THEME POETRY
SUMMER 2024 = LABYRINTH
IF I WAS IN A GREEK MYTH
Linda M. Crate
Meadville, PA, USA
if i was
from greek mythology,
i would avoid labyrinths
like the plague;
wouldn't want to be killed
by a minotaur or any
other monster
they thought to hide in the
confusing structure
built and designed with seemingly
the sole purpose of killing
people—
i have a strong instinct to want to
live,
would've lived a boring life
because i would've known better
than to vex or mess with
goddesses and gods;
just lived my quiet life in the forest
or by the sea—
embracing always my own
magic and my own wilds,
probably be seen as some sort
of conquest and shoot down
every man who fought for my hand;
but marry the first woman who
made my heart swoon.
__________
​
CORN FLAKES
Michael Ball
Boston, MA, USA
I’m an old man, but often not the oldest
to hunt food at the Super Stop & Shop.
I recall a fellow geezer who pulled on
my shirt sleeve while pleading, “Can you
help me find the Kellogg Corn Flakes?”
What courage it takes to tell a stranger
that you cannot buy groceries on your own,
a lightweight Kyrie eleison. seeking mercy.
While we were already at the cereal forest,
I understood his frustration. He and I had
grown up and old with far fewer options —
not 100 running feet of boxes seven feet high.
How complex our food choices are now.
I have shopped that supermarket for years,
plus I know adult cereals are head height,
and shelved by manufacturer names.
I strode to the Ks, (not so fast as to leave
him behind) as he told me that all he ate
for breakfast was Kellogg’s Corn Flakes.
I led him to the several sizes, had him
choose his box, and shared the shelving
secrets. His shoulders relaxed and lowered
Then, after firmly planting his cereal
in his cart, he thanked me several times,
He knew then and told me he knew
where to find Kellogg’s Corn Flakes.
__________
​
DON’T LOOK NOW
Bob McAfee
Boston, MA, USA
Don’t look in the crowded cities of the coastal bore
for love is apprehensive, avoids easy entanglements, prefers
to remain in each of the seven villages of solitude,
appears for only the briefest moment, occasionally,
but not necessarily, obvious.
Don’t look in the high country beyond the central spine
for love is never foolish, sometimes insanely bizarre,
often flattens against the bracken of a purple moor,
telegraphs nothing.
Don’t look in the unpainted desert of the western quarter
for love carries no water, needs to cool his longings
with hopeless wonder, sidesteps quicker than a moonbeam’s
shadow at high noon, decoding pure delight for amused
observers.
Don’t look across the widest prairies of the fertile
midsection for love abhors un-distinguishment, oblivious
to flagrant rosins floating in stifling conditions,
heedless of hankering needs, incongruous.
Don’t look along the shores of the serpentine river
snaking from north to south on a speculative whimsy,
harnessing no excuses, flowing indefatigably toward
the lost sea, for love has his private salt, cures desire
into jerky strips, proffers himself to a lucky few, inevitable.
Don’t look in the redwood forests of the rockiest regions
where snow-covered aspirations stand tall among
unfulfilled longings, for love has already anticipated
your blind groping, now lies in ambush with a quiver
of extreme countermeasures, laughs quietly.
Don’t look now but your trail-wrecked body, after years
of false wanderings, is now in love’s arrow sight,
cross haired and helpless; ironically, love has been
assiduously hunting you.
Don’t look back.
__________
​
Lost World
Duane Anderson
La Vista, NE, USA
My mind is in limbo,
with one death in the family days ago,
and another one very near,
waiting on the edge.
I sit outside on the deck,
unable to read from my book,
staring at the house and trees,
listening to the cars passing by
on a street blocks away.
My life, on hold,
as I attempt to take care
of all the death around me.
__________
​
THERE ARE NO WORDS FOR
Antoni Ooto
New York, USA
https://www.ooto.org/
the sound of coffee pouring into a cup
a napkin wiping a lip
Sound tries its own speech.
A stirring from another room, hear it?
a page turning
an envelope hitting the floor
We understand… but can’t speak it.
So much is sensed.
Without words I try
to learn this unspoken language…
a hand waving good-bye
a dog shaking off
And how would I translate it, anyway.
__________
​
THE LABYRINTH OF MY MARRIED LIFE.
Sonia Pal
Wolverhampton
The labyrinth of my married life
Had its colours dark and bright
by separating me from
My parents,
Siblings, and
Friends
by replacing them with
British (retired) neighbours
Poems, and
Two children
What a blissful experience in my newfound
Love
Emotions, and
Strength
plus, all the other lovely associated emotion that counts
more than enough for me to stay on life’s track when it mounts!
__________
​
LABYRINTH
David Hughes
Isle of Wight
My father planted seeds
My mother watered them
Devoid of any recognizable
Plan at first they grew together
A thick tangle of soft white roots
Reaching out to find new ground
Interwoven in intricate patterns
And where they touched
Nodules formed
Round kisses of commonality
Pivot points determining
Where my thoughts would go
And they were left to grow
As I aged the tangled mass
Became a labyrinth
Trimmed by time and circumstance
By life’s experiences good and bad
Formed by thick stems
Of experience and memory
Branches laden with recollection
My mind became a labyrinth
And everyone I met ventured in
Most returned after moments
Too scared to take a chance
They did not want to get lost in me
But you my love you were brave
You ventured in where no one else dared
And I believe you have reached the centre
And though it is selfish to say this
I hope you don’t find your way back out
__________
​
UNRELIABLE SORCERESS
Jean Janicke
USA
How could I know the glass veins
would be severed just before the interview?
I tucked talismans under the table:
an inky octopus on sail cloth,
a yellow-washed Bee
posed at a picnic,
her gold chain clasped
around my neck.
I drew the willow card,
saw three stars in my teacup,
like Orion’s belt piercing the skylight
last night.
I assumed the blue cornflower receiving
line up the lane marked the right path,
a barking deer foretold something found.
I must have lost
focus when I searched for that spotted
sock, ignored the tower of empty boxes
when I took out the trash, forgot
to count creaks of my cookie-sheet roof.
I circled the labyrinth,
but lost the bend of bricks
under an inch of snow. Each turn
of the teacup alters the
liquid, leaves a loose leaf
stranded like seaweed
on the white porcelain shore
of my next incarnation.
__________
​
I REMEMBER
Gene Goldfarb
New York City, USA
I remember being so young
I thought death an illusion
that the feeble yielded to.
Now I see it an inevitability,
perhaps a long-lost friend
who’s ready to take me home
because the party’s no longer fun.
I remember seeing my mother
and father folded in grief on our couch
both of them in tears and it hurt
even more when he begged me
to go outside and leave them be.
Now they’re long gone
and I’m empty of grief
but I’m mostly sorry
I didn’t ask them the important things:
Did he love his first wife—the cute
honey on the handle bar
of his bicycle on the cobblestones
of Warsaw before the War?
How did my mother feel about him
when she first married him?
Somehow I never got the genealogy straight:
How was Uncle Philip my dad’s uncle?
And Uncle Frank and Aunt Sylvia,
who were these poor birds anyway?
Cousins to whom and how?
It leaves me too exhausted to get
into the pedigree of Uncle Mendie
and Aunt Ida, another deserted wretch
who looked like Mary Pickford in her day.
My mother’s family was pretty big
and no mystery, even Uncle Freddie
who they usually called “Chicago,”
because he had made it
and lived in suburban Skokie.
And Polish I wasn’t taught because
they hated the Poles, and Hungarian never
because it was a tribal tongue imported
by wild Magyars from central Asia
solely to confuse the civilized among us.
To remember is my punishment
to forget, my crime.
Or is it the reverse?
_________
​
LEMON SPARKS
Daya J.
Oregon, USA
Lemon sparks
fly by
fleeing the
strawberry flames
as they flutter
Here I
frolic
through the labyrinthine of
destiny
Fearing no escape
I forget the way
heart races
hands gripped
frozen
I remember
Lemon sparks
Sparks
spark me on
till I reach the eternal flame
to frolic through the labyrinthine
again and again
_________
​
JOURNEY
Chris Wilson
Liverpool, UK
The journey begins through
An open door. I can go in any direction,
Though that first step can be difficult to take.
But, soon one metre becomes many more and
‘Iamb’ traversing steadily by foot,
Cantering confidently on Consonance Close,
Or smoothly sauntering along Sibilance Street,
Taking time on Rhyme Road
To greet all I meet
As they leave their abodes.
Sometimes, I take a detour down memory lane
Retracing steps, recalling people and places
Or things I’d rather forget
Yet, a puddle or pot hole can alter the rhythm.
A road closure can take me off course
Until I am lost. A
Slip up I cannot re ‘dactyl’ I
Carefully check the map
Reconsider my options.
Suddenly, I
Venture down Volta Avenue,
Taking an unexpected route,
To alien territory,
Or an area you wouldn’t wish to visit after dark.
Though finding more familiar landmarks,
I slip through Simile Strand,
Which I know like the back of my hand,
And if I’m in a rush,
I catch a lift on the metaphor motorway,
A more efficient way to convey
where I’m heading.
Finally, arriving back home via the ring road,
I close the door.
The journey complete.
__________
​
A CRUEL SPRING
Sarah Das Gupta
Cambridge, United Kingdom
Water rushes, angrily, cruelly,
crashing jagged boulders
against the soft, green banks.
Red clay colours the waters.
Now a stream of blood
dashes onward.
In forest glades
beneath the dark, tangled roots
of oak and beech,
Death Cap, Funeral Bell,
vicious fungi, pose as
fairy toadstools
to lure the unwary.
The elusive shapeshifter, hare
runs through the bramble thickets
where sharp thorns hide
under new, green livery.
Beneath the sparkling
woodland pond
thick, black sludge
lies in ambush.
__________
​
MAZE
William Aarnes
USA
the maze in amaze
as we’re sure
to get lost
in wonder
by taking wrong turn
after wrong tun
__________
​
THE ROAD TO WELLSVILLE
Mark Hudson
The War of the Worlds, by H.G. Wells,
was performed on radio by Orson Welles.
On all Hollow’s Eve, 1938,
a labyrinth opened through radio waves.
It caused a great sensation,
people thought of an alien invasion.
They said an object fell on a farm,
with no intention of causing harm.
Aliens come out of the U.F.O,
and deal the people a death blow.
Giant alien war machines,
smash everything to smithereens.
Orson Welles is the narrator,
talking about what happens later.
The performance brought public outrage,
they had the radio as a stage.
But is this a comment on the internet?
Will our worst fears be realized yet?
A labyrinth of terror at our fingertips,
feel our sanity lose it’s grip.
The social media of this modern day,
makes you isolate in a paranoid way.
__________
​
WHEN ALL SEEMS LOST
Carolyn Chilton Casas
California, USA
https://www.instagram.com/mindfulpoet_
we can search for the compass
buried deep within,
that navigational system
handed down from a loved one
who has always cared.
You are not alone.
Recall how the squirrel, the rabbit
and the blue jay communed
side by side on a small patch of grass.
Light and wind can hold you.
The trees will envelop you
in the canopy of their branches.
Remember that warm, fall evening
when blinking stars shone
through the dome of leaves,
lighting up a map
to the constellation you came from
and where one day you’ll return.
_________
​
ALONE
Katherine Simmons
USA
I enter
the wilds
afraid guarded
body armor
the scratch
of an unseen
animal nibbles
the air around
my ear I see
nothing noise
crashes through
the ravine a jay
yawps
its sharp rasp
alarms me
a woodpecker
cackles around
me the world
wobbles
winter lurks
beneath
the roots
ready
to deaden
the world
a roost
of robins
weaves
a net of sky and
drapes it
over me
__________
​
FUN HOUSE
Kathleen Chamberlin
Albany, New York, USA
Diving deeply into the memories entombed by time
Excavating with extreme care to preserve the fragile images
Dusty and dormant these many decades,
The earliest slowly emerges, fluid or faded around the edges,
Struggling against the weight of time.
Straining up, up, upward
Revealing more and more detail.
Finally, it appears, facade cracking but fully formed.
My father, tall and stern, towers above me in a crowded, noisy place.
I am 3 or 4
And he is all of 25.
As the memory gains strength, colors brighten and sounds fill the air.
I smell the ocean and kettle corn.
We are at an amusement park drifting through music and laughter,
Jostling bodies pushing past on every side.
It might be at the Jersey Shore...1952 or 53...
We stand in line, I holding my father's hand.
Excitedly, I climb into the green car, a clam shell, tilted upright.
My father takes his place beside me and I feel special.
I have him all to myself.
My older brother stands with our grandfather, eating salted peanuts from a red and white striped paper bag.
I smell the grease of the track as we jolt forward once the attendant pushes the lever.
All I see is his cracked and weathered hands and a bit of his shirt.
I wave at my mother who waves back.
We creep along the greased track in the creaky cart
Towards the looming closed doors, battered and brown and forbidding.
I hold my breath as with a tired "whoosh,"
The doors spring open, swallow us.
My smile and excitement fade.
It is dark and I am frightened.
I shrink into myself: small, so small, and vulnerable.
Why it is dark? I didn't know it would be dark.
Light flashes and something lurches toward me, menacing,
Large and looming.
I shrink away and I scream as if the power of my tiny voice
Could banish this unwanted intruder.
The space grows dark again, a darkness deeper than before.
The cart struggles forward, slow and awkward.
Another figure bolts from the shadows.
My terror grows as I scream and cry,
Wailing with increasing volume as more and more horrible things
Spring from the darkness into view.
"Make it stop, make it stop, Daddy, make it STOP!!"
My ear-shattering screams do nothing.
We lurch through the darkness, my hands now covering my eyes.
He orders me: "Stop crying. Right now."
I whimper and suck in my breath, jaw clenched, pressing my tiny lips together.
Finally, we push through doors into sunlight.
It is over.
I have survived the horror.
I bolt from my seat and run towards my mother
My tears and sobs spilling out in rolling waves.
People have turned to view my drama playing out against the calliope of the Merry-go-round.
My father is angry and storms off,
My 23-year-old mother, bewildered, following, calling his name.
I watch her overtake him. I cannot hear what they say.
I watch their pantomime through the horses gliding up and down along their gilded poles.
And I know they are arguing
About me.
My brother, two years older, looks from them to me as he holds my grandfather's hand.
He knows I have spoiled the day.
He glares at me, the sister he never wished for,
With the unfiltered rage of a 5- or 6-year-old.
Tears course down my cheeks.
My mind screams "it was supposed to be a fun house!"
But I do not speak. If I stay quiet, he may forget.
My grandmother keeps me close
I try to understand all I have seen.
The taste of fear is even stronger now
But I do not scream.
Some daytime creatures are more terrible
Than those found behind fun house doors.
__________
​
WHEN THE DUST DIES
Lynn White
North Wales, UK
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100063706441633
https://lynnwhitepoetry.blogspot.com/
One day I’ll see through the mist
when the bombs cease
and the dust settles.
That day I’ll be back
to find you again
and uncover what slipped away
when we became lost in the fog
and the rubble,
the labyrinth
that was once back streets
and tall buildings.
One day I’ll stop searching
and watch the mist fade away
as the dust settles
and the sun breaks out
and the lost and broken begin to heal
and start to return
and reclaim
and rebuild
what they lost.
One day I’ll greet you again
as the mist clears
and the dust settles,
one day at a time.
__________
​
A BIRD STOLE MY SANDWICH
Erin Stone
Wales, United Kingdom
https://www.instagram.com/erin_writes_stuff
A bird stole my sandwich
and it reminded me that
nothing is yours to keep.
Perhaps just for a moment,
A fragment of time,
our hearts are its cave, its
humble abode.
But not forever, not for always.
We are temporary beings
in a singular existence,
floating in a gale of animation.
Every second we love
is the biggest risk our soul can take,
for any moment, it may quit,
vacate from our lives like
specters in the night.
A bird stole my sandwich
and it reminded me that
everything will fly away,
eventually.
__________
​
​
IT’S SON DAY
David Earl Williams
All jealousies aside
It’s true
It’s not even as hard as it looks
It’s just that
First Nail going in
That’s the hard part
By the time your soul leaves your body
It’s all a Street called Easy, a Street of Gold—
That’s what the scriptures say!---
Then
You get to be vampires—
VAMPIRES— !!!!
DAMN IT ! … and some of us in pretty dresses…
____________________________
“David Earl Williams” has been his alias since birth and he’s not changing it. To be sure, you’d have to ask his mother and grandmothers to know the truth. But you can’t ask them— they’re sleeping now with the Hopewell and the Adena who want their land back from the Cherokee and the Shawnee once they’ve head-tripped it back from the, mostly, but not exclusively, European rejects who are sitting on it now. All that can be said about the alias for for sure is that it’s a little like Mike Fink King of the River Pirates— it’s fluid— half water snake, half beaver, half bear, half alligator, half Blevins, half Fyffe, maybe, half Williams, maybe a little bit McCoy, (yes, those McCoys… and Bad John Phillips), if you can believe the 2nd cousins thrice removed— and probably, you can’t… ) Anyway, his I. D. is just like everybody else’s— it’s being made up daily, cut like a suit to fit the dummy wearing it— or at least it is until somebody cries, bullshit— that doesn’t belong to you— you narcissist!--- and makes it stick.--- But until then, “David Earl Williams'', he’s just like you, Dear Reader— one of a kind, and a representative of millions, the vessel of all their grievances and glories, la di da, like he came this way, quality stamped and assured, straight from a furious little factory somewhere down around his mothers pelvis, billowing a camouflaging chimera of self-protective smoke into the always immanent abyss.
___________
​
LOVE'S LABYRINTH
Loti Uwatabaye
Rwanda
Wandering through winding paths,
But spent countless years upholding trust
With relentless pursuit of a dream.
Love was my sole motivation,
Naively believing in a straightforward path,
Unprepared for destiny's twists and turns
Blindly trusting despite betrayals so brazen.
Love now reigns at the center,
An endless circle surrounding me,
Wishing traversing it all
To commence anew beyond this world
Where beauty resides solely in you
And every refuge I seek stations close to you.
Amidst this labyrinth of love
I tread with a shattered heart,
Each step leaving a trail of pain;
An atlas to guide my past journeys,
As I choose paths I have never taken
To avoid losing myself in love's labyrinth again.
__________
​
BELONGING
Suzanna de Baca
Iowa, USA
https://suzannadebaca.substack.com/
I am walking along the sidewalk
at six a.m., dog by my side,
looking at a sliver of moon,
wondering how is it that I am here
in this particular place.
Do I belong in the soil,
the trees, the wind? I plant bulbs,
as if trying to convince myself
my roots are here. The soil
feels familiar, but I am temporary
like the peonies, and vulnerable
like the asters I’d planted,
only to be devoured by rabbits.
I walk
through my hometown
still adrift, reaching for a current,
a sign, looking at the yellow moon
to tell me which way now,
which way next.
I turn the corner to the path
behind the old railroad bridge
on the south side of town.
It’s paved now and smooth.
The acorns have begun to fall,
crunching beneath me as I walk.
They say, You belong here today.
__________
​
WHAT IS MY FAULT?
Shampa Saha
I forgot the way to come out,
I lost the path to escape,
I emerged in the depth of your eyes,
I am ready to be an example of history,
The petals of your heart,
The lub dub of your beats,
Intricate the desire,
Triggered to be insane!
What is my fault,
If your eyes are so deep?
What is my fault if your lips are so lustrous?
What is my fault if your call is like death,
Unavoidable?
What is my fault, if I lost my past, present and future in the labyrinth of your love!
__________
​
AMAZING LIMERICKS
Ken Gosse
I’m stuck in a limerick daze,
many long nights and days in its haze.
It was easy to start
but I can’t find the part
where the path leads me out of this maze.
___________
​
FOG MAN (V2)
Michael Lee Johnson
Chicago, United States
https://www.illinoispoets.org/
There is a stranger in the fog
screaming into this harbor tonight.
A lonely son-of-a-bitch without
a mother or a lover.
He screams obscenities
with bad breath.
There is a way the moon
investigates a sailor in fog
at night, sheltering no one.
Hungover in the lead piping
suffering from myopia
but downing in pride,
hyperopia magnified.
These memories are distant.
A lady now of a dream
still walker on sliding sand
near that beach, leaving
sounds of her own
where winds tell the
fog man where to cry.
Life a saint in blue mist
a roller coaster, thrill
master-slave driver
of its own.
__________
​
ENDINGS AND BEGINNINGS
Jonathan Chibuike Ukah
United Kingdom
There is an end to everything,
or the ghost of the end we fear;
yet we say it is the beginning;
but if there is a casting down,
it’s the obscurity of our blessings,
the hiccup of arrival, its slow start;
then there must be a lifting to the sky.
There is a tendency among men,
to release a sad tune when played,
while we are all violets and violins,
pianos, guitars, drums and cymbals;
or when the gloss of victory paints their brows,
they contort their faces like a dark sky,
as though they were a bunch of Oedipuses,
running from their shadows rather than staying?
We count not among the children of Algea,
whose eyes are pain, and whose hands are sorrow,
but we are the chasers of the glowing Laetitia,
with smiles larger than the Heaven door
though we slump when we run,
and our heads hang in the clouds,
our hearts stagger into our mouths.
Sometimes, we die to live tomorrow
after we have lived for yesterday.
We will not be dismayed at our body;
we can brew a mess of our lives,
and with filth in our hearts, we purify our blood.
If we are captains of our life,
we must stiffen our sinews and bring up the blood,
or pursued by locusts, we bend our spirits
while hardening our bones like the Iroko tree.
There is no worthier art than painting great pictures,
except we dab some colour bit by bit.
If we leave the city with its lights at night,
we find ourselves in a labyrinth without stars.
To survive the gloating of the dark,
we must carry our lights always within us.
__________
​
THE PARK NOT FAR FROM HERE
Robert Nersesian
Washington, DC, USA
The park not far from here, just the other side of a hemisphere,
swirls in teetering, tottering flames all whimsy and mirth.
Magenta slags, razor sharp. Greasy slopes. Demure cairns.
Spires to the sky stippled with pot-bellied climbers and resigned sherpas
doomed and denied satori, falling into the folds of purgatory—those creases of longing.
Lost. An occasional whimper. A cry.
The fire lives forever, neither quenched nor cajoled.
Its demesne fills the range of vision.
It consumes the park.
She is the fire.
A plan: blinded by ash, whitened by smoke, grapple for a hold—
follow fixed ropes into the blaze, skip the fate of the ravaged,
tease out a line to her heart, hide in her soul,
wait for the rains.
But nothing quenches. Relief has a wait as long as a lien on unpaid sorrow.
Flaps in the night beckon with a mighty groan and seal in final judgement.
Pray for a fadeout, a quiet exit, an Irish goodbye.
Look no more.
__________
​
THE UNFORGOTTEN
Dianalee Velie
Newberry, NH, USA
Locked in the labyrinth of my heart
the unforgotten pound and pump their fists
begging release from my memories art.
Poet, dreamer, yearning to be an alchemist,
I remember as comfortable and safe
places of pain and grief. Devil and angel
blend into one incoherent, unsafe
delusion of spirit. Purify this temple:
restore joys to their proper placements
devoid of their constant companion, sorrow.
Flames glow brightly in the darkest moments.
Memories that should shine into tomorrow
are cloaked in inexplicable darkness;
the labyrinth locked, the inmates helpless.
__________
​
ANOTHER FINE MESS
Adrienne Stevenson
Ottawa, ON, Canada
https://www.facebook.com/adriennestevensonwriter/
we are gathered here today
to protest the current status
perplexed by how it happened
this was not supposed to be
we who still had faith engaged
participated, marched, voted
but still the juggernaut overcame
majority’s clearly expressed wish
no Alexander ready now
to smite the Gordian knot
trails too convoluted to reveal
a path out of this maze
this is no mere brouhaha
we are more than distracted: chaos
has us in its toils – no deus
will help us exit this machina
___________
​
FOOTPATHS
Tina Hudak
United States
The sky is wide and blue
The path narrows but laid
out clearly, if only one step
at a time. The center, while
elusive, exists. This is true
even if other knowledge is
unknown. At this point.
Between curved walls of
metal, now burnished by
rain and wind, their warmth
in ochre and crimson belie
the chill felt from fear. Yet,
turning back is not an option.
At this point.
On and on. Despite
disorientation; regardless
of Venetian déjà vu. Always
look up. See how the clouds
skitter across this slightly
tilted sight line. On and on.
Soft footpaths meandering
among dense forests.
Moments offer joy.
__________
​
POURING THE LABYRINTH
Catherine McGuire
Sweet Home, Oregon, USA
I.
Imbolc, Candlemas – the ground waits.
Cold rain pattering on shed.
Felled tree: logs like a sliced carrot
across the ground; spine and spurs of dismembered
limbs, lying as they were sheared – a giant
filleted fish back crossing the yard.
II.
Half-buried stakes form a circle.
Wet twine is awkward in my numbed grasp;
distances marked in ink along its length;
tied to the center pole, unfurled. The pacing starts.
Pouring cornmeal from a measuring cup:
at first the circle flows, then dampness
clogs the grains, they clump and fight
like waves hitting a beach. I stoop,
back and legs sore, watching as I draw
the circled meal yellow on grass,
watching it fall on bits of moss and mud.
Chickadees squeal, their voices closer
as they scent the grain.
Chick a dee, dee, dee…
pattering like rain in the yard.
POURING THE LABYRINTH
Catherine McGuire
Sweet Home, Oregon, USA
I.
Imbolc, Candlemas – the ground waits.
Cold rain pattering on shed.
Felled tree: logs like a sliced carrot
across the ground; spine and spurs of dismembered
limbs, lying as they were sheared – a giant
filleted fish back crossing the yard.
II.
Half-buried stakes form a circle.
Wet twine is awkward in my numbed grasp;
distances marked in ink along its length;
tied to the center pole, unfurled. The pacing starts.
Pouring cornmeal from a measuring cup:
at first the circle flows, then dampness
clogs the grains, they clump and fight
like waves hitting a beach. I stoop,
back and legs sore, watching as I draw
the circled meal yellow on grass,
watching it fall on bits of moss and mud.
Chickadees squeal, their voices closer
as they scent the grain.
Chick a dee, dee, dee…
pattering like rain in the yard.
____________
​
LOVE AND TOMATOES
Jennifer B. Kahnweiler
Atlanta, USA
Dad once planted
beefsteaks in our Long Island
backyard.
my Father-in-law,
another Depression-era kid,
groomed his cherry tomatoes
in the humid summer of a
Chicago suburb.
both fueled by hope
in their green patches
of 60’s suburbia.
but after a few unnoteworthy
yields they each placed
backyard farming on the
back burner.
last summer I planted
tomato seedlings,
constructed a climbing fence,
hung mosquito nets,
and threw in fresh compost
(for good measure)
to increase my odds.
like the men before me
my crop didn’t fare well.
the Cherokee buds bloomed
sort of.
the Philly Brandywines,
barely budged in
the unfamiliar southern soil.
​
​
On a hopeful visit to
my plants one morning
I heard their voices,
those two old guys.
DON’T OVERWATER
PLANT THOSE BABIES DEEP
TRIM THE LEAVES
FORGET THE COMPOST
Stop mansplaining!
I said back.
I imagined them chuckling together
like two schoolboys
Stop WHAT?
It means explaining things to a woman\
in condescending terms.
OH SORRY, JENN
WE WERE JUST TRYING
TO HELP
as their voices grew dim
in the hot Georgia sun
ALL I wanted
was more unwanted advice.
__________
​
WANDERING THE VAST UNKNOWN
Julie A. Dickson
Exeter, NH, USA
Wandering the vast unknown
Traverse highland, craggy hill
Battered, barefoot, she shall roam
Barn owl breaks the late night still
Traverse highland, craggy hill
Gathered threadbare cloak surrounds
Barn owl breaks the late night still
Footsteps placed without a sound
Gathered threadbare cloak surrounds
Twigs entwined in tangled hair
Footsteps placed without a sound
Escaping ceaseless nightmare
Twigs entwined in tangled hair
Bruises shadow arms and face
Escaping ceaseless nightmare
Left servitude without trace
Bruises shadow arms and face
Battered, barefoot, she shall roam
Left servitude without trace
Wandering the vast unknown
__________
​
LIFE'S LABYRINTHINE WAY
Kathy Jo Bryant
United States
Twisting and turning,
This way and that,
Is the labyrinthine way of life.
With no concrete predictions,
As to what will occur,
Whether peace, or the weather of strife.
There are so many givens,
We often get lost,
Not knowing which way to go.
We rejoice, at the bright,
But are down, with the dark,
The future, we just don't know.
But life's labyrinthine way,
We should just take in stride,
And embrace whate’er may come.
Put a smile on our faces,
With a spring in each step,
Sing a song, where’er we're from!
__________
​
DREAM AT WITS’ END
D.R. James
Saugatuck, MI, USA
https://www.amazon.com/stores/D.-R.-James/author/B00IW6KT3W
https://www.amazon.com/This-Aint-High-School-Anymore/dp/B099C14N6G
Under branches defying gravity the path
meandered toward the forest.
From an uncertain height all eyes seemed upon us.
The silence of blossoms made it at first feel right.
Leaf-fall, bleeding from selected trees,
the greenhouse at its designated distance,
argued for the set-up as an outgrowth of nature,
the temperature not as a kind of poison.
In fact, the caretakers were in league
with economies of fear.
They would take mallets to our knees.
These thorns were gods
and we travelers, worshippers,
torsos caught eternally in coarse and caustic
brambles. What use to mouth inane prayers
or stride like animals? What use to side-step
the torn stubble like creatures of the night?
We’d need streamers of fire
to excavate a trench toward home.
We’d need to swivel our shoulders,
plunge through the forest without helmets,
pause before the altar whose namesake was
our mother, whose stanchions were of heartwood,
whose scene allowed no repeating.
Our best intentions undercut before daylight,
our balance challenged by the frequency of foxholes,
our voices reduced to the capacity of swine,
our vision limited like a gas-lit lamp,
we ping-ponged till pleading Uncle.
—first published in Typishly
__________
​
LIFE’S LABYRINTH
Heidi Gilles
To live in
your heart center,
You must go through,
the lessons,
endless decisions
and surely the trials
of a well lived life –
You must experience,
the layers
of emotions
the difficult ones
and dear sorrows too –
You must define,
the next step
forward, full of mystery,
without,
knowing the
final outcome
-
For if you hope
for a harmonious
peaceful life and,
find your way home -
You must
breath deeply,
think creatively,
believe
in the possible -
As to, live within
our heart-center,
we must weather
the current
and flow, in and out as, the heart trusts those who have
walked
the path
around, and
before us
___________
​
MINDLESS WORLD
Karuna Mistry
United Kingdom
https://karunacreations.wordpress.com/
https://www.instagram.com/karunamistrypoetry/
Dizzying daze, I’m in a mindless haze
A pointless gaze, I find useless ways
Lost in this maze over manifold days
Labyrinth tricks within a myriad matrix
All routes inbound, no escape to be found
Dancing dame, lost in a mindless world
__________
​
GO WITH THE FLOW
Julia Griffin
United Kingdom
Why do humans seem to make life so complicated?
Do you need to say all the words to express something?
You don’t need to impress, you simply need to be.
How to be?
Simple, uncomplicated, uncluttered – at peace with the clarity from your mind.
How to reach that clarity?
Go within, quietly, peacefully and comfortably. Have a question? Rise up from this
peaceful state and you may have an answer.
Go with the flow – try, and try again; maybe change direction to find the smooth open
door. A test? But always worthwhile: whatever the outcome, you learn.
Your decision – maybe; or maybe not. For you are living your Tapestry – not a labyrinth
but a logic, a design where all is in order and nothing is by chance; all is for good reason.
This is your life, the threads are there for your purpose.
For good reason keep things simple; take time, pace, think, question, doubt. Truth is all.
Find, and be happy.
Everything you need is within. Carry it well.
And feel the peace that is more wonderful than words can say.
Go with the flow…
__________
​
LABYRINTH
Chartres
David Olsen
United Kingdom
https://www.davidolsenpoetry.net/
You tread narrow channels of anger and grief
reflected from deceitful switchbacks, dead
ends, reversals of fortune. You’re inside
and outside, deflected by these annular rings,
concentric partitions, separations, boundaries.
You have nowhere to turn, yet your course
is nothing but turns. You crave relief,
refuge, sanctuary at the sacred centre,
but are wary of confinement in unity.
Projecting a brutal past, you remain afraid,
unaware that an altered future awaits.
From these holy circles you can accept
the blessed peace of infinite possibility.
You are not, and never need be, alone.
Reprinted from Sailing to Atlantis,
Finishing Line Press, © David Olsen 2013
___________
​
ON YOUR DYING
Sister Lou Ella Hickman, OVISS
tears beauty like
sapling sun birches catching the wind
o bend…
tears are the unseen bending
now memory is
dark sheets
silent with pain
knowing is anguish then light—
from rainfall to flowers
that bend with terrible beauty
and you will
as i watch you now
too much with why…
become like saplings
that bend
until the day of the lion comes
___________
​
Mandy Ramsey
Haines, Alaska, USA
@mandyramseysoulhappyart
1.
Vines of ivy crawling up the stone wall
flickering torches lining the path,
the barrier brims with wild roses
framing the possibility of escape.
Tending to the garden as these visions appear
I am released from the grind of winters deep freeze.
2.
I have left the grind of winters deep freeze-
stepped forward on a new path, brimming with possibility.
I carry a bright torch before me
to clear my vision and sidestep the barriers and obstacles, while
Admiring the vines that weave and wind a labyrinth of beauty.
3.
Labyrinth walk
Reflects the life path
the twists and turns
dead ends and redirections
spiraling towards-then away from the center
Just when you think you have arrived
at the place you have been journeying towards-
The answer you have been longing for
The solution you have been asking for
The peace you have been longing for
The sacred circles path leads you
further away, despite being a step away
from the center
You keep walking on
moving forward
one sacred step at a time
over crumbled earth.
Paths made of carefully placed stones lead you forward
Your breath synchronizes with each step
you notice the bright pink primulas on the edges of the path,
lighting the way
You hear the swoosh of Raven’s wings over your shoulders,
You can hear the breath of the humpback whale surfacing in the deep waters nearby.
Suddenly it feels like an invitation to remember to exhale this weight of unknowing.
Suddenly you find yourself surprised at the center of the spiral, smiling.
_________
​
THE BRAIN IS A LABYRINTH
Alan Bedworth
Knottingley, West Yorkshire, England
Hey, where are you going?
you can't go there.
I take another path,
but that doesn't lead anywhere.
I retrace my steps
back to my starting point.
My emotions and temperament
have dissolved into mush.
The choices in front of me
are too numerous to comprehend.
The paths that were there to take,
are replaced by numerous doorways.
The question I have is
which one should I take?
I've got to regain my emotions
so I can select the right door.
The brain is a labyrinth,
and a complex organ.
that controls your ability to think.
It's processes still aren't understood.
All this story was played in my mind.
Never underestimate how powerful
the brain is in determining
your journey through life.
__________
​
WAITING ROOM
Bob Whelan
Rockport, MA, USA
a carpet of colorless gray
plexiglass barriers at the end
of the queues where you bow
down to the Formica counter
In order to hear the instructions
through the slot at the panel’s base
then to obediently sit in
chairs covered in neutral
blue Naugahyde, easily cleaned
sprayed and wiped with disinfectant
couples host fragments
of conversations where one
translates the obvious to their partners
or share everyday reports
mail picked up bills paid
so much white hair
all about to be ghosts here
now they hobble, then sit down slowly
or just release their weight
to be caught by a chair
cell phones holding their frozen gazes
blank faces searching
some unknown distance
do the numbers of years
they collectively have left
total even one lifetime
i am one of them
awaiting the call of my name
to be led down a labyrinth
of hallways with anonymous offices
where you can secretly
plead at the doorway
for the elusive magic of
more time
__________
​
LABYRINTH
Morrow Dowdle
Hillsborough, NC, USA
In myth, its walls would have been taller, no egress
unless we’d left behind a trail of crumbs
or brought a ball of twine, unraveled
while a beautiful girl held the threads tight.
Instead, we go missing inside the labyrinth
behind an Episcopalian church
when it’s nothing but an ankle-high hedge.
If we wanted, we could step over the edge
and vacate the maze altogether,
yet we stay, dumbly, between the lines,
following their curves to the center and back.
Our future depends on this slow stroll,
waits for us to pass on concurrent paths,
recognize how little stands between us.
But eventually the sun grows impatient and drops
behind the steeple. And we, driven back to the car
by the chill that follows, fall into the oubliette,
the dark orifice that offers no such promise.
__________
​
Susanne Leaf-Brock
Ames, Iowa, USA
Prairie Woods labyrinth
missing stones here and there
the center : : still
__________
​
CALIFORNIA HERE I COME
Gary Beck
New York City, USA
https://www.facebook.com/AuthorGaryBeck
A local college
in the spirit of doing good
reserved 15 parking places
in the student parking lot
for the homeless students
who can sleep in their cars.
I’m heading for California
where I’ll live in a car,
if I can get a car.
Maybe I can eat
in the cafeteria,
talk to other students,
maybe a professor
and it’ll be like
getting an education,
not like New York City
where I sleep on cardboard
and scrounge for food.
__________
​
MY HEART’S SONG
Lakshman Bulusu
New Jersey, USA
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/127227.Bulusu_Lakshman
Ring, ring, ring—my words sing
Rhyme, chime, melody—they do bring
Their music the air does rent and I, for long
Dance to the tune of their song
The tunes lend many a string
Thereby enliven the fairest thing
My deeds helpful and willing
Do service to a faintest being
My life joyful and content has a lot to mean
Immaterial of what I have ever been
Sing the glory, sing the blues
Play well my part, pay well my dues
Sing, sing, sing—the words ring in
Unfold a whole new world within
Where each candid thought
Is dear than gold ever bought
Where feelings of love, sweet and tender
Are more than just read, recite, and render
These strings in all their art
Complete the song of my heart
__________
​
THE LIFETIME CHANNEL IN AN OLD MOTEL ROOM
Peter Magliocco
Las Vegas, NV, USA
Your ex-husband calls to remind you
of a lingering, legal unpleasantness
that never ends. Your nightclub voice
is an odd one: mannish, scary &
smoke-scarred like the walls
of old European nightclubs
where the voices vie to be heard.
Against the onslaught of phonetics
we share something out-of-kilter
in our rage against falsehoods
as time spins the memory bottle
for the lipless crones to kiss ass
with alliterative literary abuse.
Your poetry alone overwhelms
contextual meanings of theory,
& content remains secondary.
The ghost of Picasso mutates
in your distorted hip soul,
the one you’ve tampered with
yet strive to break free from
like the bonds of doctors burdening
hologram visions in your mind
with all the floating memory games
reborn to suffering, vicarious victims
of a dark terrorist rapist’s seed
you claim I don’t see the holocaust
or the old neon motel sign I am
advertising -- a “No Vacancy”
sign for just another nobody inside
uninhabited rooms like yourself,
waiting to be turned on or off.
__________
​
IF I WERE
Najma Naseer
Sindh, Pakistan
If I were sky
You were my moon,
And makes me happy with your talk,
If I were bird
You were my wings,
And makes me high fly,
If I were firefly
You were my light,
And makes me bright like a moon,
If I were kite
You were my twine,
And makes me to stay stable,
If I were ocean
You were my shore,
And makes me safe to spoil,
If I were flower
You were my fragrance,
And makes me bloom like flowers,
If I were passenger
You were my destiny,
And finally we will meet at any turn of life.
__________
​
COLOR WHEEL
Tracy L Duffy
United States
Green Skies
Yellow Heaven
Purple Grass
The Waters Blue
How Odd – How Crass
we must seem,
to the looking glass
The Hollow Moon
Glaring Down
Cooling Sun
Flickering Out
I see by Night
Sleep by Day
How Odd the Frey
The Water’s Blue
My Smile’s a Frown
Your Upside Down
His Ears they See
Her Eyes they Hear
How Far, yet Near
The Water’s Clear
Red Rain, Black Snow
An End – Don’t Know
___________
​
A CRUEL SPRING
Sarah Das Gupta
Cambridge, United Kingdom
Water rushes, angrily, cruelly,
crashing jagged boulders
against the soft, green banks.
Red clay colours the waters.
Now a stream of blood
dashes onward.
In forest glades
beneath the dark, tangled roots
of oak and beech,
Death Cap, Funeral Bell,
vicious fungi, pose as
fairy toadstools
to lure the unwary.
The elusive shapeshifter, hare
runs through the bramble thickets
where sharp thorns hide
under new, green livery.
Beneath the sparkling
woodland pond
thick, black sludge
lies in ambush.
___________
​
THE BEST TWO THINGS
Barbara Anna Gaiardoni
Verona, Italy
https://www.facebook.com/barbara.gaiardoni/
https://twitter.com/BGaiardoni
It is difficult to explain why, but now wondering what my right way to create was I built my own mental maze - intangible and sterile - and lost my self in it. I have forgot how to simply act. Madonna, my feet are so cold!
a few pair of swans
pass occasionally
to greet you
__________
​
DICHOTOMY OF RESILIENCE
Samm Cohen
New York, New York, USA
Behind a trail of leaded breadcrumbs
Janus stands in the gateway
inviting us to look at both past and future
And in duplexity shows our dimensions
building cities on forestland and wanting rustic viewed skyscrapers
making youth gray-aged in worry as elderly plead for patient pampering
adding talons to doves and mothering to hawks
civilizing barbarism or maybe brutalizing decency
cutting the cord whose ties seem boundless
The dyads in this human experiment endless sometimes
cause such rips in harmony’s blanket
leave us shivery and skeptical
to whether those old Roman deities, or any other, are interested at all
Holding this invisible tether
we sojourn slowly climbing in just one direction
to the next number in this sequenced cycle of symmetry
and attempt to find a middle ground in the transition
vacillating in two-minded consistency
The duality of the door stands open today and
I wonder if I peer into our ambivalent tomorrows
Is there enough despair and doubt
to finally bring back hope?
__________
​
LOST PATHWAYS OF MY MIND
Ian Martin
Which way should I go?
Straight ahead, right or left
No, it’s easier to turn left
But which way do I go next?
It’s that road on the left?
No, it’s over there on the right
No , so straight on I have to go
Looking searching for my home
I live on a very long street
But there all very long streets!
By some shops, like those over there
No, not them either, am I lost?
I sit and cry by the road side
I go to the shops everyday
But today I can’t remember how
I am meant to get back home
My minds gone blank, why?
Directions, there lost somewhere?
Like which number do I live at?
What street do I live on and your name?
Lost in the chasms of my mind
All the things I’ve learnt in my life
I can’t seem to remember anything
Yes, lost in the pathways of my mind
__________
​
SHE SAID, “ALZHEIMER’S
Judy DeCroce
New York, USA
https://www.linkedin.com/in/judydecroce/
An empty shape wears my shoulder,
yet, if I wait, there comes a moment
a focus,
pieces of possibility, a right answer—
something.
Everyone asks for something.
Shifting words wheel;
answers circle, spin.
And the worst is when there’s nothing,
not even the wheel.
I wish you could come in.
Out is impossible.
Do you see me?
I’m over there.
Poem by Judy DeCroce
first appeared in
Four Three Three Magazine
Spring / 2021
__________
​
HOUSE WITHOUT ROAD
Faruk Buzhala
Beautiful house
with shadows cast
and overturned bread.
Pathless labyrinth
The road to it.
__________
​
I FALL ASLEEP WITHIN AN ECHO
Lisa Sultani
United States
The sun was small compared to the flags
symmetrically draped with a hero’s salute
Other flags we walked across
reciting generational curses
The sun grew even smaller
I speak with my grandparents atop a mountain
Their eyes widen when I reveal what I found
in the basement of a library
Although the mountain is dense
I now understand it was created by sandstorm
My grandparents have always understood
Our veins were created by prayer-- platelets
carry words to unwrite generational curses
When I get out (WHEN I GET OUT)
I can be an editor or a doctor
I can be an archivist or a writer
Trials have fastened additional sensors to my skin
through these I understand:
Under a sun of any size, our blood will inexorably thicken
And so my family name remains on the mountain.
___________
​
Association for the Study of Women & Mythology
Kelley Jean White
Philadelphia, PA USA
It’s late. Don’t use the elevator.
You’ll have to climb stairs to
the Thirteenth Floor. You might need
oxygen to get past the twelfth. Or you might
be blinded and skid right past to
the twenty-eighth. There’s an observatory
of days, and a radiographic memory
of months. Here, see, Isis dismembers
Osiris. Oh, sorry, that was his brother,
Seth doing the dismemberment, see Isis
stitches him back but his, well his
‘generative staff’ is lost. So how does
Horus arrive. Ah, virgin birth, how often
we remark it. Look, here a nine-year-old conceives,
and names her father as the father. Now that can’t
be true, can it? Ask Mary’s father. Oh Goddess,
I do believe. I’ve made a great mistaken
Sin. Mary, I beg you, forgiveness. I love
You truly, your blue scarved bowed head.
How often I have prayed and you
heard. I bless you. I bless Ester, Kali,
Anahita, Brahmani, Ceres, Danu, Gaia,
Guanyin (I’ve prayed to you also, and
it is a prayer to all.) and Heavenly Mother,
I’m just getting started. In my darkest
night, when I’ve been pushed
a dozen stairs into the basement
and that man with the hammer and sickle
waits outside a flimsy door, I pray again,
Minerva, Kumari, Lakshmi, I call on all
Virgins, Mary, Mary, I have not forgotten,
I am belted with decades of your rosary,
I count beads even when he enters
that dark door. And you are with me,
Nane, and Nuit, oh sweet Night, and you
many sainted virgins, Odile, Agatha,
Catherine, oh and unvirgin Magdalene, dearest
Sister of the ever-lonely walking
Night. Come Parvati, Rhea, Shakti, come Terra,
Venus, Woman. Yes, Woman, your name is
Legion, study you? We see you, Womb.
__________
​
LABYRINTH'S CONFINED
Pratibha Savani
https://www.instagram.com/pratibhapoetryart
https://www.facebook.com/pratibhapoetryart
Lost in a maze
No way to get out
My heart is lost
I have no doubt
Besotted by you
Your charming nature
Alluring dark eyes
I venture deeper
Deeper into the maze
Stumbling inside
Falling for you
In labyrinth's confined
Lost in love
Entangled in a gaze
Tantalizing touch
Puzzling a dreamy daze
Meandering through
Walls of solid green
Path becomes clearer
Don't you see it too?
___________
​
LABYRINTH LOST
Diane Funston
Marysville, California
Walking the labyrinth,
in France,
on Maui,
in Mojave sand,
in Bakersfield,
for Christ’s sake.
Setting intention,
tracing the spiral,
moving inward,
towards center,
completion of journey,
end of watch.
Ancient cycle,
deliberate steps,
the old ways
of many footsteps
beginning and end
call and response.
The answer came
in heated city council meetings,
of the small-minded rural town,
they voted NO on a city park labyrinth,
“It’s part of the occult”, they screamed.
The stone saints above cathedral labyrinths world-over,
shook marble heads in disbelief.
_________
​
READING BILLY COLLINS AT 3 A.M.
Maryella Desak Sirmon
United States
I should not be awake but time’s on standby,
sleep and dreams out on a date
cruising around the nighttime sky,
commenting on nearby stars as they speed
past the moon’s dark globe showing
me a nail-clipping sliver of silver light.
I could hope they hurry back,
but if they do, I might not finish
feeling The Rain in Portugal
as it dampens my hair, seeps into my chest
during this second nocturnal reading.
So, I listen to an owl’s ethereal ‘Who-whos’
leaking from the old live oak shadowing
my window. This roosting picket warns
of traffic on the glide-path of a breeze,
signaling return of galaxy-trekking mates,
who shred a few clouds on their hasty descent.
Bluebird has not spoken, but morning
has broken the somber stillness of my warm
word-cocoon. I rest my book and tuck the tired
wanderers beneath a pillow, where they will wait
for earth to rotate me into darkness again,
before they crawl out and settle in my bed,
perhaps staying a while tonight.
​
​
​