Heaven and Hell
(Hieronymus Bosch, in scrambled haiku)
a peacock, three Eves
with four apples up on top
dark twins flank six white thighs
*
a woman torn asunder
by silver spiked saw
all breast and sinew
*
grown from fish gums
rabid incisors, dark claws
how we are hungry
Hieronymus Bosch
he is the keeper
of dead birds, their ocular
sockets oozing death
*
a man with a platypus bill
points to the words on the page
hooked crooked nose, a flashlight
*
the gourd drums,
the cockroaches
the sloped ukeleles
*
butterfly wings
salamander feet
a parade of devils
*
pterosaurs and frogs
sail through the constellations
feathers like silk, hook web flippers
*
slippery, sex stuffed with
moonlight, cock and buttock
cuffed, cucked, drowning
*
the pigment is cracking
the bonfires are crackling
the witches are cackling
Hieronymus Bosch
soot, smut, braided angels
fingers in her sex, mouth open
drowning men are swimming
*
owls, line laundry,
hooded heads and varicose veins
stingray, crab, a basket of wolverine
*
the lamb of the world
in a tunnel below the loam
the keys to death and hades in her hooves
*
sail away
sail away
sail away
*
you are the doctor
at this table, this emptied heart
these fractured bones
*
my ears and my feet
have been severed by arrows
hell's sharp blades
*
the water is green life
and your wife's skin is red
blood, trickling from struck branches
Hieronymus Bosch
a murder of crows
streaming from the crack of your ass
from his, gold coins.
*
a cauldron, an oboe,
a man vomits into a portal,
another man is born from blue.
*
three fey faces feed
on blackberries and pigs
a martyr is hogtied and stung with arrows
*
this is the house of empty barrels,
and an old and spooky widow
eyes glued to the window
*
the bridge to nowhere
the ladder to an overpass
that slides back down to earth, or hell
*
a reindeer is a centaur
a fig leaf is a burial cloth
a bovine jangles goblets and red silk
*
the gooseberry orgy, naked
circling the giant spiked fruit, mouths open,
dice, vice, stockings, and scorpions
*
the bull ruts until the woman's thighs
fall open and she cries with relief
at entry
*
Hieronymus Bosch
a nun screams at puncture
porcupine quills, claws of skunk
sex with white teeth and a mask
*
plucked bird, polka dotted fox hijab
pewter vessel of bitter water
a turtle, a crystal ball in his rubber throat
*
there are ladders across hell
the miners and their shovels
hoist volcanic ash, ashes to ashes
*
the arrow, the bullet
they are aimed at the swan
watch how her wings span death, then life
*
frail white eggs glow
among cymbals and harps
so long ago, the garden
Lorette C. Luzajic
Lorette C. Luzajic writes poetry and flash fiction inspired by visual art. Her works are widely published and nominated. She is the founder and editor of The Ekphrastic Review. She is also an internationally collected visual artist.
A Narrow Channel
Once again I walk
those long baroque corridors.
A bird is singing;
I have heard its song before.
Butterflies rise disturbed
by the wind yet resettle
to wait for the next gust.
The book falls open
at the same page.
Will no-one rescue me?
Oh Carol
It was a
night just
right for
singing
Neil Sedaka
songs. No
wonder
he had
Leonard
Cohen on
his mind.
Apparently
gluttony is
not recognized
as a sin by the
individual links
in the food chain—
viz. this quite
large spider
with a wasp
of similar size
pinioned in
its pincers but
flipped over so
they travel back
to back; & the
conjunction
being hungrily
tracked by a
lizard that is
smaller than
either of them.
Per severe
When he
presented
his latest
premise
he said
it's the same
as the old one
& the one
that came
before that
but I'll keep
on presenting
it because
one of these
times its time
will come.
#littlebylittle
(A sequel to “How to Save the World: A New Year’s Resolution”)
By Christopher Bernard
1.
“Little by little” was the phrase
for everything she feared to face, to
keep her quiet, calm, unfazed
despite whatever she must do
that otherwise might make her crazed
with the enormity of the true.
2.
Who was she? A heart of life,
loyal, strong, generous,
kind, true, not without strife,
not perfect yet good, for me, for us.
I save and keep her name. Her love
was stronger than life. She taught me love
3.
Little by little, we can do
what we must do. Strangers, friends,
pull back a little here, just so,
a little now. Prevent the end.
Protect the earth from our dark arts.
Preserve the world with your strong heart.
_____
Christopher Bernard’s latest collection of poems, A Socialist’s Garden of Verses, won a 2021 PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Literary Award and was named one of Kirkus Reviews’ “Top 100 Indie Books of 2021.”
NOT MAJOR HOOPLES BOARDING HOUSE:
I just returned from a long mostly silent journey.
To discover I just inherited a twelve-room house.
It feels vaguely like the last house.
But don’t ask me its location.
Exterior needs a little paint but don’t they all.
Remodeling seems to be a work in progress, just like so many of my paintings.
There are tenants occupying most of the rooms.
But even those that are currently empty one often hears the whispers of the past.
It’s rumored that Tiny Tim produced his best music in room number three.
The Venus room looks wonderful, but Saturn has done the decorating.
Surya shines bright and bold, but I find it too hot…Jim Morrison felt the same way.
A hell of a fight breaks out in room number six, Mars breaks a window or two.
The Moon is milky sweet but is afraid of Rahu’s shadow.
That snake scares me too.
Why oh why did they decide to be roommates!
Mercury is fast but sometimes outruns himself and forgets to lock the door.
Jupiter is gracious and our guiding light, watching over everyone like a sleepy owl.
In time they all will transit to other rooms.
Google maps says follow the neon sign shouting Color TV and Free Coffee!
Damage deposits and thirty days’ notice required.
SHADOWS:
My dear departed wife collected dolls.
I am now collecting shadows.
Storage is not a problem.
This collection is not for sale.
I normally don’t play favorites but this one has all my attention.
Its exact location is hard to pinpoint.
Google maps does not help.
It often appears under a passing cloud or nestled beside me in the warmth of my shadow.
Often it shows up in a dream, wearing a blond wig and a t-shirt that says I love Cairn Terriers.
I even wrote a long and beautiful love letter to it, but it was too long and too beautiful.
Now it’s gone AWOL… was it stolen or just a runaway?
Is there an app for this?
Searching Frantically!
I might put on a milk carton… Have You Seen Me?
My friend Jenny collects sentences.
Poet Frankie Laufer
Frankie Laufer is an oil painter and writer living in Walla Walla, WA. His paintings have been shown in both the SF Bay area and Eastern Washington state. His poems have recently appeared on Piker Press.
The expressive nature of both painting and writings creates the possibility of rediscovering lost or forgotten feelings and the possibility of new discovery.
Sold the path through the Walls of Disbelief,
for nothing can still the Heart
than then when
than then when
Faith's steps time Blend
Delicious fruit taste
Delicious
I am Stupid
Yesterday
& Eyes open
taste the light
that
Hearts drink
In waters I swim
Alive running
Thank you
for the nothing
I'm creative today & your
name is as good as
mine
Ours Creation
♡
I'm Love ARE WE
the shared
is a lie where
All is in
sharing
Just rests
Triumphant
without an
opponent
You're good for the
nothing
Knowing the Completeness
the Greatness
unbounded freedoms
GAMELESS Victory
Comfort sleeping
on the Granite warmed
from Beneath without a Blanket.
Cold as snow Drawn
to Life from within.
Thanks for
the nothing that
fills my Heart
from within where
sharing has creation
Beyond what any
thought possible
to give.
Creation is already
with or without
my attention to
detail.
Thank you for the nothing
where Welcome Stands
to fill the VOID
Creation's Call
My Heart Sings,
And rises as if yours
is mine all along
without evidence the
LOVE Pillars
Built Before
time Began.
And I'll find my cup Full
Before You Stand to Smile
& Pour LOVE'S Grace,
Knowing Full Well
the LOVE we share
Creation's damage
Broken clocks , all to say, Before & After,
Where NOW Stands the Glory!
it would be late
for you to come
to my bed
wake me
brush my forehead
and say belatedly
"I'm proud of you."
Maybe that's why we die.
When it's too late.
********
Shadows are elongated today. I
am slouching the other way toward an art
supply store to pick up some canvases,
tubs of paint, pig bristle brushes and charcoal.
It's cold. The earth won't yield to my weight.
A stray dog and I look at each other.
Neither of us can decide whether we're right
for one another. Then we separate.
A woman hides behind her window curtain.
She's beguiled by me, my smile.
I agree with David Hume. What I see
are the ideas I work with. The row houses
to my left are appealing. As are the pinnate
leaves in the gardens. As are the people.
*************
You have to have a barn. The warped red wood
the sunlight through its slats the straw that's left
on the ground. It's required if you want to write
a poem to a country meant to last. You
just say what you see. You are a cirrus cloud.
You are a witness. Like the scarecrow there
in the dry brown field wearing the farmer's hat
who has left to work in Long John Silver's
restaurant in town. The supervisor
is strapped to his back. He plows the people.
He fetches bags of fried fish and hamburgers.
His mule is now a tube of glue for children's projects.
He makes about 20K a year. Enough
to make repairs to the home he built to last
for all his years.
Foreknowledge
My mind drifts to arcane words, then I read,
turn pages, find them waiting for me there.
Are these eerie messages I should heed?
Chance? A higher power, malignant, fair?
Loose thoughts alight on out of contact friends,
presaging their emails in my Inbox
banjaxing me, more disturbing godsends
nearing my final act, hands circling clocks.
In these times of surveillance, a feeling
of being monitored persists, a weight,
also, mumbo-jumbo’s cant, this reeling
from sense for one dubious about fate,
yet I like the image of shadows cast
by guardian angels’ wings. Safe at last?
**************
Their Names
Daydreaming of youthful trove’s cloth of gold,
I can’t recall the name of an old flame,
names’ past mode gentle, today’s, blazoned, bold.
I see her, hear her voice, this long-gone dame.
Stab in the dark searching keeps us apart.
Stymied, my tired brain reaches impasses.
I tick off the alphabet, letter smart,
cease rummaging, revisit schools, classes.
Alma, Beatrice, Cassandra, Diane,
Elvie, Florence, Gwenda, from days sublime,
Helen, Irene, Judith, her golden tan.
Katie, Lorraine, Meredith, down through time,
names’ threnody, faded array of choice.
I think that haunting flashback dame was Joyce.
Biog: Ian C Smith’s work has been published in Antipodes, BBC Radio 4 Sounds,The Dalhousie Review, Griffith Review, San Pedro River Review , Southword, The Stony Thursday Book, & Two Thirds North. His seventh book is wonder sadness madness joy, Ginninderra (Port Adelaide). He writes in the Gippsland Lakes area of Victoria, and on Flinders Island.
