Author Archives: Sarah

A Gentle Rain


The morning’s rain, 
like love, does not insist on its own way—

patiently, kindly, permeates itself 
down among roots of daisy and of oak
where it does the most good.

A mystery: something that ends well.  

We never get to see
the intimate congress of rain with root
in chambers underground,

yet from childhood I recall
the preacher in his long black robe,
halving a loaf by hand, raising a cup—

how he spoke of outward, visible signs
of inward, invisible grace.

Gentlest of rains settles in 

only as soil allows.  It is not arrogant
or rude.  It will reach 
the roots of life when it reaches them.

Russell Rowland writes from New Hampshire’s Lakes Region, where he has judged high-school Poetry Out Loud competitions.  His work appears in Except for Love: New England Poets Inspired by Donald Hall (Encircle Publications), and Covid Spring, Vol. 2 (Hobblebush Books). His latest poetry book, Magnificat, is available from Encircle Publications.

dusk’s trees 


through still 
ness dance 

their pur

pling-black twigs
against fading s 

ilver sky and 
here just

there my

limbs my bones my
pumped blood my

pul

sing net of
veins en 

mesh 

on 

death’s

edge with

birth

Mark Goodwin is a poet-sound-artist, fiction-maker & re-thinker who speaks and writes in differing ways. He is also a walker, balancer, climber, stroller … and negotiator of places.  Mark has a number of books & chapbooks with various poetry houses, including Leafe Press, Longbarrow Press, & Shearsman Books. His latest chapbooks are: to ‘B’ nor as ‘tree’ (Intergraphia, Sheffield, October 2022) & Of Gone Fox (The Hedgehog Poetry Press, Clevedon, April 2023). Mark lives with his partner on a narrowboat just north of Leicester, in the English Midlands. He tweets poems from @kramawoodgin, and some of his sound-enhanced poetry is here: https://markgoodwin-poet-sound-artist.bandcamp.com  

Without Holding Anything
Or Doing Anything Or Trying

Not pushing anything away
So that even happiness
Returns to the place
It previously occupied

Which seems to open
A jar full of joy
Dumping it out
So everything
Has that pliable
Feeling of spring
And the scent of flowers

The feeling expands
Like every green thing
Absorbing the light
Turning it into kindness
An exquisite gem
That the day can’t seem to get
Out of its mind

Even night
When it finally comes
Seems to glow green
Finding a place
For another emerald
In the vast storehouse
Of constellations 

Gerry Grubbs has published poems in Haikuniverse, Poet Lore and other magazines. His recent book, Learning A New Way To Listen, has just been released by Dos Madres Press. 

What Shaped Her

Frances in her library
reading a book on Hamada

in the studio
the potter’s wheel
turns and Frances turns
anew

she repairs a broken bowl
 the golden seams
she said
make the repaired
more beautiful than the whole

on the table 
are the flowers she planted
then tended
then cut
and brought indoors
to arrange
                               just so!

her bees gift her honey
which sweetens our world
we ate some the last time we met
while talking about
the poetics of Bashō 
the tea ceremony
and her young brother’s death
long ago
that shaped her

Iljas Baker is a retired university professor born in Scotland and living in Thailand. His debut collection Peace Be Upon Us was published earlier this year by Lote Tree Press, Cambridge UK. He has been published in a number of anthologies, the latest being Kaleidoscope of Stories: Muslim Voices in Contemporary Poetry and has been published in various journals in Asia, the USA and Europe.

Hoping

 
I hope one day
I can feel peace in my bones
like the five buddhas
nestled in my yard, all
wearing beads and holding
flowers plucked from my garden:
an altar just for them
to nurture as they nurture
me when looking
in their eyes.
 
I hope one day
the stars shine on me all day long
and a shooting one
comes out to greet me
on earth so that my
biggest dream comes true
and who really knows what that is
when I’ve already lived
so many lifetimes,
seen so much.
 
There are no longer surprises
or sparks. Is this the
sign of something?
I hope that one day
I will learn what it is.

Diana Raab, MFA, PhD, is a poet, memoirist, blogger, speaker, and award-winning author of thirteen books. Her work has been published and anthologized world-wide. She blogs for Psychology Today, The Wisdom Daily, Thrive Global and is a guest blogger for many others. Her latest book is, An Imaginary Affair: Poems Whispered to Neruda (Finishing Line Press, 2022).  Visit her at: dianaraab.com.

Haibun (untitled)

March winds whimper through pine boughs and prayer flags. At long last, the gilded doors and whitewashed walls of Ghoom monastery. In the courtyard, three boy monks chase one another with fat brooms, their tattered robes flying behind them as they jostle past us. Taking two steps at a time, they climb up the stone stairway that leads to the temple entrance. As they run up the roughhewn stones, my eyes fall on the deep chilblain scars circling their ankles. 

Inside the cavernous shrine, the splendid Buddha—golden body, brocade robes, perfect hands on lap. 

                incense ash
                falling silently
                through eternity 

Sayantani Roy’s writing straddles both India and the U.S., and she calls both places home. Her work appears or is forthcoming in Cold Lake Anthology, Gone Lawn, Heavy Feather Review, Imposter Poetry Journal, Pen to Print, The Hooghly Review, The Seattle Times, and Wordgathering. She dreams of teaching poetry to young children one day. Find her on Instagram @sayan_tani_r. https://www.instagram.com/sayan_tani_r

Motif


When fullness wasn’t warranted in my writ
I sought it in words. 
Never got into the one-upmanship bid: 
My fingerprint is prettier than yours. 
In last night’s outage, 
a glowfly kept me ticking. 
During other eclipses, 
I discovered newer fireflies. 
Theology led to the thoroughfare: 
I soaked in its suggestions.

Sanjeev Sethi has authored seven books of poetry. His latest is Wrappings in Bespoke (The Hedgehog Poetry Press, UK, August 2022). He has been published in over thirty countries. His poems have found a home in more than 400 journals, anthologies, and online literary venues. He edited Dreich Planet #1, an anthology for Hybriddreich, Scotland, in December 2022. He is the joint winner of the Full Fat Collection Competition-Deux, organized by Hedgehog Poetry Press, UK. In 2023, he won the first prize in a poetry competition at the prestigious National Defence Academy, Pune. He was recently conferred the 2023 Setu Award for Excellence. He lives in Mumbai, India.

X/ Twitter @sanjeevpoems3 || Instagram sanjeevsethipoems

On the Firth of Clyde

She sat down beside me on the bench
outside the big Texas hospital, both of us
waiting for the valet to bring our cars.
She also seemed in no hurry,
glad to be out in the mild March wind again.

Your perfume smells wonderful, I remarked
impulsively, a luscious aroma drifting my way.

White Linen, she said, turning toward me,
pleased. A gift from my family. They saved up for it.
She grimaced, it’s expensive.

Is that a Scottish accent I hear?

She nodded, eyes sparkling, and as some strangers
will do, she told me her story.
A husband four years buried, a move here
decades ago from Dumbarton, a town
on the Firth of Clyde.
Glasgow’s River Clyde flows
toward the Atlantic and the Irish Sea,
blooms into this estuary five hundred feet deep
surrounded by peninsulas and splotched
with skerries and islands.

Scotland’s freezing, I said. I’ve been there.

She laughed, showing misaligned teeth.
True, but one summer, oh a dozen years ago now,
we returned to celebrate our anniversary
and we danced at night on the banks of the firth.

She hadn’t seemed a white linen lady,
just an ordinary woman with mirthful eyes.
Yet in those few minutes, she offered me
a scene in a life surrounded by love,
that I recall now and then when I most need to.

A sky lumpy with gray clouds, the cold wind snapping,
daughters, brothers, nieces, bonny friends,
the day darkens to purple heather,
the shingled beach crunches under their feet,
they hold each other, the water laps, they dance.

 

Karen McAferty Morris writes about nature and ordinary people. Her poetry, recognized for its “appeal to the senses, the intellect, and the imagination,” has appeared in Persimmon Tree, Sisyphus, The Louisville Review, The Ekphrastic Review, Black Fox Literary Journal, and Lyric Magazine. Her collections Elemental (2018), Confluence (2020), and Significance (2022) are national prize winners. She is lucky enough to live on Perdido Bay in the Florida panhandle.

Memorial Square


You know that church, that birch, that rusted grating.
You recognize the park from years ago.
It’s like the bench and pigeons have been waiting;
tulips are selfless, putting on a show.
As manhole steam eddies across the lawn,
the sunlight crimsoning it says, “Night’s near.”
The fury you were walking off moves on.

This place, an old friend pleading, “Come; sit here.”

Aaron Poochigian earned a PhD in Classics from the University of Minnesota and an MFA in Poetry from Columbia University. His latest collection of poetry, American Divine, the winner of the Richard Wilbur Award, came out in 2021. He has published numerous books and translations with such presses as Penguin Classics and W.W. Norton. His work has appeared in such publications as Best American Poetry, The Paris Review and POETRY.

The World's Sharpness

Arising from the 24th sonnet of Elizabeth Barrett Browning


          Despite a handstitched receiving blanket
for your arrival   soft   dry & warm
& your mother's strong arms
          despite the appearance of our world   
so round & smooth   you could   only briefly   
be protected from the catch
of serrated things   from the stab of worldlings  
          So come   you pierced 
torn   & riven of soul
          come   you born to trouble  
muddled by sunderings   & you   
so hard pressed
          come to the one who offers rest

D.S. Martin is Poet-in-Residence at McMaster Divinity College, and Series Editor for the Poiema Poetry Series from Cascade Books. He has written five poetry collections including Angelicus (2021), Ampersand (2018), and Conspiracy of Light: Poems Inspired by the Legacy of C.S. Lewis (2013). He and his wife live in Brampton, Ontario; they have two adult sons.