IN CIRCUMSTANCES BEYOND YOUR CONTROL

by Sara Sarna

"Broken Heart — Bleeding Heart" by Michal Boubin

You feel the cracking.

Vow to be a gap-filler,

leak-plugger,

like the boy at the dike,

who knows if he walks away,

the world drowns.

It seems there is no way

to stop things coming apart,

short of legions, armies

of the like-minded,

plugging holes.

But despair is pervasive,

contagious,

the goal all along.

Hold fast,

and I will hold you

and someone else 

will hold me

and on and on

until together we are 

stitch and bandage

to bind up the hurt,

the heart,

of a nation.

Sara Sarna is a poet, actor and hiker. She is a member of Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets, Wisconsin Writers Association, and Write On, Door County. Her work has appeared in print, online, and been heard from stage and radio. Her chapbook Whispers from a Bench was published in 2020.

HELP ME, JOE

by Alan Walowitz

I’m not the handiest man
though sometimes feel the need to prove I am—
at least among those still extant in my demographic
who might be foolish enough to wield a screwdriver 
a couple of  feet in the air
and intend to get close enough to what needs tightening.
Though not mistaken for the Wallendas
who repair the skylight when it won’t close right.
Or that D.B. Cooper guy I hire to change the bulbs
in the fixture that hangs a hundred feet in the air
from my foolish cathedral ceiling. 
You know, it’s been a while since
I climbed to the top rung. 
I’m happier watching from the ground
and telling those youngsters 
everything they’re doing wrong
and how I would’ve handled it
way back when, a couple of year before. 
Though I do remember from being up there, 
the thrill of the heights
I know when you fall, you hit with a thud.
Meantime, help me, Joe. 
Hold this ladder, will you? 
For this young one—
willing, ready  to climb up.

Alan Walowitz is a Contributing Editor at Verse-Virtual, an Online Community Journal of Poetry.  His chapbook Exactly Like Love comes from Osedax Press. The full-length The Story of the Milkman and Other Poems is available from Truth Serum Press. Most recently, from Arroyo Seco Press, is the chapbook In the Muddle of the Night written with poet Betsy Mars. Now available for free download is the collection The Poems of the Air from Red Wolf Editions.

GURFA

by Joan Mazza

From one remaining gallon of water,

precious drops pooled in the palm.

The fighting continues after two long weeks,

the air filled with dust and the stench

of rotting bodies.

Water and electricity have been turned off,

no food and no way to cook any food remaining

in half a house that has been shelled. Next door,

a home on fire, two dogs howling, left behind.

How to escape?

Three children, but only two hands to hold

onto them. Who will carry what they’ll need

wherever they might land? Which way is safe

passage, a welcome waiting from strangers?

How to escape?

Tanks line up for miles, out of gas, ammunition

spent. Phone dead. Each vehicle with a driver,

no more than a trapped boy, his stomach growling,

howling. No water. He cries for his mother, his bed.

How to escape?

Who asked for this war? One man with a few drops

of power he wants to hold. No matter who

suffers, dies. Didn’t other leaders kill millions?

Stalin. Hitler. Pol Pot. He can, too. Confident.

No need to escape.

Joan Mazza has worked as a microbiologist and psychotherapist, and taught workshops  on understanding dreams and nightmares. She is the author of six books, including Dreaming Your Real Self, and her poetry has appeared in Rattle, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Prairie Schooner, Poet Lore, and The Nation. She lives in rural central Virginia.

THE LADDER

by Howie Good

There are days when I look up from some small task,
answering a text or fixing coffee or leashing the dog,
and see miles more of the skyline burning and crowds
chanting encouragement to the flames, and on those days,
I feel broken and hollow and lost, too old and slow to be
able to make any sort of difference, but then I remember
I don’t have to be one of the ones who climb a rescue ladder;

I can stand on the ground and help hold the ladder steady.


Howie Good is the author most recently of Stick Figure Opera: 99 100-word Prose Poems from Cajun Mutt Press. He co-edits the online journals Unbroken and UnLost.