An Online Literary Journal for Poetry and Flash
Poetry by Suzannah Watchorn
Suzannah Watchorn is an English-Irish writer who grew up outside of London, UK. She now lives in the US, where she works as a writing coach and freelance editor. Her poetry and essays are featured or forthcoming in Eunoia Review, Nebulous, Sunspot Literary, Wild Roof Journal and Red Noise Collective.
Poetry by Peter T. Cavallaro
I met God in the ocean swell.
Yes, didn’t you hear?
There
in the roar of the surf
standing astride sandbars
I met him.
It happened when I got jolted off-balance
and passed into the dread wall—
heart pounding,
a rush of cold on my face,
the weight of watery worries on my hair.
There was I, alone: descending
spread-eagle
inside the collapsing tube
where sky eclipsed
and sound stood still
and my eyes, kissed by debris, locked shut,
when I felt
my body rise, hoisted
by some muddy clamor—
weightless
care-less
swallowed – a plaything!
tumbling fro
at the whim of breakers,
like clay in their crush.
There
in the press
of that green deep
came God;
in the pit of the sea we met.
And he said:
“Control is your illusion.”
The waters rolled back,
lowering me
onto a carpet of kelp
where
the sun’s rub pierced
my receding aqua-veil.
Stillness – and then roar.
Written underwater
Peter T. Cavallaro is a poet, writer, attorney, adventurer, and nature photographer. He lives in New York.
Poetry by Margaret D. Stetz
the famous poet gave a reading
at my school
because the English teacher
knew him
attendance was required
his voice was dry and white
what I imagined
certain wine was like
though I’d never tasted any
something you had to
twirl inside a crystal glass
not drink with pleasure
his shirt was Oxford cloth
white and sharply ironed
the reading was
informal
so he’d left the top two buttons open
rolled the cuffs
his shoes were loafers
which I’d only seen on girls
(adults I knew wore lace-up shoes
and uniforms to work)
his hair looked dry cleaned
freshly pressed
when he began to read
he gazed straight
at the first two rows
where young men sat
a group I’d never seen before
(did they travel with the poet
like a set
of matching luggage?)
the young men
also white
not quite as starched
were silent
bobbing heads
to show they understood
the Classical allusions
gliding past me
like a boat along the Styx (the only line I got)
I knew there must be
witty twists and plays on words
because the poet
sometimes slightly raised his eyebrows…
soon I was nodding
face pitched forward
eyelids lowering
I shook myself to stay awake
reciting in my head
the lyrics of a Beatles song
the record that
I couldn’t wait to play again
when I got home
Margaret D. Stetz is the Mae and Robert Carter Professor of Women’s Studies at the University of Delaware, as well as a widely published poet. Read her earlier poem “Robins” from the August 2022 issue of The Bluebird Word.
Poetry by Robert Nisbet
Leaving a small dark town, hurrying,
we pass a notice, To the Carnival,
swing homeward over a sweep of bridge,
then glance down at the show itself,
in the valley, in its meadow,
a multi-coloured load of sight and sound.
We see and hear, briefly
the motley morrice of copious ribbon
the comedy notes of oompah-oompah
a cone of helter-skelter red
maybe a hurdy-gurdy grinding
We sense . . . maybe
the sketching of likenesses
the telling of fortunes in shadowed tents
and (as in American country fairs)
a bespectacled girl sitting at a card table,
typing poems for the passing crowds . . .
Stay, stay
oompah, oompah
but our car has to race on, race on . . .
Robert Nisbet, a Welsh writer, was for several years an associate lecturer in creative writing at Trinity College, Carmarthen, where he also worked for a while as an adjunct professor for the Central College of Iowa. His poems appear in Robeson, Fitzgerald and Other Heroes (Prolebooks, 2017). Read Robert’s poem “Later” published in The Bluebird Word‘s January 2023 issue.
Poetry by Barbara Siegel Carlson
The heart’s fingerprints are everywhere.
Richard jackson
From somewhere in the city
come the colorful pungency
of oils and spices,
the scent of wet stone,
a woman perspiring
in her high heels that click by,
and the smoke a squinty-eyed man
exhales as he taps
his ashes to the ground
a few feet from the doorway
where a raw-cheeked woman sleeps
under a blanket of particles
near a piece of mooncake some pigeons
& sparrows are sharing.
Barbara Siegel Carlson‘s third book of poems What Drifted Here was published by Cherry Grove Collections in 2023. Her previous books are Once in Every Language and Fire Road. A chapbook Between the Hours was published in 2022. She teaches in Boston and lives in Carver, Massachusetts.
Poetry by Kristin Van Tassel
we give you lamp
light that we might
see you transparent
sea cucumber in sheer
pink open blossom 2
miles deep—& see
you yeti crab, pincer
thin arms frost furred,
or you blind lobster,
needle nosed pliers
in open jaw—& you,
comb jelly, trailing
translucent tulle
veins glowing LED
cool, sliding starless
sky 4.5 miles below
our surface—so
quiet, this cold
Kristin Van Tassel lives and teaches in rural Central Kansas. She writes essays and poetry about place, travel, and teaching. Her work has appeared in World Hum, Wanderlust, Whale Road Review, The Land Report, About Place, Porcupine Review, and Ecotone.
Poetry by Sarah Das Gupta
A blackbird sings at break of day,
the notes cascading, trickling,
over sunlit tiles.
On the old flint wall
a sparrow chirps, cheekily
to an awakening garden.
A pair of thieving magpies,
black patches over each eye,
chatter like pirates
from the dark yew,
planning a surprise attack
on the treasures of the bird table;
while ring doves coo softly
from an avenue of ancient limes.
Sarah Das Gupta is a retired English teacher from Cambridge, UK. She has had work published in many magazines/journals including Bar Bar, The Bluebird Word, Cosmic Daffodil, Green Ink, Waywords, Shallot, Pure Haiku, Rural Fiction, American Readers Review, Paddle, and others.
Poetry by Sharon Scholl
rises reluctantly through ground mist,
travels on the fringe of the horizon,
sinks into a cloak of early dusk.
I find the last of it in a tiny pool
and savor its remains reduced
from August lake to dim reflection.
Leaves enough remain to catch its light
and send their shadows dancing
with a scatter of dry weeds.
Lingering squashes dangle on shrinking
vines while single pumpkins sit deserted
in a field of empty furrows.
This is the season of farewells
to spring wonders worn and drab,
to the past that fades in memory.
Sharon Scholl is a retired college professor (humanities) who convenes a poetry critique group and maintains a website (freeprintmusic.com) that donates music to small, liberal churches. Her poetry chapbooks, Seasons, Remains, Evensong, are available via Amazon Books. Her poems are current in Third Wednesday and Panoplyzine.
Poetry by Cynthia Bernard
Along with the silvering of my hair
the years have gifted me
with a Frequent Wanderer Award
granting open access
to the Mojave of Middle-Night,
where there are many
interesting places to meander
but there does not seem to be
a trailhead that leads back to sleep—
and though I could remedy the one
with gloves, a bottle of dye,
and the laundry room sink,
there seems to be no compass
to help me navigate the other.
For a long time I grumbled about this
and stumbled through too-much-coffee tired days,
but then, during one weary too-early,
I paused to watch a horned lizard
swishing tail, flicking tongue
near the base of a Joshua tree
and noticed the almost silent whisper
of a gestating poem,
stopped to play with her for a while,
and soon I was surrounded
by her many siblings, cousins, and rivals—
quite a lively little nursery
with a hungry baby sonnet I’d almost forgotten,
two toddling villanelles fighting over a yucca flower,
and a pantoum with sand in her eyes crying in the corner.
Middle-Nights now, when the Mojave calls,
I am ready, having indulged in another
gift of the years, the afternoon nap.
I brew up a pot of cactus flower tea,
toss my tinseled hair over my shoulder,
grab my favorite pen,
and set out happily a’wandering.
Cynthia Bernard is a woman in her late sixties who is finding her voice as a poet after many years of silence. A long-time classroom teacher and a spiritual mentor, she lives and writes on a hill overlooking the ocean, about 25 miles south of San Francisco.
Poetry by M.S. Rooney
to meet the one
who invented the spoon, that
mouth-sized bowl, that
stirrer of soups, that
gatherer of rain water
from spring puddles.
It doesn’t seem a thing
you would think to invent
just for yourself.
After all, a stick is quick and sure,
fingers do just fine, and
you can drain a big bowl
with just one tilt.
But for the other,
the child, the beloved,
how we must have yearned
for something more shapely,
more tender, to hold,
to offer,
again and again.
M.S. Rooney lives in Sonoma, California with poet Dan Noreen. Her work appears in journals including The Blue Mountain Review, Illuminations, Leaping Clear and Pensive Journal, and anthologies including A Walk with Nature: Poetic Encounters that Nourish the Soul. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize.
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