Day Twenty-Three

-Anjum Wasim Dar – Drink

-Gaynor Kane – GK23 Mussenden Temple in photography crystal ball

-John Phandal Law

These dark days (AWD23)

These dark days
I see no beacon on the rocky shore
no light at tunnels’ end

beneath the fields
forced with crops
the soil is silent.

I see the glass half-empty
where the wind whistles no turnstones
the only flood is blood

and in this tormented sky
of cold cloud cross-hatched with rain
where are the swallows?

-Jane Dougherty

23. [Drink AWD23]

Ghost goblet somewhere out of sight floating like a thirst close my eyes to taste you don’t know might you kill me might you soothe this knap of velvet brushed against rasp of a serrated blade might you be here a ghost of all I drink upon and yet when I place you to the lips of my heart two becoming the the same thing they always were drink and spit drink

-Math Jones

A Toast
to AWD 23 Drink

She said No to an open marriage,
so he opened the bottle. Stopped talking
no matter how hard she tried to get
Hello! How was your day?

He started with coffee.
Lots of sugar and cream. Just sat
around all day. By the time she arrived home,
he’d had a few beers.

How’s everything? You OK? She’d ask.

One day, he replied. Called her outside.
Ordered her to move the air conditioner.
I can’t move that thing! She said.
Move it, dammit! Move it, you bitch!

Another time, his drunken bullying forced her
to turn onto an interstate no-exit ramp
into oncoming traffic.

He told the counselor
that the problem with the marriage
was that she talked
too much.

Yes, she did. Called her mom,
her sisters, anyone who’d listen
and just cry and cry –

until one day, she said, Leave!
Take your beers. Your cigarettes.
Your abuse. This is my house!
You can no longer harm me!

Let’s toast to that!

-Barbara Leonhard

Wine
Wine transports you to places
seen and unseen. The castles
of the Rhine, the banks of the Loire,
the hills of Spain, the broad plains
of Marlborough.

Sun. Rain. Vine. Grape.

Fermenting and aging in cellars.
Waiting for the turn of cap or cork,
the sound of pouring liquid.
The swirl of the glass.
Memories and wishes.

-Tim Fellows

23 JPL
The wreck of the Moskva becomes Kintsugi for a moment
when it is declared a UNESCO site of Cultural Heritage for Ukraine

Whenever we’d pass salvage yards, she’d
say: Who’s going to tidy this mess up? When
it’s done, and the thing-crushers, breakers
and compactors have shut down – mangled chunks
of this, shattered shards of that, splinters of lives
or treasures hoarded in hope – who will put
the fractured chunks together again, pick up
the last screw stuck in mud to make
things neat? Can you mend the disembodied
or is your best hope mosaic?

-Lesley James

GK23

The sun hides its face
From the ruins on the cliff
No one cares

Carrie Ann Golden

Inspired by AWD23 and JPL23

Yes, existence may seem too complicated
Some days
Too multi-faceted – more ways of going wrong
Than right
But you wouldn’t want a two-dimensional life, let’s
Face it
Most knots can be unravelled given time and
Patience
So sit around a table with those you trust
And talk

-Peter A.

-Lesley Curwen

 

What I can see, said the child (JPL 23)

I see stars, their eyes like triangles
the pillars of gondolas, herringbone
floors, nursery tiles, scraps of flags
spotty dogs, spiral shells, bridges
to heaven, honeycomb cells, flower
stamens, a rising sun, viking shields
yellow brick road, comet dust, roman
mosaics, arrows pointing both ways

-Lesley Curwen

Crystal Ball
After Mussenden Temple GK23

She shows me her a crystal ball
making upside-down images
of things right in front of it
and I feel so lost and confused I cant even…

She says ‘isn’t refraction amazing’
and I say I hate it.
She tries to explain how it works
and I just burn up

/ acid reflux / my primal reflex /
fight or flight / panic attack /
hammer / luddite / fight and flight /
no crystal ball / just broken glass /

She says ‘but I love it’
I tell her ‘it’s the ball or me’.
She shrugs indifferently and says ‘it’s ok’.
Turns out she didn’t see a future for us anyway.

-Jamie Woods

Casandra (Inspired by all three artworks)

No one listens,
none believe
my auguries, the dreams
in crystal, upside-down

temples, cities, walls atilt,
a second away from tumbling
into the sea

as they toast from the precipice
at sunset, the sky blood-red
and the wine,
spilled

as I tremble, a cup plunges into the sea–

the fish swim on unconcerned–
I see their eyes, their eyes
meet mine
eyes on eyes

as I fall
in a vision.

But I am a woman, chattel,
a prize of war.

No one listens

-Merril D Smith

Bios And Links

-John Phandal Law

is 68. Lives in Mexborough. Retired teacher. Artist; musician; poet. Recently included in ‘Viral Verses‘ poetry volume. Married. 2 kids; 3 grandkids

-Gaynor Kane

Gaynor Kane lives in Belfast, Northern Ireland, where she is a part-time creative, involved in the local arts scene. She writes poetry and is an amateur artist and photographer. In all her creative activities she is looking to capture moments that might otherwise be missed. Discover more at gaynorkane.com

Twitter @gaynorkane

Facebook @gaynorkanepoet

Instagram @gaynorkanepoet

-Anjum Wasim Dar

started drawing at St Anne’s Presentation Convent High School, Rawalpindi.
Drawing was taught as a Core subject from  Kindergarten.
Anjum learnt the  skill of  Still Life, Sketching,  Landscape Drawing, Coloring  and Shading  She recalled the scented wax crayons and black  paper sketch books vividly.

Subject of Fine Arts at Intermediate level at Govt.College for Women Rawalpindi,   was stopped by the Indo Pak War of 1965. Anjum continued her passion for art privately.
Her job as a Teacher Instructor allowed her to pursue Art work designing and preparing  Thematic Bulletin Boards and Low cost teaching Aids with the Fauji Foundation Teacher’s Training Institute Rawalpindi. www.faujifoundation.org.
This won her the National Education Award 1998.
 
Completing  a Course in Graphic Designing  at NICON Academy Rawalpindi , Anjum began working as a Digital Artist, On Line, registered her Own Firm CER Creative Education Resources 2004 and is a Member of DRN Drawing Research Network UK  and www.bigdraw.org.uk
https://www.lboro.ac.uk/research/tracey/drn/
 https://sites.google.com/site/cerprofessionaldevelopment/
With her artistic skills she plans and conducts “Environment Awareness Workshops for Children” and is a member of www.unep.org and www.earthday.org
CER Participated in World Environment Day and Earth Day Programs 2011-2013
“Face of Climate Change”
Anjum  loves Nature, landscapes and abstract imagery. Works with pencils, crayons and  the Software ArtRage 2.0  and MyPaint.

Anjum Wasim Dar’s Art Portfolio  can be accessed  here:

https://www.artwanted.com/anjuartwriter/gallery/

-Merril D. Smith

lives in southern New Jersey near the Delaware River. Her poetry has been published in several poetry journals and anthologies, including Black Bough Poetry, Anti-Heroin Chic,  Fevers of the Mind, and Nightingale and Sparrow. Her first full-length poetry collection, River Ghosts, is forthcoming from Nightingale & Sparrow Press.  Twitter: @merril_mds  Instagram: mdsmithnj  Website/blog: merrildsmith.com

–Barbara Leonhard’s

work appears in various online and print publications. She earned both third place and honorary mention for two poems in Well Versed 2021. She is currently writing her first poetry collection about her relationship with her mother, who suffered from Alzheimer’s. From that memoir collection, her poem “Marie Kindo Cleans My Purse at Starbucks” was voted Spillwords Publication of the Month of January and February 2022. Barbara was also voted Spillwords Author of the Month of October 2021 and recognized as a Spillwords Socialite of the Year in 2021. You can follow her on WordPress at https://www.extraordinarysunshineweaver.blog.

-Lesley James(she/her)

is a teacher and writer. She was shortlisted for Love Reading UK’s 2022 Very Short Story Award. Featured flash can be found in The Broken Spine, FullHouseLitMag and RoiFaineant. Kathryn O’Driscoll selected her poem Empty for Full House’s 2021 mental health live reading and forthcoming podcast. Brian Moses, The Dirigible Balloon and Parakeet Magazine have published some of her writing for children.

-Lynne Jensen Lampe

has poems in or forthcoming from Figure 1, Olney Magazine, Yemassee, Moist Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. Also to come is her chapbook Talk Smack to a Hurricane (Ice Floe Press, 2022) about mothers, daughters, and mental illness. She was a 2020 Red Wheelbarrow Poetry Prize finalist. Born in Newfoundland and raised in the Deep South, she lives in mid-Missouri where she edits academic books and journals. Visit her at https://lynnejensenlampe.com. Twitter: @LJensenLampe.

-Math Jones

is London-born, but is now based in Oxford. He has two books published: Sabrina Bridge, a poetry collection, from Black Pear Press (2017), and The Knotsman, a collection of verse, rhyme, prose and poetic monologue, which tell of the life and times of a C17th cunning-man. Much of his verse comes out of mythology and folklore: encounters with the uncanny and unseen. Also, as words written for Pagan ritual or as praise poems for a multitude of goddesses and gods. He is a trained actor and performs his poems widely.

-Caroline Johnstone

is an author and poet from Northern Ireland now living in Scotland. She has been published widely including Poetry Scotland, The Blue Nib and Marble Poetry. She loves spending time with her grandchildren, curling up with a good book and champagne or cocktails in no particular order. 

-Lesley Curwen

is a poet and sailor living in Plymouth. She often writes about loss, rescues and the sea.

Her work has been published in anthologies from Arachne Press, Nine Pens, Quay Words, Slate, snakeskin, and soon by BrokenSpine and Broken Sleep.  

Her poetic relationship with sound has been helped by her work as a BBC broadcaster, editing words on screen.

-Carrie Ann Golden

is from the mystical Adirondack Mountains now living on a farmstead in the Red River Valley of North Dakota (USA). She writes dark fiction and poetry. A Deafblind, her work has been published in places such as GFT Press, Doll Hospital Journal, The Hungry Chimera, Asylum Ink, Piker Press, Edify Fiction and others. You can find her on her writing blog as well as Medium and Twitter.  

-Jen Feroze

lives by the sea in Essex with her husband and two small children. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in a variety of publications including Ink Sweat & Tears, Chestnut Review, Atrium and The Madrigal. Her first collection, The Colour of Hope, was published in 2020 and she’s currently working on a chapbook of poems about early motherhood. 

-Paul Brookes

is a shop asst in a supermarket. Lives in a cat house full of teddy bears. First play performed at The Gulbenkian Theatre, Hull.  His chapbooks include The Fabulous Invention Of Barnsley, (Dearne Community Arts, 1993). A World Where and She Needs That Edge (Nixes Mate Press, 2017, 2018) The Spermbot Blues (OpPRESS, 2017), Please Take Change (Cyberwit.net, 2018), As Folk Over Yonder ( Afterworld Books, 2019). He is a contributing writer of Literati Magazine and Editor of Wombwell Rainbow Interviews, book reviews and  challenges. 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. Most recent is a poetry collaboration with artworker Jane Cornwell: “Wonderland in Alice, plus other ways of seeing”, (JCStudio Press, 2021)

Day Twenty-Two

-John Phandal Law

-Anjum Wasim Dar – Peace

-Gaynor Kane – mixed medium abstract garden

-Jane Dougherty

It Starts with One
to AWD-22 Peace

Arid tongues,
Parched by fury,
Cannot sing “Imagine”.

One cannot grow an Eden
If the soil is tilled
By bullets.

Peace is impossible
When the inner smile
Smirks.

-Barbara Leonhard

22. [Peace AWD22]

This will be a difficult to write.
Needed to allow a touch.
Has to let a settle down.
Alightment. There.
Cannot put my legs. Walk
such a pasture. Hear
to the music. Help. Hand
needs taking and another
to the shoulder that I turn to,
burn to, fling so many hurts
away –only exhaustion of grief.
Only when I listen to the growing again,
and always it’s a difficult to write.

-Math Jones

Who Said Your Mother Wants a Party? (AWD21 + GK21)

Earth Day—tie-dye,
patchouli, and a new band
every hour from noon to five.
Drum circle in the parking lot,
children blowing bubbles
near the stream. Booths line
both sides of the street
for blocks and the whole
city celebrates spring.
Hundreds of people sprawl
on new grass, pile plastic
bottles into recycle bins,
buy sundresses made in sweatshops.

 

For those who seek
solitude, a forest
of oaks and sycamores,
may apples, trillium, and
sweet william. Fickle trails
that flirt with sun and rain.
Slick stones that almost
bridge the creek. Cardinals
whistle and chirp. Spend
quality time with your
mother, only fifteen
miles from town.
Most hikers burn
fossil fuels to get there,
clomp on new grass.

Respect your mother,
they say. But how?

-Lynne Jensen Lampe

-Tim Fellows

In For Four, Out For Eight
After Anjum Wasim Dar

This morning dawns
in colour, and the bird

in my chest
has been set free.

Slightly stunned, I watch
as it embroiders the sky

with song, and wonder
if I’ll miss its wingbeats.

-Jen Feroze

Both AWD22-Peace and GK22-mixed media

So enraged and saddened are we in these difficult times
It feels sinful for poets to produce indulgent rhymes
But these images that inebriate my eyes and mind –
Of fairy woods and meadow flower music all combined –
Unlock emotions and chemical reactions Nature-designed
To rock me in their summer notes – make my sad soul find
A colour-coded rare content, permission to unwind —
Suspicion-free to welcome love and joy both unconfined

-Peter A.

 

Monsieur Qui in the Garden (Inspired by all three images)

There’s a ghost in the garden–
a man with a hat from a century ago,
sitting as if for a portrait–
(I think he’s French.)

He seems content,
as he sits and smokes
his hand-rolled cigarette,
the scent drifts over the first roses

as real as this serene garden
of fall fruit and spring flowers,
a fantasy
as elusive as peace.

-Merril D. Smith

-Beth Brooke

 

The Insignia (JPL22)

An elder woman and a boy
Roamed through the rumbles
Once their home
She spied something among the ruins
And picked it up
What’s that, Baba? The boy asked
The woman paused, tears filled her eyes
Mij Tato. She gently touched the piece of torn fabric
An insignia my papa wore during the invasion years ago.
Your da was a soldier? The boy looked up at her
Yes, my boy – he fought against Rosiya.

She caressed the cloth

He died defending Mariupol – ‘tis all I’ve left of him

With her gaze on the boy, she held out the patch
He’d want you to have this
The boy took it from her trembling hand
He studied the badge for a long time
Baba? Is war like tornadoes?
The woman glanced at the debris
No, tornadoes are natural occurrences
Wars are evil, waged by evil men
What you hold in your hands – the blood your see on it
Shed in the hands of such men
Your freedom came at a high, high cost my dear boy
And I pray it’s a price you never ever have to pay
She rested a hand on his head
Slava Ukraini. She whispered with a smile

-Carrie Ann Golden

22 JPL

Today, in a steelworks, liberation looks like:
sulphurous explosions in the mid-ground
mortar shocks left and right
from a distance, a yellow dream of dancing
figures, emerging from starved catacombs into corridors.
A last stand of the barricaded,
an obliterated city,
liberation looks like fighting.

-Lesley James

 

-Jamie Woods

Bios And Links

-John Phandal Law

is 68. Lives in Mexborough. Retired teacher. Artist; musician; poet. Recently included in ‘Viral Verses‘ poetry volume. Married. 2 kids; 3 grandkids

-Gaynor Kane

Gaynor Kane lives in Belfast, Northern Ireland, where she is a part-time creative, involved in the local arts scene. She writes poetry and is an amateur artist and photographer. In all her creative activities she is looking to capture moments that might otherwise be missed. Discover more at gaynorkane.com

Twitter @gaynorkane

Facebook @gaynorkanepoet

Instagram @gaynorkanepoet

-Anjum Wasim Dar

started drawing at St Anne’s Presentation Convent High School, Rawalpindi.
Drawing was taught as a Core subject from  Kindergarten.
Anjum learnt the  skill of  Still Life, Sketching,  Landscape Drawing, Coloring  and Shading  She recalled the scented wax crayons and black  paper sketch books vividly.

Subject of Fine Arts at Intermediate level at Govt.College for Women Rawalpindi,   was stopped by the Indo Pak War of 1965. Anjum continued her passion for art privately.
Her job as a Teacher Instructor allowed her to pursue Art work designing and preparing  Thematic Bulletin Boards and Low cost teaching Aids with the Fauji Foundation Teacher’s Training Institute Rawalpindi. www.faujifoundation.org.
This won her the National Education Award 1998.
 
Completing  a Course in Graphic Designing  at NICON Academy Rawalpindi , Anjum began working as a Digital Artist, On Line, registered her Own Firm CER Creative Education Resources 2004 and is a Member of DRN Drawing Research Network UK  and www.bigdraw.org.uk
https://www.lboro.ac.uk/research/tracey/drn/
 https://sites.google.com/site/cerprofessionaldevelopment/
With her artistic skills she plans and conducts “Environment Awareness Workshops for Children” and is a member of www.unep.org and www.earthday.org
CER Participated in World Environment Day and Earth Day Programs 2011-2013
“Face of Climate Change”
Anjum  loves Nature, landscapes and abstract imagery. Works with pencils, crayons and  the Software ArtRage 2.0  and MyPaint.

Anjum Wasim Dar’s Art Portfolio  can be accessed  here:

https://www.artwanted.com/anjuartwriter/gallery/

-Merril D. Smith

lives in southern New Jersey near the Delaware River. Her poetry has been published in several poetry journals and anthologies, including Black Bough Poetry, Anti-Heroin Chic,  Fevers of the Mind, and Nightingale and Sparrow. Her first full-length poetry collection, River Ghosts, is forthcoming from Nightingale & Sparrow Press.  Twitter: @merril_mds  Instagram: mdsmithnj  Website/blog: merrildsmith.com

-Lesley James(she/her)

is a teacher and writer. She was shortlisted for Love Reading UK’s 2022 Very Short Story Award. Featured flash can be found in The Broken Spine, FullHouseLitMag and RoiFaineant. Kathryn O’Driscoll selected her poem Empty for Full House’s 2021 mental health live reading and forthcoming podcast. Brian Moses, The Dirigible Balloon and Parakeet Magazine have published some of her writing for children.

-Lynne Jensen Lampe

has poems in or forthcoming from Figure 1, Olney Magazine, Yemassee, Moist Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. Also to come is her chapbook Talk Smack to a Hurricane (Ice Floe Press, 2022) about mothers, daughters, and mental illness. She was a 2020 Red Wheelbarrow Poetry Prize finalist. Born in Newfoundland and raised in the Deep South, she lives in mid-Missouri where she edits academic books and journals. Visit her at https://lynnejensenlampe.com. Twitter: @LJensenLampe.

-Math Jones

is London-born, but is now based in Oxford. He has two books published: Sabrina Bridge, a poetry collection, from Black Pear Press (2017), and The Knotsman, a collection of verse, rhyme, prose and poetic monologue, which tell of the life and times of a C17th cunning-man. Much of his verse comes out of mythology and folklore: encounters with the uncanny and unseen. Also, as words written for Pagan ritual or as praise poems for a multitude of goddesses and gods. He is a trained actor and performs his poems widely.

-Caroline Johnstone

is an author and poet from Northern Ireland now living in Scotland. She has been published widely including Poetry Scotland, The Blue Nib and Marble Poetry. She loves spending time with her grandchildren, curling up with a good book and champagne or cocktails in no particular order. 

-Lesley Curwen

is a poet and sailor living in Plymouth. She often writes about loss, rescues and the sea.

Her work has been published in anthologies from Arachne Press, Nine Pens, Quay Words, Slate, snakeskin, and soon by BrokenSpine and Broken Sleep.  

Her poetic relationship with sound has been helped by her work as a BBC broadcaster, editing words on screen.

-Carrie Ann Golden

is from the mystical Adirondack Mountains now living on a farmstead in the Red River Valley of North Dakota (USA). She writes dark fiction and poetry. A Deafblind, her work has been published in places such as GFT Press, Doll Hospital Journal, The Hungry Chimera, Asylum Ink, Piker Press, Edify Fiction and others. You can find her on her writing blog as well as Medium and Twitter.  

-Jen Feroze

lives by the sea in Essex with her husband and two small children. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in a variety of publications including Ink Sweat & Tears, Chestnut Review, Atrium and The Madrigal. Her first collection, The Colour of Hope, was published in 2020 and she’s currently working on a chapbook of poems about early motherhood. 

-Paul Brookes

is a shop asst in a supermarket. Lives in a cat house full of teddy bears. First play performed at The Gulbenkian Theatre, Hull.  His chapbooks include The Fabulous Invention Of Barnsley, (Dearne Community Arts, 1993). A World Where and She Needs That Edge (Nixes Mate Press, 2017, 2018) The Spermbot Blues (OpPRESS, 2017), Please Take Change (Cyberwit.net, 2018), As Folk Over Yonder ( Afterworld Books, 2019). He is a contributing writer of Literati Magazine and Editor of Wombwell Rainbow Interviews, book reviews and  challenges. 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. Most recent is a poetry collaboration with artworker Jane Cornwell: “Wonderland in Alice, plus other ways of seeing”, (JCStudio Press, 2021)

#WorldCurlewDay

When Curlews Cry
They don’t stay long,
these longed-for guests,
split their hurried time
between fields and firth.

Strike frost, lift sand—
for old barley, earthworms, crabs.
Within a day or two, these rarities
will have flown.

Those wings we long to touch,
and us—lost to winter storms.

-Lynn Valentine

Our Home

-Paul Brookes

Bios and Links

-Lynn Valentine

lives in the Scottish Highlands. She had her debut collection, Life’s Stink and Honey, published by Cinnamon Press in 2022, after winning the Cinnamon Literature Award in 2020. Lynn’s Scots language pamphlet, A Glimmer o Stars, was published by Hedgehog Poetry Press in 2021, after winning their dialect competition. She is widely published and was runner up in the Scots category of the Wigtown Poetry Prize in 2021.  The Scottish Poetry Library chose one of her poems in their selection of best Scottish poems 2021. She is currently being mentored by Niall Campbell after winning a place on his mentoring scheme in memory of the poet Roddy Lumsden.

Day Twenty-one

-Gaynor Kane – Love Hearts

-Anjum Wasim Dar – Double

-John Phandal Law

Garden Party (AWD21)

Radishes.
Rapphanus raphannistrum.
Rapture. French breakfast
radishes, sliced and
sauteed in butter and salt.
Oblong, magenta and white.
Or Easter egg radishes, round
and wrapped in pink, purple,
red, yellow. Sparklers and
Cherry Belles tumble
the produce case, waiting
for a snip and crunch. An
unassuming bit of glamour
underground. Party time
they lose flesh to knives.
linger on deli trays,
trade natural beauty
for commercial appeal.

—Lynne Jensen Lampe
.

GK21

So often the cliché
conceals a truth so
profound it exists in
plain sight but is not
seen

Search classic Stax
from the late Sixties
you’ll find this track;
just look for William
Bell’s

title, which expresses
what the brave bereft
have learned A Smile
Can’t Hide (A Broken
Heart)

-Peter A.

GK21 Love hearts

Largs Fun-fair 1963

flesh-coloured spex & see-through mac
I flirt with Timmy the goofy lad
who judders around the roundabout
in pouring rain with toothy pout

offers me soggy love-hearts

hair all plastered to streaming face
braces bared in the jerky chase
even though he resembles a frog
we chew our hearts, lean in to snog

-Lesley Curwen

Smile
I have always loved
watching children force a smile
for the camera.
Half grimacing, sometimes
with slightly upturned mouth,
sometimes not.

Or not showing teeth at all,
perhaps embarrassed
by Tooth Fairy gaps.

More often than not
seen in overpriced school photos.

-Tim Fellows

21 GK

In the sweetness of Love Hearts, palest purple hearts,
one an indictment to be happy, orders if you like,
the other a cartoon counterpoint of straight-mouthed
resignation. But which heart tastes the sweeter?
Choose one for a friend – which fits the bill?
What message do they need (or want) to hear?
No matter. Equal sour-sweet fizz on the tongue
if you choose right or wrong.
Choosing friendship is a bitter pill.

-Lesley James

21. [Double AWD20]

I am pinching my self blush-hard
To bring me up as red as you,
Underneath the table. Polishing,

Polishing so bright, I’m seen
As your reflection, as your dopple-
Ganger. How can I scratch

Another size into the air I never
Was. Scritching all my variation,
Can I not just be your double?

-Math Jones

Star-Crossed
To GK 21 Love_hearts and AWD 21 Double

A girl is misled to seek rescue
From her Prince Charming,
Her soul mate, protector.
He gazes into her eyes,
Looking for himself, or possibly
His mother.
She bends her smile to reflect his, or possibly
Her father’s.
Their steed, bloodied
By the weight of baggage
Stuffed with cracked mirrors.

-Barbara Leonhard

One

Light lapping the darkness,
unpeeling the pith from the fruit,
the sorrow behind the smile,

the underbellies
and shadows between sunbeams,
are all parts of the round whole,
the casing of the hole,
the velvet casket where treasure lies.

The pearl in the rugged oyster,
fox eyes in the dark,
kite wings tilting with the wind,
rose petals falling after rain,

all that flies and creeps,
runs, streams or whispers
among the leaves and upon the strand
is life.

-Jane Dougherty

Retirement
after JPL21

In my thirties
I started planning for retirement,
stuffing loose change into ISAs and pensions
so when I get old
we’ll live our days out
in a little white cottage.
Swaying together, greying, peacefully
watching waves balance the shore
restoring stolen sands,
washing up seaweed and crabs.
In my forties it changed overnight
from ‘when I get old’ to ‘if’.
Now I’m considering
splashing the lot
on a fortnight in Florida
with the kids.

-Jamie Woods

 

I Am

(Inspired by all three images)

I am Janus-faced
smiling as I frown
ending a job, just
as I begin it

in a wave of motion, I swell,
an ebb and flow, a tide of becoming
a current of loss.

I am a chimera, the sea flows
through my veins, tiny salt crystals—
like stars–float
as my heart beats a tattoo,

wake and sleep, hope and despair.

I am time and timeless
a ripe apple and a seed newly planted
both here, both gone.

-Merril D. Smith

AWD21

A mirror reflects
Duality
That exists in each
Reality
Tends to bring with it
Catastrophe
Increased by tenfold
Insanity!

-Carrie Ann Golden

Bios And Links

-John Phandal Law

is 68. Lives in Mexborough. Retired teacher. Artist; musician; poet. Recently included in ‘Viral Verses‘ poetry volume. Married. 2 kids; 3 grandkids

-Gaynor Kane

Gaynor Kane lives in Belfast, Northern Ireland, where she is a part-time creative, involved in the local arts scene. She writes poetry and is an amateur artist and photographer. In all her creative activities she is looking to capture moments that might otherwise be missed. Discover more at gaynorkane.com

Twitter @gaynorkane

Facebook @gaynorkanepoet

Instagram @gaynorkanepoet

-Anjum Wasim Dar

started drawing at St Anne’s Presentation Convent High School, Rawalpindi.
Drawing was taught as a Core subject from  Kindergarten.
Anjum learnt the  skill of  Still Life, Sketching,  Landscape Drawing, Coloring  and Shading  She recalled the scented wax crayons and black  paper sketch books vividly.

Subject of Fine Arts at Intermediate level at Govt.College for Women Rawalpindi,   was stopped by the Indo Pak War of 1965. Anjum continued her passion for art privately.
Her job as a Teacher Instructor allowed her to pursue Art work designing and preparing  Thematic Bulletin Boards and Low cost teaching Aids with the Fauji Foundation Teacher’s Training Institute Rawalpindi. www.faujifoundation.org.
This won her the National Education Award 1998.
 
Completing  a Course in Graphic Designing  at NICON Academy Rawalpindi , Anjum began working as a Digital Artist, On Line, registered her Own Firm CER Creative Education Resources 2004 and is a Member of DRN Drawing Research Network UK  and www.bigdraw.org.uk
https://www.lboro.ac.uk/research/tracey/drn/
 https://sites.google.com/site/cerprofessionaldevelopment/
With her artistic skills she plans and conducts “Environment Awareness Workshops for Children” and is a member of www.unep.org and www.earthday.org
CER Participated in World Environment Day and Earth Day Programs 2011-2013
“Face of Climate Change”
Anjum  loves Nature, landscapes and abstract imagery. Works with pencils, crayons and  the Software ArtRage 2.0  and MyPaint.

Anjum Wasim Dar’s Art Portfolio  can be accessed  here:

https://www.artwanted.com/anjuartwriter/gallery/

-Merril D. Smith

lives in southern New Jersey near the Delaware River. Her poetry has been published in several poetry journals and anthologies, including Black Bough Poetry, Anti-Heroin Chic,  Fevers of the Mind, and Nightingale and Sparrow. Her first full-length poetry collection, River Ghosts, is forthcoming from Nightingale & Sparrow Press.  Twitter: @merril_mds  Instagram: mdsmithnj  Website/blog: merrildsmith.com

-Lesley James(she/her)

is a teacher and writer. She was shortlisted for Love Reading UK’s 2022 Very Short Story Award. Featured flash can be found in The Broken Spine, FullHouseLitMag and RoiFaineant. Kathryn O’Driscoll selected her poem Empty for Full House’s 2021 mental health live reading and forthcoming podcast. Brian Moses, The Dirigible Balloon and Parakeet Magazine have published some of her writing for children.

-Lynne Jensen Lampe

has poems in or forthcoming from Figure 1, Olney Magazine, Yemassee, Moist Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. Also to come is her chapbook Talk Smack to a Hurricane (Ice Floe Press, 2022) about mothers, daughters, and mental illness. She was a 2020 Red Wheelbarrow Poetry Prize finalist. Born in Newfoundland and raised in the Deep South, she lives in mid-Missouri where she edits academic books and journals. Visit her at https://lynnejensenlampe.com. Twitter: @LJensenLampe.

-Math Jones

is London-born, but is now based in Oxford. He has two books published: Sabrina Bridge, a poetry collection, from Black Pear Press (2017), and The Knotsman, a collection of verse, rhyme, prose and poetic monologue, which tell of the life and times of a C17th cunning-man. Much of his verse comes out of mythology and folklore: encounters with the uncanny and unseen. Also, as words written for Pagan ritual or as praise poems for a multitude of goddesses and gods. He is a trained actor and performs his poems widely.

-Caroline Johnstone

is an author and poet from Northern Ireland now living in Scotland. She has been published widely including Poetry Scotland, The Blue Nib and Marble Poetry. She loves spending time with her grandchildren, curling up with a good book and champagne or cocktails in no particular order. 

-Lesley Curwen

is a poet and sailor living in Plymouth. She often writes about loss, rescues and the sea.

Her work has been published in anthologies from Arachne Press, Nine Pens, Quay Words, Slate, snakeskin, and soon by BrokenSpine and Broken Sleep.  

Her poetic relationship with sound has been helped by her work as a BBC broadcaster, editing words on screen.

-Carrie Ann Golden

is from the mystical Adirondack Mountains now living on a farmstead in the Red River Valley of North Dakota (USA). She writes dark fiction and poetry. A Deafblind, her work has been published in places such as GFT Press, Doll Hospital Journal, The Hungry Chimera, Asylum Ink, Piker Press, Edify Fiction and others. You can find her on her writing blog as well as Medium and Twitter.  

-Jen Feroze

lives by the sea in Essex with her husband and two small children. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in a variety of publications including Ink Sweat & Tears, Chestnut Review, Atrium and The Madrigal. Her first collection, The Colour of Hope, was published in 2020 and she’s currently working on a chapbook of poems about early motherhood. 

-Paul Brookes

is a shop asst in a supermarket. Lives in a cat house full of teddy bears. First play performed at The Gulbenkian Theatre, Hull.  His chapbooks include The Fabulous Invention Of Barnsley, (Dearne Community Arts, 1993). A World Where and She Needs That Edge (Nixes Mate Press, 2017, 2018) The Spermbot Blues (OpPRESS, 2017), Please Take Change (Cyberwit.net, 2018), As Folk Over Yonder ( Afterworld Books, 2019). He is a contributing writer of Literati Magazine and Editor of Wombwell Rainbow Interviews, book reviews and  challenges. 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. Most recent is a poetry collaboration with artworker Jane Cornwell: “Wonderland in Alice, plus other ways of seeing”, (JCStudio Press, 2021)