WATER FOR PUERTO RICO (A Reaction to Puerto Rico’s Struggles) Dad always said, “No te ahogues en un vaso de agua.” “It means don’t drown in a glass of water,” I’d explain to my non-Spanish-speaking friends, wanting to share the magic because, for some reason, when he recited such words, I was able to hold my breath longer underwater, […]
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Poem By SIMON PERCHIK * Though there’s no leak your hand at every turn makes the adjustment takes hold the way this wrench begins as mountainside, workable picked up and the pebble dragged off circles down, carving out her name and from your mouth the stutter tighter, tighter –it’s all about the water isn’t it? a spill […]
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THE MAN WHO ATE HIS BOOTS I remember now. Air so still you could hear it breathing through the frozen shrouds, the crack of floes caressing hulls as if ships could talk to each other. Men slept fully clothed, smoked, drank tea, cooked, read books from the library, and pretended that this was all normal. On holidays […]
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The Face of Death The doctor has seen the face of death on many occasions. He has seen scars and lacerations. His duty, his call the doctor has seen it all.
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FRANKFURT PIG (By Joseph Cavera) There once was a pig from Frankfurt, Who found he had grime on his shirt, He believed neither eye As he sullied a silk tie After spending a day, or two, in the dirt Now our dear friend had a quandry “How could such pure muck come upon me?” I can’t go wrong […]
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The Stop & Shop Strike The Stop & Shop strike v. Game of Thrones. In Game what’s not made plain is the condition of the people compared with warriors and queens. There is no mention of land-clearance, tree-felling, pruning, chopping, digging, hoeing, weeding, branding, gelding, slaughtering, salting, tanning, brewing, boiling, smelting, forging, milling, thatching, fencing and hurdle-making, hedging, road-mending and […]
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Why Are the Dead So Still – By Fern G. Z. Carr Arms crossed, lying motionless in an open casket, he gazes upward through closed eyelids. Maybe if I look hard enough I’ll see him flinch or wriggle his nose at the acrid smell of incense rising from the censer; holy water is sprinkled on his body – it […]
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Enigma – By Elaine Nadal The bells tolled. I heard them. S l o w l y LOUDER Numbing my body. Obscuring my vision. Searching for color in my subconscious… I found images: games, gatherings, horse rides– artifices sufficing for a time. An unrecognizable figure putrefied instantly, leaving ashes S E E P I N G It burns. My […]
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DOPPLER DELIGHT – By John Zedolik The Doppler effect drags away the angry horn that melts like unattended ice cream on an August day in an unnoticed street drain and the careless eater’s fingers have found protection in napkins guarding against the sticky-sweet that might cling to exposed skin and require a washing if said consumer even cares, since it […]
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WINTER, A LOVE STORY (By John Biscello) Winter’s brides, wearing long white scarves of sleet and song, touching pale sky to blue lips, breathing memory and frost; their sorrow and spectral want grows hands that enclose me, a robust crush, matrimonial in its grip, until I am no more than a whiff of air, and then, not even that, […]
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