Quest / Joyfully Blue by Michael L. Newell

Quest

The road rises gradually, tumbles 

down into a valley, curves back 

and forth, straightens and goes

up a long grade into 

darkening sky, then switches 

 

sharply back along its own path;

everywhere I look I see life dying, 

being born, struggling, triumphing, 

and fading away into energy which 

will feed the next generation of travelers

 

searching for a destination where 

they can rest at last, lay their heads

upon a stone or stump or clump of grass,

and sleep until they find a dream

which allows them to rise and move on.

 

              (Kigali, Rwanda, March 2012)

 

 

Joyfully Blue

In the dark blue

deepening to black

 

of early evening,

I, silent and still, sit

 

listening to a gently rising

orchestra of sound:

 

a bird rhythmically sounding notes

which call to mind

 

Milt Jackson's mallets slow dancing

up and down a vibraphone, a chorale 

 

of insects gradually growing louder, voices

of lads playing soccer in the distance

 

down a curving dirt road, men 

and women talking, laughing, flirting,

 

and welcoming the deep peace of dusk's

warm and comforting waters;

 

I lean back and my eyes rest upon the rising 

of a silvery moon, and I drift away.

 

                (Kigali, Rwanda, September 2011)

 

Michael L. Newell has recently been published in Bellowing Ark, Shemom, and Jerry Jazz Musician.  His most recent book is from Cyberwit.net.  Its title is Don't Fret (Jazz Poems).

A Man Praises the Sea by Robert Nisbet

Along the prom in a small university town,
a man praises the sea.
The vestiges of waves drift and sink
upon the brown-ish sand.
Beyond them, horizons on,
the noise of bird and storm,
but within that noise, silence.
Through ocean and the Irish Sea,
those marathons of silence.
Ashore, the beach, the prom,
and children paddle, students posture,
holiday people drink and talk.
Here are the gulls’ yell
and the rattling tills of happiness,
the man praising.

*A version of this poem appeared in Orbis (UK, 2012)

Robert Nisbet is a poet from Wales who has over 500 poems published in Britain and the USA, in magazines like San Pedro River Review, Third Wednesday and Burningword Literary Journal. He is a four-time Pushcart nominee.

Hallelujah Spring / Idleness by Diane Webster

Hallelujah Spring

Like a monastery 

snow-bulky pine trees 

sag in domes 

atop the mountain 

closer in prayer 

to catch the ear of God 

above clogged 

masses of grasses 

buried beneath. 

 

Tree boughs bow 

in winter reverence 

gowned in purity, 

anonymous in white, 

a forest of awe 

devoted to snow 

awaiting 

Hallelujah spring. 

 

 

Idleness

  

The woman’s silhouette 

stands on the darkened land 

as if on the horizon’s edge. 

 

Stagnant as a ship’s sail 

sagging without wind 

she allows the tsunami 

of night to consume her 

into its darkness. 

 

By morning she returns 

as a shadow stretching 

her skinny figure 

across grass rippling 

like waves washing its beach. 

 

The woman stands 

on the lightening land 

as if on a cloud’s 

silver lining.

Diane Webster lives in Colorado where she retired in 2022 from working 40 years at a local newspaper. She enjoys the challenge of transforming images into words. Her work has appeared in "El Portal," "North Dakota Quarterly," "New English Review" and other literary magazines.

Night Snow in April / The Good Work by Dave Malone

Night Snow in April  

The night is black and full. 
The town sleeps in the valley,
a silent garden, where pear and apple
shutter their naked blooms.
Before buzzard or crow wake,

it begins to snow. Creamy flakes
fall, the rich dark deepens, this can’t 
be April one thinks, but the whole 
town is covered like this, black 
and white.



The Good Work 

The first delight is the soil. 
How black loam moves between
fingertips, rubs graciously
in the palms like prayer,
falls gently to the earth,
and whispers in this cathedral garden.

I like Sundays here the most
when the town is quiet, the streets
gray and vacant, the trees ripe
with robins and ripped with green arms.
I hoe the tiny rows by hand,
drop the seeds thin as eyelashes
then hide them inside plump mounds
before the rain.

Dave Malone is the author of Tornado Drill and You Know the Ones. He lives in the Missouri Ozarks where he writes poems (sometimes on a Galaxie II typewriter) and enjoys long hikes in the bountiful forest, not far from his town. 

How Night Survives / Spirit Face by David Chorlton

How Night Survives

The blue desert unrolls

beneath a full moon whose light

snags at the tip

of every needle on saguaros leaning

up against the darkness.

The day’s last hummingbird turns into a leaf

that turns into a star that turns

into the all-seeing eye

in the sky: such are miracles

 

where a bobcat flies

from peak to peak

and coyotes run faster than time can

pursue them, back, back,

back to when God rode on horseback

to claim all the land. But the dry air

 

fought back and made of thirst

a prayer for the life

even of the scorpion

whose sting points the way for the

spirit to follow.

 

Spirit Face

 

The poster stared from every summer

window in business next to business next to

where the trail begins

that leads to the ridgeline holding up

the sky. Out walking, nowhere in particular

 

to be, just a spirit loosened from

the mind, lost and drawn to desert light,

just the lure of distance

beyond distance and the curiosity late

in life to find what meaning means.

One dizzy step, a rock

 

to lay her head on,

heat that dreamed its way out through her eyes,

all paths leading to the sun

and the sun takes every offering,

 

gives nothing back.

David Chorlton lives within reach of the desert park that interrupts the urban flow of Phoenix. His newest book is "Poetry Mountain" from Cholla Needles in Joshua Tree, CA, which draws extensively on his immediate surroundings and its wildlife.

Night Eye by Michael Keshigian

The moon which comes
through the dark
and settles between layers
of wispy, cumulus haze,
feebly illuminates a path
the sun has abandoned
while casting a pale, dead silent beam
downward to spy from a distance
our forbidden actions
beneath the cloak of night.
To the unsuspecting,
it is a most beautiful lie,
thinking all is secure,
that the moon watches,
but in truth
it thinks of nothing
and only waits to see
what might appear,
camouflaged and covert
in the seamless summer night
of the world below,
though should the moon
shine its eye to reveal
those with malevolent intent
and keep the balance,
what might we do
but merely enjoy its light
and with our hearts
continue to hope.

Michael Keshigian has recently been published in the Tipton Poetry Journal, Bluepepper, Young Ravens Literary Review, and Jerry Jazz Musician. His latest collections, What To Do With Intangibles, Into The Light, Dark Edges, are available through Amazon.  He has been nominated 7 times for a Pushcart Prize and 3 times for Best Of The Net.

Tree Murmuration by Andrea Ferrari Kristeller

Leave flocks synchronize cloud-like
their formations shape
a change of pace in the sky
the urge to fly, windomized

Treetops merge and swell and splinter
from root trunk dependencies
as if they did not understand belonging

Leaves dream they are the birds they sheltered

They rehearse a choir of fricatives
sibilance becomes deafening

Do they practice autumn?
They seem to murmur something
that sounds like leaving

Seeds listen

Andrea Ferrari Kristeller is an Argentinean teacher, writer and naturalist. She often travels to the rainforest in Misiones, near Iguazú Falls, and writes mostly poetry and science fiction stories set in these lands. Some of her poems have been published by several different American and British magazines, as well as her short stories.