Beyond All Counting, by Mary Anna Scenga Kruch

Beyond All Counting
by Mary Anna Scenga Kruch

Unease perforated edges of my awareness in dreams: Ukrainian women forced to watch husbands shot, lose sons in battle, take shelter in shadowed remains of homes, grow cold with approaching winter. As my own fireplace had cooled to blinking embers, I added wood and lit candles to mark remembered comfort that I longed to somehow send, contemplated a sky that stretched across oceans, past burned out buildings and blackened tanks – to where moonlight invited views of a cloudless sky splashed with stars beyond all counting.

Mary Anna Scenga Kruch, a former middle school teacher and university professor, is now a full-time writer. She has published a chapbook, We Draw Breath from the same Sky and a full-length hybrid memoir, Grace Notes. Recent poetry can be found in Wayne Literary Review and The Wild Word and is forthcoming in Blue Heron Review and Panoplyzine.

Evolution of Time, by Mark Tulin

Evolution of Time
by Mark Tulin

The crimson sky of daybreak
rises during prehistoric times,
when the dinosaurs roamed the earth—
alpha-beasts trampling on jungle weeds,
undisturbed by humans
when nature had its way.

Until man invented the wheel,
a gun, and the need to control
the land, sky, and ocean
to suit his desires.

Turn back the time
when the Stegosaurus
walked on too big feet,
when the Brontosaurus
could reach the top of a tree.

Does evolution spell extinction?
Is human progress destroying Mother Earth?
Do we need to bring back dinosaurs
to save us from ourselves?

Mark Tulin is a retired family therapist from California. Mark’s books include Magical Yogis, Awkward Grace, The Asthmatic Kid and Other Stories, Junkyard Souls, and Rain on Cabrillo. He’s featured in Weeds and Wildflowers, Still Point Journal, The Mindful Word, The Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, Amethyst Review, Vita Brevis Press, White Enso, and others. He is also a Pushcart nominee and a Best of Drabble. Visit Mark at http://www.crowonthewire.com.

Venice Beach Mermaid, by Mark Tulin

Venice Beach Mermaid
by Mark Tulin

The homeless man on the beach
sculpts the woman of his dreams
with gnarled hands and a kid’s shovel.
He may be destitute and hungry,
but he has the passion of Michelangelo.

He carved her sandy flesh
into smoothed edges,
serrated her fishtail,
and gave her life
by the shine of the sun.

A mermaid! He exclaimed—
sensual and slender,
able to provide hours of friendship,
to share stories by the sea,
easing his loneliness.

Her quiet presence, he enjoyed
until the tide was high
and his only faithful companion
melted by a wave,
along with his heart.

Mark Tulin is a retired family therapist from California. Mark’s books include Magical Yogis, Awkward Grace, The Asthmatic Kid and Other Stories, Junkyard Souls, and Rain on Cabrillo. He’s featured in Weeds and Wildflowers, Still Point Journal, The Mindful Word, The Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, Amethyst Review, Vita Brevis Press, White Enso, and others. He is also a Pushcart nominee and a Best of Drabble. Visit Mark at http://www.crowonthewire.com.

It Feels Like 1955, by Mark Tulin

It Feels Like 1955
by Mark Tulin

We all meet again next week,
with frowns on our faces,
a pair of baggy sweats,
an overflowing laundry basket
poured into the churning vortex.

It seems like 1955,
outdated calendars on the walls,
a black-and-white TV with a fuzzy screen,
and dingy tile floors, mid-century.

We are like sloths in the launderette,
everyone appears resigned
to miss out on life,
as our clothes take priority,
watching them do the Maytag dance.

There is never enough change
in the malfunctioning coin machine;
no excitement in pushing a cart;
our clothes, like old ideas
have just enough detergent to spare.

I wait patiently to be renewed,
leaf through an old People Magazine,
study each spin-dry cycle,
believing my life will change
once the buzzer goes off.

Mark Tulin is a retired family therapist from California. Mark’s books include Magical Yogis, Awkward Grace, The Asthmatic Kid and Other Stories, Junkyard Souls, and Rain on Cabrillo. He’s featured in Weeds and Wildflowers, Still Point Journal, The Mindful Word, The Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, Amethyst Review, Vita Brevis Press, White Enso, and others. He is also a Pushcart nominee and a Best of Drabble. Visit Mark at http://www.crowonthewire.com.

Triptych: On Cinematic Waves, by Karla Linn Merrifield

Triptych: On Cinematic Waves
by Karla Linn Merrifield

I.

This is the voyage
of movie songs
of jigs and reels
–oh, and of waltzes
of blues and bar stools
of parallel soundtracks
of Bach and Brubeck—
of your tempo’s desire.

II.

This is of North Atlantic voyaging
of USA and Canada
of international waters betwixt
of British Empire born to independence
of Boston port, 4th of July
of an entire movie plot walking by
of 1st Lt. O’Malley, his “breast salad”
of four wars: WWII to Desert I.

III.

This is to be a voyageur again
of meta-documentary subject matter
of chart and shoal in minute/second parts
of another longitude of longing
of northern latitudes
of surprise and wonder
of the quintessential video du jour
of this truth: I am the movie.

Karla Linn Merrifield has had 1000+ poems appear in dozens of journals and anthologies. She has 15 books to her credit. Following her 2018 Psyche’s Scroll (Poetry Box Select) is the full-length book Athabaskan Fractal: Poems of the Far North from Cirque Press. Her newest poetry collection, My Body the Guitar, recently nominated for the National Book Award, was inspired by famous guitarists and their guitars and published in December 2021 by Before Your Quiet Eyes Publications Holograph Series (Rochester, NY). She is a frequent contributor to The Songs of Eretz Poetry Review. Web site: https://www.karlalinnmerrifield.org/; blog at https://karlalinnmerrifeld.wordpress.com/; Tweet @LinnMerrifiel;  https://www.facebook.com/karlalinn.merrifield.

Holding Patterns, by Karla Linn Merrifield

Holding Patterns
by Karla Linn Merrifield

1.

I hold you safely
by a tanka’s tight confines—
deliciously—
for we can come together
on the spicy here and now.

2.

I
hold
you yet
bodily
in Fibonacci
safety, perfectly boundaried.

3.

Encore! Encore! Unexpected encore
of holding you again, a kiss’s fleshy surprise
within the slinky five-lined skink
of a playful poem, on my flicking tongue:
you holding me again, how kiss of flesh surprises.

4.

Trust me, I’m containering your hold
to a scherzo.

5.

Holding you?
What?
Just
fuckin’ happily
in bondage of a piem.
Tight? Right!

6.

This:
the box
I cast us in
together, not
so much a looser hold
as one more expansive.
In an etheree I wrap
thigh-lengths of measured lines—heartbeats.
En fin, this exuberance is skin-deep.

7.

All I gotta do
is hold on, hold on—let go
till who fuckin’ knows.

Karla Linn Merrifield has had 1000+ poems appear in dozens of journals and anthologies. She has 15 books to her credit. Following her 2018 Psyche’s Scroll (Poetry Box Select) is the full-length book Athabaskan Fractal: Poems of the Far North from Cirque Press. Her newest poetry collection, My Body the Guitar, recently nominated for the National Book Award, was inspired by famous guitarists and their guitars and published in December 2021 by Before Your Quiet Eyes Publications Holograph Series (Rochester, NY). She is a frequent contributor to The Songs of Eretz Poetry Review. Web site: https://www.karlalinnmerrifield.org/; blog at https://karlalinnmerrifeld.wordpress.com/; Tweet @LinnMerrifiel;  https://www.facebook.com/karlalinn.merrifield.

Tonight I Wish Of, by Karla Linn Merrifield

Tonight I Wish Of
by Karla Linn Merrifield

the taste of that hurricane season
of the ten-thousand thoughts
of wishful thinking that is
of thee
of thy brain and
of leaning over in this poem welcoming you
of salt from your fluid body on my lips
of electrolytes delivered to my tongue
of Beaufort-12 velocity
of lashing me vigorously limp
of humbled pose in the eye—
of deceptive calm—then you, you
of, oh, tumultuous thrashing
of muscles
of my well-toned pelvic floor, but also
of my heart as organ, also fit, and
of my heart, love’s metaphor, imperiled

then of warbler song lovely and lilting,
whistling again and again:
you, insistent for me to listen—
sing to me as you pass through me, all
of me, my ten-thousand thoughts
of wishful thinking
we could be anything

Karla Linn Merrifield has had 1000+ poems appear in dozens of journals and anthologies. She has 15 books to her credit. Following her 2018 Psyche’s Scroll (Poetry Box Select) is the full-length book Athabaskan Fractal: Poems of the Far North from Cirque Press. Her newest poetry collection, My Body the Guitar, recently nominated for the National Book Award, was inspired by famous guitarists and their guitars and published in December 2021 by Before Your Quiet Eyes Publications Holograph Series (Rochester, NY). She is a frequent contributor to The Songs of Eretz Poetry Review. Web site: https://www.karlalinnmerrifield.org/; blog at https://karlalinnmerrifeld.wordpress.com/; Tweet @LinnMerrifiel;  https://www.facebook.com/karlalinn.merrifield.