Ross Vassilev- A Poem

the ride

it's slow walking

when yr hands are cuffed behind yr back

and even yr ankles are cuffed together

the blonde policewoman was nice enough

making sure I didn't bang my head on the roof

of the squad car as I got in

I wanted to compliment her

on her big round beautiful ass

but I thought better of it

it was a hot summer night

hot in the back of the squad car too

I remembered the idea

that the whole world is only a dream

but the handcuffs and anklecuffs were real enough

as I watched the full moon rising

through the window of the squad car

I thought about what a million other people

might be doing at that moment

while I was waiting for my ride to begin

at the station

they took away my belt and shoelaces

I found out later that the guy in the next cell

was a co-worker I barely knew

it's a small world.

Jennifer Lagier- A Poem

The Wounds She Leaves Behind

It’s Friday night. In preparation, Camille stuffs
swollen 36Cs into a push-up black bra
exposing promises, white breasts suggesting
last supper to a mark ready for resurrection or death.

The silver see-through tunic is cinched
tightly with a wide, silver-studded belt.
Goddess leggings emphasize her ass.
Camille is hungry, looking for meat,
another night of collecting scalps.

She stalks the rich men’s lounge.
Targets at the piano bar take notice,
calculate their chances while
mentally counting the hundreds in their pockets.
Do it now: purchase an opportunity to escape for
an hour or two between rented thighs.

Michael Cluff- A Poem

 Untitled

Dub-dub drama
people fighting
for the farthest
point above the globe,
it must be done
their way
nothing else
is good or graceful
to them.

A slug
or persimmon tree
never worries
the sun and water
of an average day
completes them.

Paul Tristram- A Poem

You’re Just Like Your Father, You Are!

I did not ask for the blood
               that flows through my veins.
Hair colour, skin pigment, bone structure,
                     feet size or hand shape.
Do you think I wanted to inherit his
                            

           nervousness,
                                         depression,
                                         alcoholism
                                         and all the
                                         long bouts of
                                         anger and apathy?
Of course not
                     that would be
                             absolutely ridiculous.
I would have asked for a longer list
                                                    than the one above
and then cranked up the volume of the LOT.
I have ambition,
                          I differ.

© Paul Tristram 2004

Published in Moodswing, Issue Twelve, Summer 2004



Paul Tristram is a Welsh writer who has poems, short stories and sketches published in many publications around the world, he yearns to tattoo porcelain bridesmaids instead of digging empty graves for innocence at midnight, this too may pass, yet.

Donal Mahoney- A Poem

Woodpeckers and Cable News

Simply because anchors 

have little to say means 

they'll keep saying it 

till others believe.

This is America.

They have that right.

Woodpeckers drum 

on maple and oak 

and redwood trees

hours each day 

for insects that 

keep them alive.

Matthews and Hannity

drum on noggins 

at night for converts 

among the faithful

on couches 

and recliners.

They're popes without 

mitre or crozier, preaching 

in America's Square, 

infallible for an hour

while in the forests

woodpeckers sleep.

----------------------------------------

Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, MO

John Grochalski- Three Poems

heavyweights

nobody had a clue
what they were always fighting about

but every so often
they’d slam down their beers
and put up their fists

they’d dance around the small bar
like a couple of worn-out heavyweights

ducking and jabbing
while the rest of us tired bastards
made love to our drinks
and tried to listen to the jukebox

tried to carve out a few hours
before bed and work the next day

of course someone had to shout
knock him the hell out!

but then just like that
the fight would be over
and they’d go back to bullshitting and drinking
like they were the best of friends

it would be sooner rather than later
that one of them would start again

then the fists would come up
and the dance would begin anew

ali and frazier
fred and ginger

they’d sometimes take it into the street
and do their little routine for the stiffs
carrying pizzas and ice cream

a lot of us waited for some citizen to call the cops
and someone in the bar would always shout
for the love of christ, lock the goddamned doors!

but no one got there in time
and they’d be back inside again

the best of pals
arms slung around each other’s shoulders
like war buddies

ready to fight and drink off and on all night
until one of them passed out
or stumbled the hell home

we never figured out what it was between them

but they were something to watch
in between the mets innings
and grateful dead songs

even though they never landed a punch

when the joint closed for good
and the bunch of us went scattering for other stools

i always thought i’d end up somewhere
and see those two guys again
doing their crooked waltz as the sun came down

but eventually all the great ones retire or they get too old

they lose the zest for violence

and the rest of us blood thirsty fools
get nothing in return for our patronage
but stale beer and adele songs playing for hours

some old fuck muttering to himself

or the seven o’clock news
blaring from two wide screen televisions
on another useless friday night

 

enemy state

passing the street festival
twelve days of work and one off

and the people are smiling
sitting in the cruel sun drinking sodas and light beer
eating corn on the cob and greasy wieners

all that i can think
waiting to cross the street with my wine bottles
my red eyes and the merciless pain in the small of my back

is how disgusting they all look

how they look like grinning, chomping road kill
a rested and well-adjusted farce if ever i saw one

and that each and every one of these slap-happy cretins
from the youngest to the oldest
have become my true and stark sworn enemies

this place morphed into my fucking prison

my enemy state with cheap carnival rides
fried dough and another shitty local band
playing covers of dreadful radio songs

and when the light changes
i turn from this obnoxious circus and walk on

somnolent and brow-beaten
by the hapless art of my existence

but still so very very glad
that i’m not an ounce like any of them

and that i
don’t own a gun

 

to the girl getting out of the elevator
last saturday night

my sense of humor

is often ill-timed

but my aim is true

so when you came popping out of the elevator
in that golden halter top and mini

looking as deadly
as a tank in tiananmen square

and didn’t see me at first

i probably shouldn’t have smiled at you
and chuckled embarrassedly

when you shouted, holy shit
and clasped your chest
like you were heading for a heart attack

but i couldn’t help it

and no offense over the dirty look you gave me
as you and that ass of yours walked away

it was well-deserved
for an old creep like me

who’d failed to apologize

for having nothing better to do
in the magic of a saturday night

but stand there in the hallway
with a bag full of cat shit and garbage

accidentally scaring the hell
out of pretty girls.

James Babbs- Three Poems

They Found a Body

in the field

not far from my house

last night

I saw the lights

flashing

outside my window

but I didn’t know

what was going on

until the morning

when I saw it on the news

they found the body of a woman

badly decomposed

they don’t know

what happened to her

they think

she may have been there

for a long time and

I drive down that road

every day

on my way to work

Longing

the beautiful woman gets up

and slowly leaves the room

she doesn’t say goodbye

you sip your coffee

and gaze at the empty chair

you catch the faint scent

from her lingering perfume

you spend several minutes

after she’s gone

trying to give her a name

you contemplate

your place in the universe

you return home

and sit in the driveway

before entering the empty house

In the Warmth of the Sun

I’m thinking about death again

sitting out in the front yard

and it just crosses my mind

I’m watching the cars

as they drive past my house

the grass turning green

and it’s almost time

to start mowing the yard again

I need to drive to the station

and fill my cans up with gas

but I’m thinking about death again

while drinking a cold beer

trying to remember

something my brother said

the morning before he left

Michael Cluff- A Poem

 Not So Bad  (for Jose Saramago)

Crouching on a newer island
where California once was,
Bruce waits
for a tide
that never comes.

Sagebrush and yucca blossoms
aren't enough
the chalky stream
is starting to run low to
lower to lowest.

Helicopters will fetch him up soon
and Margo as well
he suns himself
under the Hollywood sign
while she scampers by
on a camel
freed from the zoo.

Waves of heat
caper kilometers away
and Catalina is closer
than it as ever been before.

Alixandria Moore- Three Poems

Falling In and Out

We were built into a monument,

stones stacked into columns—

a skyscraper of limbs intertwined.

While finding a home on the backs of one another,

we became a collaboration of souls

until we were strangers to ourselves;

our legs still attached. 

Rivers of people rushed at our feet,

flowing into one another and

into us—

but you aren’t made of stone,

only flesh disguised as the immovable.

You handed pieces of yourself to the willing;

auctioning off your marble limbs and cement organs,

even plucking the clump of

pulsing granite from between

the columns

keeping us intertwined

until I was standing alone.

I’ve been looking for you

underneath the cracks of doorways,

in the pockets of strangers,

from rooftops to alley ways

but you have become a currency;

traded for bread and milk,

to those with a craving.

We were built into a monument.

Kissing the sky

above the stream of  people.

I just never thought

I’d have to see it

fall.

The Sunday Night Before You Left

The grass was crystallized from the cold,

clinging to the backs of our coats and heads.

We leaned into one another, into Earth

picking pieces of sky for our collection.

You told me the sky was made for holding,

because it held so many things.

The stars, burning still in the grasp of the sky

and the moon, a solid rock held captive.

We pressed our hands together,

as if when we let them sink,

they’d never find their way back again.

Leaning into you, into Earth

with pieces of sky in our hands

was when you told me you loved me,

and I believed you then. 

Ashes to Ashes

I am scraps

and bones crafted

from your skin.

My limbs are yours,

wrapped in Irish cream

freckled and pail.

My temper is yours,

sparked by the prick of a finger

or the whistle of a tea kettle,

burning like I do.

My hair, unruly and wild,

mimics the rough curls of brown

brushed back behind your ears.

I can fit in the blue waves in your eyes,

swing by the legs of smoke rings

spiraling from your cigarette

still burning in between your

middle and index finger.

You made a bed of the recliner in your

tattered country home with your arm

resting on a ketchup stain

that was matted to the fabric as you slept.

The smoke from the cigarette grew hungry

and devoured the carpet underneath you

until you sat in a sea of flames.

Fast asleep as the flames grabbed the

end table, lamp shade, pillows

on the couch, and eventually you.

The same bones that created me

scattered into ashes—

gliding through the clouds of smoke

and angry rushing flames.

I am in your bones, the crease in your lips when you

smile, in the red of your blood running hot,

and you left me swinging

by the legs of smoke rings

as they took you.