St. Agatha Waits for Peter

The National Gallery, Edinburgh, 2015

It’s true. I did not need 

them, the mounds of flesh 

where my children should have 

fed, their milkteeth nibbling 

cracked skin, suckling little drops of 

blood with every gulp of milk. 

Still, as I lie bleeding, 

my breasts carried away in a bowl 

(perhaps given to a hungry dog)

I want them back. I send a prayer 

like a stumbling child to heaven. 

I wait in the blooming red.

           ©️  Ellie White, 2016

(First published by |tap| magazine, 2016)

The martyrdom of St. Agatha
by a follower of C. Welcome
from Wikimedia Commons

Rain

When I rain

I rain on plastic tents

stretched over heating vents

where the homeless sleep on cold nights

in the cold, cold cities.

In southern towns

I pound tin roofs—

slanting shanty roofs

across the railroad tracks.

There I drum a slum song

to children asleep in one bed.

Under the bridge,

an old man in a dirty sleeping bag

slips into a drunken doze.

He dreams of better days

when he was a young buck,

dancing like rain

on top of the world.

© Peg Latham,  1993

Rain in Kolkata
Photo by Monster eagle
from Wikimedia Commons

Persist, Resist: 2019, Facing Evil

I will not cease from Mental Fight

Nor shall my Sword sleep in my hand

Till we have built Jerusalem

In England's green & pleasant land.

-----Willian Blake

(To be human in a hurt world is to evolve from being a tear because aware to

being a wound seeking others hurt by terror to becoming ash yet we revive to in peace resist)

Once we were a walking teardrop

Though we shone while we thought.

Then we were a walking wound

Wound wooing other wounds

Wound aiding other wounds

Wound asking other wounds

"Are you truly a wound too?"

Now we are ashes moaning with memory--

Are ashes anything other than moans?

Yet love exists even in ashes

Love may persist even in ashes.

May the Phoenix be formed

Out of our ashes

Whose feathers flash through the air

Like Blakean blades!

      © Stephen Margulies, 2019

"The Garden of Love," by William Blake
from Wikimedia Commons

The Queen of the Damned

Shhh

I’m only going to say this once

While the god of doves

Sleeps behind a rusted-out Buick

While it’s rained from dawn till dusk

I pulled the bow back and settled

The arrow in the heart

Of the queen of the damned

Her minions rolled forward and vanished

Her black eyes closed

She left instructions for burial

In a far west mausoleum which followed

The arc of the setting sun

But I thought it best to leave her

For the dogs of the night

It rained from dawn till dusk

And then a crescent moon held Venus 

At the end Bonnie and Clyde were slaughtered

By Texas Rangers and Louisiana police

Twenty thousand attended

I made my way back to Manhattan

I made my way back to the city called home

I removed my boots and my clothing

And laid in a hot bath till the water turned cold

I stood and dried my bruised body

While the god of doves slept

While the queen of the damned attracted vultures

I put on a blue robe and lit a cigarette

Watching the crowded street

Through my sixty-seventh floor window

The phone rang

I let it

It stopped but then rang again

I got into bed and pulled the covers to my chin

And while the phone rang over and over

Fell asleep

© Phillip Marlin, 2019

Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow
Photo 1932 - 1934
Available through the Library of Congress
from Wikimedia Commons

Noble and Sentimental

Eight-thirty.  It’s dark in the room 

at my daughter’s house. Just across 

a blackened lawn the Quaker church 

glows—eight double windows 

blazing bright.  Twelve people pair 

as partners face-to-face, one hand 

on a shoulder, another at a waist, 

two clasped firm, held up high. 

Six couples move, flow over the floor, 

ONE two-three, ONE two-three, 

gliding out of sight, back in view,

out of sight. No music permeates 

the night, silence separates them 

from me. But dresses whirl, couples 

twirl, shoes barely brush the floor.  

I can hear my last waltz so long

ago—Strauss, maybe Ravel.  Lord, 

let me dance this fleeting life.

© Martha E. Snell, 2019

A couple dancing
Photo by Alvin Mahmudov
Originally posted on Unsplash;
from Wikimedia Commons

To Open All the Doors and Windows I Can Find

WAFTING SUN ON WINDED WATER

MAKES THE RIVER MOLTEN GOLD

LET ME BASK IN THIS MOMENT’S GRACE

ISN’T THIS MY PLACE?

TO OPEN ALL THE DOORS AND WINDOWS I CAN FIND?

TO LISTEN, TO SEE, AND FEEL THE DIVINE?

NINE HUNGRY BUZZARDS CRUISE THE SKY,

WIND CHAFES THROUGH THE RIVER PINE,

I MOVE CLOSER TO THE WATER

NOW I FEEL THE HEAT —

FIRE AND WATER ARE MINGLING, THEY CONSORT,

(I DO NOT COMPETE)

FIRE BURNS BRIGHT

AND MOVES ACROSS THE WATER INTO ME —

WE ARE ONE !

I BASK IN THE MOMENT

© Gerry Sackett, 2019

Sunset over the River Cam
Photo by Andrew Dunn
from Wikimedia Commons
(This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.)

Sanctuary

Stomping divots in this ocean of mud

Is like trying to make the earth flat again

And you laugh and I say some people

Are actually trying and not only that but

They would have us unwind the journeys

Of our ancestors across isthmus bridges

Across oceans on ships so tender that

They could not sail even a broad reach

Across rivers and through tunnels at night

Holding hope that some will not be deported

My barn is big enough for six families

At least, enough feet to stomp all the divots

Enough to carry on the farm when I die

Enough for a complete circle around the fire

So let us go out now into the muddy pasture

And ask the horses for those greater hearts

© Bill Prindle, 2019

Horses in the field
by Peter, from Bern, Switzerland
from Wikimedia Commons