Keep your eyes peeled for our next book, Bone Talking by Will Mayo, set to be released September 21st.!!
This one is a little smaller than our normal 100+ page collections; 57 poems/74 pages total. A mixture of prose and poetry that ends with its title poem, “Bone Talking.”
Write On!
JDCIV
🤟💀
invisibility
the day from tomorrow
taking a married woman out
to a fancy meal
and a show.
then,
back at a motel
she’ll massage my ego ergo
as i laid on her breast
after calling out to mother
after scotch
and jello shots.
call her up at 4 in the morning
after being rejected by
makers mark and cocaine
tellin you i loathe
where i gotta go
but
u gotta do u gotta do u gotta do rag
in this worldly body and tongue
under such and such
then
I’m hopping right back on the train.
Towards wherever I’m from
opening opening up the window
and waving
to the vacant platform collecting
fog and dust.
“Son: it’s alright to head into the valley every so often, so long as you come back to dryer ground. “-Pup-Pup said.
©2021 A.P. Lewis All rights reserved.
This poem is from the forth-coming ‘No Variation on the Old Theme‘
A.P. Lewis has been published in Reclaiming Our Voices poetry anthology on Amazon— in 4th and Sycamore the Cleveland Main Library, Other Rooms Press, and most recently Agony Opera out of India.
All the roads which lead to roam
walking through nightshade
walking through moonscape
lights in the sky wink off and on
people gazing with unseen starlight in their eyes
drowsily wondering why
walking through purple haze
on the dark side of the moon
falling through empty space
listen to the howling of the wolves
gathering at the gates of dawn
behold the abundance of our world
the rich beauty of running blood
uncover your ears
turn to the screams rising from scorched soil
await the rise of the threatening flood
there’s a shadow hidden in the secret of dreams
invisible fingers reaching for the soft of throats
footprints left by someone unknown
disappearing towards the horizon
laughter seeping through cracks in the walls
when the sky trembles
don’t look back
don’t look around
when clouds depart
keep on walking
eyes to the ground
when lightning strikes
don’t look back
don’t look around
and all those roads which lead to roam
won’t help you find your way home
no, all those roads which lead to roam
won’t help you find your way home
©2021 Wilfred Hildonen All rights reserved.
Wilfred Hildonen was born on a Sunday, the 15th of March 1953, by the banks of the river Tana which forms the border between Norway and Finland, as far north as the countries go, in the Arctic zone. He is mainly of Sami and Finnish ancestry, the Sami being the indigenous people of Northern Europe, living across and divided by four nation states – Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia. Aside from this he is also partly Karelian, which is a Russian republic today, the home of Kalevala, the Finnish national epos. His Karelian ancestors were known to be among the best rune-singers, wandering storytellers who brought the ancient tales of Kalevala down through the ages. Through his paternal grandmother, he is also part Romani, a people akin to the Roma, otherwise known as gypsies.
He was born in the ruins of WWII, as the retiring German occupants burnt down everything up there, so although eight years had passed, he lived his first months in an earthen dwelling, built out of dried peat, before his family moved into a cottage with one room and a kitchen. He has been on the move since then and has lived for shorter and longer periods in Greece, Spain, Sweden, Finland, Portugal and Brazil. At present he lives on the Åland Islands, an autonomous region of Finland, located in the middle of the Baltic Ocean.
He has been working as an editorial cartoonist and illustrator since 1992, mostly for the largest Finnish daily in the Swedish language, Hufvudstadsbladet. Aside from that he paints, mostly abstract, and he writes and so far he has published one book in Norwegian; Livet – kort og godt or Life In Short. One of the stories here, Four Hares in a Boat, was inspired by an artwork of the English artist Shelly Wyn-De-Bank, and it has been sent on a local radio station based outside London, read by the English actor Tony Ffitch. The poem Spring Ballad/Vårvise was included in an international project initiated by Ron Whitehead called From The Ancestors: Poems and Prayers for Future Generations. He also created the cover art for that project. In 2022 his book Seven Times Down – prose and poems will be published by Cajun Mutt Press.
He is fluent in four languages; Norwegian, English, Swedish and Portuguese. He also understands Danish and some German and Spanish, but very little Finnish.
Down Below
We are nature
Uniquely significant
Turbulent and original
Retrospective
In our shaping
And forward moving
By design
Forgoing nostalgia
For novelty
Where everything
Is here
Now
Living within
The divine spark
Of will
In the ruins
Of our discontent
With transparent seeing eyes
Within the grandeur
Of ordinary life
Toiling beneath the surface
Where we never
Quite belong
©2021 John Drudge All rights reserved.
John is a social worker working in the field of disability management and holds degrees in social work, rehabilitation services, and psychology. He is the author of three books of poetry: March (2019), The Seasons of Us (2019) and New Days (2020). His work has appeared widely in numerous literary journals, magazines, and anthologies internationally. John is also a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee and lives in Caledon Ontario, Canada with his wife and two children.
Another Look at Loneliness Due
the lonely has finally crept
into all the crevices
sometimes you get what you
want
to see the fail
to be left alone
really alone
not what you expected
destroying hearts of others
to find this empty void
that surrounds
and permeates
feeling utter disgrace
©2021 John Goodie All rights reserved.
John Goodie is a recovering programmer/analyst who found an affinity for words and began writing poems and short stories, returning to college for an English Degree and Tesol certificate to teach English to refugees and immigrants of the USA and the children and people of Spain. Now he seeks his master’s degree in English with a concentration in Multicultural and Transnational Literature.
