AB24

BB24

Dryad (OVP24)- published only on social media

SFM24

Petals

Sara FM24

She loves me, she loves me not.
We planted Forget-Me-Nots on the day we wed.
He loves me, he loves me not.

He loves me, he loves me not.
We spread Rose petals all around our bed.
She loves me, she loves me not.

She loves me, she loves me not.
We grew Ox-Eyed-Daisy around the house.
He loves me, he loves me not.

He loves me, he loves me not.
Soon the pitter-patter of tiny feet.
She loves me, she loves me not.

She loves me, she loves me not.
We called her Rosemary.
He loves me, he loves me not.

What if out love does not last.
What if our love runs out.
She loves me, she loves me not.
He loves me, he loves me not.

Frank Colley

Love

IMAGE SFM24

The ochre of the soil
a fertile place
beneath our feet.

And some fall on stony ground
others nurtured by nature
she is a good mother, Earth.

The flower reaches out
towards the light
pushes down.

Green shoots of spring
turning leaves
into blossom.

Petals tumble down
return to the ground
feeding immortality.

Flowers – a metaphor for life
love never falls far from the tree,
there’s enough for all of us –
it will never run out.

Paul Dyson

Now

Nothing lasts forever,
not roses or trees,
cathedrals, pyramids
or wind-sculpted monuments,
not rivers, not rocks
old as the world, lapped
by the waves’ rough tongues to sand.

Nothing lasts forever,
not sorrow, not love or hatred,
certainly not happiness,
not even pain,

so I will cherish this moment
of soft rain, the black, white and red
rat-a-tat-tat woodpecker in the hornbeam,
the cheery-chappy calling
of the oriole pleased to be home,
because this moment
is all that matters
now.

Jane Dougherty

Robert Frede Kenter

Confounded Sight

Inspired by all 4 images

The flapping flight of damselfly,
a flitting ballet to human views,
but compound eyes, a survivor’s look,
they were here with dinosaurs—

what if we saw as they do,
multi-imaged with iridescent hues,
or if we flew

through space to perch–
each cherry blossom, a universe
of twinkling pollen to a bee–

and what of rivers, or oceans,
do fish tell stories of what they see,

or wonder at the human folly,
the treasures roped-rigged and hauled
from watery depths,
when all we have to do is fall,

un-winged,
into love.

Merril D Smith

Fishing

The cool summer wind
toys with the line, hook and bait;
no fish bite today.

Dragonfly

You catch our eye in summer,
iridescent, flashing, darting lights.
Your thousand eyes,
your two sets of wings performing
aerobatics in the evening sky,
dipping to the water before speeding
you out of our sight.

Tim Fellows

 Every Second Saturday (BB24)

In the redundancy of obsolete industry
the boy dutifully takes the rod from his dad
he baits it with animation
casts without expectation
he worries that if he does catch something good for once
then they’ll be back in the car driving home
the road and radio stealing his father’s attention again

Jamie Woods

Bios and Links

Oormila Vijayakrishnan Prahlad

is an Indian-Australian painter, poet, and improv pianist. She is a self-taught artist who has been painting and exhibiting for over 20 years. Her work has been featured in several journals including Amsterdam Quarterly yearbook, Pithead Chapel, Two Thirds North, Kissing Dynamite Poetry,  and Stonecoast Review. She has been nominated multiple times for the Best of the Net. She lives and works in Sydney on the traditional lands of The Eora Nation.  Find her @oormilaprahlad and www.instagram.com/oormila_paintings

Sara Fatima Mir

Born on the 26th of July, 2007, in Islamabad , Sara Fatima is a Pakistani of Kashmiri origin. Gifted by nature with an inborn aesthetic sense, she is passionate about art. It is not just a hobby for her, rather it is a well settled heart and soul, way of life which inspires her to visualize the fine beauty and form in the world around. She has won numerous art competitions at school level. She is a natural artist and has completed the following two Courses : a) Graphic Designing -2020 b) Resin Art Skills -2022 from the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) Finishing School, Islamabad Capital Territory Pakistan. This learning has further enhanced her artistic skills . International Participation in Art and Poetry Project: Rucksack A Global Poetry Patchwork 2022 A Poetry Project by Ms Antje Stehn of Italy and Mamta Sagar of India. Sara made a Teapot with the help of dried teabags. A requirement .Its image is on display at the Poetry Museum Italy. Sara Fatima Mir believes Art connects people by portraying their lives. Different people, different drawings, different stories. Using all sorts of mediums, she flaunts her amateur talent and aspires to learn more to become the best version of herself. Please Follow her on Instagram @sketchfilez

Beth Brooke

is a Dorset-based poet and her writing is grounded in the Wessex landscape and history. Her debut pamphlet, A Landscape With Birds was published by Hedgehog Poetry in July 2022. Her second pamphlet, Transformations, will be published by Hedgehog next year. The poems are all inspired by the work of Dame Elisabeth Frink, the sculptor and artist.

Aaron Bowker

based in the United States is a super self-critical Virgo, walking a path between worlds while dabbling in art, photography, and poetry. Poems have been featured in Failed Haiku, Cold Moon Journal, The Wombwell Rainbow, and Heterodox Haiku Journal, with art featured in The Hooghly Review, The Wombwell Rainbow, and Black & White Haifa/Haisha. Special thank you to Jerome Berglund for being my mentor and pushing me to limits otherwise unexplored.

Robert Frede Kenter

is a writer, pushcart nominee & visual artist with work in many venues, on line and in print, incl: Storms Journal, Anthropocene, Fevers Of, Acropolis Journal, CutbowQuarterly, Anti-heroin chic and many others, as well as books including EDEN (2021) a visual poetry collection, and Audacity of Form (ice floe press, 2019). Work in anthologies: Book of Penteract (Penteract Press, 2022), and Seeing in Tongues, an anthology forthcoming from Steel Incisors (2023). Robert is publisher & EIC of Ice Floe Press, www.icefloepress.net.

Jamie Woods

Swansea-based Jamie Woods is poet-in-residence at the charity Leukaemia Care. His work has been published in Poetry Wales, Lucent Dreaming, Ink Sweat & Tears and more. Jamie’s debut pamphlet Rebel Blood Cells is out in June, and can be pre-ordered from https://www.punkdust.com/shop
https://www.jamiewoods77.com

Jane Dougherty

lives and works in southwest France. A Pushcart Prize nominee, her poems and stories have been published in magazines and journals including Ogham Stone, the Ekphrastic Review, Black Bough Poetry, ink sweat and tears, Gleam, Nightingale & Sparrow, Green Ink and Brilliant Flash Fiction. She blogs at https://janedougherty.wordpress.com/ Her poetry chapbooks, thicker than water and birds and other feathers were published in October and November 2020.

Paul Dyson

is from Swinton, Rotherham, in the West Riding of Yorkshire.
He says –

“We all have an urge to be creative
whether it’s art, poetry, music . . .
or just putting together flat pack furniture,
being creative keeps us alive and feeling human”

Paul gave up his day job 5 years ago to dabble in art, poetry and music, and hopes the passion in his Art reaches and touches the hearts of fellow humans too.

Merril D. Smith

lives in southern New Jersey near the Delaware River. Her poetry has been published in journals including Black Bough Poetry, Anti-Heroin Chic, Acropolis, and Humana Obscura, and anthologies, such as the recent Our Own Coordinates: Poems about Dementia (Sidhe Press). Her full-length poetry collection, River Ghosts, was published by Nightingale & Sparrow Press, and was a Black Bough Poetry Book of the Month.

Twitter: @merril_mds  Instagram: mdsmithnj  Blog: merrildsmith.org

Tim Fellows

is a writer from Chesterfield in Derbyshire whose ideas are heavily influenced by his background in the local coalfields, where industry and nature lived side by side. His first pamphlet “Heritage” was published in 2019. His poetic influences range from Blake to Owen, Causley to Cooper-Clarke and more recently the idea of imagistic poetry and the work of Spanish poet Miguel Hernandez.

Lynne Jensen Lampe’s

debut collection, Talk Smack to a Hurricane (Ice Floe Press, 2022) concerns mother-daughter relationships, mental illness, and antisemitism. Her poems appear in many journals, including THRUSH, Figure 1, and Yemassee. A finalist for the 2020 Red Wheelbarrow Poetry Prize, she edits academic research in mid-Missouri, where she lives with her husband and two dogs. Visit her at https://lynnejensenlampe.com; on Twitter/Spoutible @LJensenLampe; or Instagram @lynnejensenlampe.

Frank Colley

lives in South Yorkshire and has been writing poetry all his life. He is an active member of the Read to Write Group and has performed his poems at a wide variety of venues including CAST in Doncaster. His poems have appeared in several anthologies.
He is an admirer of Edward Thomas. His collection “The Story of Soldier A” was published by Glass Head Press in 2022. His self published pamphlet “The Nantcol Sonnets” both are available on eBay.

Kushal Poddar

The author of ‘Postmarked Quarantine’ has eight books to his credit. He is a journalist, father, and the editor of ‘Words Surfacing’. His works have been translated into twelve languages.

Twitter- https://twitter.com/Kushalpoe