Issue 14 September 2017

Issue 14

Editor's Comments

I hope you enjoy reading this issue which is the last general issue of 2017. As usual my task as an editor was challenging and the number of submissions to Allegro continues to grow. I would like to make a plea to poets intending to submit their work to Allegro. Please read the submissions guidelines and follow them. If you don't follow the guidelines I will delete your work without reading it. With the quantity and quality of submissions increasing I do have to be fair to the majority of poets who stick to the requirements. 

Sally Long

(Editor)


Poems



Cat Rip

Cat rip, rubber-slither jettisoning eye-shot blood
from quick to dead, fast-tracked and facile: fact.

Fur from warm/clean/sleek to streaked,
pulled cold and matted flat to tarmac
black and red  (and red... more red...)
– a carpet red from quick to dead.

Come then the day-long line—
the muttering motormourners miling by
to offer final coughing scoffing scant
hard hasty petro-diesel disrespects.
Believe me, it's the least that they can do
and it's the thoughtlessness that counts.

2 a.m. – still in state.
Stiffened, splayed, displayed
sprawling stretched as in mid hunting-flight…

Its quarry (let's assume there was one)
– unaware of having been, on this or any
other such occasion, spared predation –
breathes
the
night.

Ken Cumberlidge

The orchid garnish

A day of sea air whetted

my wife's lust for fish.

We found a restaurant

overlooking Hyannis Harbor.

As we watched the Nantucket ferries

slide in and out of their berths,

she ordered lobster and scallops.

They come tented in asparagus,

crowned with a vibrantly purple

orchid whose fleshy mouth

is rimmed with an aureola of pink

- a provocative tongue sticking out.

My wife lays the orchid

on the table between us,

then attacks the lobster

with her hands. As she leans

over her plate to stuff succulent

lumps in her mouth, I glimpse

white curves inside her shell

untouched by the sun.

She licks the juices and butter

from her fingers then picks up

the orchid, drapes it over

her ear, flutters negligee

eyelashes, and aims a moonlight

smile. My mouth waters.

Eric Chiles

Anger Artist

My love drew from the time
she could dream.
In time she could draw anything.
And when she grew angry,
she reached for a pencil and drew.
The year her father died young,
she drew nothing but flowers.
The following year mammals.
The next, creatures of the sea.
On his birthday she draws till it aches.

My portrait, after we marry,
lies everywhere.
I tag the pictures in reply.
Our romance ends up
a war of scribble and line.
I no longer annotate.
Shared moments of mute rage
express a polite symmetry.
She rummages for paper,
I whittle pencils to a savage point.
We’ve hardly exhausted
all there is to argue.
But ask the anger artist.
I’m merely the face on the wall,
aging relic drawn to perfection,
by a loving eye for error.

Dick Altman

White Heron

At night, the nose of a stray dog loses its glow,

grey in the smoke of burnt foliage. A ghost walks

along a rice paddy; the dog barks and barks, yelps

until more dogs appear. A white heron flies. 

A row of dead march across a mosquito field;

thresh grass and leaves like a strong wind,

splash pools of frogs, kick old coconut husks.

A rooster flies high onto the branch of a tree;

the hard flap of his wings. A papaya falls 

to the ground, smashes bright

like the late afternoon sun, a cremation

in Ubud, orange flames that swathe her body;

she becomes the black of night.

In the heat there is no blood; red turns

to black, turns to grey. Ash hangs in thick smoke;

all her flowers burnt. She is finished,

like the ghosts that prowl the paddies.

Tonight she will walk the rice fields, wake dogs

and roosters, find other ghosts.

The sun goes down early here, the heat

in the mountain brings clouds, cool wind

and heavy rain; a time to rest.

Everything is quiet now;

only a white heron flies the blue-black sky.

Ion Corcos

Your Son and Cavafy

You were expecting a normal boy

but he’s been dipping into

the poetry of Cavafy,

taking the book with him everywhere,

reading it in his bedroom to his friends.

Your enquiries on the internet

confirmed your suspicions.

Perversion, sodomy, homosexuality –

none likely to earn pennants

to be pinned proudly on the wall.

You blame it all on an absent father.

He drank heavily, couldn’t hold down a job

and beat you often.

But there was no doubt he was a man.

You sit by yourself,

hating your own tears.

A whimpering little girl, you call yourself.

You can’t help it.

But it’s you

so at least you understand it.

John Grey

That seagulls would grieve for you, circle down

as cries still wet, almost water, making the sky

look for a place not asking for more salt –mourn

the way a whitewashed wall is handed over

though a boy in sleeves is waiting nearby

with his initials around someone no longer there

–stone by stone it will come back and she

by the worn-down buttons on her blouse

that fell open to point a finger at the hole in the air.

Simon Perchik

A Hush of Blackberries

For the first time in years
I respond to you—

the rain,
with silence

even as you play little sticks
across my rooftop.

If you were to diminish
your flurry of stems

all that you want me to say
would yet remain unspoken.

The glaze of incoherence
you’ve left

still stirring above me
contains more meaning

than you ever intended—
kisses of togetherness

descending to a level
of unwanted compromise.

A hush of blackberries
rises to a place once loved.

Richard King Perkins II

Just the Way Things Are

for E. M. Delafield

Rare, this copy begins to fall
apart, corners creased, end-papers
missing, faded page.
Blemished, the green-spine
between the book-ends, is just, intact;
but if we cherish the gossamer thread
of the words it protects, it
can scoop us into the still buzzing pulse
of the inner plot...

At the time of her prime,
she bought new notebooks,
sat in the alcove of her provincial drawing-room,
sharp pencil in hand. Outside,

across sunny fields, the Culm;
river-views to die for; inside,
her close circle of family and friends

went on wittering, while she kept on and
on relentlessly fixing, subverting the crux
of her company's guile. Eventually, when rains
and war had arrived, juggling threaded veins of life,
she moved through barriers of pain and despair, back
to a place of girlhood long forgotten: up
against the haystack in a pool of mid-Devon
light, she's listening to the voice of her mother
reading to her, from the faraway pilgrim's story -
'Come, pluck up, heart, let's neither faint, nor fear'.

Julie Sampson

 Notes: The Way Things Are, first published in 1927, was reprinted by Virago, in 1988.  Edmée Elizabeth Monica Dashwood, née de la Pasture (1890-1943), later called EM Delafield (or EMD) lived and wrote at her house, Croyle, near Cullompton, Devon, from 1923 until her death, in 1943. Three years after the tragic loss of her only son, in 1940,  EMD was taken ill; although her remaining months were spent in considerable physical suffering, she continued to write to the last hours of her life. When EMD was a child the family stayed at East Butterleigh, where, in a nearby meadow her author mother, Mrs Henry de la Pasture,  read to her daughter from The Pilgrim's Progress.

Mrs Danton’s corner garden in May

wrist-bone brittle

as sticks
pick-up pick
   up
your pieces  may
may   you
     may
  come
            back
and mend
               in May

 for      sweet-
 peas and
     clematis
       wreath
your steps

and door -

under
  in earthenware
pots corms
 hibernate

waiting for the next white rush
-  hyacinths
           snowdrops

Julie Sampson

Night Swimming – Assumption College 1979

They call it the duck pond,

lily pads, wild grass and sprigs

of daises around the edge.

The breeze makes circles

of the dark water,

skeeters skimming across

on paper legs and a gang

of boys in their underwear

jumping in together,

resurfacing with a breast stroke,

or a crawl, a collective scream,

their beer cans floating to the surface.

They pile out laughing,

running up the grassy hill,

all but one,

a red head, still and silent,

everything gone numb.

He thinks:  don’t leave me

as the raucous voices fade

across campus.

But they do.

Kevin Carey

Self-Portrait at Saint-Remy

Why is the wall behind you moving?

Because it is like the sky.

Why is the wall not moving?

Because there is no sun or clouds.

What is the color of your eyes?

They have no color, they are green.

What are you looking for?

There is nothing on which to focus.

What is your occupation?

I work with colors and landscapes.

Where are you going from here?

To a place I know nothing about.

Is music playing in the next room

I don’t know, I don’t listen anymore.

Are you friends in the garden?

They have left me, it is raining.

Why does your face seem white?

Because it is the color of madness.

Why is your hair and beard red?

It is a color for which I would die.

Paul Alexander

Rat Poison

Barn owl, she's come again to the barn,

perched in the timbered rafters,

head at inhuman angles.

Scattered below, pellets of fur and bone

twitched and coughed-up carelessly

to nestle beside a once blue tractor

and rusty bucket. Throat loose,

she's ready to make the air bristle.

Off kilter, her ears can hear

a shrew's breath in the tussocky grass,

or the scurry of a vole,

the meander of a mouse.

Sensing prey, she rides the swell of a breeze.

Expecting a rattle in her talons,

a struggle of size,

she wonders why this rat surrenders.

Later, well fed, she roosts.

A feeling inside her body, fire rising.

Gathering her screaming head

she ventures outside,

seeks the solidity of a low branch.

Struggling to stand or stay steady

she thinks of twilight, the sound of rain.

She thinks of home. Everywhere falls

to whiteness.

Belinda Rimmer

Distaff: Pandora

I was made as a punishment.

Imagine what that does to a girl’s self-esteem.

The gods made me beautiful and deceitful

and set me up to fail.

Hephaestus made my body,

Hermes taught me to lie,

but how could I have known

what was in that box?

What plagues and desolation

I would release?

Later, after Zeus rained down the waters,

my daughter, Pyrrha, would repopulate the world,

each stone she threw becoming a woman,

each her husband threw becoming a man.

I am the grandmother of humanity,

but all people remember

is that damned box.

Cruelest of all,

what remained was hope.

Terri Simon

Telling a Fortune

Come in, my dear, and sit in that chair.

What’s that? No, no crystal ball, no incense.

Just a table, and two chairs, and you and I.

Before you pay me, I must give you a choice.

Choose between two fortunes-neither of them lies.

One lets you look in a mirror,

What you will do, who you will bed,

The future as others are able to see you.

Most are content with that.

The other? Ah, that’s much more painful.

I will flay your image and look inside you

At what you become and what you fail to be.

Your essence as it purifies or taints.

Clients are unhappy with these revelations,

But recognize their truth

Even though they rarely change.

So what will it be?

Inner or outer, the money is the same.

My actions will not vary.

But I will be looking at you

Either dressed up or naked.

The procedure? Absurdly simple.

Your elbow on the table, fingers straight out.

I set my hands on each side of yours.

And pass them up and down, just not touching.

Your hand feels pressure and warmth.

Both are phantoms but not unreal.

Your focus is through your hand

As I begin to know you.

I ask no questions, that would be fraud.

Only begin to tell you

Of what you will have done

Or what you will become.

What’s that? No, of course I understand.

Most people prefer to know

The course of their life rather than

The curses of their nature. Shall we begin?

Ed Ahern

Climbing Maula Ali Dargah

There is a climbing 

that faces the clouds 

that hide the magenta 

sun scattered like 

jujubes on the floor of
the sky, the colour of pink 

oranges and yellowing violets.

There is a climbing 

that hears the bird, a dog 

barking, your hair

rustling and a third person 

not there. Voices are heard 

last. Song last but one. 

There is a climbing 

of coincidence 

the azan gurgles from behind,

unexpected, slightly off key 

then seven azans join in 

one after the other. one sung 

by the boy with the uncracked 

voice, substituting

the woman washing the vessels, 

humming in tune 

one too soft perching on the 

withered branches of March. one an 

old man's pain knotted into stone

one perfectly right but never heard 

overlapped by every other tune. 

There is a climbing 

of spirit in the rhythm of 

this evening.  

Rebecca Vedavathy

Headers and Volleys

We kicked and flicked, passed

a ball that belonged to no one.

The houses stood in stadium

as we turned a tarmac plain

into a football pitch. Garage

doors rattled from our made up games.

Headers and Volleys was a knees

up, stretch of limb, balancing act.

Angling our lives, trajectory of what

we knew, all pulled from our bodies

as we tried to keep the ball

off the floor. Not allowing things to settle

then roll. We needed it amongst ourselves

so we understood the future. Keep

things up so our eyes knew where we

were at. This game developed us

more than anything else. It taught

us to stand on one leg, swivel a foot

for a new direction, leap high when

things were easier left to drop.

We chased shadows, tried to grab time

as if we owned it. Belted our anger at wood

and brick. Kept a watchful eye on those

amongst us. Wondering if they were going

to pass us anything light or heavy.

Gareth Culshaw

With This Ring

My left hand

is now unburdened

by a ring.

The ten-point

diamond, the thin band engraved

with your grandfather’s

initials:

an almost worthless

heirloom you

will soon pawn

or sell for scrap gold. No one

in your family,

not even

your sentimental

sister, will

reclaim it.

Twenty years on my finger,

it's as good as cursed.

M. Stone

Mourning not over yet

It harks back to the two of us, your car,

layback seats cranked up, serious talking,

no hope of happiness, can’t remember where,

grey trance of sky, waste land, silence,

an abandoned railway, iron stitched to weeds,

the last train’s haunting whistle gone, gone.

So many hours of longing, a supporting act

to so few saline kisses, ragged breath, wretched bliss.

Trying for stoicism, demented by raw ache,

dying slowly as most do, I believed my wound

would last forever, typical of young ego.

Lulled by beauty, coming across quiet clearings

on long, lone walks, familiar pangs of loss

quicken my heart, most of my forever now up,

being fundamentally right no consolation. 

Ian C Smith

Valley of Broken Wings

Praying foa rain

but only getting virga

is da unfortunate result

as da oblivious clouds move on.

Parched beneath da wishes

droplets nevah reach da ground

no mattah da dance

or da heavenly incantation.

One can dream

of streams and rivers

wit cascading watah

falling ovah cliffs.

It’s easy to imagine

but sometimes

so much harder to receive.

Da dusty soil

passing between fingahs

is testament enough.

  

It seems dat everywheah

da heat is taking its toll

and disappointment is soaring

in da valley of broken wings.

Heah is wheah all da optimists

step in wearing smiley faces

wit dere encouragement

of green buds and rainbows.

On many occasions dough

immediate happy endings

are just not in da offering.

  

It’s so sad to be da messenger

of terrible tidings

but sometimes

wen drought settles in

dere’s pretty much nutting

dat anyone can do.

Joe Balaz

Home Last Night

That man took the waitress

home last night, the waitress took the

flatware home last night, the flatware took

the leftovers home last night, the leftovers

took the pepper home last night, the

pepper took the pepper mill home 

last night, the pepper mill took the 

salt shaker home last night, the salt shaker 

took the sugar bowl home last night, 

the sugar bowl took the ketchup

home last night, the ketchup took the

napkins home last night, the napkins 

took the tablecloth home last night, 

the tablecloth took the table home 

last night, the table took the chair 

home last night, and then the chair,

the chair came looking for the man.

Laynie Tzena

Expat

It is so easy to press down a nib
on a piece of paper that isn’t yours,
tear a hole through it, 
disclaim it,
put it back into the folder from which it came,
and leave it (e)motionless.

How did we become this banal? 

Like the surges of a sea not having yet
felt the moon swathe between its rippling,
flat-lined without heaving, swelling, 
or even rustling the brim of its waves
to lap at the sky.

Melancholy knows well of your heart(h);
the embers knows of their last dance – 
fire and air no longer accomplices.

What words must I sing to burn 
through your paper countenance? 
Your seas portray a calmness your sky cannot
endorse. You have survived none of your mysteries
in the mirrors that have you betrayed – 
ground over your once humble barrenness. 

Sheikha A.

Abeyance

I wouldn’t change anything about tonight,
the hours are thick with poignancy, outside
two cats cry like women recently widowed,
keeling as if wrapped in a spool of fate’s 
cruelties. 

My pen makes no sound on this white page – 
deathly ashen – representing the jaundiced
moon; my pen produces the blackness 
that aptly contrasts my yellowing thoughts
I haven’t yet written.

The clock’s ticks saunter off into the silence,
the hours remain thick and the cats’ cries
become one with the night. I wouldn’t 
change anything – except for your memories
and the mewling of my ageing soul.

Sheikha A.

Mosquito

The stridulation hauls me

up and out. Stridulitrum

in concert with the plectrum.

A nocturnal performance.

Electrically alert I

lash out into darkness.

Miss. Pianissimo now.

Silence. One that got away.

It slipped up from the river,

into the city. Pipi-

strellus and apus notwith-

standing. Sterility would

do the job nicely! Male fails!

Though bite not his. Proboscis

of fiendish famished females.

But the food chain? Bat and swift?

Miffed. Swiftly! The switch! Can’t stand

its presence. Fat cat sat there,

hanging on the wall. Exposed.

Stealth. Wealth of experience.

Telling blow. Explodes. No tell-

ing. That feeling! But oh! In-

delible. Remains of the

feast. Blowed if I can remove

it. The stain. The beast. My blood.

Glenn Hubbard

Country Church

porch

Citizen’s Advice

Evensong: alternate Thursdays

Mr. Davis

drought

dark oaken door

heavy leaden latch

clack! click!

span and spic

silence

Help yourself!

20 pence

Realy lovd your Church!

motes

children’s corner

yellows and blues and reds

Susan Hopkins (8): The Ox And Jesus And The Donkey In The Stable

Crayola

the Green Howards

gave their

Albert Reynolds (23)

George Reynolds (26)

donated

three steps to the altar

hesitation

Numbers 12, 34, 102

windows

men with beards

pews

91 Whoever dwells in the shelter

leave it back with the rest

sadness

no Mary

Henry VIII

sadness

generously

last look  

Glenn Hubbard

Silence

A little silence after a storm

Is really just a snake biding its time

Lying in wait, shedding its skin

And always ready to bite.

Is really a calculating accountant,

Tallying the number of people with you,

Multiplying it with two invisible hands,

And subtracting sympathy from it all.

A little silence after a storm

Is really a secret little porcupine,

Running into holes for winter,

Before winter strikes,

And whooshes into its bloodstream

To eke out forced stories

And painful memories.

Is really a table,

A quite brown mahogany one,

Sitting by the fireside and holding fruits in its bosom.

And sleeping quietly between thunderstorms.

A little silence after a storm,

Is a permanent guest in my life,

Is a temporary reprieve

And is clouds,

And is emptiness.

Anjali Bhavan

Widow

Don’t call me that.

I will not be defined

by withoutness.

What I know of loss is this:

it can break you

in half, in a thousand

thousand pieces.

You can rage at the rubble,

crawl through it

on your knees or bury

yourself inside.

   I choose

to refuse.

    One by one

I gather up the pieces,

run my fingers along

each jagged edge

as if reading the Braille

of my future.

          I will spend

my life fitting the jigsaw

shapes together. 

Though I lack a picture

to guide me, I will

make something

of these random ragged

shadows, patches

of color, maybe

some bits of light.

Joyce Meyers

The Way We Were

for Joni Mitchell

‘Cactus Tree’ was our song, the one

that lit a flame, when I heard you sing

and taped you, bruised and plaintive,

on John Peel’s Top Gear. Straight off

your gift possessed me, too young

in sixty-eight for you to even notice

how I tagged along: the one face

in the entourage who really got you

and realized that other men

would leave you wanting more,

while you danced on tables,

obsessed, as ever, with being free

in the candle-lit taverna where,  

scowling, I found you smooching

with a drifter you’d taken

into your bed all week.

And when you booked that suite

with its own Steinway grand,

I fetched you flowers that wilted

and fruit you didn’t eat,

too involved in writing songs

that soon the world would own,

but I was still the first to hear

played the way you meant.

David Cooke

Bleak House

Ours was not a bookish house

Except for the reader's digest

That stood on a Formica shelf,

Like a grand prize.

A beautifully bound 

mock leather book,

'The Odessa files 

and Stepford Wives'.

Still as headstone

 'Abridged',

Untouched

 By eyes.

David Rudd-Mitchell

bird song

beyond the window

of this room

one tree

  leaves muttering

  in morning sun

from which

a single bird

  gloss black

  obsidian eyed

stares out

wondering

why anyone

would choose

to live like this

would want to live

inside this cage

  where

    no bird

      sings

Nick Carding

Collection

This impulse to gather-

Crouched on a shoreline,
we cannot keep the waves
so we take the shell.

Our baskets filled with hunger days,
raiment of our parents twisted like driftwood,
cost analyses.

We stand at the end of a continent
Perpetual brace for impact encasing pupae,
bodies soften with vapor and waiting.

A prayer for the blessing of our wounds
A prayer for salted water
sift the blank spaces and the voids
until they no longer tremble in a riptide.

 Jessica Michael

Contributors

Sheikha A. is from Pakistan and United Arab Emirates. She has been published in numerous literary venues, all of which can be accessed on sheikha82.wordpress.com

Ed Ahern resumed writing after forty odd years in foreign intelligence and international sales. He’s had a hundred fifty stories and poems published so far, and three books. Ed works the other side of writing at Bewildering Stories, where he sits on the review board and manages a posse of five review editors.

Paul Alexander is the author of eight books, including Rough Magic, a biography of Sylvia Plath. His poetry has appeared in Poetry, The Sewanee Review, Southern Poetry Review, Mississippi Review, The Vanderbilt Poetry Review, Poem, The Louisville Review, among others. He teaches at The New School in New York City.

Dick Altman lives in New Mexico.  His work first appeared in the Santa Fe Literary Review, in 2009, and won for poetry in the Santa Fe New Mexican’s 2015 writing competition.
American Journal of Poetry, Vine Leaves in Australia and many others have selected his work for publication. 

Joe Balaz writes in Hawaiian Islands Pidgin (Hawai'i Creole English) and in American-English. He edited Ho'omanoa: An Anthology of Contemporary Hawaiian Literature.  Some of his recent Pidgin writing has appeared in Rattle, Juked, Otoliths, and Hawai'i Review, among others. Balaz is an avid supporter of Hawaiian Islands Pidgin writing in the expanding context of World Literature.  He presently lives in Cleveland, Ohio.

Anjali Bhavan is an 18-year-old college student. Her work was published in A Twist in the Tale, an anthology of short stories. Her work has also appeared in The Speaking Tree, a supplement of the Times of India, Esthesia magazine and Span, the magazine by the American Embassy in New Delhi.

Nick Carding is an Englishman now living in Croatia. His poetry and short fiction have appeared in print and online in the UK (most recently in Orbis and Ink, Sweat & Tears), USA, Canada and Australasia.

Kevin Carey teaches at Salem State University and coaches seventh-grade basketball. He has published three books. Kevincareywriter.com

Eric Chiles is an adjunct professor of Journalism and English at a number of colleges and universities in eastern Pennsylvania and was a print journalist for more than 30 years.  His poetry has appeared in Allegro, American Journal of Poetry, Apeiron Review, Asses of Parnassus, Chiron Review, Plainsongs, Rattle, Tar River Poetry, and Third Wednesday and other journals.

David Cooke’s work has appeared in Agenda, Ambit, The Cortland Review, The Interpreter’s House, The Irish Times, The London Magazine, Magma, New Walk, The North, Poetry Ireland Review, Poetry Salzburg Review and Stand. His fifth collection, After Hours, was published this year by Cultured Llama.

Ion Corcos has been published in Grey Sparrow Journal, Clear Poetry, Communion, The High Window and other journals. He is a Pushcart Prize nominee. Ion is a nature lover and a supporter of animal rights. He is currently travelling indefinitely with his partner, Lisa. 

Gareth Culshaw lives in Wales. He is an aspiring writer who has his first collection out in 2018 by futurecycle.

Ken Cumberlidge has been writing for 40+ years.  Recent work can be found online (Algebra of Owls / Ink Sweat & Tears / The Open Mouse / Picaroon / Spilling Cocoa / Strange Poetry / Snakeskin).  Currently living in Norwich, muttering and gesticulating in the company of an embarrassed-looking dog. Don't worry – the dog's fine.

John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in Sheepshead Review, Studio One and Columbia Review with work upcoming in Louisiana Review, Poem and Spoon River Poetry Review. 

Glenn Hubbard was born in the UK but lives in Madrid. Fluent in Spanish, he is poetic only in English. His poetry has appeared in The Bow-Wow Shop,Snakeskin, The Interpreter’s House and Algebra of Owls and will appear inThe High Window, Carillon and Bindweed later in 2017

Richard King Perkins II is a state-sponsored advocate for residents in long-term care facilities. He lives in Crystal Lake, IL, USA with his wife, Vickie and daughter, Sage. He is a three-time Pushcart, Best of the Net and Best of the Web nominee whose work has appeared in more than a thousand publications.

Joyce Meyers’ books include The Way Back (Kelsay Books, 2017), and two chapbooks, Wild Mushrooms (Plan B Press, 2007) and Shapes of Love (Finishing Line Press, 2010).  Her work

appears in The Comstock Review, Iodine Poetry Journal, and Slant, and she won the Atlanta Review International Poetry Competition in 2014.    

Jessica Michael resides in Prescott, AZ. She writes poetry, fiction, and adventure travel articles which chronicle her journeys around the globe.

Simon Perchik is an attorney whose poems have appeared in Partisan Review, Forge, Poetry, Osiris, The New Yorker and elsewhere. His most recent collection is The B Poems published by Poets Wear Prada, 2016. For more information, including free e-books, his essay titled “Magic, Illusion and Other Realities” please visit his website at www.simonperchik.com.

Belinda Rimmer has poems in magazines, including, Brittle Star, Dream Catcher, ARTEMIS poetry; Obsessed with Pipework; Sarasvati. On-line includes, Cloud Poetry, Picaroon, Ground, Writers Against Prejudice, Amaryllis. Some poems are in anthologies. She recently came second in her first Poetry Slam and won The Poetry in Motion Competition as part of Cheltenham Poetry Festival. 

David Rudd-Mitchell is a Slough based occasional poet.  His poems have been published in magazines including BLER, Lighten Up, Zen Space and the Projectionist's Playground.

Julie Sampson's poetry has been widely published in magazines and placed in several competitions. She edited Mary Lady Chudleigh; Selected Poems (Shearsman Books, 2009). A full collection, Tessitura, was published by Shearsman, in 2014 and a non-fiction manuscript, was short-listed for The Impress Prize, in 2015. Main website at https://www.juliesampson.com

Terri Simon is a writer and a techie. Her poetry has recently appeared in Mused, Jellyfish Whispers, and Rat’s Ass Review. She lives in Laurel, MD with her husband and dogs. She’s works in IT, is interested in spirituality and usually has multiple craft projects in the works.

Ian C Smith’s work has appeared in, Antipodes, Australian Book Review, Australian Poetry Journal,  The Brasilia Review,  Poetry Salzburg Review,  The Stony Thursday Book, & Two-Thirds North.  His seventh book is wonder sadness madness joy, Ginninderra (Port Adelaide).  He lives in the Gippsland Lakes area of Victoria, Australia.

M. Stone is a bookworm, birdwatcher, and stargazer who writes poetry and fiction while living in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Her poems have appeared or will appear in SOFTBLOW, Calamus Journal, and Amaryllis. She can be reached at writermstone.wordpress.com. 

Laynie Tzena is a writer, performer, and visual artist based in San Francisco. Publications: Bayou, Event, The Lake (current issue), Sonora Review, Zone 3, among others. She received an Avery Hopwood Award in Poetry. Tzena has been featured at the Austin International Poetry Festival and on Michigan Public Radio.

Rebecca Vedavathy is a research scholar studying Francophone Literature in EFLU, Hyderabad. She recently won the first place in the Poetry with Prakriti Contest. She was also nominated to be on the longlist (English Poetry) for the Toto Funds the Arts Awards, 2017. She is writing to be a poet.