  At least the stove still worked, she thought, as the blue flame sprang up.  George had been smart to buy this little camp stove; he had said at the time that no matter what happened they would at least have warm meals.

    She ate her soup.  There were only a few crackers left so she had them, too, in the soup.

     Oh,no!  She saw that she had left the darned burner on!  Quickly she got up and turned it off.  If George saw that, he would get on her about it, tell her she was getting forgetful…How silly of him!  She was only seventy-two, a whole year younger than he was.

     She glanced at the clock on the wall.  Six-thirty!  George was late, late, late!  He’d been late yesterday, too–she remembered that.  He must have had a late client at the office.  Maybe she should call to be sure…But, no, that’s right:  the phone wasn’t working.  Maybe that terrible wind a couple of days ago had knocked the lines down.

     Darn!  Now the neighbors’ dogs were barking again, loud, big-dog barks.  She went to the window and pulled aside the heavy drape.  The hurricane impact window was cracked all over, 

probably from that horrendous wind they’d had two days ago.

     Plus, it was awfully dark for being so early on a June evening.  And where had all that smoke come from?  Had anyone called the fire department?  She would do that as soon as the phone came back on.

     Now–oh, for Pete’s sake!  Those darn dogs were in her yard!  What were the neighbors thinking of, letting their dogs roam like that?  She should march over there and give them a piece of her mind…

     The dogs had finally stopped that incessant barking though–thank God!  But now they were tearing away at George’s scarecrow that had collapsed onto the ground.  That scarecrow had been one of George’s good ideas, Mary thought fondly.  He liked planting a few tomatoes, some summer squash, and a row of sweet corn, just a pocket sized garden he would  harvest in the fall.

     For a moment, Mary rubbed at her cheek in puzzlement.  They didn’t normally put up the scarecrow this early.  Why was the scarecrow there now?  And–oh, my God! she thought, why was it wearing one of George’s good suits!  They always dressed the scarecrow in any old rags that would stay on the frame.  She would have to chide him for that–those suits were expensive!  She sighed and let the drape fall back over the wrecked window.

     Anyway, it was time to fix dinner.  She glanced up at the electric clock over the drainboard:  six-thirty!  Darn it!  George was late again.

Attended the University of Oregon. Currently living in Las Vegas, NV with one son, two large dogs and too many books.

they say time is a constant
that does not speed up or slow down

yet every moment with you becomes memory too soon
and every second without you a race to see your face

as you find your steps, your voice, your personality
we do our best to mold, while we also wait

to eagerly see who you will become
but also enjoy the journey of right now

they say time is a constant
but it already feels like you are timeless

A Raj is a father and physician. His world became even more wonderful when his daughter was born.

So softly the snow
falls. We are alone.
I want to sleep in you
like an animal under
a rising drift,
wordless and tender.

Dan MacIsaac writes from Vancouver Island. His poetry has appeared in magazines including Magma, Hummingbird, Event, and Stand. Brick Books published his collection of poetry, Cries from the Ark. In 2023, Alfred Gustav published his chapbook, Jazz Sessions.

the only sounds–
Ray Bradbury pages turning
and my beating heart

I drift to sleep
on fairies’ wings…
my phone on silence

even the crickets
have all gone to sleep–
late-night silence

oh the symphony–
if shooting stars
weren’t silent

I have silent skills–
the scent of rain before it falls
the taste of cilantro

your words spilled out
before you could filter them–
silence came too late

sometimes
all that’s needed–
loving silence

raucous hail
gives way to snow…
blissful silence

a lifetime’s laughter
swallowed by the vacuum
of silence

as the sun wakens
before the world–
peaceful silence

that moment
of silent introspection
to get your brave on

a squeaky door
meets a miracle worker–
WD40-silence

Jennifer Gurney lives in Colorado where she teaches, paints, writes and hikes. Her poetry has appeared internationally in a wide variety of journals, including Rue Scribe, The Ravens Perch, HaikUniverse, Haiku Corner, Cold Moon Journal, Scarlet Dragonfly and The Haiku Foundation. Jennifer’s haiku has recently won the 6th Basho-an International English Haiku Competition and was recently selected for the Golden Triangle Haiku Poetry Competition in DC. Her poetry has also been accepted into the Ars Nova Shared Vision project in Colorado and will be turned into a choral piece and performed in a series of concerts in the Denver area this June.

In October once, late evening,
after a long-weekend’s hideaway
where a Great Lake had licked
my mind into submission
and a steady wind had advanced
the ancient dunes their micromillimeter,

I sat in the blue light of the television
and heard the words that numbed
then freed me to myself—
I’m leaving you—
and one of us said, “It will be for the best,”
neither yet knowing if it was the truth.

D. R. James, a year into retirement from nearly 40 years of teaching college writing, literature, and peace studies, lives, writes, bird-watches, vegges, avoids the tourists, and cycles with his psychotherapist wife in the woods near Saugatuck, Michigan, a short ride from the lovely western shores of Lake Michigan.
https://www.amazon.com/author/drjamesauthorpage

The souls of this world move in quiet cycles,
passing through unseen thresholds,
lingering in the space between.
Each turn of the wheel brings them back—
to beginnings that feel like endings.

Under the muted glow of lanterns,
they wait at the edge of choice,
their paths fracturing like glass.
The weight of past decisions clings,
a shadow stretching into the present.
Yet, in the cracks of regret,
a new light trembles,
unfolding slowly.

The souls tethered to this earth—
who will meet them with tenderness?
Who will loosen the knots of their burdens?
They press forward, pulled by longing,
rooted in the soil of what was.

The cycle does not break,
it dissolves into itself,
a quiet rhythm of becoming.
In sorrow’s low hum,
in joy’s fleeting pulse,
they carry forward.

The waltz is endless—
a weaving of lives,
of losses and fragile triumphs.
Even in the weight of their distractions,
grace whispers beneath.

To the countless souls,
once denied a horizon,
may they stand now
in the quiet light of belonging.
And still, the dance moves on—
soft, relentless, through shadow and dawn.

Charles Ho Wang Mak is a legal academic. He lives in Scotland, where he starts to admire poetry.

The little land crab stands right in the road,
Waving his big red claw.
Almost hit by a car rushing past –
Another, then one more.
The little crab stands fearless and alone,
He just won’t back away
And all the other crabs beside the road
Call out “¡Olé! ¡Olé!”

Robin Helweg-Larsen is Anglo-Danish by birth but Bahamian by upbringing. After dropping out of the University of Dundee because they weren’t teaching the meaning of life, he spent five years based in Copenhagen, working in factories and hitchhiking on four continents. After decades in British Columbia as a tax preparer, prison guard, etc, and in North Carolina as a simulation designer and management consultant, he has returned to blog at formalverse.com from the Bahamas.

They tell me I’m pretty and I can already see the end,
Cause for them, my body will be a sanctuary
They will leave in peace, and I will be left in pieces

Olivia Trachtenberg is only sometimes a poet. She likes to write poetry and prose whenever the inspiration strikes.

Like the species she represented, she had always been a creature of two minds; dissatisfied unless her brain was wrapped around two dreams at once: one immediately controlling her eyes and fingers and all of the other things belonging to the real world, while her heart burned with some more essential, private dream. Now, as she lay on a custom-built couch, her essential mind was on a beach walk with Stephanos, nights ago.

They had climbed through a notch in the dune vegetation, and sat down as the surrounding sea oats framed the moon and hid everything else. She laid her head in his lap.

“Tell me stories of the night,” she said.

He stroked her sensibly-short hair and smiled at the way she always asked for his stories. He thought awhile, and then pointed up at the moon.

“The ancients,” he said, “called her Selene.”

“What, the moon?”

“Your moon.”

She turned her eyes into the pale white light.

“They said she was destined to someday give birth to Pandia, which means ‘all-brightness.’ Homer said Pandia was ‘exceeding lovely amongst the deathless gods.’”

She said, “And all I have to do, to give us that daughter, is to touch the moon.”

He smiled in the darkness, and said nothing. She stretched her arm one faint yard toward the moon.

“Seems so easy,” she said. “Seems so impossible.”

“And yet, you are the hope of people dedicated to doing the impossible.”

#

Back in her first mind, she heard a bodyless voice ask a question. She studied a screen and replied. “42.5. Nominal.”

#

Stephanos, at the beach, pointed back at the moon.

“The Lakota indigenous people have their own story: a legend that the Sun and the Moon were once lovers, living together in each other’s arms. One day, their followers got into a war over which of their gods was greater. After, it was decreed that the Sun and the Moon would live together forever in the same sky, but forever separate, seeing each other only rarely. The legend has it that, on those rare occasions when the Sun and the Moon are allowed to come together, the Moon is so hungry for her lover, that she gobbles up all of his light, and doesn’t spare any for the Earth. And thus, we have eclipses.”

Giggles. “I think I’m glad they don’t allow you to teach science.”

He gave a noncommittal wave she barely saw in the night.

“All wisdom is poetry, dear Ann. That was science, told with a flair. Modern scientific cosmology says that the Sun, the Moon, and the Earth were once the same heavenly object. They split, and gave birth to life, and mankind. And you. Although I do think you’re mostly moon.”

She raised an imaginary glass.

“To reunions.”

#

In her first mind, she heard the voice say, “One minute,” and she answered, “Roger that.”

#

At the beach, with Stephanos, she said, “Those are other people’s stories. What’s your story, oh my wise teacher?”

He stared out at the unceasing waves and thought.

“A story of a lonely man, in love with a world that didn’t love him. One day a beautiful goddess held him and welcomed him a to the humanity he thought had rejected him years ago.”

She smiled and sat up.

“Ah, but what about the moon? These are supposed to be stories about the moon.”

“Like all mankind, he is literally built of pieces of the moon, held together with moonbeams. Every moment since the dawn of creation, tiny particles of moondust have fallen to the earth, driven by the sun’s powerful radiation. And they become part of every one of us. To be a man is to be shot through by the moon.”

“Yes, but what of the moon in this story?”

 “She, too, is waiting for that girl.”

She kissed his arm.

“You are such a dreamer.”

He paused.

“We are all dreamers. And you are the apex of those dreams.”

She squeezed his arm.

“And you are the protector of those dreams.”

She stood up, did a slow 360 and scanned the beach cottages and industrial buildings that now appeared beyond the grass.

“Well, I am going to go be the protector of sleep. We have a lot of work in the days ahead.”

He stood up and surveyed the cottages to find the path home.

“That we do.”

#

In her mind of the here and now, and for mankind’s future, Artemis Mission Commander Ann Bradley lay strapped to her couch in the cramped metal capsule balanced atop the 98-meter-tall SLS launch vehicle. She glanced at her companions as the voice counted down.

“Three, two, one. Liftoff. Liftoff, of Mankind’s Return to the Moon.”

Ann said, “Roger, Control.”

Flames finally poured out of her rocket, the way her species’ dreams had poured out for centuries. She felt her new home shake with the fire until it broke free of her old earth home and rejoined the sky where her species belonged. She glanced out the window at the Launch Control Center and her second mind imagined she saw the man she loved inside it.

In the Launch Control Center, Range Safety Officer Stephanos Palmas kept his hand hovering over the switch with ABORT written on it in big red letters. His eyes were focused with an all-consuming vision on the screens in front of him, searching for any sign of trouble that would mean he would need to hit that switch and save the crew—his crew—from a mission gone bad, at a cost of giving up mankind’s dream of the moon. Only when he heard the voice say, “MECO” did he take his hand away, and allow it to begin a very human shaking as he watched his dream, and the dream of mankind, sailing to their destiny.

Michael Guillebeau eats grouper in Panama City Beach, Florida, and soy curls in Portland, Oregon.

Frank might as well have been looking through a glass darkly. Staring out the kitchen window that Saturday morning, he could barely make out the birds in the tree above his car in the driveway. Were they singing to their hearts’ content? He needed batteries for his hearing aids. The flowers in his small backyard were crowded out by weeds. Could he distinguish colors? Did they have a pleasant scent? If he had instilled his eye drops, would it have helped? Never mind used his inhaler.

Finished splattering over his car, the birds flew off. Was it a pleasant sight? The flight, that is?

His flat screen was on. Now came advertisements for decongestants and hearing aids. Someone instilled eye drops. Could she – it was a woman younger than Frank on the flatscreen – see her car through her advertisement window? And was it, too, splattered with bird crap?

David Sydney is a physician from Pennsylvania. He writes fiction in and out of the EHR (Electronic Health Record).