Issue 24.2: November 2022
We left rosettes in fire clay
before we were naked,
exhaling each other.
One flesh nation coupling,
our blood of blood
and gristle of gristle,
shanks fat with marrow,
whisper-breathing,
lungs full of chattering dark. Continue reading “Richard Manly Heiman: In Carne Una”
Fierce blasts unleash
from the west to batter
yellowing ash leaves
Predatory gusts snatch
at reluctant clingers
wrenching them loose
to skitter and whirl
to clutter sidewalks
and streets with ochre
Flaxen elm leaves sprint
eastward in a foot race
to no apparent finish line Continue reading “Glen Sorestad: Winds of October”
What if the blood-thirsty thorns,
driving deep dripping crevices into the crown,
the rusted iron stakes pulverizing arteries
with a one-two-three pounding,
and the dull steel sword plunging
into the bony-caged heart
were too late
to save
one
from sacrificing
another lamb
to the dark? Continue reading “Jules Gates: The Light”
When we are young we look forward, our eyes always on the future, it seems. The present is illusory; “now” disappears into our past the instant our mind forms the concept and then the word. And for the young that past is often ignored, blotted out, refigured into a history that gives reason and comfort to their lives as they relentlessly focus on what is coming next.
But if you have the fortune to live with relatively good health and a somewhat sound mind until you are, like me, closer to eighty than to seventy, dwelling on what future still looms ahead often seems futile and without purpose.
So what am I, or anyone my age, to do but look back, relive my life’s history, once again going over those things from the past that have left their marks, a search for self-acceptance and self-understanding. Continue reading “Donley Watt: Circling”
Amarillo Bay 