Michele McDannold
Author's posts
May 23
2 poems by John Grochalski
punching billy croce, age 6 the exhilaration of two combatants meeting center ring and that’s what our big concrete communal backyard was back then a boxing ring a baseball field in the center of the stinking city billy flying out of his backdoor full of piss and vinegar as i remember it flesh on flesh …
May 22
2 poems by William Barker
The Rusty Environment of Modern Imagination drenched in our digital age, bereft of the cool, blue knowing, the streets teeming with indifference, people desperately lost in idol worship, voyeurism, or other savagery, clinging to distractions where the gorgeous, elegant butterflies of our souls have become trapped behind glass to be swiped away in seconds with …
May 21
2 poems by Heather Kays
Flinch I don’t trust gestures. Even kindness comes in fast. Every hug, a held breath. Every “I love you,” a loaded silence with the safety off. The hand raised in love looks like the one that hit me. They never start with fists— they always start with flowers. And I’m still learning how to tell …
May 20
THE POLISH HAMMER POETRY CORNER: If You’re Reading This, Then I Must Have Managed to Write a Column Yesterday by Karl Koweski
If You’re Reading This, Then I Must Have Managed to Write a Column Yesterday So, my plan for last weekend ideally involved relaxing for hours on the front porch with my feet propped up and a book in my lap. I even had my clothes picked out, white linen trousers and a thin sky-blue button-down …
May 19
The Devil’s Haircut by Lori Jakiela
The Devil’s Haircut I was in sixth grade when my mother, fed up with the long blonde hair I’d resist brushing, sick of the knots and tangles that grew like nettle-ridden shrubs underneath, took me to Esther. Esther was, in theory, a beautician, which is what people called hair stylists back then, but I never …
May 18
5 Haikus by Morley Cacoethes
5 Haikus Tell me, Green Buddha, as I spark you into my lungs, what is True Zen? In cold Cleveland’s streets where we gather, seeking warmth, what smoke will heal us? Green Buddha, sit and bless the altar of my lungs with sweet incense smoke. March Snow in Cleveland, blown so thick even the pigs …
May 17
Cigarettes by Kurt Nimmo
Cigarettes It is like this: I go outside to throw a plastic bag of garbage in the bin. I see the neighbors across the street. They are older than me, maybe younger. It is difficult to tell these days. She has short purple hair and he is obese in a misshapen LONGHORNS t-shirt. Both lean …
May 17
Soul Auger by Brian Mosher
Soul Auger The poet had written, “kneel to auger the soil,” but misspoke, and so, I auger my soul, drilling towards the core, hoping to find some essential, unique thing, all the while fearing what might emerge. Ghosts long buried might arise to haunt the peace of this new life, or a subterranean chain reaction …
May 16
No One Here Gets Out Alive by Johnny Cordova
No One Here Gets Out Alive I must have been sixteen when I took down the posters above my bed of Cheryl Ladd and Jaclyn Smith in beach bikinis with contoured stomachs and lipstick smiles – Charlie’s sexiest angels – and replaced them with a leather-collared close-up of Jim Morrison. When my father ripped Morrison …
May 15
2 poems by Ryan Quinn Flanagan
What’s In Your Coffee? (for Brian Fugett) The Ohio River is bursting at the banks. Joe Burrow hits a streaking barn burner across the middle. I pass this woman drinking in a parking lot, dressing down a happy face painted on a building across the street. And the question arises, as if from the cackling …
