lost my moo after 100,000 moos

hooves prod through a squeeze shoot

freeze branded my left flank at -89^{o c}

pierced my nostril with a metal ring

cows know who they are

don’t need no number *M899312

NOW-WOW-POW-HOLY COW

cows moo who they are

born a Jersey cow

bull keep your pizzle away from my vulva

moo Moo MOOOOOOOOOOOOVE

Red Angus’ would a cow jump over the moon?

Simmentals moo over the moon

Texas Longhorns jump hurdles

Shorthorns jump long

Charolais volt poles

Limosin jump high

Brown Swiss model for Swiss Miss

Herefords graze alfalfa

HOLSTEINS CHARGE the CORRAL

**

**

**

**

Robert Fleming is a visual poet from Lewes, DE. He is a founding/contributing editor of Old Scratch Press and a contributing editor to the digital magazine Instant Noodles. His books are White Noir, and Con-Way in 4 in 1, #4. He is an award-winning writer and artist: 2022 San Gabriel Valley California-broadside, 2021 Best of Mad Swirl poetry; nominations: 2023 Blood Rag Poet, Delaware Press: poem: 3^rd place and three mentions, and two Pushcart and two Best of the Net nominations. https://www.facebook.com/robert.fleming.5030 

To the forgotten

Death will come and you have the memory

dissolved in a coffee liqueur awakening the sense of modesty

of the carved material with veils covering the nakedness

of the spirit revealed to the connoisseurs

of secret stories of the temple.

No one can be placed higher

in the pedestals of heaven

unless he is a saint or an angel,

 a bagpipe player –

announcer of the graces

of all the divinities

of the religions of the time

and we believers to sing

their glory, innocent.

Found in the history

of unlikely places

modeled by rainwater,

peoples of the green colonies,

embalmed in resins

of disappeared forests.

BIOGRAPHY

Lidia Popa was born in Romania in the locality of Piatra Șoimului, in the county of Neamț, on 16th April, 1964. She finished her studies in Piatra Neamț, Romania with a high school diploma and other administrative courses, where she worked until she decided to emigrate to Italy.

She has been living for 23 years and worked in Rome as part of the wave of intellectual emigrants since the fall of the Berlin Wall.

She wrote your first poem at her age of 7. She is a poet, essayist, storyteller, recognized in Italy and in other countries for her literary activities. She collaborates with cultural associations, literary cenacles, literary magazines and paper and online publications of Romanian, Italian and international literature. She writes in Romanian, Italian and also in other languages as an exercise in knowledge.

BOOKS

She has published her poems in six books:

in Italy:

1. ” Point different ( to be ) ” – ed. Italian and

2.” In the den of my thoughts ( Dacia ) ” – ed. bilingual Romanian/ Italian AlettiEditore 2016,

3.“ Sky amphora ” – ed. bilingual Romanian/ Italian EdizioniDivinafollia 2017,

in Romania:

4. ” The soul of words” ed. bilingual Romanian/ Albanian Amanda Edit Verlag 2021,

5.” Syntagms with longing for clover ” ed. Romanian, EdituraMinela 2021.

6.” The Voice interior ” LidiaPopa and BakiYmeri ed. bilingual Romanian/Italian, Amanda Edit Verlag 2022.

Her poems featured in more than 50 literary anthologies and literary magazines on line from 2014 to 2023 in Italy, Romania, Spain, Canada, Serbia, Bangladesh, United Kingdom, Liban,USA,etc.

Her poems are translated into Italian, French, English, Spanish, Arabic, German, Bangladesh, Portuguese, Serbian, Urdu, Dari, Tamil, etc.

Her writings are published regularly with some magazines in Romania, Italy and abroad.

She is a promoter of Romanian, Italian and international literature, and is part of the juries of the competitions.

She translates from classical or contemporary authors who strike for the refinement and quality of their verses in the languages: Italian, Romanian, English, Spanish, French, German, stating that “it is just a writing exercise to learn and evolve as a person with love for humanity, for art, poetry and literature “.

SHE IS

*Member of the Italian Federation of Writers (FUIS)

*Honorary member of the International Literary Society Casa PoeticaMagia y Plumas Republic of Colombia,

*Member of Hispanomundial Union of Writers (Union Hispanomundial de Escritores) (UHE) and Thousands Minds For Mexico (MMMEX)

*President UHE and MMMEX Romania, August 21, 2021

*She had come power of attorney Vice-president UHE Romania, Mars18, 2021- August 21, 2021

*President UHE and MMMEX Romania, August 21, 2021

*Counselor from Italy for Suryodaya Literary Foundation Odisha India,

*Director from Italy for Alìanza Cultural Universal (ACU) Argentina

*Member Motivational Strips Oman,a member of numerous other literary groups at the level internationally,

*Director of Poetry and Literature World Vision Board of Directors (PLWV) Bangladesh

*Membership of ANGEENA INTERNATIONAL NON PROFIT ORGANISATION of Canada

International Peace Ambassador of The Daily Global Nation International Independent Newspaper from Dhaka Bangladesh – 2023

*Founder literary group Lido dell’anima with LIDO DELL’ANIMA AWARDS

*Founder LIDO DELL’ANIMA Italian magazine

*Founder SILVAE VERBORUM INTERNATIONAL multilingual magazine

*Founder literary currently #homelesspoetry

etc.

SEEKING GOD’S KINGDOM ON EARTH
A Psalm-inspired prayer for leaving the earthly world for God’s Kingdom: “My heart is set on heaven, my soul long to fly, to leave this earthly world, and touch the sky, I yearn for God’s Kingdom,...What does it mean to seek God’s Kingdom, To follow His Holy Son Jesus? This is the life I’m prepared to seek and leave behind confusion, chaos, and hate. My joy, hope, or contentment. I have this hope and I have a future.” “As I grow in the Spirit of God, I experience joy, hope and contentment. I find continued joy, compassion and hope because the scriptures say that God has plans to give me a hope and a future.
Jeremiah 29:11 I have this hope and I have a future in Christ Jesus.
Prayer: Hear my plea my Heavenly Father, I kneel and bow my head in obedience, to live a life that is filling my mind, heart, and soul. I contemplate about a life you have given me since childhood. These memories give me solace. I give you praise and thanksgiving for I have Salvation and Redemption. 

EMPTY AND PEBBLED
--Cheops Beach in autumn

Naked we together again run
on our gold dust and pearls
beside the sleeping sea.
The waning sun beads our skin
while the wind smothers our lungs.

Every vagina is exposed,
a messy lagar where the wine is formed.
Any penis is Hermetical, closed,
an opaque clarinet.

Today the halves of the hinge
are rusty, stiff, and worn.

These times before,
nipple and prick would respond
to the air the sheen the motion
with alert anticipation.
These times before. But no more.

This is what this fall displays:
our lifetimes are pyramids
infinite at base
inexorable toward the point.


TAKE ME IN

“Take me in.” the poet prayed, “take me in.” The prophet hid.
“Take me in,” the poet said. “take me in.
No banker paid. “Take me in.” The soldier fled;
“Sink or swim,” the lawyer pled. “Take me in,”
the poet said, take me in.”
A woman did.

“Make me warm,” the woman cried, “safe from harm.”
The poet sighed. “Words are thin,” he did reply, “weak and thin.
But yet I’ll try. Weak and thin, but yet I’ll try.”

In the bin by page by page,
in the bin the books were laid,
inch by inch were set ablaze.
Line by line the match was lit.
Word by word
the poems all went.

“Now I’m warm,” the woman said,
“safe from harm. But poet’s dead.”
Poet dead?
Poet dead?
He lives on inside her head.
His words go on inside her head.


JENNIFER IN TWO VOICES

I know why the sky sings the blues – for you, Jenny, for you – atmosphere breaks down and cries. Once the wind must have had your voice: Wind makes my soul rejoice to hear you echo once more. Your precious beauty to preserve, earth freezes to its nerves in ecstasies of ermine. And the waves for you outreach – the sea begs up the beach, hands-&-knees its way in pride. And trees have honored you in gold, red carpet where you rode, jade ceilings and emerald floors -- nature’s learned your lesson well how to be beautiful: your appearance is your sermon.

I know why the sky sings the blues – for you, Jenny, for you – atmosphere breaks down and cries. (Across the landscape many-firred, atmosphere breaks down and cries,) Once the wind must have had your voice: Wind makes my soul rejoice to hear you echo once more. (urges us make love manifold to hear your echo once more.) Your precious beauty to preserve, earth freezes to its nerves in ecstasies of ermine. (Among the creeks and conifers in ecstasies of ermine,) And the waves for you outreach – the sea begs up the beach, hands-&-knees its way in pride. (in fields of foxes henna-furred – I hands-n-knees my way inside,) And trees have honored you in gold, jade ceilings and emerald floors (where moist warmth is plentiful, on jade ceilings and emerald floors.) -- nature’s learned your lesson well how to be beautiful: your appearance is your sermon. (Raven-eyed/lynx-face Jennifer: Your appearance is your sermon.)

Across the landscape many-firred, atmosphere breaks down and cries, urges us make love manifold. To hear your echo once more among the creeks and conifers in ecstasies of ermine, in fields of foxes henna-furred – I hands-n-knees my way inside where moist warmth is plentiful. On jade ceilings & emerald floors, raven-eyed/lynx-face Jennifer: Your appearance is your sermon.


AN ORDINARY LOVE STORY

If you are the vault, I
am the combination.
(a tux,
a mum,
a candled dinner)
If I am the match, you
are the conflagration.
(a kiss,
the cum,
those tangled
fingers)
If we are the watch, you
are the complication.


PEACE MEAL


…That night we dined. We had port and escargot
       and music,                      and the candles kissed the wine, the
WE                           *I                 way
       WERE                   *tried        one
REFUGEES                          *to  would                                                     the
        WEIGHING --minds not on *hold or cargo,                          rosebud
              INTO  (the)                   pearls*her                                        parted,
                     (PORT)                     or           *eyes                        blossomed,
                   (pearled)  FROM       fine                  *in                            grew
                           (on)               CHINA.                     *mine.
                          (her)                                           OR                           toward
   Fine food our (lips) barely touched--     SOME                                  the
                         (like)                   OTHER                                                    sun
                        (dew)               FAR                                                                in
                           (on) WHERE.                                                                     my
                (rosebuds,)                  Words chilled                                     eyes,
(like rain on shipsail)                      in the air.                                      kissed
      (as from her port)                   Finely she said: we’re through.       the
              (she slipped)                                                                                  sun, And cried.
And I cried too.                                   And then we left, as diners do
                                                                          when they are finished.

“Spiritual Pulse” Letter from Churchgoer Per the Request of a Local Pastor

By Jacques Fleury

Local Pastor: Dear Churchgoers,
 
We live in uncertain times filled with both possibility and peril, not to mention the daily joys and challenges of living. What are your hopes, dreams and fears in [sic] this moment? What are the urgent spiritual, moral, ethical, and religious questions that are on your hearts as we face these turbulent times? Your questions also help me take the “spiritual pulse” of our congregation, and they inform my preaching throughout the year.

Churchgoer’s reply to Pastor’s request:

I attended this Sunday’s service and although I spoke to the Reverend about how much I “felt” his sermon in the viscera of my soul, which left me in a haze of joy, I did not get a chance to tell him how much I enjoyed the singing and piano playing and how it blended harmoniously with the his sermon on being “grounded” through deep penetrating “roots” of the spirit.

The choir sounded ethereal, as a creative, I felt like I was in one of my lofty literary dreams, as doves and butterflies flutter around me in some, as we say in French “Île de la Cité” akin to Elysian Fields …in some island paradise.

First and foremost, I want to offer a snippet about my origins. I am from the island of Hispaniola, as it was re-named by notorious colonial era usurper Christopher Columbus or Hayti (meaning mountainous land) as it was originally named by the indigenous Native American Indians, I have not been there since I left to study abroad with my parents in America when I’d just completed the 7th grade in an exclusive, strict and abusive catholic school near the Haitian White House called Frere Andre or “Brother Andre” in English. My father had U.S. Residence & mercantile status as a business owner hence he lived in both America and in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, where his retail store was located adjacent to the then Versace storefront in the bustling sunny city.

Both he and mom owned businesses so they both travelled back-and- forth which meant sometimes I had to live in other parts of the world. At times I stayed with my paternal grandmother, who was biracial, my paternal great grandfather was a “white” man from France, hence explaining the reasons why my DNA tests on Ancestry dot com reveals Euro-Afro-Haitian ancestry since I’m also a descendent of enslaved West Africans brought to Haiti by the French for the purpose of cultivating and harvesting a then prosperous island replete with natural resources. Bauxite (aluminum ore), copper, calcium carbonate, gold, and marble were the most extensively extracted minerals in Haiti. Once the richest colony in the world, Saint Domingue (Haiti) was a leader in the production of sugar, coffee, indigo, cacao, and cotton.

I have published four books thus far and in all my books you’ll soon find out that Hayti, or St. Domingue/Santo Domingo or Haiti, as it is now called, and its people are NOT defined by “misery and hardship” as the mostly North American mainstream media would have you believe.

In the impassioned pages of my books, you will find stories of beauty, joy, resiliency and its revolutionary marker as the First Black Republic in the world and it was money from the then prosperous island that France used to supplement the American Revolution and Haitians also came to fight America’s fight against the British for independence for which they are memorialized in Savannah, Georgia. “The largest unit of soldiers of African descent who fought in the American Revolution was the brave “Les Chasseurs Volontaires de Saint Domingue from Haiti. This regiment consisted of free men who volunteered for a campaign to capture Savannah from the British in 1779” according to Contemporary Monuments to the Slave Past. The island constituted 70% percent of France’s economy, which is why they fought so hard to uphold the system of slavery and keep the country under French rule.

Now that I’ve said a bit about myself to provide some interpersonal context, here are my questions; which will be listed in two parts.

Part I.

I spent my early primary schooling in catholic school up the 7th grade when my father sent me to study in the States. I was physically and psychologically abused by the “Brothers” in my school, which has damaged my sense of self-worth and trust in “any” religious organization.

Q. How do you propose healing these immanent wounds of yore and letting go of the anger and resentment I often wrestle with daily and be able to keep my heart “open” to the love and light from a Higher Power, or Universal life Force Energy, God, or Allah whatever one chooses to call him/her/them etc…? 

Part II.

Growing up in America has also inflicted additional wounds to my already wounded heart having been labeled falsely a “Black man” when I am just “A Man” — due to the pseudoscience of eugenics and polygenesis–and considered an anomaly and the pejorative prejudice that is tethered along with that notion and practice. I try to keep an open mind and heart and try not to see the potential for more harm from those who look like the people who’d acted with prejudicial intents in the past; and who conceivably continue the atavistic practice of discrimination and dehumanization against those who look like me in the present. Particularly considering the Global Call for Social Justice and Racial Reckoning currently manifesting in America and elsewhere after collectively witnessing the public lynching of George Floyd on National Television.  All this harmful racialized hoopla triggered by the misinformation and xenophobic theoretical discrimination exalted by biased “scientists” of yore. They exalted a myriad origins of humanity and consequently separated the races into white, brown, black etc.

As you may already know, Polygenism was expressed in the seventeenth century in the work of Isaac De Peyrère (1596–1676) and by some philosophers and writers of the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. Monogenists of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, such as Buffon and Blumenbach, countered, arguing for the unity of the human species as ONE race: the human race.

I have written extensively about this in my book: Chain Letter To America: The One Thing You Can Do To End Racism for according over 100 years of genome research from such prestigious Universities as the likes of Stanford and Harvard, the first civilization was traced back to sub Saharan Africa 50,000 years ago, before their eventual migration to Asia, Europe and other parts of the world hence we are all geophysical representations of our African ancestors! The farther away from the equator, the lighter our skin colors and other modified traits. I wish this had been taught in high school…which would have probably prevented my negative sense of self and the ensuing feelings of “inferiority & not enoughness” which then propelled me to write my latest book: You Are Enough: The Journey to Accepting Your Authentic Self to celebrate myself just as I am!

Q: How do I reconcile the celebration of newfound racial justice “allies” and/or “accomplices” while navigating the relative continued oppression of Black Indigenous People of Color (BIPOC) in America?

Rev. I am aware that my two questions almost read more like essays, it’s just that I have NEVER been given this opportunity before…NO ONE has ever asked me about how I feel about these matters since I’ve been an American citizen or “Black” or “African (-) American” or “Haitian (-) American” citizen etc… As the ubiquitous Pulitzer Prize winning writer Toni Morrison of “Beloved” fame once said: “In this country American means white. Everybody else has to hyphenate (-).”

Thank you, Reverend, for this momentous and iconoclastic opportunity. I will treasure it always. One Love!

Jacques Stanley Fleury is a Haitian-American Poet, Author and Educator. He holds an undergraduate degree in Liberal Arts and is currently pursuing graduate studies in the literary arts at Harvard University online. Once on the editing staff of The Watermark, a literary magazine at the University of Massachusetts, his first book Sparks in the Dark: A Lighter Shade of Blue, A Poetic Memoir was featured in and endorsed by the Boston Globe. His second book: It’s Always Sunrise Somewhere and Other Stories is a collection of short fictional stories dealing with the human condition as the characters navigate life’s foibles and was featured on Good Reads. His current book and hitherto magnum opus Chain Letter to America: The One Thing You Can Do to End Racism, A Collection of Essays, Fiction and Poetry Celebrating Multiculturalism explores social justice in America and his latest book, “You Are Enough: The Journey to Accepting Your Authentic Self”  along with all other previously mentioned titles are available at public libraries, The Harvard Book Store, Porter Square Books, The Grolier Bookshop, Goodreads, bookshop, Amazon etc.  His CD A Lighter Shade of Blue as a lyrics writer in collaboration with the neo-folk musical group Sweet Wednesday is available on Amazon, iTunes & Spotify to benefit Haitian charity St. Boniface.

Rebirth

Upon the mighty sun's death
Comes gentle moon's birth
Twelve beats of burning labor
Darkness shines with cool favor
Silence disturbed by chirping
Cicada's courtship revibrating
Floating a heavenly orchestra
Twinkling lights of stage's extra
Nocturnal actors play a drama
Mysterious aura of a diorama
Silence fill the eight hour recess
Secret dreams no one can guess
Dawn creeping slow and gently
Sending off darkness longingly 
A rooster screamed with might
Announcing valiant sun's rebirth



Be Free

When voice is silenced by insults and threats, 
When life is drowning in anger, pains and regrets
When mind is forbidden to be free and fly
When truth is twisted and one is forced to lie
When sound is hoarse towards the heaven's ears
Yet not even a single blot of cloud hears
When one's soul and spirit is condemned to die
Then one has no recourse but carve all into words 
Be they bleeding festered wounds or sheathed swords.
For a windy fire, muteness cannot afford
Its blaze shall cackle on its on accord
What joy to be read and understood
Though no difference if forever hidden under hood
For the heart's knife scraped not for honor
Thrusts and slashes are to expose the horror
Thanks Green Owl

Lilian Dipasupil Kunimasa was born January 14, 1965, in Manila Philippines. She has worked as a retired Language Instructor, interpreter, caregiver, secretary, product promotion employee, and private therapeutic masseur. Her works have been published as poems and short story anthologies in several language translations for e-magazines, monthly magazines, and books; poems for cause anthologies in a Zimbabwean newspaper; a feature article in a Philippine newspaper; and had her works posted on different poetry web and blog sites. She has been writing poems since childhood but started on Facebook only in 2014. For her, Poetry is life and life is poetry.

Lilian Kunimasa considers herself a student/teacher with the duty to learn, inspire, guide, and motivate others to contribute to changing what is seen as normal into a better world than when she steps into it. She has always considered life as an endless journey, searching for new goals, and challenges and how she can in small ways make a difference in every path she takes. She sees humanity as one family where each one must support the other and considers poets as a voice for Truth in pursuit of Equality and proper Stewardship of nature despite the hindrances of distorted information and traditions.