Daily Archives: March 10, 2014

4 posts

“The Kaiser’s Contemplation 100 Years Out” by Jenean McBrearty

Was it possible to end aristocracy

Without the guns of August?

Perhaps the officers who ordered

The lost generation

To match mettle and wits with bayonets

And gas and mortar shells,

Who trudged on trench feet

And served as food for lice,

Never believed it would come to that.

That home and rank would disappear,

Once men left their station.

They believed, and wrongly,

Through glasses darkly,

That things that were would always be.

Certainly, had someone said

You’ll kill God as well,

The officers would have reconsidered

The cruel and unusual war.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jenean McBrearty is a graduate of San Diego State University, a former community college instructor who taught Political Science and Sociology, and is finishing a certificate in Veteran Studies as a Donovan Scholar. Her fiction has been published in a slew of print and online journals including Cigale Literary Magazine, 100 Doors to Madness Anthology, Mad Swirl, and The Moon, and her poetry has been accepted by Van Gogh’s Ear and Page & Spine. Her photographs have appeared in Foliate Oak Literary Journal and Off the Coast Magazine, among others. Her novel, The 9th Circle, was published by Barbarian Books.

“What Were You Thinking” by Morris Dance

I know. You saw pretty things: how the birds

Paint themselves wild with color, flowers

Ruffle and flounce. You wanted to be pretty too.

And you are: to the poets, the painters,

Little children who feel a parade when

You arrive, and those dizzy young men with

Stars in their eyes who don’t want to rub them

Away, ever. All those in this world who

Are numbered among the hopelessly sane.

 

But when you put on clothes he could forget

How we are in this world; began to think

About other things than bringing you shells

Or flowers or desserts; began to think

Maybe life isn’t that much of a mystery;

Began to think things looked better in straight

Lines, that black and white were the best colors.

Flowers and birds and contentment­­­­-useless.

Well, alright, as long as they didn’t get

In the way. And he began counting: stars

Trees, gold, slaves, houses, children, and kisses;

Began to believe whatever he could count

Was important because it was counted.

And soon everything had a number. Then

 

He climbed still higher to see if it all

Could be counted. Oh, he liked you better

Covered. It got rid of those distractions

Like life and love, beauty and meaning. But,

There was nothing to anchor him to earth;

Nothing to remind him life needs a root;

Nothing to get in the way of counting

Each thing­­­- all the way­­­- to his extinction.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Morris Dance attended the University of Utah and studied with Galway Kinnell, Judith Hemschemeyer, and Richard Schramm. Time, sadly, they will never get back. He has worked in a variety of jobs; among them retail management and transit bus driver. Time, sadly, he will never get back. He currently resides alone, accursed, yet strangely happy in California’s central valley.

“Tugs” by Denny E. Marshall

Feel constant tugs

The winding hugs

Time with heart

Pull of species

Always lingering

Since ancient DNA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Denny E. Marshall has had art, poetry, and fiction published, some recently.

“Enough Is” by Theric Jepson

Enough is
enough, she said, as she walked
through the mud and into the sea—
I watched her float out and then
down. When I realized this time she
had returned from whence come we all—
her phrase—I turned my back and bent my neck
and produced a small sea of my own, then agreed
(enough) and walked away.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Theric Jepson is the author of the novel Byuck. He is online at thmazing.com.