CONFLICT

by Mary Hamrick

"I thought we were fighting for God.
Then I realized we were fighting for wealth and land."
--from the motion picture "Kingdom of Heaven" (quoted in _The New Yorker_, May 9, 2005)

Slumped,
I mimic your hate.
I am capable of this.

I am a fish
eating fish.
No regrets.

I am a flying fish,
hitting and slapping,
breaking you down and

breaking myself into pieces.
These are my bloodiest days.
They say forgiveness cleanses the soul.

I cannot cleanse myself.
I will not cleanse myself.
You are my launching platform of revenge.

Where is God? You say He is with you.
They say He is with them. I know He is with me.
Well, who is He with? Who does He love?

What color of animal does He favor?
What texture of hair is He partial to?
How does He measure our cultures?

Does He love Islam more than Judaism
and Sikhism more than Animism?
Does He love Hinduism more than Christianity?

I am only a flying fish,
hitting and slapping,
breaking you down and

breaking myself into pieces.
In the name of God,
we have the right to torture with skin-bullets

and to decapitate with our blood-battalions
and to instill the act of taking one’s own life.
I mimic your hate.

I am capable of this.
I am a fish
eating fish.

Maybe God wears a buffalo robe
and sadly watches us from a horse
as we demolish one another.


Mary Hamrick was born in New York and moved to Florida when she was a young girl. Her writing often reflects the contrast between her Northern and Southern upbringing. Current and forthcoming publications include Arabesques Press, Architecture Ink, Cezanne’s Carrot, Howling Dog Press (OMEGA 6), On the Page Magazine, Pemmican, Poetry Repair Shop, Poems Niederngasse, Potomac Review, Scrivener’s Pen, Tattoo Highway, The Barricade, The Binnacle, The Subway Chronicles and others.

GOD FORBID

by Charles Frederickson


Shear madness wild and wooly
Deep pile fleece bombastic stealth
Cover-ups perpetrated by rapacious carnivores
Remaking tigers tame sheep ferocious

Too gentle to live amongst
Ravenous wolves howling moon predators
Lascivious rabid foam spitfire drool
Bleating for mercy Allah willing

Cunning and conning silver foxes
Fierce hunted creatures demon haunted
Vixens cannot hide luxurious bushy
Tails furry pelt scraps entrapped

Black sheep are biting beasts
Straying from flock lost found
Rams protecting flock fighting back
Gelded horny wethers shagging man

Ewes bearing hundreds of guileless
Sacrificial lambs led to slaughter
Tenderized mutton marinated in blood
Lesser god forsaken altar offerings


Dr. Charles Frederickson is a Swedish-American pragmatic idealist, chronic optimist and heretical believer who has wandered intrepidly through 206 countries, an original sketch and poetic impression for each presented on http://imagesof.8k.com. Having spread rejuvenated roots and wings in Thailand, the past year has been devoted to providing volunteer comfort and supportive relief to children and families affected by the tsunami. 100+ publications on 5 continents.

THE NIPPLE EFFECT

June 21, 2006


by Erle Kelly


Janet Jackson made
the Congressional Record.
Or, her nipple did.
Right there with Roe v. Wade,
the 2000 mile fence
to keep the Mexicans out
and the resolution to invade Iraq
because “they gotta have WMD.”
The incensed House is making sure
no child will see a mammary gland
after suckling it for their first two years.
Nintendo and Play Station horror:
fast-action hero dismemberment games
slide under the radar screen.
Sex is taboo.
Violence gets PG-13, a pass.
A national referendum
on bra tensile strength?
Legislate. Go on the stump.
Whip up the base.
Stay the course.
Let’s nip this nipple
in the bud.


Erle Kelly lives in Long Beach, California, attended Cal State University, Long Beach where he received a BA in Business Administration. He retired three years ago and has been filling his time traveling, gardening, volunteering and attending a poetry workshop conducted by Donna Hilbert, a noted published poet and writer both in the US and England. This is Erle's first published poem which came out of the workshop.

BANG

(a note on spontaneity
of combustion)


by Carol Elizabeth Owens

“The current crisis is part of a larger struggle between the forces of freedom and the forces of terror in the Middle East…[a]nd as we saw on Sept. 11, the status quo in the Middle East led to death and destruction in the United States, and it had to change.” George W. Bush [New York Times (on-line) Jul. 31. 2006]

it’s real--
this big theory
wherein the religious
(whether left or right) wait in wings
while airy peacekeeping
missions station
themselves

at flash-
points & guns blaze
as the sun has its way
with the tender skin of safety
chafed, a bomb is long sought
wars cost, of course
dollars

are mixed
with gilead
as israelis, arabs
iraquis and americans
start locking their hot stocks
of explosive
cocktails

fully
loaded barrels
are often expensive
when exchanged in the battle’s heat
maneuvers must be smooth
liberally
applied

call them
balms, whether smart
or stupid — it’s dirty
to drop folks like flies or bad words
they serve us at arm’s length
and we’re not one
leg up


Carol Elizabeth Owens is an attorney and counselor-at-law in Western New York (by way of Long Island and New York City). She enjoys technical and creative writing. Her poetry has been published in several print and virtual publications. Ms. Owens loves the ways in which words work when poetry allows them to come out and play. The poem "bang (a note on spontaneity of combustion)" is written in a form called eintou (which is West African for "pearl," as in "pearls of wisdom").

HEARD ON THE NEWS

by Jon Wesick


Sad tidings for the family of eighty-two-year-old Norman Goestler. The St. Louis native was vacationing in China’s Shanxi Province, when he died in an earthquake. Local officials say Mr. Goestler suffered a heart attack brought on by the shaking of his hotel room. Two hundred thousand Chinese were also killed in the quake.


Jon Wesick has a Ph.D. in physics, has practiced Buddhism for over twenty years, and has published over a hundred poems in small press journals such as American Tanka, Anthology Magazine, The Blind Man’s Rainbow, Edgz, The Kaleidoscope Review, Limestone Circle, The Magee Park Anthology, The Publication, Pudding, Sacred Journey, San Diego Writer’s Monthly, Slipstream, Tidepools, Vortex of the Macabre, Zillah, and others. His chapbooks have won honorable mentions twice in the San Diego Book Awards.

MALEDICTION FOR THE MALEVOLENT

by Robert Emmett


mal
you speak
bad juju
follows you
male addiction
skull and
geronimo’s bones
ground to powder
up your nose
wired to brain pan
flashing male violence
heat seeking missile
straight to the baby’s heart
rub the blood in
scoop the blood out
now you drink your fill
malice
in your chalice
every lip it touches
burns with deceit
your tongue’s edict
no good valence
topsy-turvy
every word
a kiss of death
hovers near your ear
whispers
sand in your throat
magnetic wires
across your forehead
draw metallic shards
to a point
between your eyes
veins catch in
all your teeth
mal odor
your fly-blown breath
snuffs
the only candle


Robert Emmett finds some of these words flying through the air, caught in the branches of trees or among the beach stones of Michigan, where they may have a life of their own. He's just borrowing them for now.

OBSERVATIONS OF DISSENT

by Casey Lee Cobb


A psychological social path, stuttering and stammering down well worn paths, of presidential prose.

Yet wavering, inconsistently, from the traditional norms, divisively emulating a civil right’s foes.

The masses look on with eyes glazed over, like donuts, doing nothing, hearing nothing, seeing nothing.

Nothing but doublespeak, doublethink, enshrouded into a message projection of patriotic bellyfeel.

Jellyfish! you could call them sheeple, you could call them asleep, or don’t call on them at all.

For if they are all just a lost cause, that cannot hear beyond the propaganda, we will certainly fall.


Casey Lee Cobb dedicates this poem (© 2006) to George Orwell, and his impeccable foresight, that the world ignored. Cobb adds. "Bloggers are the hackers of the corrupted main stream mediocratic monopoly. Our mission is truth, our numbers are many, and we are taking back the control of the public mind. Liberating it from those whom peddle complacency, conformity, and ignorance. This is our mission and not one of us can do it alone. Join us!"

FORFEITURE OF COLLATERAL

by James Penha


Bomb ‘em.

          Who?

‘Em.

          Why?

Because of what
               they did. We have to
               get ‘em
               back.

          But bombs--

Yeah.

          Mean war--

Yeah!

          And war--

Yeah?

          Means bombs--

?

          Will bomb others.

As well as ‘em?

          Probably.

Bomb ‘em.

          And the others?

Will never get us back.


James Penha edits The New Verse News.

FROM THE ORCHARDS OF SILENCE

by Martin Burke


On the Lebanon border
The cedars weep

The orchards do not yield their fruit
And shells litter the shadows
Like broken arguments of peace.

History has come
And it seems some harsh necessity prevails
Above the exile’s song
And this verse that weeps with the cedars.

The orchards weep
The children weep

The exile cries aloud in desolation


Martin Burke is a widely published Irish poet/playwright living in Belgium whose latest e-book Gilgamesh is freely available from Cervena Barva Press.

STABBING PAIN

by Rochelle Ratner


It's nothing to worry about. He's sixty-seven years old and
has had headaches for as long as he can remember. Two
Advil, sometimes four, or the new Advil Migraine, and it's
pretty much unnoticeable. The problem is, he's developed
an ulcer. Newly retired, and he develops an ulcer. Kiss
Advil goodbye. Say hello to headaches almost every
afternoon. The strongest over the counter drug he can take
is Tylenol. Doesn't do a damn thing. Finally he lets his wife
convince him to see a doctor. The doctor starts him on a
low dose of Elavil. When that doesn't help, they decide to
take x-rays, just in case there's a problem. The doctor's
office calls and makes another appointment. He walks in to
find two other doctors sitting there, one a neuro-surgeon,
the other a psychologist. They show him an x-ray with
three needles embedded in his brain. They say they've read
about cases such as his before: needles inserted in the soft
spots of an infant's head to stop his crying. Usually fatal.
Usually undetectable. Then they ask him to tell them
about his parents. He begins, of course, by saying how
much they loved him.


Rochelle Ratner's books include two novels: Bobby's Girl (Coffee House Press, 1986) and The Lion's Share (Coffee House Press, 1991) and sixteen poetry books, including House and Home (Marsh Hawk Press, 2003) and Beggars at the Wall (Ikon, October 2005). More information and links to her writing on the Internet can be found on her homepage: www.rochelleratner.com.

VIVA THE VETO

by Anne G. Davies


After nearly six years I've cast a veto
And I must admit the power feels sweet-o.

With a stroke of my pen I killed the ambitions
Of those godless stem cell coalitions
Who crassly deny that embryos frozen
Are truly human, though left unchosen.

Potent forces were arrayed against me;
Even Bill Frist inveighed against me.
I was shocked to see many Republicans fail me
Did they really think they could derail me?
I'm the Decider and what I decide
No two-bit Congress dares override.

The Innocents rescued from the slaughter
Might someday be your son or daughter
(Though embryos I've fiercely guarded,
may end as waste, to be discarded.)
I'm a kind man; I pity human afflictions
As long as they suit my higher convictions.

In one fell swoop I earned God's grace
And galvanized my strongest base.


Anne G. Davies is a fund-raising writer by profession and a writer and versifier by avocation. Her work has been published on local and regional papers. She lives in Lexington, Massachusetts.

COMING HOME

by Sara McWhorter


In a couple hours I will shave and shower and grab my jacket and flag
and head downtown to be a face in the crowd, a hand waving, a hand
waving a flag for Bravo Company riding down downtown on a fire truck.
Finally home! And the hands waving and the signs not like the signs before. So
Welcome Home Troops! Bravo, Bravo Company! And the flags
waving and the yellow ribbons waving and the hands
waving the flags and the ribbons being taken down and the cheers,
Hurrah! and the hats coming off and the mothers crying a little and my hat off
and some dads saluting and my hand waving and the trucks wailing --
all this as sure as there is a war.


Sara McWhorter has appeared in 360 Degrees and in TheScreamOnline.

WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PEACE?

by Charles Frederickson


Declaring uncivil war against itself
Deadbeat planet willing aborted ceasefire
Outlandish sour milk viscid honey
Rareripe fruit that never rots

In cradled manger of humanity
Unholy mount overcast with melancholy
Olive branches lose vitality shrivel
Pitted hatred versus brotherly love

Arab to Zionist alphabet soup
Hearty mock chicken cure-all broth
Promissory covenant best perused backwards
Without rear view mirror hindsight

Desert oases shifting quicksand mirages
Hourglass overturned wishing well poisoned
Forced Exodus in reverse cave-in
Separate passage burrowing ant tunnels

Ordinary miracles hoodwink heretical believers
Wandering tribes misplaced not lost
Parted salty rivers neatly folded
Crossover bridges feathery snow fantasies

Inflicting revenge with nationalistic fervor
Razor wired perimeters off limits
Giants in miniature stonewalling stalls
Suppose world ends so what


Dr. Charles Frederickson is a Swedish-American pragmatic idealist, chronic optimist and heretical believer who has wandered intrepidly through 206 countries, an original sketch and poetic impression for each presented on http://imagesof.8k.com. Having spread rejuvenated roots and wings in Thailand, the past year has been devoted to providing volunteer comfort and supportive relief to children and families affected by the tsunami. 100+ publications on 5 continents.

OBSERVING CELLS

by Erle Kelly


That cells contain life.
That cells incarcerate lives.
That cells extend life.
That cells divide humanity.
That cells challenge morality.
That cells politicize, terrorize.
That cells communicate.
That cells unify, multiply.
That cells atrophy and die.


Erle Kelly lives in Long Beach, CA and is a graduate of Cal State University Long Beach. For the last three years he has participated in a local poetry workshop conducted by published poet and writer, Donna Hilbert. Since Erle's retirement he volunteers his time tutoring, working for the local United Nations Association, traveling with his wife, Kristine, gardening, reading and writing.