Impossible Love 
 
To grasp what an impossible love truly is, 
Not everyone can fathom, only those who've lived it. 
The strange emotion that is called love, 
Is known and felt by those distanced, who've felt it. 
In an instant, it comes, taking you by surprise, 
You find yourself enchanted by a stranger's eyes, 
Unknowingly, your heart takes flight and flies, 
To love is something only the heart implies. 
The delicacy of a rose's velvet touch, 
The beauty of a leaf with a grace that's such, 
The blush of your cheeks, a sight to clutch, 
When your hands tremble, that feeling, it does clutch. 
The glances exchanged, like lightning's sparks, 
Eyelashes fluttering, like burdens in the dark, 
Your heart flutters wildly, like a mad lark, 
This state, only those in love can embark. 
When you gaze at their picture, lost in thought, 
As the caravan of memories passes, unbought, 
And separation's inevitable, as it is sought, 
The years of longing, in your heart, are caught.

Elmaya Jabbarova was born in Azerbaijan. She is poet, writer, reciter, translator. Her poems were published in the regional newspapers «Shargin sesi», «Ziya», «Hekari», literary collections «Turan», «Karabakh is Azerbaijan!», «Zafar», «Buta», foreign Anthologies «Silk Road Arabian Nights», «Nano poem for
Africa», «Juntos por las Letras 1;2», «Kafiye.net» in Turkey, in the African's CAJ magazine, Bangladesh's Red Times magazine, «Prodigy Published» magazine. She performed her poems live on Bangladesh Uddan TV, at the II Spain Book Fair 1ra Feria Virtual del Libro Panama, Bolivia, Uruguay, France, Portugal, USA.

GLOBAL WARMING 

A voice without a voice 
The beauty of nature is being damaged 
The shores are covered with garbage 
The wealth of flora and fauna is becoming a thing of the past 
And man is to blame for everything! 
We are slowly sinking into ruin Carried on waves of poison 
The danger of global pollution lurks 
The sky, air and water are poisoned 
And no one takes responsibility 
We are knee-deep in mud 
There is no solution anywhere 
The echo echoes - DOOM! 
The will of the people becomes weakened 
And an indecisive look, when we disagree 
We don't hear her pain, Mother Earth is crying... 
If only people knew, to say:                                                                                                     
Enough is enough, let's make Mother Earth smile!


Maja Milojković, born in 1975 in Zaječar, Serbia. She lived in Bor, Serbia, and Hillerod, Denmark. Laboratory technician, artist, reviewer. Internationally recognized poet who advocates peace in the world. Activist in the international organization "RRM3, RINASCIMENTO-RENESANSA Millennium III" Together for the Future of Europe - International Peace Organization. Director General: Mr. George Onsi from Egypt and Franca Colozzo from Italy. She regularly publishes her poems in these two leading newspapers Galaxy Poetic Atunis", Belgium "Synchronicity of chaos", California Her poems have been translated into many world languages and many poems are available on You Tube. She is a member of the International Association of Writers and Artists "Gorski Vidici" in Montenegro and a member of the Poetry Club "Area Felix" in Serbia.

Midnight Soul and Hay Meadow Heart 

Night comes creeping softly 
Like a ghost descending the stairs 
Dragging reluctant shadows behind it 
With a dark beauty that mystifies reality; 
Flooding my being with midnight skies 
And lining the walls of my soul 
With planets, suns, orbiting moons, swirling 
Nebulas and covering the Sistine ceiling of my soul 
With the layers of a million Milky Ways. 
My super-conscious is a blackness 
Lighted by a billion twinkling stars. 
There is just room enough left in my psyche 
To fill each crevice with the scent of new mown hay 
And the site of the burgeoning meadows of home 
Over-flowing the memory banks of my heart. 



Night and Its Shadows 

Night has come and shadows pace 
The corridors of forgotten memories 
And stops at the door of the vault 
Where unused dreams are stored. 
The shadow of longing whisks by 
The faint light left glowing 
On the memories of timeless love; 
The preciousness so close to the soul; 
That can never be forsaken 
Nor cast into the mists of time 
Unspoken, unused or wasted 
Or left waiting for the eyes of love 
To open and see what they never saw 
When longing was young and fresh as dew 
And dripping sweetness so heartbreakingly new 
And never gathered to an intended’s pulsing breast. 
Now the shadows glean the aftermath 
Of unrequited love and endless dreams 
Trapped like lost souls endlessly 
Seeking to find the elusive heart 
For whom they were always meant. 

Annie Johnson is 84 years old. She is Shawnee Native American. She has published two, six hundred-page novels and six books of poetry. Annie has won several poetry awards from world poetry organizations including; World Union of Poets; she is a member of World Nations Writers Union; has received the World Institute for Peace award; the World Laureate of Literature from World Nations Writers Union and The William Shakespeare Poetry Award. She received a Certificate and Medal in recognition of the highest literature from International Literary Union for the year 2020, from Ayad Al Baldawi, President of the International Literary Union. She has three children, two grandchildren, and two sons-in-law. Annie played a flute in the Butler University Symphony. She still plays her flute.

An Unkindness 

They congregate in a sorrowful gale
Holding mourning souls in mist-o-pale.
Their callings, cawing; clawing ears.
A dirge for all those forlorn tears.
An unkindness of ravens surge
Their saddened song does purge.
Haunting as they remind of dismal days.
Taunting they scream in the dreadful haze.
Here does Death now call.
Where the curtains make a final fall.
Unkind is the Unkindness 
For Death knows no blindness.


An Ember of Tomorrow's Sorrow

Of all the sorrows my heart hath ever begotten
There are few which in grave will then be forgotten.
For over time I have passed many a threshold
That have closed to wounds that have grown old.
Still I have scars deep in my soul that fester and remind.
Some of which the origin of the wounds I have yet to find.
Phantom paper cuts of endless festering sorrow,
Fears of a drear from a hopefully distant tomorrow.
My monophobic thanatophobia paints a gloomy portrait
Of a dystopia that haunts from a future unknown date.
Death and I have carried this platonic affair since I remember;
Which is evermore but a faint glowing ember.
I fear when that sorrow becomes a flame.
When that ember burns with her name.


From South-Western, Michigan, Jerry Langdon lives in Germany since the early 90's. He is an Artist and Poet. His works bathe in a darker side of emotion and fantasy. He has released five books of Poetry titled "Temperate Darkness an Behind the Twilight Veil", “Death and other cold things” “Rollercoaster Heart” and “Frosted Dreams” Jerry is also the editor and publisher of the literary magazine Raven Cage Zine poetry and prose. His poetic inspirations are derived from poets such as Edgar Allen Poe, Robert Frost and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. As well as from various Rock Bands. His apparently twisted mind, twists and intertwines fantasy with reality.

This Ebb of Darkness

1
Deep yawning coming into focus
your room a hole between walls

another blur of the ceiling
morning light accepting your awakening

wondering what day it is
searching a few moments for meaning

and you stretch in a bed of only one
familiar blanket and cold feet

turning your stiff neck toward the window
curtain open as always a hint of the still
life calling

outside sky of puffs of cloud over blue
blending behind a bad city of sadness

you want to cry but can't remember how
and nothing would come out of it
so why waste the energy

and you rise
a stiff stick of a man
slow grinding your teeth

a declaration of "I'm not dead yet!"

2
A laughing toilet waiting in the bathroom
white porcelain cleaned somewhat
with a week of writing poems
for someone you don't know.

3
And you shove your skinny legs
into old pants and walk barefoot
to the peephole window

glaring down three stories to the street
littered with garbage in the gutters
and stinking slick sidewalks

children not playing but running
for hiding places and free cookies
from handouts from crooked hands.

4
Deep sigh
deciding you're hungry now

going downstairs
past all the other losers
locked in tombs with ears smashed
against their doors

tears in their eyes
wondering why
they can't help the emptiness
even with the sunrise...

5
You won't quit

brushing your teeth
with no tooth paste

smile still showing in the dark
even with a crack in the mirror.

6
A crack quickly spreading
into a top heavy internet
with Jack the Ripper coming
riding two motorcycles
with a foot on each

but you're good with it
this ebb of darkness.

7
For you can survive
almost any trick
of the wicked
which will eventually stumble
and fall into their own dark
spy holes.



Excuse?

We're in a country of top heavy pretenders...

not understanding sooner or later
someone is going to slap them down,
stomp on their false teeth,
and kick their tail down the street.

They'll have to live with the rest of us...

Seeing how we feel more
than how they ever felt

they with their fathers
giving them a lousy excuse
on trying to exterminate us.



The Downward of Now

Floating
in the ocean swell
a last wave
and breath

sunset prayer
bubbles rising as I sink
eyes closing
sea deep

my dreams
heart beating
echoes
satisfying sleep

I am
one of those
in the downward of now
watering of tears

burial at sea
never reaching bottom
riptide
back home on shore

coughing up
hallucinations
and a headache of dreams

a rope tide around my ankle
someone pulling me
across the finish line.




Stephen Jarrell Williams can be found on Twitter (X) @papapoet 

Circular [movement] over [juxtaposing]

        
        L
        L
        A
LLAC
        CALL
                L
                A
                C

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


lifted
from
nothing
to
find
in
nothing

////////////////////////////////////////////////////
///////////////////////////////////////////////////

                                                      yet...
...

                          the
                                hair
                        catches
                                in
                         the
                                    monument


yet...
yet...
yet?????????


                         
                                YES
                                YES
                                YES

'...............................................'

■ 
Language {as the} lotus {pulse}


ah
a
ah
a
..............................................
...................a
...................................ah
..........a
............................ah


□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□
□                   □
□                   □
□       sound                   □
□                   □
□                   □
□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□


now without reform the corner
turns and bleaches into noting
not spoken or stolen but ringing
and ringing and ringing and...


ETC.
ETC.
E  C.
  TC.
E    .


and now I'll take the tune and 
smother the ring into the bound
hand and the corner that has
come unstuck and coloured
white and blue and gold and...


a     n     d               
s     o                      
s     a     i     d         
a     g     a     i     n  


                                             BREATH
AND                                   LET
                        GO                
Lost without Translucence 

ba
ba
ba
ba


!

                                       only
                                       lonely
                                       this


         ==▲
      ==■
   ==●


SHUTTERED WITHOUT WARNING



...................................................
'I told you to watch the weather'
...................................................



                            a
                    WARNING
                           to
                     THROATS



in any case I am estranged



==▲
   ==■
     ==●



pause
pulse
ba
ba
a 
Progression [into] hyper-modern



                             as

S           T              A               I            N


//strip mined//for mercury//


              ABSTAINED


                             //from the//dense step//


half===============this
half===============this
                     ++
                     ++
..............................................



walking
backwards
talking
eastwards



                                {{shaped
                    like an}}
                             {{elephant
                      TUSK!}}





 
Re(turned) to form as (catalyst)

re
re
re                           ----member
                                               e
                                               m
                                               e
                                               b
                                               e
                                               r


▲
▲▲
▲▲▲

                                    and fit to size


the
bicycle
and                                             G         
                                                   O
                                                   D

                         
                            sit
                           the
                                     same



where                  is                 your

                       
                        LOTUS


                         NOW



▲
▲▲
▲▲▲

Nathan Anderson is a poet and artist from Mongarlowe, Australia. He is the author of numerous books and has had work appear widely both online and in print. He is a member of the C22 experimental writing collective. You can find him at nathanandersonwriting.home.blog or on Twitter/X and Bluesky @NJApoetry.