We have reached the end of our first online open-mic. It has been even better than I imagined! A big thank you to all the incredible artists who participated!
But don’t be sad, because there is much more to come! Next month we have Love Starts With You, a series on receiving love first for ourselves before we give to others. The submissions are open until February 1st, 2020, so go check it out to participate: Love Starts With You
When winter went into ember wherein you lived your sleep?
I had a flaming kangaroo hopped between my eyes, and I had none
until my aunt called me to tell the news. The cold sat on our porch.
The beer bottles left for recycling spacies refilled themselves with undyed.
Aunt turned up the news. The wildfire crackled in the newsreader’s throat –
world just dipped south. Kaput. I opened my sight to the life leaving lives.
Where were you? Did you see winter fluffing the orange and red?
Our porch spread across the other dimension. White covered our trash in another world
where I had two eyes sewn beneath, and winter, alive, weaved a quilt of fables
for those miracles that could have been.
The One Arrested And Later Left At Our Doorstep
The missing one is restored to her apparition, disoriented, oozy-blood, smelling like a marsh; two days’ve passed since the protest fired up from the gully to the alcázar.
We ask the silence to nurse her. Tim answers the media in waiting. We blame the throne obviously. The air stinks of conspiracy.
The missing one, reinstated, exists in flickers, now here, now beside the basin, a hologram, a substance, now a totem archaic, now a numen, Jesus.
The protest flows with the paradigms. Tim and I ask her what happened inside; she seems to miss herself if only by a smudge of soul or some slogan half finished. Silence bandages her; strings her together. MediaMedia disappears to attend another somewhere.
Monkey’s Paw
A teargas shell tore off my bro’s hand; since we called him a primate in childhood we kept the hand, nicknamed it ‘Monkey’s Paw’, presented it before every guest in our house, cherished their shriek; the severed limb just wouldn’t rot; the second hand revolutionists often borrowed it for their demonstrations, but no one asked my sibling what the paw meant to him. Probably a missing link in the evolution chain between Adam and Cain. He wouldn’t have answered anyway, rather scratched his arm’s end the way one alley cat scratches the blind bricks when cornered in dire need of some magic.
Artist:
Kushal Poddar authored ‘The Circus Came To My Island’, ‘A Place For Your Ghost Animals, Understanding The Neighborhood’, ‘Scratches Within’, ‘Kleptomaniac’s Book of Unoriginal Poems’, ‘Eternity Restoration Project- Selected and New Poems’ and now ‘Herding My Thoughts To The Slaughterhouse-A Prequel’ (Alien Buddha Press)
We were young Just learning how to love Our friendship grew Into something new We belonged together You knew it from the start You stole my heart Then I fell apart
And now after all these years I look at myself in the mirror The woman staring back at me Misses what we used to be
Hate and love and broken trust That is what’s become of us But something pulled me back to you And now I don’t know what to do
So here we are Kissing in the dark Too late to undo I’ve lost myself in you I crave you like an addict Been starved, unsatisfied You’re helping me remember What it’s like to feel alive
Red
I reach out for you but you’re not there I’m crying, grasping at thin air I feel it underneath my skin Your lack of love is creeping in
I’m seeing red You’re in my head I lost everything we never had I missed all our memories While you never once missed me I’m your nothing And nothing hurts more than nothing
Wild In Me
What can I do with this wild in me? Where can I go to spread my wings? I want to run, to breathe, be free So I run, then it starts running me
How do I stay up here so high? How can I stay in this open sky? I fear the fall as I struggle to fly The abyss below is consuming my mind
My aching wings, they’re giving in My feet crave solid ground again I’m falling, rushing through the wind Back to the black I’ve always been
How can I feel when I’m buried so deep? Twisted up in the words I’ll never speak The darkness takes me, my body is weak So I fall apart until I fall sleep
What can I do with this wild in me? Where can I go to tame the beast? I want run, to breathe, be free Free from the wild inside of me
Artist:
Shannon O’Loughlin is 29 years old and has been choreographing, teaching dance and coaching gymnastics for over 12 years. She started out as a competitive gymnast before training in hip hop, breakdance, contemporary, tap, jazz and ballet. Shannon also danced and performed through college at UAA. Her choreography has been featured in halftime shows, dance competitions, auditions, talent shows, gymnastics meets, cheer competitions and dance recitals. She has also choreographed numerous productions for Valley Performing Arts and helped judged local talent shows. Shannon always tells her students, “I learn more from you than you do from me. You are helping me learn how to teach you in a more effective way during every class”. Shannon enjoys writing, watching documentaries, playing guitar, dancing everywhere and doing her make up!
Bruce McRae, a Canadian musician currently residing on Salt Spring Island BC, is a multiple Pushcart nominee with over 1,500 poems published internationally in magazines such as Poetry, Rattle and the North American Review. His books are ‘The So-Called Sonnets (Silenced Press); ‘An Unbecoming Fit Of Frenzy; (Cawing Crow Press) and ‘Like As If” (Pski’s Porch), Hearsay (The Poet’s Haven).
W. RUTH KOZAK is a published historical novel writer and travel journalist who sometimes writes poetry. Several of her poems have been published in anthologies including the most recent, “Precious Moments on the Beach” in Limitless, an Anthology Charity Project by McGrath House with proceeds going to refugees and immigrants. Ruth plans to publish a book of poems written during her many stays in Greece titled “Songs for Erato”. She is currently working on a YA historical novel titled “Dragons in the Sky” in which some of the chapters are written as Bardic verse.
Jay Gandhi is a 33-year old accountant from Mumbai, India. He writes free verse in English. Most of his poems derive their inspiration from human inter connections. In free time when he isn’t reading poetry, he practices guitar, enjoys the peace that Yoga Asanas brings and walks for long distances.
when at home, I imagine the Himalayas: the yellow tent to buy from Decathalon, the UGG Men’s Butte Snow boot.
when in nature, I think: if my Dad has taken Ecosprin 75 mg, if my Mom has got an eight hour sleep.
My problem, my solution
You cross my mind while I eat roasted almonds. I begin counting the pieces left in my right hand paying close attention to the size, color and feel of each almond. I try to name the taste & listen to the crackle — smell the roast. I visualize the smiling face of my 3-year old niece, followed by how the sun rises in the gullies of Ghatkopar. I imagine the sound of the rain on the Himalayan mountain. After that I count back from 100— only the multiples of 7 & 3 and on the numbers like 63, I utter “a double”
Pedestrian meditation
I look out from the 8th floor window to count the number of buses which halt at the bus stop
All the buses roar in, dash out: there is an urgency
Everyone wants to reach somewhere
They want to meet someone; someone wants to meet someone else and someone else might just want to visit me
Focus Charlie! Focus
my bladder is screaming, acids are churning the stomach, eyes are getting weary—
Here comes #399; Nirvana isn’t a piece of cake
Cold Diwali
(i) these days I am writing a thesis about how bats & owls survive the nights. I think it would help sole rangers like me
(ii) there are coloured tablets in my medicine case which create different rangoli every time; this Diwali they are the only colours
Children have left the house
the timid streams gather courage, bustle as they build momentum. they start to join at the junctions and begin to soften all the rocks one at a time. sandstone is becoming quartzite. granite is becoming gneiss. milk is slowly curdling and the tributaries are forming a river. a river which is uninhibited, it has no colour, no nationality, no race, no religion. it breaks all the boxes, crashes mental dams, while it houses the salmons and eels, it is the home for fishes and flies, a place for hippos and rhinos but has no place for a thought of flowing backwards.
Budding Romeo
Today I’ve visited the home of my beloved It seems as if I’ve visited the entire city
Black tea created such an atmosphere I’ve sensed my partner in just a few moments
In the shining diamond around her neck I’ve seen the stone which hypnotises
I’ve felt such a peace and relief that I’ve seen the fear of loneliness tremble
In the slightest of her smiles, I saw a boat. Trust me, I could visualise the full sea
kaka
A portrait is locked in my wrist. My 2B Natraj pencil chokes on the Fido-Dido sketchbook. Muse’s forehead has many lines: first line is a prayer for his wife battling breast cancer, second line denotes the loans taken to send his son abroad, third line is for the pregnant daughter. His hair is grey but doesn’t appear so when oiled. The oil seeps through the head and tries to dissolve the turmoil. No Old monk. No Jack Daniels. Each day when he returns home, his wife opens the door and greets him daily; that moment is Nirvana— the precise reason to stay alive. His knees no longer bend but he still tries to do so when bowing to the God. Even Picasso would tremble to get the layers and wrinkles right. But I have taken up the challenge and the running title is kaka.
===================================================== kaka is a respectful way of summoning a old man in Gujarati Language
Badlapur Local
In a first class compartment there are blue seats with soft cushion.
In a second class compartment there are brown seats made of wood.
some people discuss the features of the Apple XR
others are contemplating the next step to be taken because the water supply would be cut by the time they reach home
White
She loved vanilla, eggs & snow. Every night she tracked the cusps of the moon— she died today; she was wrapped in whites as she traversed the clouds.
Rubato
More than 10000 pieces of broken mirrors are stuck together for the installation.
Some pieces are dull, some are luminous, some from the crashed wardrobes of a big shot while others from the remains of the dashed cars.
they reflect with different intensities but create the Large beat—
Earth hums songs on this very beat
Artist:
Jay Gandhi is a 33-year old accountant from Mumbai, India. He writes free verse in English. Most of his poems derive their inspiration from human inter connections. In free time when he isn’t reading poetry, he practices guitar, enjoys the peace that Yoga Asanas brings and walks for long distances.