Poetry Wall
CALL WAITING
By Leslie Perry
Hello, call waiting! Hello, let me put you on hold I got another call Might be important Not that you're not important But I got to take this call Don't go away I'll get back to you As soon as I can Soon as I'm finished talking to this other person Soon as I make this connection Don't want to miss any calls This might be the one that is very important One that will change my life Don't want to miss that cal I'll regret it for the rest of my life Meanwhile- let me put you on hold In no man's land Click! I hate call waiting!
BEING NEXT STORE
By Cornwoman
Standing at the kitchen sink Gazing out the window Which is filled with many potted plants The beauty and magnificent of nature Take my breath away Tears moisten my cheeks
Have you really stood still long enough, To watch what's right in front of your face? As the moment takes my sprite to another level-of such a state of Ah I'm filled with all it's wonder.
Those little beings grabbing the essence from every jester they make, They sing, fly, and eat While they are praising and giving Thanks, For every inch of this "Celebration of Life"
Feral
By Norma Fain Pratt Ph.D.
Taking a walk one early Saturday morning in November,
escaping multitudes in New York; that endless stream
of humans, papers, gases, pungent wet autumn yellow
and red leaves, taxis, trucks, what-else?
Only one cat perched on a granite boulder in Riverside Park,
near the boat basin.
I make sucking noises. I want attention.
She (he) stops, turns round, her (his) head crouched low
to decide if there is anything to worry about.
Feral now.
A refugee, maybe, from a warm home in an eight room
West End Avenue apartment.
Where do the street cats go when winter comes?
Haunting cat, grey as dust, vanishing among the river odors.
It’s time for my breakfast.
The Emptying
by Brandon Cesmat
Nine years ago, I seduced you with poems though sometime between then and now I stopped relying on your opinion. You say I love metaphor too much, that it is so much lard slathered onto the poem’s drive like talking with one’s mouth full, swallowing and spitting, so let me say this on point: I want to clear a place in our house, as it was when we first moved in together. I’m carrying the tchotchke and bibliotheca out into the sunlight, leaving dark spaces indoors, a gift, this house as when we first discovered it, a mouth, lips parting for a kiss, ready to forgo food or breathing for a moment together.
The Creature's Stitches
by Brandon Cesmat
Brandon CesmentIn his basement study, the writer walks around pages scattered on the floor and reads until he straddles what could be a first line. He scratches his left leg but can't find the itch, a struggle to reconcile what he feels with what he sees. He closes his eyes to finger the scar where his right arm was sown together. The memory arcs to nowhere. On the desk the computer drive whirs, "We’re waiting." His hands—are they his?— will not stitch a sentence, so he groans. The wife upstairs yells, "Either come to bed or be quiet."
He considers French kissing the electrical outlet to prime himself for writing revisions all night— yum, fresh pages for breakfast— and catches a moan before it rumbles past his lips.
The manuscript clings to his mind like a bandage to be changed. His eyes watch the fingers hover over the keys, matches ready to drop and strike. His eyes watch and wait, afraid to see a flame rise.
God Song apologies to John Coltrane
by Brandon Cesmat
Brandon CesmentI've been up since the dawn, listening to the rivers in my veins, lightning in my brain, playing ‘long to that God song
Fog on the road, from the sea every wave His blue breath coming to me heartbeats break on the shoreline to that God song
somewheresville
by Terry McCarty
in spite of everything bad in the world
there are people doing just fine
walking a girlfriend-to-be home
getting a high school diploma
earning a college degree
hearing the interviewer say the job is yours
opening the door to a new apartment
making the final payment on a car
volunteering to work at a precinct on election day
being thanked by the supervisor for hard work
going to the jewelry store to buy wedding rings
seeing the first child for the first time
something good will happen to you someday
in the meantime, help someone else have a good day
in spite of everything bad in the world
