PPP Ezine; Volume 2, Issue 3, March 2018

Titanic by Author Renee’ Drummond-Brown

 

Tired is as tired does. She floats on

carless streams; who knows no love. She floats on river-banks

giving her all to the poor. She floats on oceanic “blues”

of a dark history’s past

“SEEshores” + “SEEshells” – white beaches = black quicksand. She’s

not built to last. Duracell, ALKALINE and Energizer

keeps her going and going and going. CHARGE-she’s gone!

 

 

Can’t you “sea?” The saltwater pressures her blood

greater than the strength of them waterfalling hearts. She boils!

She boils!! She boils!!! And can’t hide!

But why?

Ain’t no pearls clamed inside. Can’t you “sea?”

Her lake’s shallow and parliament knee deep. They can’t

swim like she

and never did they learn. Can’t you “sea?”

Her army, her navy, her coastguard are the few, were the proud,

but in no way can withstand alone without THE marine!

 

 

Walking by faith

gets momma utterly exhausted for which she terminates

the struggle for them quote-un-quote

un-grates.

Forevermore, can she no longer float on

sureSEEs and/or SEEshores; whichever!

 

 

BUT

when them momma’s give up; WATCH IT NOW

EVERYONE DROWNS

and i mean everyone; FOR “SHORE!”

“Their” life jackets will forever work

no-more.

 

 

Sending out an’ SOS

can’t help the raging of an angry battered sea.

Nothin’ like a shipwreck

that gets tossed

AND

turns.

 

Dedicated to: The heart of the ocean!

 

A B.A.D. RocDeeRay poem

 

 

 

 

Renee’ B. Drummond is a renowned poetria and artist from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She is the author of: The Power of the Pen, SOLD TO THE HIGHEST BIDDER, Renee’s Poems with Wings are Words in Flight-I’ll Write Our Wrongs, and Renee’s Poems with Wings are Words in Flight. Her work is viewed on a global scale and solidifies her as a force to be reckoned with in the literary world of poetry. Renee’ is inspired by non-other than Dr. Maya Angelou, because of her, Renee’ posits “Still I write, I write, and I’ll write!”

 

No, I will not buy you an aardvark by Ryan Quinn Flanagan

 

No, I will not buy you an aardvark.

You are not Noah, and there are monetary constraints.

Just like they use at the asylum, but without all that tussle.

I haven’t screamed in decades.

I should get paid for that if it makes me half-professional.

Conformity is simple as waiting on steeping tea.

Removing the bag, we all have our rituals.

Or standing in an elevator watching the bright red numbers of gravity prove themselves indoors.

In a controlled environment. Large oak desks and uniforms to give the impression of permanence.

And grazing upon the avenues, I stumble upon a new pair of eyes; 3 pairs for $5 the sign reads, as though anyone requires three pairs of eyes.

I left abundance with the bill seven rentals ago.

In a room with vaulted ceilings so shut-ins could enjoy the sky.

Have you seen the 8 tonne Henry Moore sculpture outside the AGO?

Large Two Forms they plan on moving to a park.  It always made me think of fat sex if I am honest.

 

No, I will not buy you a tree sloth either.

There are speed limits to follow, and you must make your own way now.

To Nirvana or Tallahassee.

Who can tell one from the other?

 

 

 

 

Ryan Quinn Flanagan is a Canadian-born author residing in Elliot Lake, Ontario, Canada with his wife and many bears that rifle through his garbage.  His work can be found both in print and online in such places as: Evergreen Review, The New York Quarterly, PPP Ezine, Piker Press, Red Fez, and The Oklahoma Review.

Love is our master by Allison Grayhurst

 

The tone resonated the red heat

of a sea of lava burning away the dead cells,

activating a living substance. We held

hands, walking in the deserted late-December streets.

Ours is nobody’s but ours – broken train tracks carried,

dropped, put back together. The lapping wind of the spirit

like a bell in the far distance, calling us here, there

and always home.

 

Your pockets are full of roots, ones

you chopped from the ground, left there with no tree

or shrub to source its life out to. But those roots still thirst,

so you place them in a high jar in our bedroom, tend to them,

give them the attention of your brilliant mind, hurting

for their inadequacies. I love you deep in the hole and in

the twilight of an open summoning space or when locked

in desire, the two of us, giants without chains – the illusion of

isolation shed, heroes to each other’s loneliness, and the rising

of our blood that has no ancestry, no pastlives or this life before.

 

We are the keepers of this conversation. You are the place where

all my ships land, in the infinity of your eyes, a strong arrow spark

of awe-striking connection, where underground tunnels are excavated.

We are a perfect rub and flow, and we flow, fingers

over the tender inner thigh, mouths

braving more than kisses. We built a bridge and we crossed it,

holding hands, watching each other’s back. We take off our shoes,

a field is before us.

 

All animals are gorgeous, each with a full and necessary soul.

Animals peer out from behind the curtain of high trees

lining the field, waiting for us to run. We run

and twirl and lay down in laughter, like we once did long ago.

We are good just as we are. We are one at the knees and at the core.

Hell and the moaning of withheld mercy is far behind us,

we have been devoured and we dissolve –

our shells and our centers, seasoned, spring-woven,

what is ours, what is God’s, combined, surrendered.

 

 

Allison Grayhurst is a member of the League of Canadian Poets. Four times nominated for “Best of the Net”, 2015/2017, she has over 1125 poems published in over 450 international journals and anthologies. She has 21 published books of poetry, six collections and six chapbooks. She lives in Toronto with her family. She is a vegan. She also sculpts, working with clay; http://www.allisongrayhurst.com

 

Exploring silence by Reena Prasad

 

The sound stills itself at times

waiting for cleverer ones to have their say

In that brief interlude, I search

for a reverberation of my thoughts

in this orb of acoustic mazes

Drop a silent sigh here

It rebounds back the next moment

its echoes lingering, feeling, exploring the twilight zones

hanging like bats in unseen crooks

to come flying back

and swat me into stillness

 

In the dissonance of lively voices

talking themselves hoarse to keep out milder ones,

the rustles, the sighs, the whispers, the hums

make me marvel at their innate softness

but my silence

kept out of the picture for too long

envies these mellow beauties

and longs to make itself heard too

It thunders, it yells, it roars, it wails

There is no respite ever.

 

 

 

Reena Prasad is a poet from India, currently living in Sharjah (United Arab Emirates). Her poems have been published in several anthologies. She is the Destiny Poets UK’s, Poet of the year for 2014 and co-editor of The Significant Anthology & Silhouette I & 2. She is the winner of the Reuel international prize for Poetry, 2018.

A  Lonely Tree and A Longing, Sharp as Knife by Asha Viswas

 

A  Lonely Tree

 

Autumn leaves

A calligraphy in ochre

On a blanket of sighs :

A sea of sibilance .

 

The wind whipped tree

Holding a single leaf

The next gust signs it off ,

Like the trace of a dream.

 

The shadow of the tree

Rests in the backyard-

Loneliness- bleak and nameless,

Fear howls in the silent house.

 

 

A Longing, Sharp as Knife

 

I walk through the rooms

Nothing is lost, not even the sounds.

I rummage through the many cupboards

Where dream and memory live together.

 

As I open the door, another dream sprouts

An old, gentle but sad face

That still waits for a fistful of light

Through the darkened road .

 

The dream stops at the edge of a thought-

A paradigm for a few question marks.

Realizing that I am encroaching

On somebody else’s dream, I shut the door.

 

Slowly the house turns into an allegory of words

Without a future, without a past

syllables, and not a trace of you.

I wish the ghosts could sleep forever in peace.

 

Asha Viswas is a much awarded Indian poet whose poems have been published, praised and liked all over the world.

 

Rhapsodies of the East by Pitambar Naik

 

 

I enameled those whom I love

With the green pride

And those of the up-shoots of the green coppice.

 

Dreams which needed to be freed

I let them fly as birds in the deep blue sky

I let them sing the song of liberty.

 

Along the bank of my fickle mind

I let blossom a lot many divine lotuses

To carve the eternal pride

The words which appealed me

I let them be enlivened with the life of my life

To hear the rhapsodies

Of the new stanzas of the east.

 

 

Translated from Purbaraga by Debendra Kumar Bauri

 

 

Mora antahina bhalapaiba mananku

pingheideli patrapari kanluthiba

gachhara sabuja spardhaku

 

Mukti loduthiba swapnamanku

Chadheikari udeideli

Nila akashare

Purnaswadhinatara geeta gaibaku

 

Mora chapalakhialara kule kule

Mun phuteideli

Aneka brahma kamala

Nashwara pkhudare

Rachibaku shashwata garimaku

 

Mote jeevana maguthiba shabdamanku

Mun pranaru prana deli

Sunibaku nuaeka panktire

Kabitara purbaraga

 

 

 

 Pitambar Naik is an Indian poet. Odisha is the state where he was born and grew up amidst paddy fields hearing heartrending folk songs and playing kabbadi. He toils hard and sweats in an advertising studio as a creative writer for a living and writes poetry and short fiction to live his passion. His works have appeared in Literary Orphans, Occulum, Moonchild Magazine, Bhashabandhan Review, HEArt Online,

Coldnoon Travel Poetics, Spark Magazine, and The New Indian Express and PPP Ezine among others. He can be reached at pitambarnaikwriter@gmail.com

 

 

Poem #5 by Grant Guy

 

He flipped hamburgers

He flipped her heart

She worked the counter

At the A&W in Transcona

 

That was enough of a common ground

To base their 35 year marriage on

 

Their three children

And their eight grandchildren

All worked at the A&W in Transcona

 

For three generations they were the Burger Family

 

They called their marriage a success

 

 

 

 

Grant Guy is a Winnipeg, Canada, poet, writer and playwright. His poems and short stories have been published in Canada and Internationally. He has three books published: Open Fragments (Lives of Dogs), On the Bright Side of Down and Bus Stop Bus Stop (Red Dashboard). His plays include an adaptation of Paradise Lost and the Grand Inquisitor. He was the 2004 recipient of the Manitoba Arts Council’s 2004 Award of Distinction and the 2017 recipient of the Winnipeg Arts Council’s Making A Difference Award.   

 

 

Chickens Hatching by Scott Thomas Outlar

 

Even when there remains

nothing left to say,

our silence can prove to be

the weapon of gold

that helps to save

lost souls in the end.

 

There is no war

righteous enough

to convince me

to flick my tongue

in anger

or pick up a sword

in disgust

this time.

 

All of my dragons

lay out slain

behind me

on the path;

their bones buried

beneath the ash.

 

We breathe this sacrament

of sacred fire

into our lungs

together as One;

 

and now only

parasitic mosquitos

remain

to be slaughtered

until we have recovered

all of the blood

from generations

they’ve tried

their damnedest

to taint.

 

 

Scott Thomas Outlar hosts the site 17Numa.wordpress.com where links to his published poetry, fiction, essays, interviews, reviews, live events, and books can be found. His work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. Scott was a recipient of the 2017 Setu Magazine Award for Excellence in the field of literature. His words have been translated into Albanian, Afrikaans, Persian, French, and Italian.

Regrets Nothing by Kelli J Gavin

 

The moments I have lived

The times I have treasured

The words left unspoken

The conversations I have entered

 

I Regret Nothing

 

Nurturing

Growing

Molding

Perfecting

Each instance serving a purpose

 

I Regret Nothing

 

The heartache that breaks me

The joy that rebuilds me

The children that fulfil me

The husband that completes me

 

I Regret Nothing

 

The days I have conquered

The illness that consumed me

The lessons learned over

the excessive passage of time

The light bulb moments now gone dim

 

I Regret Nothing

 

A life well lived

Not a moment wasted

Each day grasped

and fully experienced

The nights that restore and quench

and motivate

 

Because

 

I Regret Nothing

 

Kelli J Gavin lives in Carver, MN with Josh, her husband and two crazy kids.  She is a Professional Organizer, owns two small companies, and is a Writer.  She is a blogger, writes for newspapers and for online sites as a guest columnist.  Her focus is special needs parenting, non-fiction stories from her own life and poetry that often can’t be contained.

 

 

Remolded by Heath Brougher

 

The reflex

of the reverberation

reflected and refracted

down the rectangular roads

ravaging a reality recently revived

and repaired and repaved

counterbalanced concrete

in real time.

Reassured no one was relinquished from the realm

of reamed recognition.

Everyone regarded

the ravage of the repulsive ravines

now reigning and running randomly

throughout the rent ruins we pretended not to see.

 

 

Heath Brougher is the co-poetry editor of Into the Void Magazine, winner of the 2017 Saboteur Award for Best Magazine. He is a multiple Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net Award Nominee and his work has been translated into journals and anthologies in Albania and Kosovo. He was the judge of Into the Void’s 2016 Poetry Competition and edited the anthology Luminous Echoes, the proceeds of which were all donated to an organization which helps prevent suicide/self-harm. He published three chapbooks in 2016, two full-length collections About Consciousness (Alien Buddha Press 2017), To Burn in Torturous Algorithms (Weasel Press 2018), and has 3 collections forthcoming in 2018. His work has appeared in Taj Mahal Review, Chiron Review, MiPOesias, Blue Mountain Review, Main Street Rag, eFiction India, Loch Raven Review, Boston Poetry Magazine, Setu Bilingual, BlazeVOX, and elsewhere.

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