Vulnerable Girls

I’d let boys blow
My innocence and stability away
Only to wish
That other, prettier girls were the same
*
Time would go by
My seeds slowly did too
Blowing in the wind
Of pheromones, testosterone, and sin
* 
Then the storm hit 
Ripping my seeds into it’s grasp
Almost engulfing me from my roots
Asphyxiated under the profound grasp
*
All that remains
Is a few seeds
My dainty stalk
Sustained from the root
Where it begins, the pain


Sydney West, 
Harbert, Michigan, 
United States 
disemboweling@hotmail.com 

Waterlogged

Rain pounds pebble-dashed walls
Rebounds and reverberates
against panes of glass.
A million tiny droplets, crashing, splashing,
Cold, hard concrete. No grip.
The water, frozen soft. 
Fine icy pulp covers the concrete floor,
black, almost greasy, 
slippery.
Back wheels, black tires
Scrape and push and
spin and spin
Going no where.

Aimee Miller
Liverpool, England
aimeeaimzmiller@aol.co.uk 

Far from Equilibrium

Amidst cacophony:
the wood's silence emits
hidden sounds.

A branch falls:
already risen from the dead,
an ancient shift decays.

Wolf on hill,
lichen, resin, pine,
old day, smells.

Little bird 
on top of a mountain pine 
sings the blues.

Pine cones
in the wood's cemetery
await resurrection.

Shadows caress 
mingled pine needles 
lost to their trees.

Canopies cascade
in defiance and embrace 
of natures flow.

In the wood
canopies don't argue
about space.

Gnarled roots
bust the paths
& feet.

*

The mill on the hill
landmarks the village below:
the signs say so.

A pathway's trees & fields 
conceal an extended motorway 
revealed only by its noise.

A conjuring trick, 
like a rabbit out of a hat, 
galaxies in all directions.

Lost on the hill,
you track extensions, 
cell phones & satellites. 

Fear grips 
the gut, a gradient 
of civilization! 

*

Behold in your air
the majesty of nature,
which you cannot share.

Not even with her,
who, like you, will disappear.

Further down
season's rushing river,
turbulence:

stillness & motion,
dissipative & liberating. 

*

The story lingers on
after the moment's gone;
a memory forms.

In presence space, 
different intervals compete: 
a homecoming.

Existence is mortal, 
order out of chaos, eternal,
time ephemeral. 

The way is strewn
with paths not taken
on looking back.

*

City street names: 
ghosts that cast us as shadows
into their sunsets.

In sunsets: 
shadows grow longer 
than time's arrow.

Suburban wasteland, 
rubbish littered allotments, 
a wreckage for the bins.

Spring 2012, 
it's never too early 
for radiant false cherry.

Park signs:
wash the animals
after touching them.

Trees watch us 
hide our roots 
in heavy boots.

*

Evening sierra:
the clouds giving depth
to escaping colours.

robin ouzman hislop

Originally Published The Poetic Bond 11 (2012)

www.thepoeticbond.com

and appearing at

www.artvilla.com 

Untitled

All of the birds flew out of me
When he
said that, & what it meant
out, out, out
they went
screaming like crows
just before the sun goes
down. All the birds inside me broke
(when he spoke)
out of my mind and eyes and ears.
My proclivities
became pterodactyl crows
wheeling around the tiny room;
a vacuum
I was. I was, yes, ‘his’, but free
because he had no need of me. 



Jessica Geddes
Dunedin
New Zealand 

Keen on Tolkien

In trenches, he dreamt of unusual worlds,

To the dictionary, gave new words.

Remarkable languages were first to come,

Perhaps in the Battle of the Somme.

Complex dialects were soon created,

Then various worlds in which they were fêted.

Wasn’t meant to be read as allegory,

Just as a fantastical, fictive story.

With obscure races of men and trees,

To Elves and dwarves, it gave new lease.

At magical realms, one marvels and gasps,

Have subtle connotations that later one grasps.

Aloof and regal, the women seemed to be,

Inspiring, instigating, were the plot’s key.

Ancient lines of fine men grave,

Their world desperately who tried to save.

Magical tools unexplained by science,

Born of Nature’s and mind’s alliance.

Elves from stars brought far-off news,

His worlds had various scents and hues.

Multi-dimensional was his approach,

Prickly topics could easily broach.

Heroes’ minds, intricate and rich,

With complex plots, could easily stitch.

Has been construed in a thousand ways,

New generations it tends to amaze.

Explores details of human nature,

In Man’s psyche, gives an aperture.

Back stories stretched for thousands of years,

Still relevant for mechanized fears.

Humans and nature, fuel and steel,

We ride the same old karmic wheel.

Can Nature prevail over Man’s iron will?

Cause the crash of industrial hill?

-©2012. Sultana Raza

Luxembourg

Sultana Raza is a free-lance writer. Her article, short stories and poems have appeared in numerous publications and have been translated into French.

Dusk on Harrow Hill

The song sheet pylons throb
chords of ice and sea salt skin
plucked like dragged lip lovers.

Dusk is a harsh desert;
birds rip varicose rivers,
gullets pulse for dead fish.

A girl disappeared last June,
skipping to a silhouette 
pounding earth with a gosling.

They’re burning gorse to look for her
the covered man points down
hardened men are vomiting. 



Antony Owen,
Coventry,
England

Dusk on Harrow Hill

The song sheet pylons throb
chords of ice and sea salt skin
plucked like dragged lip lovers.

Dusk is a harsh desert;
birds rip varicose rivers,
gullets pulse for dead fish.

A girl disappeared last June,
skipping to a silhouette
pounding earth with a gosling.

They’re burning gorse to look for her
the covered man points down
hardened men are vomiting.


Antony Owen,
Coventry,
England