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Daily Verse
 

Final week, August  2023
 

Image by Nathan Anderson

You Giggled
By Gregory Arena 1st September  2023, 

Flower Plant

You giggled when I carried you.
You had stubbed your toe at the rock pools.
We laughed, my dad too,

The lifeguard not expert with the bandage.

You giggled girl-like, though my dad’s girlfriend.
Queer I thought, but didn’t dwell.
Dad had his little family.
At 18 I finally seemed to have both a father and a mother.

Image by Qingbao Meng

More Haiku with Titles

By Tomh Bakelas, 29th August 2023

Flower
Hiking Boots

“i’ll die before i can retire”
the killer smiles—
cicada songs in my head—
i keep on walking

Image by John McMahon

“AFTER EFFECT”
teeth gone numb, cat walks
my loneliness—robins sing
outside the window

Fountain Pen

“environmentally conscious poet”
rather than waste paper
i place three haikus on
each page to save trees

Image by Jr Korpa

The Summoning
By Kathleen Chamberlin  31st August 2023

Abstract Pattern 26

The wraith shudders,
Red-rimmed eyes suddenly open.
She rises in the moonlight
Roused from uneasy slumber,
Floating on unseen currents of air,
Long grey hair streams around her sad face.
Her silver raiments are tattered with age and melancholy, sewn by ancient tears.
She glides through the gathering mists toward the lighted window, closed against
the softly falling rain.
Head thrown back, she unleashes the message she is burdened to share.
She begins the ancient death keening,
Clutching her heart with skeletal hands, every anguished memory
Of loss and grief pours forth to pierce the night,
Shattering the peace of dreamless sleep
Drawing anxious parents from their beds.
She heralds all ill omens,
Sad harbinger of death,
Warning of that which she knows
But cannot prevent,
The sad-eyed Banshee wails.

Image by 蔡 世宏

Mating Flamingos

By Bob Bradshaw 30th August 2023

Tropical Flowers & Flamingo

Dressed in sumptuous oranges,
reds and pinks, the ladies
pose, each standing on one leg
as if photographers
were hidden in the rushes.
They move slowly, like
the rich at country clubs,
wanting to be noticed.
They rest, wade, swim
between appetizers of shrimp.
Their daughters,  lovely
and gossipy, take slow steps
together, hoping to catch  
the eyes of those bachelors
wading the shallows.
When the lads lift their eyes
at them, the girls--knowing
the routine--shyly dip 
their elegant black
bills.

Screenshot 2023-09-02 at 5.32.51 PM.png

Cane & Stone
By Jan Wiezorek

Abstract Pattern 24

This cane rests slant
against a grey stone.


The cane has teeth cut
from birch. I’ve seen


it look as if it were
abandoned. It waits


for someone to grab it
at the center of the world.


This cane needs a crutch
like a stone to rest on.


Abandoned as a cane,
I hug your granite

 

& wait at the center
of the world.

Biographies of Poets

Gregory Arena is a poet from Italy whose poems and short stories are published in prestigious journals.

Kathleen Chamberlin is a retired educator living in Albany, New York. She began writing creatively during the quarantine period of Covid-19 and her writing has appeared in both print and online journals and anthologies.

Bob Bradshaw is a poet of repute.

Tohm Bakelas is a social worker in a psychiatric hospital. He was born in New Jersey and resides there. His poems have appeared in numerous journals, zines, and online publications. He is the author of 25 chapbooks and several collections of poetry, including “No Destination” (Kung Fu Treachery Press, 2021),  “The Ants Crawl In Circles” (Whiskey City Press, 2022), and “Cleaning the Gutters of Hell” (Zeitgeist Press, 2023). He has read his poems across America and England. He is also the editor of Between Shadows Press.

Jan Wiezorek writes and paints in southwestern Michigan. The London Magazine, Poetry Center San José, Minetta Review, and The Orchards Poetry Journal, among others, have published his poems. He taught writing at St. Augustine College, Chicago, and wrote the ebook Awesome Art Projects That Spark Super Writing (Scholastic, 2011).

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