Free Verse
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Elizabeth
Howard, US
Brush
Apart for years, we
meet,
old friends catching up.
We walk out, the field
spangled with grasshoppers,
cricket song, myriads of
butterflies in the Queen
Anne's lace and chicory,
a garden snake weaving
through the daisies.
You point to a wooden
cross, your father's name
engraved in the crossbeam,
a bouquet of meadow grasses
in an old amber bottle.
You cannot talk of his
death in a brush fire,
how the fire spread
to the broomsage, swept
across the field so fast
not even a buck could
outrun it. I recall his
laughing face, his teasing.
Close behind his face,
the face of the boy on
the school bus. One evening,
he pulled my hair, called
me Red, laughed at my fury.
Next morning came news of
his trauma. Set to watch
a brush fire, he poked
sapling branches as boys
will. One flipped, sparks
shot out, caught his shirt.
New overalls and lace-up
boots doomed him to months
in hospital, swaddled in gauze.
We pluck wildflowers, place
them in the bottle, speak of
earth, breeze, fragrance,
the only words we can say.
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Shanna Baldwin Moore
Free Verse
break/straight
with a
smile
a lil' left
of the west...
outlaw poets
tiptoe thru the badlands
brandishing their pens
loaded with black ink
echoes of Jimmy's
writing fingers
bent at the break
ink stained
writing
in all the margins
blues
strangely beautiful
indigo clouds
electricity let loose
filling a hole
in the ozone
whispering/sizzeling
charging /changing
blue eyed twilight
creeping
up the mountain
bring "cool" words
to the poet tree
a song of sadness
shared alone
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Helen Bar-Lev, IL
Damka*
?.8.2007 –
10.7.2008
Just yesterday you
sat,
crazy little cat,
exploring your paw
in the most awkward manner,
lying on your back,
leg over head,
rough little eleven-month old tongue
nudging a burr from your toes
Amusing,
infuriating, daring,
black and white undersized creature
rescued from a garbage bin
ten short months ago,
so enthusiastic with living,
you always leapt
before you thought
So this morning
when I opened the bedroom curtains,
I was almost not shocked
to look down on the street
and see you, unmistakable
in your tuxedo pajamas,
sprawled on the road,
in the same position you were last night
cleaning your paw,
rigid now in that comical pose,
as if you wanted us
to remember you that way
Damka the imp
Damka, I’m sorry
*Damka means
Checkers.
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July 2008 Free Verse Poets
Jeff Sphar-Summers,
US—Free
Verse: for christmas, Piano
lessons in the heartland 101, Stargazer, strip poetry,
Legend of the Baobab’s Sin, Green Tea, Untitled, we all hold
swords, What in the world can be wrong?, The King’s Court,
Dethroned, paramount to my problem, You Never Came Out of
Play, Memoirs of the Poet Laureate, Munchkin
Michael Kleiza, CA—Bongos are optional...(The beat of the
night): A Performance Piece
Maya Lyubenova, BG—The Bread of Truth
Dr. Ram Sharma, IN—Hatred
Craig Tigerman, US—Midsummer Motions
Mariana Zavati, RO—Julia May's Dream
William J. Margolis—Free
Verse: Cataracts, To His Coy Mistress
William J. Margolis—The
Mendicant
RD Armstrong, US:
Free Verse—Excerpt from A Journey up the Coast; Route
One; Excerpt from On/Off the Beaten Path; Excerpt from
RoadKill
Gypsy James--Free
Verse:
Ode T' Outlaw Poets
Tracy
McPherson, US—Free
Verse: to be a hero
G. David
Schwartz, US—Free
Verse: I Love To Laugh, Dancing All My Feet Up (and
Almost Off), There Is No Such This As Crap
Lyn
Lifshin, US—Free Verse:
Twelve Poems from Cove Point: If Those Blossoms Don't
Come, Do You Ever Feel Like One Of Those Women In Saudi
Arabia; Rose; Another One Dead; The Dead Girls; The Dying
Girls: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6; Dead Girls; Dying Girls: 1, 2
Lyn
Lifshin, US—Free Verse:
Fourteen Selections from January Poems, 2006: Scars He
Says, He Has New Ones; Before The Scars; Didn't Think Was
Ready, Never Am For Love; January 11 or Maybe 12; Jan 11,
Metro; January 11: 1, 2, 3; Haven't You Sometimes Just
Walked The; Just Missing The Metro; Glistening Trees;
Thicker Than Fog: 1, 2; My Mother and Native Dancer
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