{slider A Sorrow, Sweet by Lucy Griffith}
Time slips another abacus bead. ~ Maxine Kumin
In a creased black and white photo
four of us line up on her back,
feet dangling far above the stirrups.
Pale Sugar presides, calm as pondwater.
I am closest to her tail,
straddling the broad beam of her rump,
a damp boy in front of me,
two toddlers in front of him.
My thighs sticky with horsehair,
my smile gap-toothed.
A pounded path circled the ranch house.
Loose-lipped, she toured us for hours,
round and round.
Deep summer, cicadas rattled in the trees,
the descending whoop of roadrunners haunted the breeze.
We led the white mare into the swimming hole,
dove off her back, smelled her wet skin,
swam between her legs,
knew it was safe, but
knew not to tell.
* * *
A decade later, home from college,
I find Sugar in the pens, near death—
down on a hard hump of caliche beneath an angry sun.
No fit way to go. I want her to die in the shade.
Nearby, I nest a bed of hay beneath a monarch oak.
Then, halter her, brace my feet,
petition a rise, one more time.
With a low groan, a ripple of effort,
she unfolds to stand, unsteady.
I reach down her leg, drag each foot forward.
Left fore. Right fore.
Left hind. Right hind.
She leans on me for balance.
Slow going, foot by foot,
but I am fierce with gratitude.
I tighten the girth on my heart.
She makes it, crumples into hay.
I bring water in a bucket,
she licks molasses from my hand,
stretches out in shadow,
her great bony head in my lap.
I bury my hands in her mane.
Happiest on a tractor named Mabel (a muse of 55 horsepower) Lucy Griffith lives on a ranch beside the Guadalupe River near Comfort, Texas. Her first collection of poems We Make a Tiny Herd was published by Main Street Rag as a finalist in their poetry book contest. Tiny Herd was recently awarded the Wrangler Prize for Poetry by the Western Heritage and Cowboy Hall of Fame. She won the Returning Contributor Award in Poetry for the 2019 Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. In addition, she was nominated twice for the Pushcart Prize in 2019.
•
{/sliders}
Second Place
{slider Watching My Son Feed My Mother by donnarkevic}
His movements are rhythmic
like waves, moving in
and out. He trims the asparagus.
Without effort, she swallows soft tips.
Between bites he converses
about geology, how diamonds
do not come from coal
but from depths
far below sedimentary rock.
With a butter knife, he dices
the liver and onions.
If she could speak, my mother
would explain food
from a Depression era childhood,
the rarity of an orange
eaten on special occasions
like Christmas
when her father drank too much,
how she fed him succulent crescents,
the seeds spit out in her hand,
how she saved them,
planting them in pots
on the kitchen windowsill
like nesting doves.
She would explain
that even with loving care,
the sprouts failed to thrive.
While my son steadies the straw,
my mother leans forward.
I watch her lips
purse, try to suck,
how quick he is to wipe her chin
and explain how diamonds
rarely make it to the surface,
how deep we must dig,
the value we attach
seeming to make all the difference.
-
donnarkevic: Buckhannon, WV. MFA National University. Recent work appears in The Centifictionist, Blue Collar Review, and Ancient Paths. A Best of the Net and Pushcart nominee. Poetry Chapbooks include Laundry, published in 2005 by Main Street Rag. FutureCycle Press published, Admissions, a book of poems, in 2013. Many Sparrows, a book of poems was published in 2018 by The Poetry Box. Plays have received readings in Chicago, New York, Virginia, and West Virginia.
•
{/sliders}
Third Place
{slider Brian Eno & the Buddha by Barb Reynolds}
I blast Brian Eno when I wake:
An Ending (Ascent)vibrates
and hums in my torso & limbs,
emanates up through the skylight
and back down, sun spilling
onto the opal tile floor.
It’s Sunday, and this is my church.
I think about the man here in Oakland
who, tired of waking to junk
dumped in his yard,
set out a statue of the Buddha.
Soon, no more trash.
People lined up to sweep
and to pray. They took care
of the Buddha, built an altar,
brought the man more food
than his family could eat.
And I think: he could’ve sat out there
all night with a shotgun, waiting—
but no.
With this one peaceful gesture
he sparked kindness
instead of hatred; humanity
over retaliation. Ascension.
These notes, these chords, these tones—
they rip my whole heart open,
empty it into this room.
Barb Reynolds spent 22 years as an emergency response child abuse investigator. Her chapbook Boxing Without Gloves came out on Finishing Line Press in 2014 and was shortlisted for the 2015 Rubery Int'l First Book Prize. Barb founded & curates the Second Sunday Poetry Series in Berkeley, CA.
•
{/sliders}
Honorable Mentions*
{slider The Doe in Winter by Marlene Dean}
I want to say
before I disappear,
my edges dissolving like
fallow leaves at the bottom
of a pond,
to say before I go
all the truth I know
distilled in a word
and this one word is
compassion.
Every flower turns to face
the same light that warms you.
Every mammal feels the depths
of all the sorrow you have known.
I want to tell you
whoever you are
that you are not alone.
The apples you gave
the starving doe in winter
were a gift unto yourself,
her graceful hoof prints,
the shape of your heart in the snow.
-
Marlene Dean holds a M.A. in English and creative writing. Her poems, essays and columns have appeared in anthologies, literary journals and newspapers in Canada and the U.S.
{slider On Sharing by Nancy Brewka-Clark}
To have a support group
some assembly’s required
using a simple measure:
the matter of common need.
Some assembly’s required
to find the right people,
the matter of common need
uniting disparate souls.
To find the right people,
look first for compassion.
Uniting disparate souls
calls for bountiful trust.
Look first for compassion.
The heart of the matter
calls for bountiful trust
among erstwhile strangers.
The heart of the matter
—to hear matters of the heart—
gives erstwhile strangers
the courage to speak up.
To hear matters of the heart
the listener needs patience.
The courage to speak up
comes when others care.
The listener needs patience
to draw out another’s need.
To heal because others care
is the sweet prize of kindness.
Nancy Brewka-Clark's poetry appears in many periodicals and anthologies including Medical Literary Messenger, The North American Review, Two-Countries by Red Hen Press and Visiting Frost by the University of Iowa Press. She is past winner of the Helen Schaible International Sonnet Competition, a finalist in the Thomas Merton Poetry of the Sacred competition and the 2019 winner of the Amy Lowell Poetry Prize. Her debut book of poetry, Beautiful Corpus, was published in March by Kelsay Books.
{slider A Silent Interaction by Laura Kozy Lanik}
My grandpa told me about a man he met
during World War II
a man who spoke a different language,
who practiced a different religion,
who lived in a concentration camp
until it was liberated by American soldiers.
My grandpa told me this man changed his life,
and in these last 50 years,
not a day goes by that he doesn’t think about him
even though he never knew his name.
He never forgot him.
My grandpa told me he started smoking
when he enlisted in the Army Air Force,
the day after Pearl Harbor was bombed.
He put his Army issued cigarettes
in his shirt pocket and carried them everywhere.
My grandpa told me toward the end of the war
in April 1945, he walked through a
liberated concentration camp in Germany.
He couldn't remember which one,
where he noticed a emaciated man
lying on the cold, hard ground,
too weak to get up and
walk out of camp with the others.
This man reached out his hand,
and my grandfather gave him the cigarette
he was smoking.
My grandpa told me he helped the man
smoke the cigarette.
He held it to his mouth,
and he puffed once, then twice.
The man smiled and my grandpa smiled too.
His dull eyes lit up with a spark
before he passed from this world into the next.
My grandpa told me of the silent interaction
between two men at the end of the war,
and I never forgot this simple act of kindness and
how it created a ripple that has lasted for generations.
-
Laura Kozy Lanik teaches High School Social Studies in Minneapolis. Laura is the co-creator and co-editor of Upon Waking. 58 Voices Speaking Out from the Shadow of Abuse poetry anthology published in April of 2019.
{/sliders}
* (in no particular order)
Finalist Poems
{slider All Day After The Morning Our Dog Caught - Neil Kennedy}
All day after the morning our dog caught
a baby squirrel dead between her teeth
and dropped it bloodied on the kitchen floor,
we shouted and stomped until she was sure
she had done something wrong and hid beneath
the table until the lesson was taught.
Before turning off your light, you gated
your doorway. The dog, in turn, had to steal
down the hall, past my door, where I waited
for her with a scrap from our evening meal
and called her up to the foot of my bed.
Not always keeping score for wrong and right,
I could have scolded that dog, but instead
invited her to sleep with me that night.
-
Neil Kennedy is a poet and librarian. His work has appeared in Origami Poems Project, The Road Not Taken, The Orchards, and others.
{slider Class Photo - Francis DiClemente}
Seeing every person
As a 12-year-old child
Taking a school photo
Eliminates any animosity
You may have for that person.
When you imagine
The awkward kid squinting
At the camera lens—
You discover yourself
Staring back at you.
-
Francis DiClemente is the author of two full-length poetry collections, most recently Dreaming of Lemon Trees: Selected Poems (Finishing Line Press, 2019). He lives in Syracuse, New York, and his blog can be found at francisdiclemente.com.
{slider DEAR STRANGERS: Memphis, TN, October, 2012 - Helen M. D'Ordine}
I was looking for God and
He was looking out for me,
sending you my way to
prop me up, give me strength.
Dear strangers, you responded to the
911 call made by the hotel.
My husband was having seizures
in a strange city, a strange state.
One of you drove us to a hospital. In the wee
hours, in the Emergency Department, you,
dear stranger, kindly custodian, brought me a comfy
chair as I prepared to call our children.
That morning my husband was in the ICU
diagnosed with a right frontal lobe brain tumor.
I’d told you, young nurse, that we were in
Memphis celebrating his 70th birthday.
Into his sterile, barren room, you brought
a large “Happy Birthday” pirate balloon.
That you, dear stranger, spent your own money,
softened the blow of possible surgery.
In an elevator, I ranted to you, fellow rider,
who’d merely asked, “How are you today?”
The next day we met again, and dear stranger,
you remembered my story, bringing comfort.
Kindness matters less to the giver than
to the receiver: me. Mostly, alone,
dealing with a medical emergency,
making life-changing decisions.
You, dear strangers, came into my life.
You may not remember me, but I remember you.
Small, random acts having profound impact,
speaking louder than words.
-
Helen M. D’Ordine is a retired teacher, former RIC adjunct professor, former member of the Writers' Circle, RI Writing Project Fellow, Block Island Poetry Project participant, Ocean State Poet and Origami Poet. Her poems are published in Möbius, RI Wriers' Circle Anthology, The Providence Journal: Poetry Corner, Medicine & Health/RI, Ocean State Poets' homepage, Where Beach Meets Ocean: Block Island Poetry Anthology, They Worked-We Write, The Best of KIndness, First Edition, Thursdays at 2, WAA: Poetry/Art 2013-2016, 2018, 2019.
{slider Dollar Store - C.T. Holte}
It's a great place
for certain things you need
from time to time (Sudoku books,
trail mix, lightbulbs) and other things
you didn't know you needed but might
have a use for and only cost a dollar.
So why not?
I have enough “Why not?” dollars,
but my reality is not the only one.
Some who shop at the Dollar Store
because things only cost a dollar
may have trouble finding the dollar,
as did the lady behind me as I stood in line
to buy the red socks with piano keys–
perfect for choir Sundays–
and we discussed how the checks
always seem to come late and leave too soon.
She had only a small container of Advil.
And only 75 cents,
or so she told the cashier sotto voce.
The quarter I slipped the cashier quietly,
chump-change in my world,
may have helped make
the lady's day less headachy,
but added an ache to mine
as I realized that the difference
between her place in line and mine
was only a flip of the coin.
She said, “Bless you”
as I headed for the door.
No dollar could buy that.
-
C.T. Holte was born in Minnesota before color TV; grew up playing under bridges, along creeks, in cornfields; went to lots of school, then gigs as teacher, writer, editor, and less wordy things. Recently migrated to New Mexico and learning about fiery Southwestern chiles and sunsets: color and warmth together–like good poetry. His poetry has appeared in places like Words, Touch, California Quarterly, Survival (Poets Speak, vol. 5), and The Raven’s Perch, and has been hung from trees to celebrate the Rio Grande Bosque.
{slider Friends - Nancy Sack}
You accompanied me
On the rollercoaster of care
In the decline of my parents’ lives
You comforted me
When my fractured emotions
Broke into shapeless pieces
You supported me
When I needed to be lifted
Out of the chasm of despair
You celebrated my career highs
And my children’s journeys
Your kindness sparkled my world
Oh friends
Precious friends
-
Nancy Sack writes poetry and prose that contain a rich array of figurative language, imagery, and narrative expressing universal concerns about contemporary life issues. Many of her poems and prose have been published in national anthologies, literary journals, the NCTE Writer’s Gallery and magazines throughout her years of teaching high school English and ESL in the metropolitan Chicago area. In addition to her adult book, Musing Along the Ike, she has a children's book, Puppies and Poems, which is also available on Amazon. Nancy Sack is an educator, literacy volunteer, writer, story teller, and photographer.
{slider Junkyard Dog - Lynda La Rocca}
The old dog crouches by the car.
He has a scar
across his nose
put there by those
who hit and hurt him. Somehow he
has broken free,
and now he needs
a home, he pleads,
paw raised, tail wagging, one soft sigh.
Tonight he’ll lie
beside my feet,
new friend, sad, sweet.
-
Lynda La Rocca has worked as a journalist, freelance writer, copy editor, and community-college teaching assistant. Her poetry collections include The Stillness Between (2009, Pudding House Publications, Ohio) and Spiral (2012, Liquid Light Press, CO); her poems have appeared in numerous state and national poetry-society anthologies, plus such publications as The Wall Street Journal, The New York Quarterly, Frogpond (Haiku Society of America), and Children’s Playmate. She performs her poetry solo and with the River City Nomads, a performance-poetry troupe based in Salida, CO, where she lives with her writer-photographer husband Steve Voynick.
{Let's make the World a better place by giving to the needy - Emmanuel Ojeikhodion}
On the roadside here in Lagos,
a gallery of mendicants perches on one side.
Some bending, sitting, standing and crawling
with their enamel plate.
Their mouth breaks into a prayer for passers-by
and commuters.
Somedays when I pass here, I give them all
I have on me.
In return, I carry the stench of their prayers
home like a cologne.
A friend asks me: What reward do you receive
when you give?
I told him when we give, we do so by opening little
doors in our life where kindness shelters kindness,
and the little things we pray for reaches God's heart
in seconds
-
Emmanuel Ojeikhodion is a young emerging writer from Nigeria who majors in Poetry and sometimes Essays. His writings explores separation, loss, grief, depression, anxiety, rape & identity. He's currently running a bachelor's degree in English and literature. He loves listening to old music and to read new poems. His poems have been published / forthcoming in Capsule Stories, Rigorous, Chachalaca Review, Pangolin Review African Writer, Museum of Poetry, Déraciné Mag & elsewhere.
{slider Lift - Ella Mae E. Janairo}
I always thought,
Arguments could be the answer,
A healthy conversation,
That would lead to understanding,
But lately, it’s just not the same,
That if chaos comes,
Smile is best thing,
I could offer.
-
Ella Mae E. Janairo is a word play enthusiast from the Philippines who just can't help but dream big.
{slider Made A Friend - Joy Moore}
Got to school, still had time,
saw a kid, full of grime.
Asked him why, said he fell,
he was hurting, I could tell.
Asked for water, with a please,
helped him wash, his sore knees.
Shared a smile, helped him mend,
Split a cookie, made a friend.
-
Joy Moore is an active member of SCBWI, 12 x 12, a graduate of The Institute of Children’s Literature, Making Picture Magic, A Picture Book Master Class, The Lyrical Language Lab, The Art of the Arc and Kids Book Revisions. Her writing credits include: Wiggle-Wiggle, Scratch-Scratch, Itch-Itch-Itch with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Pink Riding Hood and the Warty Stick Monster with Bumples magazine. Song of the Whippoorwill with Balloon’s Literary Journal. Moments with Kids Imagination Train. Daydreaming with Kids Imagination Train. Visit: Word-Painting.webs.com
{slider Mother's Day Roses - Annette Libeskind Berkovits}
We sat in utter despair, waiting.
Two women who loved him,
a mother and wife broken
by his brain hemorrhage.
Echoes bounced off the polished
hallway; gurneys passed;
he wasn’t on them.
He was a moth in the ICU
hovering too close to flame.
Each of us grieved in our own way;
she a monsoon in India;
I, a windswept, parched Atacama.
A surreal vision appeared,
his neurosurgeon, the God of neuro ICU
handed each of us a bouquet of roses.
-
Annette Libeskind Berkovits was born in Kyrgyzstan and grew up in postwar Poland and the fledgling state of Israel before coming to America at age sixteen. Her stories and poems have appeared in Silk Road Review: a Literary Crossroads; Persimmon Tree; American Gothic: a New Chamber Opera; Blood & Thunder: Musings on the Art of Medicine; and in The Healing Muse. She has published two memoirs and is completing a historical novel. See: annetteberkovits.com
{slider My Proudest Day - Michelle Reeves}
The weather was the polar opposite of the feelings of us present at the funeral.
The sun was asserting its celestial dominance as it bathed
us in its warm light as we stood by his graveside and it rained from our eyes.
His family lived right next to us and he had been the same age with my son.
Leukemia had been six year old Tommy’s killer and as I
looked down at my son, Kess, clutching my hand, I could
barely imagine the intensity of their pain.
Little Nina was crying her soul out, her delicate frame
trembling as her puffy blue eyes stared at her big brother’s grave.
Everyone had called them Hansel and Gretel and they had been
as close as thunder and lightning.
She looked like her little heart was breaking and I felt
mine shatter as I watched her shoulders quaking.
Her mummy looked mummified and her father a zombie, their
family to be made whole never again.
Kess looks up to me and in his brown eyes there is sadness
I can see and I brace myself for questions that toddlers ask.
“Mama, Nina must be so sad cause she can’t play with Tommy
anymore because he is in heaven, right?”
I nod to my baby as tears blur my sight, then he lets go of
my hand, toddles to Nina and holds her hand.
“Nina please don’t be so sad, I know I’m not Tommy but I
promise to give you hugs like he did. I know I’m not Tommy
but I promise to always play with you like he did. I’m your
brother too. I know Tommy loves you and I do too, so don’t
be so sad Nina because you have me too. Hugsies?”
Then my little Kess uses his sleeve to wipe her tears and
He puts his arms around and pats her head and smiles.
I choke on my tears as they gush down and I proudly stare at
Kess who knows that to be truly human, you have to be kind.
-
Michelle Obasohan is a spoken word artist and writer who was born and raised in Benin City, Nigeria and is popularly known by her stage name; Michelle Reeves. She has written novels, short stories, poems, articles and plays; which have been performed on stage. She is currently a final year Law student in the University of Benin.
{slider Nebbish - Christopher Stephen Soden}
He was hitchhiking when I stopped
on the expressway, head wrapped
in bandages, wisdom teeth extracted.
He’d run out of money for bus fare,
his mother too busy to take him
to the dentist. Despite salt throb
and disorientation he offered to pay
for my gas, once his paycheck came.
We worked together at Taylor’s Books
and just like me, he took his turn
at the cash registers, shelving, helped
customers on the phone and floor.
30 minutes for lunch. He had
a mop of hair the color of molasses, brush
mustache and googly, Mad Scientist glasses.
He might have been a bit slow to catch on,
and sometimes fray your nerves.
But vigilant as a Franciscan monk,
and not a drop of harm in him.
Veronica was our manager: proud and slender
as a cornstalk, amber honeycomb hair.
Moonbeam skin clustered with freckles.
Cunning as a hawk. Do I need to explain
he irritated Veronica, or that she fired him,
with no prospects ahead? She could have
cracked the planet like an egg
and gobbled it raw, but instead chose
to devour a chipper, innocuous soul, because
she wanted to. Because she could.
I thank our Father, watching across the black,
bone-chilling cosmos, for putting him there.
Blood jamming his gauze-packed jaw, as he sat
next to me in the car, oblivious to the cruelty
done to him. I can’t. I can't even remember
his name.
-
Christopher Stephen Soden received his MFA in Creative Writing (Poetry) in January 2005 from Vermont College of Fine Arts. He has written film and theatre critique for The Fort Worth Ally, EdgeDallas, John Garcia’s The Column, Examiner.com and sharpcritic.com. His poetry has appeared in numerous venues including: The Cortland Review, Rattle, G & L Review, The Texas Observer, Borderlands, Assaracus, and Ganymede Poets. Short plays of his (including: Water, Radio Flyer, Every Day is Christmas. In Heaven. and Queer Anarchy have been staged at Bishop Arts Theatre Center, The MAC and Nouveau 47. Christopher also teaches and lectures on craft, theory, genre and explication.
{slider On the Subway, June 2015 - J.Lois Diamond}
On the subway, the Nanny
large and dark sits her
two charges down
while she stands
She hands the boy
a demi bottle of water
As he opens his mouth
out comes a wad full
of gum
He presents it to her
like it is the most
wondrous of gifts
She accepts it gently
bared hands without
reproach, no words that
it’s dirty, has germs or
carries disease
She discreetly reaches for
the empty skittles wrapper
in his sisters’ hands and
wraps it inside the crackling foil
I long to be these children,
the Nanny
or even the used piece of Wrigley’s
they so lovingly share
-
Lois Diamond is a poet and playwright. Her poem “Done With That” will be published in the anthology “Aunt Flo” 2020-2021. She was a featured poet at The Cornelia St Café. Her poems “The Bodies”, Where is Bess?”, “On Thursday Afternoon” were published Syndic Literary Journal, issue 21, 7/19. Her poem “The Parting” published, The Visual In Verse, Grounds for Sculpture, 2016. Her poem HURRICANE SANDY, finale NY LADIES, The Hudson Guild Theatre, 2013. She studied poetry with Harris Schiff , Alice Notley, St. Marks in the Bowery. Her play Growl, inspired by life of Iranian poet, produced Downtown Urban Arts Festival, 2019 , Theatre Odyssey, 2019. Accepted into Last Frontier Theatre Conference, Valdez, 2020, rescheduled for 2021. See: jloisdiamond.com
{slider One Day of Mourning - Joshua Davies}
Can there be a day of mourning for
the kindness that’s been lost?
A day of rest and refuge, where
we treat with tenderness all in this life
that is abandoned and attacked?
Can we have one day of silence,
where we listen without judgment?
Create a hallowed space to bind the wounds
by being present, with the care
of loving consciousness?
Can there be a day of emptiness,
of a great unmaking? Where pettiness,
cruelty and injustice dissolve and are
forsworn? Can we bring this loving presence
to our own lives, lay down our burdens?
Can we weep, and feel the gratitude
of all that grounds us, that connects us
to each other? That we are born
for praise and beauty; that this sacredness
and wonder lives inside us?
Can there be a day of witness?
Where we are attentive, see each other
as we are, for all we are? Where we recognize
our kinship, erase our gaps and differences
as insubstantial, a frail illusion?
That we are not tribes and factions
hungry for survival, lost in combat over
our separate truths - but reverent
of that singular truth: that all who live
have pain and suffer. So life is precious.
And we are here together; so never
are we isolated and alone.
Can we have one day of mourning?
One day of listening; one day of gratitude?
One day of respite and renewal,
that builds a common faith?
Let it be today.
And let it begin with me.
-
Joshua Davies has written poetry diligently and critically for over 30 years, beginning to publish now his kids have graduated college. He works within the produce and organic/sustainable food and restaurant industry, also serving on the board of TC Food Justice – a nonprofit targeting reducing food waste and supplying fresh and sustainable produce to those in need. He’s also on the Board of Gris Literatura, a Minneapolis-based nonprofit promoting poetry access through seminars, poetry readings and classes. Joshua has what he supposes is called an "eclectic" background in professional theatre, dance, martial arts, Chinese medicine and alternative healing. He lives in Minnesota’s Saint Croix River Valley with his wife Melissa and their veritable menagerie of animals.
{slider Remember Your Kindness - Tendai Shaba}
I may forget your name,
But I will remember your kindness.
I may forget your birthday,
But I will remember your kindness.
I may forget your interests, values, and opinions,
But I will remember your kindness.
I may forget your hopes and dreams,
But I will remember your kindness.
-
Tendai Shaba is a Malawian-born poet, writer and narrator. His work is mostly based on human psychology and personal development. The 31 year old started writing at age 14.
{slider rising as the phoenix - Linda M. Crate}
in my moments
of utter darkness
when the world
feels as if it were upside
down,
i choose a random act
of kindness
to bestow on someone
i love;
because i want to be the light
if i cannot find any—
sometimes we have to reignite
our own candles
in order to shine once more,
sometimes we must shed scared and pale
incantations of who we once were
rising on the mighty wings
of the immortal phoenix;
every time i rise the flames are
more beautiful than before—
kindness always helps me shine with
a more beautiful light than the one i previously was
so i will keep burning even on the darkest days.
-
Linda M. Crate's works have been published in numerous magazines and anthologies both online and in print. She is the author of six poetry chapbooks, the latest of which is: More Than Bone Music (Clare Songbirds Publishing House, March 2019). She's also the author of the novel Phoenix Tears (Czykmate Books, June 2018). Recently she has published two full-length poetry collections Vampire Daughter (Dark Gatekeeper Gaming, February 2020) and The Sweetest Blood (Cyberwit, February 2020).
{slider Silent Witness - Bill Carpenter}
From the back of the school bus
I watch a large boy take a seat
next to a one I hadn’t noticed before.
He throws himself against the sitting boy
as if the bench were solely his
slamming him against the bus interior.
He begins to taunt the boy
who stares out the window
as if it held a means of escape.
From his pocket the bigger boy
pulls out a clothespin, he pinches open
and places on the cheek of his victim.
The boy sits there as his cheek turns
red and then white where the clothespin hangs.
Soon another, then another clothespin
puckers his face, no spot too tender,
too intimate for this adornment,
transforming his subject
into a human fetish.
I can see tears running down his face, making their way
around the barbs of wooden pinchers.
The boy dares not object on threat of a worse fate.
The older boy has a talent for humiliation,
and not wanting his attention
I say nothing.
Hoping some adult will intervene,
but the bus driver’s eyes are averted
to the road,
as are the eyes of the young man
with the faceful of clothespins,
and my own eyes
scanning the roadside
for my stop.
-
Bill Carpenter’s poetry has appeared in such journals as The Newport Review, Runes, Blueline, Chest, Balancing the Tides, July Literary Press, The Cancer Poetry Project, Surrounded: Living with Islands, Balancing the Tides and the Origami Poems Project. An eleven-year veteran of Ocean State Poets, he has been a member of the ACI team giving voice to inmates in Medium Security. He has four adult children and one grandchild. A life-long Rhode Islander, he lives in Chepachet RI with his partner Emily.
{/slider the cat - Kate LaDew}
you don't flinch
used to pain,
sure the raised hand is for hurting
I bring it down, slow,
smoothing the fur
between your shoulders
your body waits,
I count one two three
before it recognizes the sensation
magically,
your insides begin to rumble,
jagged, unused,
the sound startles you, too,
as we look each other in the eyes
your purring does not stop
for a long perfect moment
as I pick you up, gently, gently
and we go inside
where I suppose
you were always meant to be
-
Kate LaDew is a graduate from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro with a BA in Studio Art. She resides in Graham, NC with her cats Charlie Chaplin and Janis Joplin.
{The Kindest Deed - Sandip Saha}
The more life is unveiling itself
to my ever-inquisitive eyes
the more I find it as a fruit
so marvelous in appearance
but extremely bitter to taste.
All living beings are constantly grappling
and rarely getting air of joy to survive.
The ignorant passersby run for water
in the hot desert path of their livelihood.
The cruel nature laughs at them
and gives them only mirage of hope.
In this deceptive world, I find
the best and most valuable act is
to lend a helping hand to fellow-humans
who are struggling for a breath
in the sinking quicksand.
Helping by food, makes one survive a day
saving a life gives one another chance
to make his life fruitful,
secular education engenders pecuniary soundness,
but the most precious gift is spiritual help
which brings the eternal freedom.
Sandip Saha, a chemical engineer and doctorate (PhD) in metallurgical engineering from India, has received three awards for his scientific work and 33 publications on his scientific research work including three patents. He is a winner of Poetry Matters Project Lit Prize-2018 and has published one collection of poems, "Quest for freedom" available in amazon.com. He is published in poetry journals including North Dakota Quarterly, Peregrine, Door is a Jar, Better Than Starbucks Poetry Magazine, Pif Magazine, The Cape Rock: Poetry, Las Positas Anthology-Havik, Pasadena City College Inscape Magazine, Shot Glass Journal, The Wayne Literary Review, Tiny Seed Literary Journal, The Ghazal Page all USA, The Criterion, Poets Choice, India and in The Pangolin Review, Mauritius.
{slider The Road, 1932 - Brooks Carver}
Dirty face with dark, hollow eyes,
Looked no more than about twelve.
The breeze brought his sour smell
Drifting through the screen door.
Baggy shredded pants, knees out,
In desperate need of mending.
He wanted work, but food mostly.
Janey made him wash at the well
Then fed him cornbread and cold milk.
The boy finished off the afternoon
Helping Sam cut fence posts.
From the porch she could see
That the strokes of his ax were
Weak, ineffective, feeble.
He spoke not a word during supper
Then fell asleep in his empty pie plate.
Sam carried him to the porch
Wrapped in an old blanket.
A raggedy pair of overalls for a pillow.
Next morning, the porch was empty.
Boy, blanket and overalls
Gone west in the dawn light.
Janey stared down the road.
Somewhere a mamma is
Grieving for her boy, she said.
I hope nobody steals the dollar
I put in his pocket.
-
Brooks Carver is a farmer, historical fiction writer, poet and photographer. His Reconstruction era novel set in eastern Tennessee, The Angels’ Share, received the Bronze Medal for historical fiction in the annual ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year Award in 2004. Brooks just finished the sequel called Give My Love to Ivey Rose. At present, he has another manuscript in the works about Confederate Cavalry General John Hunt Morgan entitled, Kentucky Rain. He has published an anthology of his short stories, poetry, and essays called Pilgrim Heart. His poems and short stories have appeared in numerous magazines.
{slider When Your Granny Panties Saved Me - Katie Manning}
One time when I wet my pants at your house, I knew my
mom would be mad. I was too old for this. You washed me
up and put me in a pair of your underwear. The white
briefs were baggy on my little body and made us both laugh
when I ran through the house while we waited for my
clothes to go through your yellowed washer and dryer.
Then you got me dressed before my mom returned from
work. You never said a word. I never forgot. I stood up at
your funeral and told this story.
Katie Manning is the founding editor-in-chief of Whale Road Review and a professor of writing at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego. Her book Tasty Other won the 2016 Main Street Rag Poetry Book Award, and her fifth chapbook, 28,065 Nights, is forthcoming from River Glass Books.
{slider Window Seat - Fiona Ritchie Walker}
Such joy at getting the window seat,
his camera ready for take off.
I watched the boy unwrap the headphones,
kick off shoes.
The steward guided a couple
down the aisle, to split seats.
Over the tannoy, a warning.
Midnight turbulence on our eight hour flight.
The woman stood,
searching the sea of faces.
Six rows back, her husband,
sitting beside the boy, waved her down.
I saw the camera go back in the bag,
two feet find their matching shoes.
The boy spoke in his neighbour’s ear,
made his way to the central block of seats,
signalled for the wife to grab her purse,
squeeze past her seated neighbours.
Such joy in her face as she dipped her head,
pressing both hands together in thanks,
then walked towards her husband,
where the window seat was waiting.
* tannoy – loud speaker
-
Fiona Ritchie Walker is a Scot who lives in NE England. A former journalist, she worked for a fair trade organisation for many years, travelling the world to help producers and artisans tell their stories. She encountered many kind people along the way. Her poetry and short fiction are widely published.
{/sliders}
Anthology Contributors
{slider After the Race - L. Shapley Bassen}
He’d lost, you see, and run away
to the woods west of Winnipesaukee,
and run as mist pressed chill upon
fallen leaves and incomplete fairy rings
and run beside pines where birds
and squirrels fled from his cries.
He found a rock locked in the lake
and sat there as the sun, it set,
red into the mercury of the lake
rimmed by black shore and put
his face in his hands and wept.
The white Moon rose regally
in jeweled gown of midnight blue
and he lifted his to her face, her O,
what on the Earth so grieves this one?
He heard her voice with nearby sound
of kitten cry he startled at, alert, recalled,
upon his feet and found an infant
cuddled in cloth half-buried in soft
pine needles, and lifted it against his chest
for warmth to feel the pounding there and ran
toward memory of the light of town.
A long time in the dark and longer strides
of tired legs and thought of the baby
dying in his arms for want of speed,
ran knowing how desperate was
this moment and helpless child in the cold
and hungry night, and then he sensed he did not run
alone but was pursued by wolves who can smell fear
and failure in their prey and so must cut them down
to strengthen those who still will run.
Soothed the baby with steady strides,
rocking motion of his arms. There was the hard
flat surface of a road ahead and lights,
a car – he cried aloud and then it slowed,
taking them faster than any youth could run
to town and hospital. He sat in a room alone
waiting word. Policemen came to tell him
who he’d saved and how the parents wanted
to thank him so. He left before they found him
and ran the roads home to his mother’s house
where she awaited him, sleeping on the couch.
She wakened and said, “Heard you lost the race.”
“Yes,” he said, “it’s all right.” “I know,” she said.
Good night both went to their beds
under that October Moon.
-
A native New Yorker now in RI, L. Shapley Bassen was the First Place winner in the 2015 Austin Chronicle Short Story Contest for 'Portrait of a Giant Squid'. She is s a poetry/fiction reviewer for The Rumpus, etc., also Fiction Editor at Craft Literary, prizewinning, produced, published playwright: originally at Samuel French, now Concord Theatricals; 3x indie-published author novel/story collections, and in 2019, #4, WHAT SUITS A NUDIST, poetry collected works at Clare Songbirds Publishing House. See: www.lsbassen.com
{slider A Mask Can't Hide Your Face - Ellis Jackson}
I can hear your hello when you greet me,
along with morning’s distant chirps.
I can see your smile stretch, crease,
and your jubilant eyes in the later evening.
I can still feel the joy in your calm, steady breathing.
A mask can’t hide the heroic hours
through which you’ve saved both love and life.
No cloth can hide your caring
or filter pure compassion’s spread.
You face the faceless, a bleeding heart beating red.
I see your vital daily journeys,
though I know you fear the streets.
I hear you offer help to total strangers
as you contemplate your own direction.
I can still feel the hope in your genuine connections.
No cloth can cover all the essentials,
so you demand and donate and drive.
Your mask you wear as if superpowered,
powered more by heart than head.
You bite your own hand to feed the unfed.
Feel your worries eventually easing;
while at a distance, you are not alone.
Hear the voices of communities and countries,
coming together, in concert, for a change.
I can still see a silver lining among the new and strange.
A mask can’t hide your every face,
but each one worn remains protective.
Some cloth you drape around your being,
a symbol of selflessness over self-blindness.
No mask wears out in service to kindness.
–
Ellis Jackson Jacksonis a freelance creative professional based in New England. When not writing, editing, or marketing, he enjoys reading, drawing, puzzles, music, and wintry weather.
{slider At Produce Junction Early in The Pandemic - Mark Danowsky}
I jump their car
record speed
glad to keep moving
because of the virus
though glad I took time
to do a good deed
in a time of great need
–
Mark Danowsky is a Philadelphia poet, author of the poetry collection As Falls Trees (NightBallet Press), Managing Editor of the Schuylkill Valley Journal, and Editor of ONE ART poetry journal.
{slider Bedtime Story - Jane Seskin}
Nightly I ask:
did I live this day with integrity?
Was I honest in my relationships?
Kind and patient with those I love?
Fair and non-judgmental
in interactions with strangers?
And, if I did not adhere
to these life-worn principles,
could I, would I, did I
apologize to other, and/or
ask forgiveness of myself?
-
Jane Seskin LCSW, is a psychotherapist and author. Her poems and essays have been published in national magazines and journals. Her most recent book is Older, Wiser, Shorter: An Emotional Road Trip to Membership in the Senior Class (olderwisershorter.com).
{slider Better Than Words - Vivian Imperiale}
The homeless man
plopped down on the streetcar seat,
looking relieved to have a place to rest.
He covered his face with his hands
and put his head down —
a little privacy in a frantic world.
When he looked up
I offered him a snack.
Instead of speaking,
he covered his face with his hands again
and I was afraid I had been intrusive. But, no...
I watched his fingers form
a lovely heart-shape to thank me.
-
Vivian Imperiale lives in San Francisco where there is a large homeless population. She cherishes the touching moments some interactions have brought.
{slider Cassie & Josh - Mike McPeek}
Sometimes love is
being okay with her waking you up
at two A.M.
To talk about your pets
the ones that have passed
and where they used to sleep at night
because she couldn’t remember
-
Mike McPeek and his wife live in Northern California with their two poorly behaved, but relentlessly cute rescued dogs.
{slider feels like a friend - Jeff Ingram}
feels like a friend
injured fawn
I carry home
-
Several of Jeff Ingram’s haiku have been published in magazines, including Acorn, Mayfly, bottle rockets, Presence, Heron’s Nest, and Frogpond, among others. And harmless posesand enjoying the soil, two microchaps of haiku, were published by the Origami Poems Project in recent years. He currently teaches creative writing courses part-time at an area university. The remainder of the time, he gardens at home and volunteers at Weaver’s Way —a food co-op in Ambler, PA. He lives in Fort Washington with his wife, Kim.
{slider Home - Eva Schlesinger}
I talked with you, my housemates, every day when I was 20
We sat in our co-op kitchen eating popcorn with tamari and nutritional yeast
If I was biking around the lake, I returned to you asking where I had gone,
How was it, how was I, did I want to hang out later
I moved; your voices in my head kept me company
When we reunited this summer, we hadn’t talked in 33 years
You remembered my sincerity,
My yearning to write a book,
And even lines from my stories
Your words took up residence in my heart
-
Eva M. Schlesinger, author of Remembering the Walker & Wheelchair: poems of grief and healing (Finishing Line Press, 2008) and three dancing girl press titles for which she designed the covers: View From My Banilla Vanilla Villa (2010), Ode 2 Codes & Codfish (2013), and Ninnies Who Whinny (2017), is a recipient of the Literal Latte Food Verse Award. Eva has contributed to ReadersDigest.com, Cooking with The Muse, Changing Harm To Harmony: Bullies & Bystanders Project, The Best of Kindness 2017, public radio, and elsewhere.
{slider I Couldn't Be There - Michael Estabrook}
I sent her flowers
a beautiful arrangement
colorful
carnations, tulips, roses, daffodils . . .
What else could I do?
She sponge-bathed my mom
changed her Depends
called the chaplain just in time
just before the last breath came
eyes closed
mouth opened wide
body struggling one last time
before not.
Your body knows when it’s had enough
when it’s time to move on.
“There is a heaven isn’t there Michael?
I will see Kerry again won’t I?”
Yes of course, Ma
Kerry and Dad, your sisters, Jean, Bill
Kay, Elmer, Aunt Queenie . . . your mom.
Making it to 92 is not for the faint-hearted
good thing she was a “tough old bird”
good thing her caregiver was there
making sure she didn’t fall out of bed
giving her sips of water
morphine when she needed it.
Yes of course I sent her flowers
what else could I do?
-
Michael Estabrook small press poet since the 1980s striving always for greater clarity and concision rendering language more succinct and precise a Sisyphean adventure for sure. Retired now writing more and working more outside just noticed two Cooper’s hawks staked out in the yard or rather above it which explains the nerve-wracked chipmunks. The Poet’s Curse, A Miscellany is a recent collection (The Poetry Box, 2019).
{slider Jamaica Appreciation - Matthew James Friday}
Phoning Delta to cancel a plane ticket.
Have to say my surname. No choice.
Tastes of self-doubt tickles the tongue.
I sigh as I say Friday, expecting
the normal reaction. The half-awake
man, mimicking a computer, ripples
with soft laughter and speeds up.
“That’s a great name, brother, great.
I’m always thinking about Fridays, always.”
We compare notes on the World Cup,
England’s misery, hopefully third place.
That other English occupation, the weather,
deserves comment. Stunning blue sky
here in White Salmon, WA. Jamaica?
“Very sweeeet here in Montego Bay.”
We wish each other well, ticket refunded,
name accepted, Jamaica appreciated.
-
Matthew James Friday has published in numerous international magazines and journals, including, recently: All the Sins (UK), The Blue Nib (Ireland), Acta Victoriana (Canada), and Into the Void (Canada). The microchaps, All the Ways to Love, Waters of Oregon, and The Words Unsaid ( Origami Poems Project USA). Website: matthewfriday.weebly.com
{slider Nice Meeting You - William Broderick}
I find kindness erotic.
Common courtesy can spawn fantasies of
Domestic partnership,
Adoption of children,
Reconciliation with parents.
I have always deep-ended on the kindness of strangers.
The list of attributes that I find sexually viable is endless:
Good haircuts,
Glowing skin,
Clever clothes,
Clothes that fit (what is more clever than fit?),
Men reading Penguin Classics in the subway,
And, of course, New Yorker readers: I brandish my issue as
though it were a bandana tucked into a back pocket,
Declaring my fetish.
But all of these are stillborn without kindness, in the eyes,
on the lips: “Thank you.” “Excuse me.”
“Have a good day.” “Nice meeting you.”
Said as if meant.
-
William Broderick is an actor and writer whose essays have appeared in "Off the Rocks," and "Blood and Thunder" (2017, 2019 and 2020).
{slider Send - Laura Anderson}
I type the words
into the pale-yellow window
of the night-muted screen
and press Send
It’s been at least
eight years, maybe ten
and our last communication
was not pleasant ---
Now that the message
has flown
from the west coast to the east
in a matter of seconds
a wave of panic rises
in me
I open the window and lean out
the willow tree is full of crows
cawing at a racoon family,
mother, father, and
two fresh offspring
marching in a
a determined line
to the compost bin
I sit down in front of the screen
to wait
hoping for nothing
hoping for something
It only took
a global crisis and
a mass murder in
your hometown
for me to stop being
the good one
long enough to
forgive you.
-
Laura Anderson was born in Okanagan territory and has been a grateful visitor on Lək̓ʷəŋə and W̱SÁNEĆ lands (Vancouver Island) for best part of her entire life. She is an artist, mother, and grandmother currently working at Camosun College during the day, and re-entering the world of poetry and memoir at night. Current thematic interests include hauntings, ancestral wounding (and healings) and the hidden bounty in crises. Her passions include natural light, spirits of the land, and creatures of the sea.
{slider Sit - Mary Grace van der Kroef}
Sit in my kitchen
In my tiny bit of world
Sit at my table
Around a cup, fingers curled.
Sit there in silence
Listen to my heart.
Sit there with tears,
Tell me why you fell apart.
Sit down with me
I promise I will listen
Sit now with me,
Let both our tears glisten.
Sit, be assured
You're not in the wrong place.
Rest, as you sit.
May my table be your safe space.
-
Mary Grace van der Kroef was born and raised in Northwestern Ontario. Her love of writing and poetry started at age 14. She is also a wife, and mother to 3 beautiful children. She currently resides in the Niagara Region.
{slider The memory of kindness - Heather Cameron}
Miss Hannah of the long black hair,
Mini-dress and the knee-high white boots.
Sitting on the mat at her feet,
Alive with tales of Julian, Dick, George and Anne,
And Timmy the dog, of course.
The temptation to lay your cheek against
The white vinyl-clad calves.
The mystery of a black nylon line
Running between skirt and boot top.
The tears one morning, the rings
On her fingers chafing her frozen hands,
As she rubbed the blood back to life.
You didn’t know you would say,
This is the first memory of kindness.
Just as you didn’t know how to tell
The nurse that sat beside your chemo chair
Reminded you of a Cornish coastline,
And children, strong and brave,
Defeating danger.
-
Heather Cameron is a poet, short story and creative nonfiction writer. Her publications include: the short story, "Change" in HorseDreams, Spinifex Press, Melbourne, 2004; the illness narrative, "Different but the Same; Young people talk about living with serious illness", Lothian Books, Melbourne, 1998 and the poem, "Breast Cancer Surgeon 2" in the British Journal of Medical Practitioners (BJMP), August 2020. Born and raised in Aotearoa/New Zealand, Heather now lives in Victoria, Australia. She is currently a PhD candidate at Deakin University. Her thesis is entitled, "Cancer Poetry: responding to loss through autopathography and elegy."
{slider The Mojave, January 1988 - Bruce Pemberton}
Twenty-five months in the Army
and who would put a kid like me
in charge of a six million dollar
tank? I’ve got a crew of tragically
obedient soldiers, all teen-age, one
who marries his sixteen-year-old
second cousin and another who
rides his skateboard to first form-
ation every morning. They’re all
good kids, but most assuredly
children.
We’ve been training in the desert
for two weeks, in cold, sleet, wind,
and constant maneuvering, attack,
defend, attack again, with an hour
of sleep a day that comes in fits and
starts, until, by design, it strips off
any sheen of humanity that’s left,
leaving us fearsome and primal.
Our first sergeant radios for us to
pull back from our firing line on a
snowy hilltop and ground guide
ourselves down to a company AO
for diesel, hot chow, and mail. We
start to back up when we find an
infantry squad, wet and shivering,
trying to dry their boots, gear, and
uniforms, in the heat of our tank’s
searing exhaust. I radio back and get
us an extra half hour, so the soaked
grunts can dry everything and get warm.
I have enough left of myself, at least,
to do that.
-
Bruce Pemberton is a retired high school English teacher, tennis coach, and Gulf War veteran. His work has appeared in SNAPDRAGON, PALOUSE JOURNAL, NORTHERN JOURNEYS, THE REDNECK REVIEW OF LITERATURE, THIRD WEDNESDAY, SKY ISLAND JOURNAL, FOLIATE OAK, AMERICAN LIFE IN POETRY, DUCK LAKE JOURNAL, THE WILD WORD, RIGOROUS, STREETLIGHT MAGAZINE, PAROUSIA, iTEACH LITERARY MAGAZINE, HEART OF FLESH, RUNE, CAPSULE STORIES, and the anthologies, IN TAHOMA'S SHADOW, and SPOKANE WRITES. He lives on the Palouse, in rural eastern Washington.
{slider The Offering - Martin Willitts Jr}
He went to where vines were heavy gifts
in hardening, crisp fall-tipped air,
hands slippery with need,
returning with squirming, marble-sized
purple clusters, spilling loose as poems.
His breath halted-stumbled unevenly
curling up the hill, straining like a field horse
yanking a plow against the grain of the land.
He heaved clear, definite stars.
He stilled the room with his bounty,
while the wind expired outside.
He placed the grapes in a porcelain bowl
painted with a ring of yellow roses.
He fed one, slowly, into his mother’s mouth,
encouraging her to eat.
-
Martin Willitts Jr has 24 chapbooks including the Turtle Island Quarterly Editor’s Choice Award, “The Wire Fence Holding Back the World” (Flowstone Press, 2017), plus 19 full-length collections including the Blue Light Award 2019, “The Temporary World”. His recent book is "Unfolding Towards Love" (Wipf and Stock, 2020). He won 2014 Dylan Thomas International Poetry Contest; Rattle Ekphrastic Challenge, June 2015, Editor’s Choice; Rattle Ekphrastic Challenge, Artist’s Choice, November 2016, Stephen A. DiBiase Poetry Prize, 2018.
{slider Worm - Katherine Pryor}
A worm wiggled on the wet sidewalk.
My son dropped low and stopped to talk.
“Why is he wriggling that way?”
I knelt beside and could not say,
“He may have fallen from a beak
Or enjoyed a puddle that sprung a leak.”
I did not want my boy to worry,
Just grabbed a stick in no great hurry.
We set worm gently in the dirt
Where he could safely nurse his hurt.
The lesson taught was not of threats,
Mistakes, or near-fatal upsets.
Merely, if you want to improve someone’s day
Rescue a worm who’s lost his way.
-
Katherine Pryor is the author of the children's books "Bea's Bees", "Sylvia's Spinach", and "Zora's Zucchini". Her newest book, "Hello, Garden!", will be published in Spring 2021. She lives in Seattle.
{/sliders}
All Poets (Finalists & others) included in the 'The Best of Kindness 2020' anthology receive a Contributor's copy.
"Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind; the second is to be kind;
and the third is to be kind." - Henry James
−
The Origami Poems Project is so very grateful to our Judge and Artist/Illustrator!
Our Finalist Judge Julia Meylor
|
Our Cover & Interior Artist Lauri Burke |
 |
 |
|
Published poet, essayist & freelance editor
|
Published poet, artist, illustrator
|
Both Julia and Lauri are familiar with the nuances of kindness...
Some of the Interior Illustrations done by Lauri Burke
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registered in the state of Rhode Island with a 501(c)3 designation.
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