Shavasana
by Ruan Wright
I saw a sun
bright as a flower
in the center
of my mind
It glowed
grew
filled my head
like a golden balloon
We lifted
floated
over the room
out of the door
into clear blue air
Bobbed
dipped
soufflé light
sank
into a melting
lemon swoon
A zephyr caught us
laughed us high
till we crashed
with the lavender moon
Smashed
burst
bloomed
scintillating stars
chrysanthemum full
falling
like the fourth of July
Copyright 2005 by Ruan Wright
Reproduction is prohibited without express permission of the author.
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The present afterlife.
by Luke Buckham
This is the cathedral morning
when a man's core wakes up:
at last the one you pursued so passionately
lies captured, sleeping naked as a thorn,
yet hidden except for her mouth
by a crown of black hair and the noise of her breathing
is unbearable, an interference with the voice
flowing through the hallways like a ghostly river
and you need her absence to re-ignite your love.
After a lifetime of chasing after companions,
a lover has been brought too close to see love clearly,
and you long for longing itself, you remember
absence and loneliness and pray for them
to visit you again, like a man craving wine
suddenly, after many years of careless sobriety,
at four in the morning, when all the liquor stores
are closed. The suns and moons,
the distant planets invisibly dancing
that visit the riverbank seen through a bedroom window
seem thin and as easy to absorb as a communion wafer,
but the meaning in dawn's colors, the rings of dust
adorning certain planets, hover near a body's dim conclusions,
the sacrament practiced so long that the receiver is numb--
mere habit, formed to cover other habits.
What we thought we had conquered
is fleeting, and what we have to conquer now
is greater than we had imagined. Not to elect
or topple a king, but first rule our own lives,
which we have never mastered.
Perhaps you said to someone, once:
I will wake up your sleeping spirit,
I will bring thunder into your life
with my own body, with my own voice--
and now your pledge is demanding to be proven.
When those few who thought the earth
was someone else's star gather around
your deathbed screaming, you see:
Einstein in rags near an alley of burning barrels,
Galileo brandishing an empty violin, shaking his fist,
the music coming from instruments
that are not stringed and will not break
and you cry for the faces of these men,
and you cry for the spirit of these men
when their faces are gone, and you cast yourself
on the rocks that made their bed when they were young.
Something no anthropoid saviour sculpted,
a love too sober and winnowing to withstand,
comes to visit us in the 21st century, of all places,
erasing the calendar, making the eternal visitation,
showing how my life is too narrow and weary
to contain that love without breaking and breaking and breaking.
An angel, ignored until a nervous breakdown
made him a nurse behind his shield, comes and says:
stop smirking when confronted with the sacred,
stop making jokes at the expense of your life;
The time for laughter, champagne and pigeon kisses,
has been postponed until you can turn in a public park
at infinite midnight, next to a bubbling fountain,
when the streetlights paint the pavement clean of time,
and see in the place where your shadow would usually be
a burning streak of light.
Copyright 2005 by Luke Buckham .
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Rez Girl And The Pharoahs
by David J. Milligan
A crazy "Chippewa" friend said
"Take me to the museum"
One sunny day.
The *R.O.M.'s stone halls blurred my eyesight
After a bit
But hers' came alive in the "Egyptian rooms".
Where lapiz lazuli inlaid wonders lay under glass,
Her shuffling feet stopped moving.
I laughed a bit to myself
Watching her stare in awe
At some remnants of the Pharoahs' domain.
The rez girl herself came from an isle
Down the **"big road": the road to Motown.
"The Narrows" they once called it,
Far from the Sphinxes
Close to my own "back yard".
Behind you, ***nishnawbe-kwe
You left a world,
Where once skilled fingers
Wove birch bark into water craft.
The Narrows.
The Nile.
Ancient liquid trails.
Copyright 2005 by David J. Milligan.
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Seasons Covered in Haiku
by Karen L. Newman
weeping willow blooms
gold forsythia bushes
draping floral beds
a new clan's tartan -
tiger lilies laid across
green grassy carpets
a calico quilt -
leaves falling in the crisp air
blanketing hillsides
icicles hanging
around white porcelain lakes
for snowflake showers
Copyright 2005 by Karen L. Newman.
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Blue Light
by Richard Denner
trying to talk of love
I struggle with words
tied to my heart
only afraid love
will end, love
let us be
blissful as bees
in the buzz
of honey making
.
long night
morning sun—
lady in blue
nice to see you
dressed in diamonds
your best suit
ready for business
hardass business
harder than diamonds
.
a lady in blue
passed through
lilac in winter
a wave of blue air
.
blue lady, persuade me—
my life goes on
going and going
I watch the moon
on snow tonight
blue light
bright blue light
.
sunny moon
several shades of blue
a face whose lips say
she loves me
destiny at my fingertips
infinity a little way
beyond the stars—
probably doesn't stop there
Copyright 2005 by Richard Denner.
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Letter to the Editor: Cherie Staples (skyearth1@aol.com).