David McLean

the sun on its side likes the stones
and woods still, it lights them
with memories of its spring and smelly
resurrection that shows the tiny deaths
in sterile snow in some months time

the stealthy sun seems to love the stones
and the trees still and remember spring
for them here on this hill, like god loves time,
like death loves life, death's memories
mine
 

David McLean is Welsh but has lived in Sweden since 1987. He lives in a cottage on a hill with five selfish and stupid cats. They get along fine. He has two full length books out. One at http://www.erbacce press.com/davidmclean/4527659941. and another, Cadaver's dance, available at Alibris or Amazon.com. Details of chapbooks and round 650 poems in or forthcoming at 270 places online or print over the last eighteen months are at htpp://mourningabortion.blogspot.com. One chapbook is free online at http://www.whyvandalism.com/ebook_poems-against-enlightenment08.html. He also features in a special issue of Instant Pussy available as a free download at http://www.lulu.com/content/4389526

WONDERING

Felino Soriano

Does to desire, also her,
become what she burgeons
from the leap softly off her predetermined
shape?
Too does she dream of touching the
swimming being within the womb,
the wind of scent encapsulating
cliché roses posited as lovers' from
him to her society's 2/14 gift?
What does the physicality of desire
want to expire from?
Or does life move her to walk atop
tight ropes long enough to examine
the name given, to twirl among the dancing
forever gilded within the light of
subtle realization?

Felino Soriano is the author of a chapbook "Exhibits Require Understanding Open Eyes" (Trainwreck Press, 2008) and an E-book "Among the Interrogated" (BlazeVOX [books], 2008). The juxtaposition of his philosophical studies with his love of classic and avant-garde jazz explains his poetic stimulation.  Website: www.felinosoriano.com

WIFE

Joop Bersee

I was his boyish
  poster on the wall,
  slowly fading,
   
  rapidly,
  time running,
  creature pale,
   
  dull dull.
Do you remember
   us?

DETAILS ARE SLIPPING
   
  More and more details
slip away as she ages,
  opening a window,
  letting a fly escape.
  How it will be chased
  by the small bats
  patrolling the house.

She realises these are
  her boundaries, her route.
  No miracle, just evening,
  the soundless wings snatching
from dusk to darkness.

Joop Bersee was born in the Netherlands in 1958. He moved to South Africa in 1989 where he lived for the next 10 years. His work has been published in 6 countries. In 2006 a book was published in India with a translation of 60 poems by Joop. Currently he lives in Holland and is the founder/editor of the site 'Southern Rain Poetry', which contains new and previously published work by South African poets. Inclusion is per invitation only. Joop Bersee is married to Sandy and they have a daughter, Jessica-Anne.

BLEAK COAST

Jan Oskar Hansen

 
On a sea that is a clear green mirror the ship sails past
sandy shore on a day the fierce wind that always rules
this shore has taken has taken a day off. Harmony and
silence the sun has taken on an African hue, burning
Nordic skin brown; a day dream perhaps, can a land so
cold and remote be so sultry beautiful, dress up like
a Mediterranean tart attracting tourists by the scores
to swim in her tepid embrace?

 
A sudden shadow casts a net the unseen's rest is over,
the sea's skin cringes, heaves and slap the shore in
a triple salty spray. Freedom, a dream; endless wind is
back the cruel ruler of land and sea, the shoreline is 
misery as are the round shouldered, windblown people
who makes a living tilling unwilling soil to produce pale
carrots, small potatoes and white, hard cabbage which
they eat with sour milk and many prayers.

Jan Oskar Hansen is a poet, story teller and seafarer , born in Stavanger, Norway. His poetry has
been widely published in hard copy and online, worldwide. Jan is widely read and fluent in several
languages, knowledge often acquired at night during his many years at sea. He chose to write
primarily in English following enthusiastic reception of his work from English-speaking editors and readers.

ROD STROKED SURVIVAL WITH A DEADLY HAMMER

Michael Lee Johnson

Rebecca fantasized that life was a lottery ticket or a pull of a lever,
that one of the bunch in her pocket was a winner or the slots were a
redeemer;
but life itself was not real that was strictly for the mentally insane at
the Elgin
Mental Institution.
She gambled her savings away on a riverboat
stuck in mud on a riverbank, the Grand Victoria, in Elgin, Illinois.
Her bare feet were always propped up on wooden chair;
a cigarette dropped from her lips like morning fog.
She always dreamed of traveling, not nightmares.
But she couldn't overcome, overcome,
the terrorist ordeal of the German siege of Leningrad.
She was a foreigner now; she is a foreigner for good.
Her first husband died after spending a lifetime in prison
with stinging nettles in his toes and feet; the second
husband died of hunger when there were no more rats
to feed on, after many fights in prison for the last remains.
What does a poet know of suffering?
Rebecca has rod stroked survival with a deadly mallet.
She gambles nickels, dimes, quarters, tokens tossed away,
living a penniless life for grandchildren who hardly know her name.
Rebecca fantasized that life was a lottery ticket or the pull of a lever.

Michael Lee Johnson is a poet and freelance writer from Itasca, Illinois.  He is the author of The Lost American:  from Exile to Freedom, http://www.iuniverse.com/bookstore/book_detail.asp?isbn=0-595-460917
He has also published two chapbooks available at:   http://stores.lulu.com/poetryboy.

He is presently looking looking for a publisher for two more chapbooks.  He has been published in USA, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Scotland, Turkey, Fiji, Nigeria, Algeria, Africa, India, United Kingdom, Republic of Sierra Leone, Israel, Nepal, Thailand, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Finland, and Poland internet radio.  Michael Lee Johnson has been published in more than 240 different publications worldwide.  Audio MP3 of poems are available on request.

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