Shielding

by BiNkwana Joshua Serutle

I’m building shells
on my beloved one’s hearts
hard laden steel sticks
crossed on their chest
shielding heartbreaks

I’m building filters
on their ears
I’m eliminating cruelty
from reach
sword words
and serpents’ hiss

I’m setting flames
on their mouths
candle tongues
burning in rage
crunching lightning
out of storms

I’m building shells from shells
for all stricken arrows
facing their doors
to bounce back in turmoil

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BiNkwana Joshua Serutle is a poet, who was born and raised outside Burgersfort in a small village of Ga-Kgwete. His work draws more attention on the streets and shifting paradigms on social issues. In 2017 he enrolled at Mzansi Poetry Academy to enhance his writing skills. Some of his highlights in 2017 includes being on theTop 10 finalist for Leleme La Mme poetry competition. He won the CSP 2018 Open Slam King of the Mic. His poems had been published on Poetry Potion, Odd Magazine, Sol Plaatje European Union Poetry Anthology Vol 8, MuseIndia, Avbob Poetry Competition and Best “New” African Poets 2018 Anthology.

Fridays

by Bruce Taylor

Afterwards, they’re too used to it all
to weep anymore in a parking lot
at such a normal thing as parting,
birds coming or going, all the trees
putting off or on their leaves.
There’s the usual weekend errands,
he gets kitty litter and light bulbs,
she salmon and trash‑bags. What they are
expected to bring home and what they do.
Then there’s the left turn and the right,
the predictable nature of the antipodal,
while the lights in every direction,
at every intersection blink their easy advice—
to stop or go or to proceed with caution.

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Bruce is the author of eight collections of poetry, including The Longest You’ve Lived Anywhere: New & Selected Poems 2013 and editor of eight anthologies including Wisconsin Poetry (Wisconsin Academy of Science, Arts & Letters), and with Patti See, Higher Learning, (Prentice Hall 3rd ed.) 2011.

His poetry and translations have appeared in such places as Able Muse, The Chicago Review, The Columbia Review, The Cortland Review , The Formalist, Literary Salt, Light, The Nation, The New York Quarterly, The Northwest Review, Poetry, Rattle, Rosebud, Slow Trains, Verse Wisconsin, Your Daily Poem and on Writer’s Almanac.

Korean Echo

by Tom Sheehan

My turn had come;
Billy Pigg, helmet lost,
shrapnel alive in him,
blood free as air,
dying in my arms.

Billy asked a blessing, had
none since birth. My canteen
came his font. Then he said,
“I never loved anybody.
Can I love you?”
My father told me,
his turn long gone downhill;
“Keep water near you, always.”
He thought I’d be a priest before
all this was over,
not a lover.

###

Sheehan served in the 31st Infantry Regiment, Korea 1951 and graduated from Boston College in 1956. His books are Epic Cures; Brief Cases, Short Spans; A Collection of Friends; From the Quickening.  He has 24 Pushcart nominations, and 365 stories on Rope and Wire Magazine. Recent eBooks from Milspeak Publishers include Korean Echoes, 2011, nominated for a Distinguished Military Award and The Westering, 2012, nominated for a National Book Award. His newest eBooks, from Danse Macabre/Lazarus/Anvil, are  Murder at the Forum, an NHL mystery novel, Death of a Lottery Foe, Death by Punishment and An Accountable Death His work is in Rosebud (6^th issue), The Linnet’s Wings (6^th issue), Ocean Magazine (8^th issue), and many internet global sites and print magazines/anthologies. Due for mid-year publication from Pocol Press is a collection of stories, In the Garden of Long Shadows. Most all his books are on Amazon Kindle or Nook.

Stranger into Friend

by Ivan Jenson

I am apologizing
ahead of time for hurting you
and I am thanking you
before you offer your kind
and selfless acts
and I am suggesting
we change the subject
even though
we have not argued yet
and I am
getting ahead of myself
by stopping you in your tracks
to see if you recognize
the fact
we have never met
but really should
in the very near future
like how about
now

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Ivan Jenson’s Absolut Jenson painting was featured in Art News, Art in America, and Interview magazine. His art has sold at Christie’s, New York. His poems have appeared in Word Riot, Zygote in my Coffee, Camroc Press Review, Haggard and Halo, Poetry Super Highway, Mad Swirl, Underground Voices Magazine, Blazevox, and many other magazines, online and in print. Jenson is also a Contributing Editor for Commonline magazine. Ivan Jenson’s debut novel Dead Artist is available as a paperback and on Amazon Kindle and Nook. His new novel, a psychological thriller entitled Seeing Soriah is now available as an eBook or in Paperback on Amazon. Ivan Jenson’s debut book of poems, “Media Child and Other Poems” will soon be published by Hen House Press, New York