A Drop of Dew
The sky that sighs in my head,
Is your lightning heart?
Rain or rain in front of my love,
You will die in front of me.
I breathed... I breathed...
I breathed fire,
Fire is fire, fire is unstable.
Ah, I burned a lot of bad in his grass,
Now my tongue is empty, my life is empty...
Is your longing sad, O poor World,
If you miss me, you are not enough.
"Oh!" fire spews from my mouth
If I sing,
You will burn me!
I lit... I lit... the fire...
A drop of dew on my poems.
I don't care about fairy tales anymore,
I don't want to cry even to music...
Shamsiya Khudoynazarova Turumovna (February 15, 1973) was born in Uzbekistan. Studied at the Faculty of Journalism of Tashkent State University (1992-1998). She took first place in the competition of young republican poets (1999). Four collections of poems have been published in Uzbekistan: “Leaf of the Heart” (1998), “Roads to You” (1998), “The Sky in My Chest” (2007), “Lovely Melodies” (2013). She wrote poetry in more than ten genres. She translated some Russian and Turkish poets into Uzbek, as well as a book by Yunus Emro. She lived as a political immigrant with her family for five years in Turkey and five years in Ukraine. Currently lives in Switzerland. Married, mother of five children. It was not possible to publish poems and translations written by the poet for over ten years.
Benediction
From mankind's cruelty and abomination
Beasts blatantly defying the laws of creation
In the midst of society's tragic situation
Exists two souls with pure, true adoration
Whence strength of one in consideration
So shall be for weakness in sublimation
One cannot claim no need of cooperation
Strong and weak are equal in protection
From each other rests their own salvation
No one claims about slavery or domination
No ego, no lies, no arrogant reputation
Their love for each other is their benediction.
Still Dare
When no one seems to care
No one for emotion to share
No wick for a heart to flare
Will you still dare?
When life seems so unfair
Feet are on a strand of hair
No space found in one's lair
Will you still dare
When there's no star to stare
Vulnerable for soul to bare
They have stolen your chair
Blocked the heavenly stair
Will you still dare?
Yes! Dare though no one care
Share even a wickless flare
Stand firm if there's no chair
With true courage, still dare!
Spared the Rod
Taught power to love and not to hate
You have relied not merely on fate
You have faith and trusted on God
Though I have spared you the rod
Soon I shall be leaving and be gone
You have always been my loving son.
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.
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
