Read Poem: THE STRANGER, by Melvin Glazer

In the day of your night, I come
a stranger appearing and disappearing
like a mirage in the desert of your dreams
In the day of your night, you come
a chaser of ghosts, but you will never find who you seek
for whom you seek is no longer there
No matter how hard you look
no matter how much you hurt
you will never find him in me
and who you do find (in me) is not who I am
but a stranger of little value to you
when placed next to the ghost of who I was
and in looking for who I was, you fail to see me

In the day of my night you come
but not as a chaser of ghosts
for no matter how hard I look
no matter how much I hurt
I can never bring back what was
the wonderful boy who is now a man
I can only deal with what is and what is, is
I see the part of me that is part of you
as you see the part of you that is part of me, and that will never change
I will always be your father and you will always be my son
and I will always love the boy you were and the man you are
and you will always love the ghost of who I was
but perhaps, one day, you’ll love the stranger in me too
and forgive me for all I did and didn’t do
for by forgiving me, you will in so doing, be forgiving yourself
thus a gift to each and each to the other
the greatest gift of all
LOVE

Read Poem: GROWTH, by Diana Radovan

Inside the ivory tower
We sit and wait for a prince
To come and cut the story short
Or maybe just our hair
While our hands grow scissors.

Bio: Diana Radovan (www.naturewriting.net), the author of the hybrid memoir Our Voices (2022), is a Romanian-born poet and Best of the Net nominee living in Germany. Her poems have appeared in Wild Roof Journal, Poetry Breakfast, Dog-Ear, Arc Journal, Feed, Wax Poetry and Art, World’s Best Poems Vol.1, Headline Poetry and Press, and elsewhere. She is currently looking for a publisher for her first poetry chapbook. Follow her on instagram @dianaradovanwriter.

Read Poem: THE POET’S VOCATION, by J.M. Magrini

The poet’s glance traverses the distance between Heaven and Earth, and back again.

As imagination bodies forth, the forms of things unknown,
the poet’s pen turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing a local habitation and name.

With the distant storm, comes the poet’s vocation: To share with brethren the divine truth of Being.
History opens with the seduction of Holy Word.

As Demigod, between the time of Earth and Heaven, the poet is thrown, alienated, and beholden to art’s task.
In the emptiness of the night, singing the song of Fate unto others,
he foretells what is yet to be.

Bowing to Nature’s Omnipotence, in the presence of Helios,
his soul is consumed by the white light and heat of a thousand suns.
Struck and blinded, he is driven to madness.
The receiving and giving unto others exact a high penance.

“I would gladly turn homeward,” laments the poet, “for what harvest but pain have I reaped?
Can I return to the gods of my childhood and expect the same peace as before?
Can my art balance life’s suffering?”

Poetizing is a striving for atonement, a longing for a purified return to the hearth, to the feast,
in communion once again with the gods at their banquet table.

The poet’s song relives the ancient, torrential event of history’s eruption,
when Kronos tore from the womb of Mother Earth and language usurped the reign of Chaos.

Awaken us, poet, we who slumber, give us laws and give us life!
Venture into the eye of the storm that rages of the clashing of World and Earth,
where light and shadow dance over victory and defeat, blessing and curse, master and slave.

The poet creates, but his letter kills,
suffering the legitimacy of aesthetics, his sprit to spirits gives vigor and new life.

A Fire divinely gleaming wells up for you, poet,
and with great pain, yet quick with desire,
you hurl yourself headlong into Aetna’s furnace . . .

And once again the cries of celebration resound and the aroma of sacrifice permeates the aether.

Gladly, did not love restrain me,
deep as you plunged down,
I would follow

Read Poem: DO NOT WAVE YOUR EYES TO MY COAST, by Faysal Soysal

To the places that you are going don’t bear my ashes.
Cast faces of mine all your pasts,
Hurl from the peaks of new life that you are strolling.
When you passed from the arid valley,
If the pens that you distilled from my books had been dried,
You can get ready to say your last words maybe.

Let my bones not sprout again any way
To the morning of each stars that slipping.
And let none of deaf hear again
Screams that had been massed in my bone marrow.
The sorrow nights that created from my ashes of your fire
If any time return to you,
Any of ashes from the fire which you burned
shall not be given to you

I want the swallow with stones have been passed
From the cities that you already passed.
From the nineth city as you didn’t mind
From the tenth one why you mind my name
I want first you gathered shall be driven away,
The sounds of nights remained with me shall be sow then
To the earths that you tread on,
However to not take any ways with my dead foots.

Let none of children look again to the sky.
My voices that had been lost shall be hammered
To the forehead of life if it had been remained
The voices which even if the blind don’t wish to hear.
Even if just one passenger shall not come
From to Sina desert to Taif or from Tuva to Tih.
No man shall come from the distance of every corner of city
To the warners of your tribe
I hope The morning shall be nearer.

The people in Araf shall not go
To at most one paradise where smile has finished.

And if any time you decide to return back
Eventhough after you obviously see the hell,
Deliver the lamed dead
That I found it your eyes every dawn
First for the sake of my deads which you sacrificed your life
If you can deliver it to remaining colors of life.

Read Poem: Doctor Big Dong, by Daniil Safonov

I’M NOT HIDING MY FAT SHLONG
THERE’S NOT MODESTY IN MY ERECT DONG
THEY TELL TALL TALES, ANCIENT LEGENDS EVEN
STEPHEN HAWKING HAS DESCRIBED THIS PHENOMENON
GOING ON AND ON AND ON:
DANIIL SAFONOV’S
HUMONGOUS DONG
HIT THE BONG
MY DICKHOLE’S THE POINT OF ORIGIN OF THE RIVER MEKONG
A RIVER, YES, THAT’S HOW NATIVE TRIBES
DESCRIBE MY SEMEN
EVEN LINES OF METH, BUT THAT’S NOT RIGHT FOR ME
I DOSE IT LIKE A SCIENTIST, NOBEL PRIZE WINNER
DOCTOR BIG DONG
GO AHEAD SNORT THE LINES, LAB ASSISTANT,
I’LL STILL BE DRILLING
YOUR UNDERGRAD ASS
ALL EVENING

Read Poem: Shadow of a Man, by Steve Dawson

For some, as dawn breaks, there is new hope.
A hope of life, of change.
With prayer’s existence, the heart awakens and is not yet dead.
For others, the light is scarring and endless.
As the day slips away, one by one,
The chest pounds unevenly, falling upon deaf ears.
That first ray of light sears the blood red lids
As they crackle open, dredging up the past and the present.
That first warmth sends chills of freedom and security
Shooting all through the icy, crimson veins.
Peeking through the thin, fine hairs, a blurring tear forms.
Not from pain, but from life.
The ears perk as the songs of the uninhibited
Winged warriors pierce the beaten flesh.
The bones remind of the darkness before.
With the first small movement on the man-made floor.
The emptiness becomes numb as time draws out.
With the knowledge of need but the reality of drought.
The pupils peer around as the shadows grow long.
Seeking familiarity, a lone face in the many.

Read Poem by Lynn Willocks

CRUMPLED AND DISCARDED THE PAPER BEGAN TO UNFOLD

INK BLACKENED WITH FEAR AND SORROW

A LIFETIME IN THE STROKE OF A PEN

A PRISONER OF THE STORIES TOLD

FAMILIAR WORDS SUSPENDED IN TIME

THEIR DISTANT ECHO STILL RINGING CLEAR

NEW MEANINGS BEGIN TO EMERGE

EACH TEAR EXPOSING THE LIGHT BENEATH

SOMEHOW THE PATH NOW SEEMS CLEAR

NO LONGER A PRISONER OF THE STORIES TOLD

Read Poem: Me And You Today, by Mario Luis Telles

Ups And Downs
But It Didn’t Have To Be That Way
Just To Understand You
I’ve Been Here With You My Whole Life
Son
Family, dude….that’s what it’s about inside and out
I took everything to try to make things better
I tried to share my successes with you
I ignore nothing you did because I have to keep living
So do you
Just don’t take it out on anyone like you took it out on me
I’m not a slave to your sickness
Neither are you.period.
Get better.love you and I’m always here.