A St. Patrick’s Day Memory

Some folks have a problem with authority,
legitimate and otherwise, and I have spent
a lifetime festering in that group.

An event in youth convinced me that 
big people are no different than little people
despite their titles and the homage paid them.

The event that changed me was in third grade
when a nun asked me if I was cousin to a cardinal 
in the Catholic Church. She had heard my father,

an immigrant blue collar worker, was first cousin
to Cardinal Stritch. Little as I was I had no idea but 
I said I’d ask my father and I did that night at supper.

He kept eating his cabbage and potatoes
then finally said we were cousins to the cardinal
whose people also took a boat from Ireland to America.

So I blinked and said to him, “Pa, Sister wants to know
why don’t we call Cardinal Stritch and tell him we’re here.”
Looking up from his cabbage and potatoes,

my father took a sip of tea, shot a laser in my eye,
sniffed a bit and said, “Ask the good sister 
why the good cardinal doesn’t call us.”


Donal Mahoney
donalmahoney@charter.net 

Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, US and has had poems published in Ancient Heart Magazine and other publications in the United States, Europe, Asia and Africa. 

Things

Things they add meaning
to this menagerie
answers to what lies in the abyss
forget cheap talk about the rain
and exit/entry strategies
what does it matter?
when Im surrounded by these things

Time ceases
to have meaning
Bright lights and sweet spots
forget cheap talk about hunger
and black dogs
I can out run them all
when Im surrounded by all these 
wondrous things

Contact is overrated
Art is for people lost in a void
Heroes in sweatpants
living the dream
forget about shelter and love
fairytales are the new agenda
as I'm surrounded by these things.


Ashley
Leamington Spa, UK
ashleygriffiths@hotmail.com

Abandonment

Upon hearing the once
eminent author had 
abandoned all hope
of finishing his novel

I felt sympathy for the poor
volume, half-done, limping
to a nearby shelf to find
the climb too stressful

Gone the simple words
that do not try to impress,
unknown the future
of the much-loved main
character.



JD DeHart 
Tennessee,
US 

A Matter of Preference

Fred prefers a mouse
connected by a wire
to his keyboard.
Walt prefers a mouse

that’s portable, able 
to roam over the desk
in Walt’s big hand.
For Walt the danger is

the mouse may slip
and fall off the desk,
hit the floor and break.
That's happened twice.

Fred prefers a wife, one 
he’s had for 30 years.
Walt prefers a fiancé,
a new one every year.


Donal Mahoney
donalmahoney@charter.net 

Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, US and has had poems published in Ancient Heart Magazine and other publications in the United States, Europe, Asia and Africa.

Passage

Roots are deep
the trees stretch
toward the ether

and within the womb
of dark brown soil.

The sky changes
like time
and leaves shades

of purple and blue
amid a cacophony
of wasted foliage.



Sneha Subramanian Kanta
United Kingdom 

No Silence

Hell is the absence
of ink with twelve more
ideas rolling out,
soon to be forgotten

An absence of voice,
itch in the throat,
when a word must be
spoken for reason

Last bits of thought
unrecorded, unexpressed
on a sullen afternoon,
embracing silence

When a sentence would
heal, banishing tension.

JD DeHart 
Tennessee, US. 

A Winter Buffet

A bright winter day
and not a leaf left
on this skeleton 

tree teeming 
with sparrows
chirping and hopping

branch to branch 
waiting for the feeder
to be free of cardinals

juncos and jays 
bickering for seed
while on the ground

four doves
stroll in silence
feasting on spilled 

seed near the tree
where a fat squirrel 
sits with tail high 

in a question mark
ready to dive 
and scatter them all


Donal Mahoney
donalmahoney@charter.net 

Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, US and has had poems published in Ancient Heart Magazine and other publications in the United States, Europe, Asia and Africa