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Read Poem: A WOMAN LIKE ME by Kuli Kohli

A woman like me should
get up in the early hours,
prepare and cook good food;
get kids ready with magic powers.
Have a spotless kitchen, bathroom;
a dust free house and make the beds,
shop, wash, wipe, clean, iron, put away;
do all daily chores with love, care and pride.
Then go to work. Be organised and tidy.
Help the kids with their homework,
take them here, there, everywhere;
serve her demanding family
without a single frown.
To respect all around her;
to speak at the right time;
know what to do at all times;
to know her culture inside out.
Have all the energy and never give up;
to keep on going, serving all and everyone.
To live like other women, behave and resemble
proper ladies amongst an expecting society.
Be clever, intelligent, beautiful, sensual;
last but not least, be a goddess in bed…
Yet to serve herself feels like a crime.
Sometimes she does not want this
strong, tough expectant life style;
she wants to be somewhere
else; someone else to sit
and just watch herself.
A woman like me hey?
Except I don’t know
a woman like me,
I only know me.

Read Poem: THE PROMISE by Arloa L. Means

In a still small voice, barely heard,

Though the wind be but a whisper, leaves are stirred.

In the fragrant incense of a prayer,

Lies the everlasting promise, God is there.

God said, call upon my name give me no rest,

‘Till the people I have chosen call me blessed,

In the land where they will dwell secure,

I have given you my promise, it is sure.

It’s a nation, born of one desire,

As it rises from the ashes, tried by fire,

To return and claim the Promised Land,

People who will not be beaten down again.

So let all creation praise His name,

Youth renewed like morning dew, from latter rain,

It’s not thunder sounding loud again,

But the blending heartbeats of a million men.

Though these ancient bones be dry and old,

God has sewn them back together as foretold,

Standing now, and walking as a man,

Israel has become a Nation once again.

Read Poem: LOVE BASKET by Silas Ola-Abayomi

Trapped in basket of love,
in love garden without
a lover;
her beauty sedates me,
just as it excites me,
she hypnotizes me with
elegance and
mesmerizes me with
golden tone.

Heart becomes
prison of love
and angel takes no
notice of it,
freedom-
I lost-
in courtyard of love,
liberty-
I traded for
sighting love-
in the house of
uncaring lover.

Enchanted by her
beauty,
intoxicated by her smile,
from tree top-I watch
her step walk every
morning-
from roof top-I watch
her evening relaxation-
in the midst of sentry;
she care less about
my feelings.

Anytime-I see her-
momentarily
I’m deactivated,
still her vivacity brings
me back to life;
anytime-she walks pass
me-
brain grids become
electrified,
eye turns automatic
camera to capture life
image.

Anytime-she talks-
acoustics in me goes
to work,
mind composes lyrics
of love,
cochlea becomes mixer
of rhythm.

I’m dying of love-
but no one knows-
I’m walking on
sand of love
without a soul mate,
on sea side of love
I lie-just alone.

On top tree of friendship,
I mount without companion,
on edge of cliff-I stay-
reciting love song-
and no one to dance.

In the wild-I see animals-
in twos
but I’m alone,
in woodland-I see lovers-
holding hands,
but no one to hold.

I see them showing
endearment,
no one to show me
love.
Basket of love!
When will thou become
basket of companionship?

Read Poem: Halfway up the Hill by Jeff Hartzer

A giant hawk screams warning
I whistle back
then the dog barks
then the Volkswagen
lies dead in the woods
right there
It happens that way
on Sundays
out walking with God
Then the Volkswagen
lies smashed and dead
papers scattered across the straw
windshields blasted away
And I sit
where it sits
Still as death
while my dog walks close
and sniffs and barks
And the sun warms my back
on an October Sunday
when leaves are crimson
more bright than the dead
My life is filled with symbols
and signs
like the dream of thumbs and fingers
Mimi says I need to be touched
Yes I say
Touch me
all you people
Touch me
and my heart will shatter open
like this broken windshield
so very still
so right with the world
And how in the hell did this
stolen heart of a Volkswagen
get up this hill halfway
to this place here
to be dumped lifeless
in the woods
And what’s in it for me
where is the sign
what does it all mean
And where’d that hawk go?

Jeff Hartzer copyright 1984,2018
http://www.JEFFHARTZER.com

Read Poem: MINE, YOURS, A MOTHER’S HATE by Niki Bell

There is no equal to or greater than
A Mother’s Love
Safety and Protection
Let us understand what it is first, not last
A lioness
There is no greater gift
Or symbolic universal feeling of connection
The harmonic bond of such love
Is a Mother’s Love
The Beatles song playing in the background at the coffee shop
The little girl looking up with wonder at her
The older version of herself
A Mother’s Prayer that she will be greater than herself
It is not the birthing and carrying of the child
Where such motherly love may be developed
It is who she is before
That determines everything after
And in the coming events of life she gives
Unconditional love
She reigns over all
Ruling one’s world of seven serpent heads
If such love comes after one enters this world
That is sometimes not okay
Accident or mistake has no bearing on the consciousness of that child
The child only knows love
The mother sends the serpents and demons away,
Love overcomes all.
A mother’s love is the evolution of where still water lies
Purely defined from all corners of the cosmos
The child only knows the fabric of her mother’s nightgown
The beautiful motherly smells
The child, you, me do not know poverty
From her womb
Anger, fearfulness, drunken rages,
Nor Hate.
Pause

When love is not valuable
Rewind
Love, is not shared nor a continuing dialogue
When at eight years old you are blamed for sleeping with her boyfriend
Bleeding on the bed
Unable to go to the hospital because there is no insurance
For the swore tore worn soul of this child
When the love you wish would come oozing out of her
Even if it is infected like the open painful wound
Shooting white puss in all directions
At the center divide of your jammed toe
As you stumbled over the drugs
Over the bodies laying in the apartment
Fast forward
Head down in the toilet as you were tortured and beaten
Over and over again
My life not yours, Your life not mine
No pain comparison
We are women now reflecting in hindsight
Making the decisiveness absolute
To either Be Hate or Be Love
And therefore, Loved By Oneself deeper than the ocean floor
Stirring storms of magnitude greater than the rising of any hurricane,
Reaching for the stars that you cannot begin to embellish
That we cannot begin to imagine
Going above and beyond the call of duty
Only being able to give ourselves that love
That love that was never ours
Period.
Taken, stolen by madness
And the coldness of a mother’s heart
To be defiled, ridiculed, harassed, abused
To have violent acts committed against us
Because we looked like daddy’s side
Because we were more beautiful or not as pretty
Because we were so smart
Because we are fat
She always exclaimed
Because we made mistakes in relationships,
Oh, but she made none
The cold of the Antarctica swoops in
To live in devastation has nothing to do with materials,
Having a home, a roof over one’s head
Having food,
For I would have given anything to know my mother’s love
Not a mother’s right because of entitlement
A true mother’s love.
Never mirrors self-hate
I would have given my life to know what that felt like
And you, a reflection of me
Sit and you read this
You think it is okay to be treated as you are
It is not
You are not trash
You are love
You are my hero
Because you have survived
Sometimes without will
Without sight
Without hope
Without dreams
And you have come to this place
Wake up!
To finally know that something is not right
Please wake up!
All the times she took their side
As they raped you
The weary never sleeps
All the times they hurt you,
Where sleeping dogs lie
And she stood there and watched
We, the animals
Caged and imprisoned
Waiting to sing.
Even if she was not, so she says, was there
She was knowingly there.
Because who you are now
Is not that
You are not the little girl
They kidnapped or tried to kill
You are not the little girl that daddy put on his lap
You are not the teenager who gave her body to whoever knocked
You are no longer the woman who gave up on her children
I say, it is never too late to accept your part without self-blame and break away
Because you know right from wrong
What was done to you
Cannot be done to them
Nor can it be undone.
When you have love from the soul of your stomach
From your gut,
From the bleeding of the inside of your organs
Ready to shut down
When you have love
From yourself
Beyond a reasonable doubt
Because no one has ever shown up for you
A crime in and of itself
I have witnessed time and time again
But they stand there
Waiting for you to fail.
As you rise
You know that you must have love for and from yourself
Despite the magnetic radiation that attracts such hate to you
In every situation and relationship
They fail you
When you have that love coming from you and only you
You begin to awaken to a newfound reality
You begin to move, you, yourself, and I.
I and him and him and they
Yes, they suffer too.
I cannot speak for him or them.
It is my calling to speak on the mother’s and daughters who are lost
The daughters’ who had no voice
Who feel they still have no voice
To voice their truth
To stand up against the niceness that everyone else sees their mother’s as having
To stand up and be mentally strong
To stand up and cry out the power of love
To stand up and demand by men to be treated like a human being
To stand up and tell your horrible friends that if you cannot love me
It is because you cannot be me
Nor do you love yourself.
I may have emotional down syndrome
Because of my Mother’s Eyes of Hate
Ripped me into tiny pieces smaller than an atom
I barely have built myself up to a stand alone molecule
And that is okay.
I am no longer her victim
I appreciate the life that was given to me
I appreciate my mother’s eyes of hate
I appreciate hearing it said from her lips, “I hate her”
In my late twenties,
I appreciate the verbal condemnation, the lack of respect
I appreciate the raping’s of my body and soul as a child and as an adult,
Never ending.
I appreciate her beating me as he gutted me then zipped his pants as she walked in
Pretending to have seen nothing at age two.
I forgive
Age ten
I am grateful
I am more than just a survivor
At thirteen
I am more than just a child
I am more than just a female
I am more than tragedy
I am more than my stories
Age sixteen
I am more than a Cosmic Being
I am more than Hate
Age seventeen
I am Somebody
I am Me
I am Love
I am Worthy
I am Deserving
I am Love
I am my own Hero
I am a Mother who loves.
I lost my way… so busy loving them.
I rather fail, fall, and try at love than for them to know that past which does not describe me
Or have a bearing on NOW.
I will not ever understand a mother’s hate
Regardless of mental illness or any excuse
There is no reason and no room in this universe
For Mother’s who hate their daughters
There is no crime committed
Only soulful injustice
But, it haunts us, you and I
In the thick of the night
We cannot shake the feeling
It will haunt us for the rest of our lives
If we are still in it,
We feel there is no escape.
There is…
It is called love, not hate
Love is your faith
It will set you free
It comes from you and to you
Do not believe in that which serves you no purpose
Allow yourself to release your inner turmoil
Free you yourself
Because your imprisonment
Will be the death of you
I need to love me
I need you to love you
Because she could not
Your spirit is old and tired
Your heart a closed soldier
You not loving you is the biggest and most heinous crime you could ever commit.
Please stop!
Love, love, love, love, love,
You.
I love you.
Said to myself, and for myself, by me…
I am a woman who has…
A woman who has overcome her mother’s hate
A mother who only loves her children
A female who has mastered the heart of loving life
A goddess who arises with the sun and dances within the moon
A human being who is conquering everything in this lifetime
without support, love from others,
And moving mountains all on her own
They say you cannot do it alone
I fear for those who cannot
Shunning independent thought
With earth shattering crystal clearness of believing in the love within me
I am a single matter co-existing amongst all that matters
I AM LOVE!
I AM LOVE!

A Mother’s hatred is true
Shame on you for propagating that it is not
In order to make yourself feel better
Oh, it is so true
We grow to fear nothing
Or become so weak we cannot stand.
Even being here is not enough
Speak your truth into reality
But, speak of love
Speak with love
Speak with forgiveness
Speak with peace
Speak with inner fortitude
Speak with your mindfulness
Speak of a better place
A better world
Where all mother’s love their daughters
Speak with a gentleness that you never imagined you possessed
And then listen…
Shh!
Listen to your love!
It is so breathtaking and amazing!
When you journey into the unknown
You will come back, but not to that
Therefore, your only remaining option is to love
And learn to love her, my mother,
Your mother,
For they could not love themselves.
For you gave me life mother
But, you will not taketh away.
I see your misery
And I love you more
Even though you could not love me.
Mine, Your, A Mother’s Hate cannot stop you or me from loving.
I AM SO HAPPY, I AM ALIVE!!
Because I believe in Love.
I believe in me.
Thank you for all of this
For every victory and every challenge.
Mine, Your, A Mother’s Hate cannot stop me or you from living,
Cannot stop you from Achieving.
Be gentle with yourself and come from a place of love
Always.

I began my life in a hate filled world where only pain existed
I end this moment with my life in a nirvana love filled world
That I created
With smiles of joy, laughter, and love,
Where only love exists.
I AM ALIVE!
I AM LOVE!

Read Poem: Egypt’s Shifting Sands by Helen Whitten

I’ve stood in Tahrir Square,
felt the dusty heat,
done deals on street corners
with scruffy boys
adept at currency arithmetic,
seen the Pyramids at sunset
after the inevitable visit to a papyrus shop,

taken a horse
into the desolate desert at dusk,
just me and a stranger,
hoof meeting sand at speed,
watched a solitary camel rider leering up
like a mirage from the tombs,
grabbing at my reins,
his smile lecherous as a snake.
The Sphinx watched it all.

And Tahrir Square that spring
was full of banners,
no Pharoah there,
no Rameses nor Akhenaton,
just families gathering,
and a herd of colts
kicking their heels,
booting out the old folk.

Danton and Havel
on ghostly watch
as a velvet wave upturns
the status quo along
the banks of the glittering Nile,
centuries of despotic old men’s decrees
unravelling like papyrus
from Tunisia to Syria.

Today, parched bones of camels
lie in dust hollows,
beside the looters’ tunnels,
where antiquities feed
a desperate generation
in the land where
few tourists go.
Horses stand in starving heat.
Young boys despair
of providing sustenance
for ailing parents or sisters,
as tombs are raided
and dynamited
below his feet.

Money changes hands
in the brotherhood of power,
A journalist risks her life
to tell the story,
as the cabal watch
and shoot at her car
to silence her.

What scrolls will be written
in the blood-red desert
of history’s graveyard
alongside the Pharoahs’ beasts
and treasures?
The Sphinx watches and waits.

Read Poem: FAT IS NOT WHO I AM by L. Gresty

I know that you see me, you cannot help that
My backsides much bigger,
Than your massive hat…
You think ‘cause I’m over, the mass of my grocer
I must be a horrible bitch.
A hunny that’s heavy, with legs just like jelly
Must really sweat, stink and itch.
Yet if you look closer, or listen to me
And value my words more than figure
You may find a friend, someone to help mend
And with kindness,
Stop me getting bigger.
I don’t smell or itch, and I’m not such a bitch
Which you’d realise if you gave a damn…
So talk to me nicely
And in future think twicely,
Because ‘fat’ is not WHO I am!

Read Poem: U’re pretty by Lamar Johnson

You are beautiful.
Models and concubines bow their heads where you walk,
Flowers wilt, and die, knowing and recognizing their ugliness.
The Seas part – they are not worthy of touching you.
The Clouds encompass the sky, smothering all in grey
but leaving a hole, an aperture of the Sun open
only to follow you around;
Just like a spotlight.
Men and Women alike kill themselves for you
understanding that there is no sight to be found greater afterwards;
No wedding, no childbirth, no love
is capable of comparing.
Children cry, scream, and shit themselves;
They regret not being born to you
and curse their inferior genetics.
The Moon no longer reflects the Sun
and instead reflects your image
a thousand times as bright.
Trees turn into paper
words spontaneously appearing
all written in your name;
A thousand times a thousand chants
that the Air reads and sings.
The Fish have moved to the abyssal zone
for they too, know they are ugly
and bemoan the Light for showing it.
Your hair is finer than the finest silk
they are not even comparable.
Your skin is softer than the softest down
and the Birds have all shed their feathers
in the vainglorious hope that you will rest on them;
A gift they do not deserve
and so you do not give it.
The Earth recognizes it’s ugliness
so you float a foot above
the ground unworthy of your bare foot.
Frost coats the tips of your hair;
Fire burns on your bare chest –
The Elements are infatuated
but know you are out of reach.

Gods of all Religions offered you their seat;
You knew ugly worshippers would have ugly prayers,
and declined the Presidents for the same reason
(but you’ve been elected Lord in all lands
and God of the Free World).

Poets, Artists, and all Creators alike go blind,
go mad, comprehending nothing, seeing nothing
capable of matching you.
You have enslaved our minds.
You are Beautiful.

Read Poem: Laughter on the Outside by John Collings

I have forgot what it means to be dry
Because I have lived in this rain too long.
I hope my personal weather will sigh,
Allowing the time with the sun the time to be strong.
Until then I will sit under this cloud
With my drenched clothes clinging to my body.
A fool in the rain can never be proud,
Punishment for never being naughty.
I will continue to wear my smile
‘Cause others depend on the attitude.
Dripping laughter will become my style,
Never expecting any platitude.
Will any ever understand my pain,
Just a wet man, standing in his own rain?

Read Poem: A Stomach Filled With Poison by Matt Nagin

Always I return to the emptiness, the lack of vigor, and the arrow
in the safari smile; always I am once more among the hunters
and magic spears, cyclops wardens, anvils in the ravine;
always with the suns smashed into the curtains of night
and whirlwind promises sold like bottles of loneliness
in the filthy streets; twisting inside, eradicating a cavernous
bliss, attacking where strength is most required…

Rainbow days cascade into wounds that can never quite heal
and presumptive questions for the limerick nights that are
torn asunder with the blinding pain like bandits tortured in
jails of soft demise until they admit defeat—but they won’t—
cannot really—for the fight is all—and to go on is to dream
today—to maintain enough resolve to lift yourself out the
swirling sea, the quicksand of hardship, the limitations
of mind and soul, the spiritual and emotive sacrifices before
the jaguars; to build yourself up and find a way to laugh at all
the madness; the way you are consumed by the jewels of
vitality within; a stomach filled with poison, but still to go on;
to, strangely, persevere.

A pound of poison, a ton, a brigade; poison by the barrel; poison in
your dreams; poison when you awaken and make love; all is spoiled;
rotten; the apple decaying on such a narrow vine; the spirit crushed;
energy waning; your friends take off on wings of majesty towards
such lofty shores and you in the bathroom just trying to make it
through another day; the pain dropping you to your feet, clipping
you where most powerful; the pain sinking you right in the gut;
poison where the night shakes and the moon holds your hand; and at
the family dinner and the job interview and the meet and greet with
the devil; it wraps itself around you like ivy like a sheet of ice
like a prayer group for a sinner—poison in your belly and nowhere
to evade the onslaught or even blunt what it does to you for a second.

Poison yet again like a curtain of topaz, like a sun shower, like a deliverance
from superficiality; to lie on the couch holding your gut wishing for an end
is to be redeemed; to suffer in silence while others go on in glass houses
catering to every unimaginable whim, pleasure-junkies, hooked on the
idiocies of desire—is to rise above; to be eagle spirit, with wings that knife
through existential boundaries making you closer to Earth even as you
seemingly float away; to make you predator and prey; this poison gift, this
abracadabra wish, this death-plunge made of sugary dreams—this is your
salvation; this is what can carry you off; this is how you can rise above
your suffering and taste the pearls of a dawn crooked and endearing
before it even happens; this is how you are redeemed.

In the end, when the waves of pain surge, your head spins and you run
to the porcelain friend again and again—a warrior for the dark spaces,
a perennial exorcist of the evil within, a sorcerer dying from a spell he
cannot understand—in the end it is all a runway for you; the planes can
still kiss a genial, aberrant sky; the night is still waiting; decades pass
and still you can return to yourself; have these brief moments, these
flashes of bliss; evolve beyond the curse; the poison in a lockbox for
an hour, or a day, or a week: it is enough. Must suffice. A stomach
filled with poison, but still a pacifist in an unseen war that most days—
in spite of yourself—you can go out and win.

Bio

Matt Nagin’s poetry has been published in Antigonish Review, Dash Literary Journal, The Charles Carter, Grain Magazine and Arsenic Lobster. In 2018, his poem ‘If We Are Doomed,’ won the Spirit First Editor’s Choice Award. His first poetry collection, “Butterflies Lost Within The Crooked Moonlight,” was released in 2017, and has obtained very strong reviews. More info at mattnagin.com

—

Matt Nagin

WEB: mattnagin.com

TWITTER: @MNAGIN

INSTAGRAM: @NAGINPLEASE

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