-Jane Cornwell

Cave

-Kerfe Roig

Jim

-John Law

Bury me where the forest was

And the voice said carry me
And the body answered gladly
And the voice said weren’t there trees here
And the ghost-twigs rattled sadly
And the voice said I think the gods all fled
And the gods said we ran madly
And the voice said well, we’re living still
And poor body answered badly
And this voice comes from the mountains
And this voice comes from the mouse
And this voice comes from the lintel
And the doorway, and the house
And should you bear one single, tiny god
And should you shoulder full regret
May your bones lie down a worship-vault
For the ones you haven’t met

-Ankh Spice

Mind Finds Soul Fearlessly Shines

In the recesses of my mind
Hidden deep within the folds
So that no monster will it find
Is a cave that hidden dreams hold
Where multicoloured hopes shine
Where the soul spark core personality mould

Hidden deep within my mind
The passions I learned to hide
In a cave that no one can find
The creativity that gives joy and pride
From the soul spark core eternally shine
A girl finding the Goddess sacraments all starry-eyed

The passions ruling my heart and mind
Gives intimate solace as nothing else can
The creativity through which I peace find
The only thing that abuse taught fears ban
A girl seeing the Goddess sacraments in her soul shine
Finds the goldenrod light path that’s been there since life began

©RedCat

Inspired by KR7 “Cave”

The Flame in the Center

Protection from the unknown
shadows–chromatic light–reflections
formed from everything—
star-breath sighed,

they fly, butterfly-winged,
repeating patterns, mirroring,

and once again,
through endless time

in the deepest cave of heart and mind,
a center glow, you find
it like a candle flame, illuminating hope–
the dreams the stars sing–

those wondrous things
multi-hued and bright,
prisms of color
glimmering in the night.

-Merril D Smith

Granite

Hard as granite, thirty years
unperturbed by relentless
dark noise and toxic dust, he told
them it wasn’t wise, but their minds
were slow, their dull thoughts
creaking like an old winter tree.

-Tim Fellows

Turning into Glass
(in response to JC 7)

Some days the palm of your hand
feels too small.
I never wanted to sit on a pedestal,
heart turning into glass,
easily broken.
I didn’t ask to be sewn back together,
sheltered from the storm,
wrapped in porcelain and kept dry.
Some days I want to hit the ground,
experience the earth against my feet,
spin and spin until the world falls away.
I want to run and stumble,
pick myself up,
feel it hurt.

-Susan Richardson

The Zen Master Mouse

(Inspired by Jane Cornwell’s 7th Painting)

The mountain range hides behind
the wood-mouse on my palm.

The Zen koan you told me, oh Master,
is already in my id, hidden, as if
I have never heard the fable beforehand.

Now is eaten by a wood-mouse,
and heaven, I do not mind.

The mountain seeks the one gone.
Dim sun looks like an undulating lantern.
Master, I whisper looking at the mouse’s liquid irides.

-Kushal Poddar

Slipping back to the beginning
Inspired by Kerfe Roig’s Cave and the work of Jane Cornwell.

We hold it all in our hands,
the greatest and the least,

watch the glaciers melt,
cliffs crumble into the sea,

mine shafts delving deep into the earth’s entrails,
the liposuction of bloody minerals, until

we cave in our own honeycombings,
sucked back into the molten darkness.

The sky screams, and life slips
like water through our fingers,

while in his sea cave, the horse god
nods his head sadly and closes the door.

-Jane Dougherty

Is Night

in this warm no way out. I sniff strange. Drowsed
I make dead then top heat dissipates
into day. I stare into two large housed
berries above two black holes that inflate

deflate, inhale, exhale, shiver long thin strands
inside them. A cavern below them opens
and from it a sound so loud my hairs stand
up. Two more massive berries I see happen

come closer to me. They have a cave, too
whose sound is higher pitched than the other.
The heat returns night, then day again too.
The warmth lifts me into the grasses cover.

We need strangeness, newness to be alive.
Unexpected, scary, constant revive.

-Paul Brookes

Bios and Links

-John Law

“Am 68. Live in Mexborough. Retired teacher. Artist; musician; poet. Recently included in ‘Viral Verses’ poetry volume. Married. 2 kids; 3 grandkids.”

-Jane Cornwell

likes drawing and painting children, animals, landscapes and food. She specialises in watercolour, mixed media, coloured pencil, lino cut and print, textile design. Jane can help you out with adobe indesign for your layout needs, photoshop and adobe illustrator. She graduated with a ba(hons) design from Glasgow School of art, age 20.

She has exhibited with the rsw at the national gallery of scotland, SSA, Knock Castle Gallery, Glasgow Group, Paisley Art Institute, MacMillan Exhibition at Bonhams, Edinburgh, The House For An Art Lover, Pittenweem Arts Festival, Compass Gallery, The Revive Show, East Linton Art Exhibition and Strathkelvin Annual Art Exhibition.

Her website is: https://www.janecornwell.co.uk/

-Kerfe Roig

A resident of New York City, Kerfe Roig enjoys transforming words and images into something new.  Her poetry and art have been featured online by Right Hand Pointing, Silver Birch Press, Yellow Chair Review, The song is…, Pure Haiku, Visual Verse, The Light Ekphrastic, Scribe Base, The Zen Space, and The Wild Word, and published in Ella@100, Incandescent Mind, Pea River Journal, Fiction International: Fool, Noctua Review, The Raw Art Review, and several Nature Inspired anthologies. Follow her explorations on her blogs, https://methodtwomadness.wordpress.com/  (which she does with her friend Nina), and https://kblog.blog/, and see more of her work on her website http://kerferoig.com/

-Tim Fellows

 is a poet and writer from Chesterfield whose poetry is heavily influenced by his background in the Derbyshire coalfields – family, mining, politics, and that mix of industry and countryside that so many mining areas had. People can email me at timothyjfellows@gmail.com for a copy of the pamphlet or visit http://timfellows13.blogspot.com for recent poems

-Jayaprakash Satyamurthy

is a writer based in Bangalore, India. His books include the novella Strength Of Water (2019) and the poetry collection Broken Cup (2020). He used to write horror, but now it’s anyone’s guess. 

-Anjum Wasim Dar

Born in Srinagar (Indian Occupied )Kashmir,Migrant Pakistani.Educated at St Anne’s Presentation Convent Rawalpindi. MA in English MA in History ( Ancient Indo-Pak Elective) CPE Cert.of Proficiency in English Cambridge UK. -Dip.TEFL AIOU Open Uni. Islamabad Pakistan.Writing poems articles and stories since 1980.Published Poet.Awarded Poet of Merit Bronze Medal 2000 USA .Worked as Creative Writer Teacher Trainer. Educational Consultant by Profession.Published http://Poet.Author of 3 Adventure Novels (Series) 7 Times Winner NANOWRIMO 2011- 2019.

-Jane Dougherty

writes novels, short stories and lots of poems. Among her publications is her first chapbook of poetry, thicker than water. She is also a regular contributor to Visual Verse and the Ekphrastic Review. You can find her on twitter @MJDougherty33 and on her blog https://janedougherty.wordpress.com/

-Redcat

RedCat’s love for music and dance sings clearly in The Poet’s Symphony (Raw Earth Ink, 2020). Passion for rhythms and rhymes, syllabic feets and metres. All born out of childhood and adolescence spent reading, singing, dancing and acting.

Her writing spans love, life, mythology, environment, depression and surviving trauma.

Originally from the deep woods, this fiery redhead now makes home in Stockholm, Sweden, where you might normally run into her dancing the night away in one of the city’s techno clubs.

Read more at redcat.wordpress.com

-Merril D Smith

is a historian and poet. She lives in southern New Jersey, where she is inspired by her walks along the Delaware River. She’s the author of several books on history, gender, and sexuality. Her poetry has been published in journals and anthologies, including Black Bough Poetry, Nightingale and Sparrow, Anti-Heroin Chic, and Fevers of the Mind.

-Tony Walker

By day Tony climbs the greasy pole of clinical hierarchy. Not yet at the top but high enough to feel the pole sway and have his grip challenged by the envious wind of achievement. Looking down on the pates and gazes of his own history, at times he feels dizzy with lonely pride. By night he takes solace, swapping scalpel for scripts and begins his training and climbing again, in the creative world of writing. His writing is an attempt to unify the twenty-four hours. @surgicalscribe seeks to connect the clinical and creative arts of surgery, science and writing. Hoping to do for medicine and surgery through creative writing what Prof Cox has done for physics with television.

So, he practices his art.

-Ankh Spice

 is a sea-obsessed poet from Aotearoa. His work has been widely published internationally, in print and online, and has twice been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. He’s a co-editor at Ice Floe Press and a poetry contributing editor at Barren Magazine. You’ll find him and a lot of sea photography on Twitter @SeaGoatScreams or on Facebook @AnkhSpiceSeaGoatScreamsPoetry.

-Simon Williams

lives and works in Edinburgh, where running clears his head and creates space for ideas. He publishes short stories and poems on www.simonsalento.com

-Anne Arbuthnot

·  Poet, Writer, Author, Small Press Publisher/Editor, Mentor/Tutor/Coach

Living a rural life, inspired and surrounded by nature, pondering and writing about life’s many puzzles and complexities, a gentle activist.

·  2008 – current Mansfield A&P Show poetry judge

·  2010 Hay Festival Most Beautiful Tweet shortlist

·  2018 Mansfield Haiku on the Footpath competition winner

·  2020 Mansfield Bushy Tales Poetry Award winner “Musing in the time of Covid”

·  2020 Mansfield Bushy Tales Chapbook contributor

Links

·  Twitter @gentleanne

-Frank Colley

Frank has been writing poems for many years and is a founder member of Mexborough Read to Write group facilitated by Ian Park. His knowledge and skill have increased since being an active member of the group. He had one pamphlet to his name “ Nantcol Sonnets”  9 sonnets one per day of a week camping in wet and windy Wales. (Available on eBay). He has a second pamphlet awaiting publication “The Story of Soldier A” charting his time in the Army and  its aftermath.

Paul Brookes

Paul is a shop assistant, who lives in a cat house full of teddy bears. His first play was performed at The Gulbenkian Theatre, Hull.  His chapbooks include The Fabulous Invention Of Barnsley, (Dearne Community Arts, 1993). The Headpoke and Firewedding (Alien Buddha Press, 2017), A World Where and She Needs That Edge (Nixes Mate Press, 2017, 2018) The Spermbot Blues (OpPRESS, 2017), Port Of Souls (Alien Buddha Press, 2018), Please Take Change (Cyberwit.net, 2018), Stubborn Sod, with Marcel Herms  (artist) (Alien Buddha Press, 2019), As Folk Over Yonder ( Afterworld Books, 2019). Forthcoming Khoshhali with Hiva Moazed (artist), Our Ghost’s Holiday (Final book of threesome “A Pagan’s Year”) . He is a contributing writer of Literati Magazine and Editor of Wombwell Rainbow Interviews. Had work broadcast on BBC Radio 3 The Verb and videos of his Self Isolation sonnet sequence featured by Barnsley Museums and Hear My Voice Barnsley. He also does photography commissions and his family history articles have appeared in The Liverpool Family History magazine.