We played tag in the ocean,
and drifted on the azure.
We were two jobless teens with reptilian eyes,
watching clouds pass,
until we turned into fish jerky.

 

Serhiy Metenko

​

​

THE JEWELED HEAD

 

for Irving Shapiro

 

I imagine myself at a table
beneath a tall window where light streams in,
refracting rainbows like in a Vermeer painting.
Before me a great open book
with crisp blank pages where my fountain pen
scratches, the nib disappearing from time to time:
Opaque ink. My right hand loiters,
my left hand writes, fills pages with arabesques and scrawls.
That pleasure seeps through my fingers
as light grows weaker but richer in hue.
I feel myself sinking toward my center, suspended
between thought and act, a deep, seething marsh
in the twilight hush where I carry
my head like a jewel through the gloom.

 

Daniel Shapiro

​

​

CRAPPY POEM (4)

At Rockaway Beach, the seagulls
line up on dunes, like soldiers
watch the children surf
instructors behind each child
on a board, paddle them out to sea
hunt waves while volunteers
in red tee shirts guide
each child back to shore.
This is surf therapy school
for children with disabilities.
From where we open water swim
beyond the jetties and wave breaks
we catch smiles of glee and wonder—
the thrill of a large swell,
bobbing on waves
clouds cover the sky,
shield the sun, the sea
is choppy but no complaints
this morning, ocean is therapy
for all who enter in September.

My father taught my brother and I
to swim before we could walk. Surrounded
by the gulf in Kuwait, he spared himself
the worry of drownings. I do not remember
a time I was not in the water—all seasons, all year.
Each afternoon when my father returned
from work and we were done with school
we'd walk to the pier down the street
dive from large rocks, swim and climb
until the sun sunk down
and we were burnt dark brown,
glazed with salty white, more sea
creature than child –
no different from whale,
hermit crab, minnow
sand shark, stingray or porpoise.
On the way home, a towel
slung over a shoulder, our flip-flops
slap the pavement, as the muezzin's
daily prayers ring out
into the holy evening.

 

Michelle Yasmine Valladares

​

​

FIRST RESPONDER

Sometimes I rush like a first responder
to the silvered shards of my memories
stacked – like silver chips.
I hurry should one, two or a few slip away
to join the other forgotten faces
and lost moments.

The pile is large – after all these years.
From one shard, father calls to scold me;
from another, mother holds my hand
while I swim – knowing my fear of water;
my uncles, fresh from the war
tell me stories I cannot understand.

It's my job to save the moments
and keep them alive,
perform triage on my memories
and greet them warmly on their return.
Perhaps, I'm both a first responder
and a last.

 

Barry Wallenstein
Emeritus Professor

​

​

WHEN MY POEM APPEARED

in a respected and established
national and international magazine
that people could actually buy
on newsstands,
people used the word
"proud," as in, they were
of me,
as if I had
the baby,
enough money,
made peace in the Middle East
and Northern Ireland,
stabbed a stake through
the heart of racism,
wrested power from the badguys
who didn't deserve it,
sat beside my father through
the moment of death,
found a lover who fought
to keep me,
and when my poem appeared,
I had.

 

Estha Weiner

​

​

END SONG

Dionysus choked on his own blood
as—torn apart—his being was scattered across the land

Oh, sing to me.
Sing to me, night, dark as the ocean
as mud
as womb.

Sing to me
from harboring caves,
from burrows of small animals,
from shadowed bar room halls.
My vision is blanched by
Apollo's searing blasts,
his explosions,
his bombings,
his bullet-riddled classrooms.

My ear pressed to the earth,
I detect the music of Dionysus reawakening

as a gingko tree,
as a holly,
as juniper on the hillside.

I rejoice in his thrumming song.
I love… I love… I love
and I
Re-member.

 

Suzanne Weyn

​

​

[FLESH IS A FRAGILE CANVAS]

I.

what          cuts          you

                 open

can            sew          you

                 shut

but will not

II.

tear          of

marrow/meat/membrane

​

cells: a small room

 

independent replication

 

divide & conquer

III.

unlocked/unbolted/unlatched/unfastened/unsecured

unbuttoned/unzipped/untied/unlaced/undone

IV.

wire threaded          nickel through skin

 

                                  ever so delicately

 

the puncture will sing

metallic burst singeing your tongue

  this is going to hurt

V.

you crave it anway

 

Alyssa Yankwitt
Alumna