Issue 13: Poetry

Here’s our poetry digest from Issue 13:

How much longer Lord
until i can sit on the couch
with a box of fiddle faddle
and watch gilmore girls

i think “Chevy Van”
might be a Christian song
if the people making love
in said chevy van are married

see what i did there … READ MORE >

John Whitney Steele
Dear Jesus

— the year of our Lord, circa 1960

I don’t know when you came into my life.
It seems like you were here right from the start.
I think you must have blessed me in Mum’s tummy.
She said I didn’t seem to want to leave. … READ MORE >

Cynthia Pitman
To Seek, To Find

Hold a parable
in the palm of your hand.
Cup it gently.
Do not clutch it or squeeze it,
seeking simply meaning from it.
Scraping the skin of it
will not release
the epiphany that awaits you … READ MORE >

Daniel Aum
Miracle

Show us a miracle,
we demand:

split a new sea,
soar above the clouds,
turn water into wine,
appear in a vision —

and I’ll believe in God … READ MORE >

Mary Hills Kuck
Holy Week

Acrid incense curls through palm fronds
Breathes dread and joy, death and life

Intimate feast, loaf and cup, mystery and treason
Mingle with love. Cleansed feet tingle … READ MORE >

Donna Kathryn Kelly
Charlotte, kneeling in her garden, Denham, Indiana, July 1978

My grandma, bent at waist
in the rural sun
patrolled the rows of potatoes,
supervised my reckless digging
not far from the sandy-sides
of an Indiana dune;
knelt down in the earth,
armed with a garden fork … READ MORE >

Joseph A Farina
Lambs of God

flawed by sins
we were inclined to
we took comfort
in your daily bread
at morning mass
recited prayers of absolution
before the bell began our day … READ MORE >

Anna Roberts
Lazarus

Lichen had crusted over my skin,
and moss had grown up through the dead
leaves and woven into my hair.
but a Carpenter
cupped water from a creek and
poured it over me and into my mouth … READ MORE >

Milla Jade Kuiper
The Groom’s Hunger

The devil held my hand in church
and whispered
Must you dress like a pagan in front of our Lord?
He drew a cross on his forehead in ashes
and grinned
and whispered
shhhh … READ MORE >

Betsy Howard
Fall

I feel the fall playing fool with me, unweaving
the faithful tapestry of my days

The wash drowns your Theragun
the one I loaded into the laundry
and drenched with soap, all unaware … READ MORE >

Colette Tennant
Pudding River Winery

The sommelier pours our samples and proclaims,
“You’ve got to be part poet to be a wine taster.”

Good news, I think. Most people
don’t credit poets much anymore … READ MORE >

Derek Jon Dickinson
Olive Tree

(fruit)

Kalamata, fruit of the gods. I
buy a slim jar. The lid pops
free (vinegar mirage).

With a toothpick I stab one of the
purplish, wet hearts. On the
tongue, a tapestry of salts; in the
brine; in the plump, somewhat
confusing bitter … READ MORE >

Sarah Watkins
shall we find any rest?

calloused fingers with cavernous cracks
dark dirt wedged in the beds of split nails

a gaping hole in the dry dirt will release a devastated groan
shall we find any rest? … READ MORE >

Kimberly Gibson-Tran
A Return

I met the kids in the gazebo to draw fish.
Our crayons melted. The sun wedged into the mountains.

Half of love is touch.
I press down on the fingernail moon.

The other half is loss … READ MORE >

Rachel Ann Russell
Church in August

A weaving of everything together
Big and little sunflowers bursting yellow over the Table
The whole mess, the whole web
Tangled, untangled, hidden, revealed
Let’s comb it out, let’s come together … READ MORE >

Dunguaire Castle by Meg Freer, Issue 13.

Glenn Armocida
The Blood of the Lilacs

The bees are not bothered by this rain.
After all — and this is the mystery —
rainwater binds the sweet sunlight, the lush soil,
the snapping spring air that birth the nectar,
the blood of the lilacs that the bees
are called to on this drizzly May afternoon … READ MORE >

J W Goossen
Assisi

Of all the towns offered
in the Italian countryside
the weight carried
by the star
of Umbria
casts the longest shadow … READ MORE >

Kimberly Phinney
When We Burn

Suddenly,
I realize what this is:
a bonfire.
And it is consuming our bodies
and lives
in the flames with a melody
that is horrific and mythic —
all the same … READ MORE >

Patrick T. Reardon
Rosary

Rosary my cane.
Gospel the times.
Prudence my ailings,
wisdom, company and Lord-words.

Child the broken bread.
Child the leash.
Child the marrow in its concealment … READ MORE >

Desi Ana Sartini
Yahweh Yireh

Three days, the journey was,
and heavy.

Father,
pensive,
silent.
Me,
aching to break the tension,
stir the silence,
but Father’s face
stopped me short
every time … READ MORE >

John C. Mannone
All that Glitters

Snakes do not eat apples, nor covet them
yet the garter and rat snakes prey on rodents
in the orchards. A good thing. But not all
snakes, especially the beautifully adorned
ones in the garden or forest, are innocent … READ MORE >

Maura H. Harrison
Deep Breaths and Sighs

Hot spots of stained-glass light flare up and blaze
The altar — brilliantly — articulating
All the mosaic tiles, illuminating
The Lamb. His perfect pale and lucent grays … READ MORE >

Debra Fair
White-tail Winter

White-tails wander the woods
biting browse and leftover pine,
panting for flowing brooks
frozen under falling snow … READ MORE >

Robert Funderburk
Finding Rest

Imagine frost-burnt weeds
and dry grass
along a fence row
and standing water
at the edge of the field
all under a playful sky,
clouds grey and flying
with winter wind sighing … READ MORE >

Dabney Baldridge
To Be a Mother

To be a mother is to love another
as your own self,
with all heart — about to burst

into a trillion sparks,
pumping the warm glow
to every nook and cranny … READ MORE >

Jennifer Fair Stewart
School of Mysteries & Certainties

Beginning Drawing I
My daughter pencilled this picture
her first studio art class;
at home, it graces our mantel
lending us perspective: grey
painstakingly rendered gloss
layers shade, one floor tile at a time,
some ho-hum hallway inside a university block
with zero architectural sublimity, yet
the gaze is drawn to an open, windowed end … READ MORE >

Ron Riekki
Genuflexorium

I have onychomycosis, a demolition-derby toe;
I know God is in there too. Everywhere. Omni-
present. We, so often, talk about the problem of
evil. But what about the solution of evil? God
is good. No, God is goood. … READ MORE >

Matthew Johnson
In Attendance of the Watch Night Service

There were about 20ish minutes before the start of a new year,
And my mother, so enraptured by the sermon and chorus,
Didn’t nudge me as my drool ran down my Sunday best
As I inadvertently fell asleep, like the disciples in Gethsemane.
I was awakened by the pastor who had caught the Spirit,
And was yelling and running up and down the aisle
Like he was being chased by a hellhound … READ MORE >

Rachel Michelle Collier
Futuristic

A gilded trifecta of mercy swaddles a white seed at its center.
The seed is a cluster of souls being preserved; the seed quivers:
the trifecta pacifies … READ MORE >

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Issue 13: Poetry

Here’s our poetry digest from Issue 13:

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