Poetry by Brandon Ezzard

In this day and age we’ve messed up, having unlearned the true history,
but meditating on God’s Word will make you a new person mentally,
physically, spiritually, emotionally, morally,
give you the courage to fight ignorance through informing others
who would stay warm in their covers, starving themselves of truth,

if a man walked on hot coals it would result in melting shoes,
falling asleep, leaving the one in a coma that’s medically induced.

But Jesus came to wake us up. He went through hell to give life to the walking dead,
endured a living nightmare to wake up those living with insomnia,
who’ve been abandoned by parents, and are spiritually indoctrinated,
taught by and raised on TV, lonely socially like they’re locked in the basement,
given gaming systems, controllers, and a shelf where all the videogames fit,
which they’re rotting their brains with, leaving them emotionally plagued, sick,
vices forms of idolatry, going by cycles and they’re not
bikes equipped with training wheels,
yet are riding on the highway to hell,

develop a dependency for such to not depart from such vodka and Jager,
become psychologically wasted,
high-minded, hooked to alcohol, snagged by the bait, dragged away,
then taken captive by streams they’re longing to break from,

mobile cells, hand-cuffed, bars that they’re chained too,
taken under arrest by society which swallowed the key, put cement blocks attached to metal on their ankles and threw them into what they want to be their watery grave-pit.

So they’re kept up at night by what they do, withdrawing from what they should have withdrawn from long ago,
thoughts a drip-drop, tossing and turning like bobbing and weaving while boxing with a brawling woman.

These activities are like weapons that draw blood,
and are aimed at your sons and daughters,
who are looked at by wicked men and satan like a lottery they can win,
who want them spend to their lives having them spend their life like the money they’re making.

Thus, to get what they want they come at you like a man robbing a bank clerk,
with no care for their safety because by that time they already hate life.

Talk to them while they’re preoccupied; yeah, they’ll nod but they can’t hear,
headphones on, looking at you but through you like you’re not even there,
inwardly, filled with anxiety, outwardly, calmly with a blank stare,
lacking spiritual breath, sack-lunch paper-bag not in the hand but by this time over the head, depriving the body when taking breaths
of oxygen they need, which is why they’re always blue.

Truly, those who are broken want to break all the rules,
don’t know how to cope with life, in turn take guns to school,
stay in an awful mood,
facial expression like they ate awful food.

Self-destructive, walking with anger,
ask them why they do what they do, even they don’t know,
it does not even make sense,
but whether jogger or rapist, we all need His graces,
Jesus died for us all, He’s longing to save us.

Read Poem: OUR MOMENT LONGER THAN A MOMENT, by Dionysia Tudor

Some trees are lonely, some are not.
What difference does that make?
When how they’re hit, and how they take it,
decides whether they’ll last or break.
I, I have been hoping for the best.

Some moments last, some moments don’t.
The former are more than moments.
Yet how they feel, and how they end,
decides
whether there will be an
‘again’.

Nostalgically
short.

A few encounters, a few days;
Much banter;
Masking,
almost,
creeping feelings –
perhaps.

Then, a fast return to before,
before even an ‘and after that’.
Truly damaging the other;
for their sake though?

I am glad there wasn’t an again
to our moment longer than a moment.

—–

Dionysia Tudor has studied law and is good at logic. She likes literary arts that focus on the beautiful and the aesthetic. If to a clean heart all is clean, she treasures art that shows that. Her heroes and inspiration are the saints.

Plus a website in the making:

https://dionysiatudor.wordpress.com

Read Poem: DISTANT IN TIME, by Michael Hogan

Cities of the last empire
Ring the desert like humpback whales swimming
In a distance that recedes to what is distant in time.

Stars of the last night
Fall without falling but explode and grow small
Birthing space that is not space,
In a distance that recedes to what is distant in time

Man and woman of the last garden
Come together in work and travail,
Birthing saviors at dawn, at midnight,
Or when the edge of eternity is just visible
In a distance that recedes to what is distant in time.

Mike Hogan (c) 2018

Read Poem: Caught Up In Me, by Georgia Blagrove

I, I, I, Me, Me, Me. Like doe re me, I am focused on only me.

If I don’t get pleasure then me has to leave for sure.

If I am not doing me then I need to see my way somewhere to be free.

Like a lion surveying the plain for its prey, so do I search for my next way.

I feel good, I look good, I am comfortable with unique me.

I sensually stretch with no inhibition for the plain is mine to maneuver.

I am reshaping the box of my mind, this part of my life currently is a wrinkle in time.

There are other dimensions of me to explore.

I am strong enough to endure, to overcome, to fail and get back up.

If I don’t explore, I have so much to loose – my peace of mind, joy, fulfillment, happiness….

I want laughter to be a smile away. A drone like 9-5 state is not conducive to this.

Acceptance of mediocracy is not suppose to be me.

I will not allow the betrayals and injustice to me change me to a lesser version of me!

It is no longer about me pleasing everyone.

It is now a conscious effort on my part to look out for my fulfillment and push my agenda.

I am thankful for the same betrayal/challenges that has plagued me which has helped propelled me to this point to actually take action.

This is where I’ve gotten stuck in the past. What is different now? What will make me take action?

My desperation? Yes, my desperation for I am at the point of shutting down. But..

But, the defibrillator call fulfillment has rejuvenated and jolted me, yes me, to get up and scream.

IT IS ABOUT ME, ME, ME!!!

Read Poem: When The Clock Strikes Death, by C.M. Rivers

Years ramble on along a narrow highway
while daffodils peak in their bright yellow prime
and I scratch at the walls of the hourglass
from which I attempt to climb.

This life was a wet shiny bubble
blown by a child whom I never knew,
who’s heart was as wild as pictures
I colored with crayons before I met you.

Now hard blow the northern winds
and heavy fall the western rains,
and the rocks and sand have barely changed,
yet I have not remained the same
while the clock struck the hours before death came.

C.M. Rivers

Read Poem: Behind Closed Eyes by Cameron Miller

When skin crawls
on the inside, and thoughts flit branch to branch
a winter brown goldfinch pecking for seed

when the longest
deepest, exquisitely practiced yoga breath
exhales an inert sigh

when it is five a.m.
with stained memories frozen
on the black box stage of emptied cranium

it is time.

It is time to step into the deepest
darkest shadow,

and discover who or what
lives there.

“Hello, anybody home?”
You say it with innocence
in case they suspect something.
Enter, shake hands
or paws
with what lives within.

If it is fierce and smelly, nod then get the hell out.
If it is seductive and smirks, be guarded.
If it is deadbeat and depressed, listen.

Behind closed eyes, in shadows
wakefulness never reaches,
skulk citizens with a vote.

Read Poem: Ibizza Redux, by Terez Peipins

The eternal Ibizza like party
of my forbearers
immigrants lost,

AM bodies fall
from reverie

A grubby child
sent to church
to be an angel on
the life raft of God

Who’s been saved?
I peek from under
folded arms,
only my hand unraised,

___
Terez Peipins is a writer of Latvian descent from Western New York. Her poetry, fiction, and essays have appeared in publications both in the United States and abroad. She is the author of three chapbooks of poetry. Her novels, The Shadow of Silver Birch and Snow Clues are published by Black Rose Writing. She won the 2016 Natasha Trethewey Prize in poetry from the Atlanta Writers Club. She was a runner up in the Foundlings Press Chapbook and Artist Residency Competition in 2018.