gleem toothpaste pepper yogurt purple


—


alert owlet the wrong orange



—


icicle painted silver lord oh lord



—



head of the larks nightly news epaulet



—



o’dell of the forest namely nothing



—



forked doorknob the proof of prawns



—



bio/graf

J. D. Nelson’s poems have appeared in many publications, worldwide, since 2002. He is the author of ten print chapbooks and e-books of poetry, including *purgatorio* (wlovolw, 2024). Nelson’s first full-length collection is *in ghostly onehead* (Post-Asemic Press, 2022). Visit his website, MadVerse.com, for more information and links to his published work. His haiku blog is at JDNelson.net. Nelson lives in Boulder, Colorado, USA.

An Outcast In My Own Life

A white peach, a slice of green melon,
and a peeled mango!
They all have a delicate pleasantness,
but the taste of you
lingers.
That taste has sweetened
the bitterness
around my heart.

I cherish those moments
when you are near.
The shadows
of apathy and uncertainty
disappear
and though
I feel vulnerable
I love
the flavor.

I once
devoured the night
and its consequences
now I lay next to you,


welcoming the morning light.
You dissolved that feeling
I’d be forever lost.
I am no longer
an outcast in my life.

snow fleas 
surface the light snow
jumping 
the thrill of a springtail
launch 

Christina Chin (Malaysia) / Paul Callus (Malta)  

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

snow mountain
a bobcat closes in
on a white-tailed deer
the timorous bursts
of vulnerability

Christina Chin (Malaysia) / Paul Callus (Malta)  

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

daily picks -
hometown favorite
restaurants
a unique experience
of local cuisine

Christina Chin (Malaysia) / Paul Callus (Malta) 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

OLD SONGS SUNG AGAIN



This beach that we run on, this beach that we sun on,

was a cold mountain once, indomitable quartz.

An insatiable wind chewed the granite into flinders.

The weathered remains gathered themselves as grains

along this treasured shore, this diamond corridor.

But the bored, restless waves too soon will take their leave,

Our beach’s secret cache will be revealed: the smashed

shells, patches of lather, condoms, crap, cadavers….



Life is like a ledger book.

Plusses and losses shape our plans.



The past is a castle; the present, a pasture:

Both are famous for blades (for cattle, or for knaves).

Instants leave instantly, last an eternity,

and new historians find and restore eons.

…. Mississippi …. Egypt …. Pasts clatter in their crypts,

yesterday’s tomorrows detached from their augurs.



Busses and crosses map our lands.

Life deserves a second look.



EVIDENCE FOR THE MUTATIONAL CODEPENDENCE OF TIME 



Yesterday 

today 

was 

tomorrow 

& my future



:ours



JEN




Not too short, not too thin,

she hid her out within.

She never showed her smile,

never revealed her pain.



SHAPE OF GOD DEBATED



Once, the future shape of god

was subjected to debate

between Simons, one a sage

and the other dubbed a rock.

One said

that a hermitage

was proper for apostles,

and the other

that brothels

were the fittest

for a sage.



Along with the skies,

the Hawk’s wings

lift

human prayers and praise.

But all the tears

are embraced

by the coils of the

Snake. 



LEAP FROG 



In slo/ 

        /mo 

                                               / frog.

           tree, and, shade, leap / 

Seasons pass, and Velcro lovers to Teflon stray.

Tomorrow 

will we kids too play 

   kids 

   play              leap 

                                   frog 

                                           

                                           leap?

MATRIARCH

Sarah stood a tall, broad-shouldered
woman of regal bearing 
wearing a dress always
and faux pearls with a black toile hat
flat as a stove top lid.
She came from Stoke-on-Trent
in old Blighty where she worked 
as a clerk for a milliner.
She married her love, Matt,
at a tender age but he toiled in a cage
in a mine and had no prospects.
The only way to escape indenture
was by adventure so they emigrated
uneducated as to their destination.
A trip by ship took them to Halifax,
then on by train to the vast plains
of Saskatchewan, where winter
was so cold, truth be told,
it tore the breath from their mouths
in gouts of astonishment.
But through it all she smiled with a style
far above her raising, a proud, penniless
émigré cleaved to her man standing alone
against a world of possibilities.
Matt hired out to farm a farmer’s land,
while Sarah took to cooking in the farmer’s house.
In time they went to rent  a place nearby
Where the wheat grown was their own.
She bore five children, three daughters 
and two sons, her family then begun.
She suffered through the Great Depression
but never questioned her decision
to become the woman she longed to be.
She was a corner post for most
of the local women in a community
of immigrants, native-born, and transplants.
She thrived, so alive in her role
as a woman risen beyond her station
in a nation where such was possible.
When her Matt died she made her way
to stay with daughters, one, two, three,
then on to a home where she roamed
the long halls on the arms of her 
grandsons, favored over the women
as was the British way. But a slip
and a broken hip sent her to hospital
undressed from her dress and bedded
without her pearls and teeth.
They called upon my mother, but Sarah wanted
no other to see her in what she knew
to be a sorry state, refusing all pleas
to please eat something, saying she knew 
what she had to do – and she did, willing
herself to die at ninety-three,
a woman to be reckoned with
to the end.