like two weeks like five years                                                                                                                   like coupon clippings
From a thick Sunday pull out
Shiny, vivid
Promising bargins in primary colors
Coupons expire
And expire and expire
 
~ Allison Whittenberg

Tonight as I lay prayerful,
in search of one bearable position,
the moon, a dove, perches
on the mountaintop, then spreads
its ever-changing body,
light as wings, across the sky.
 
No longer certain of anything
except this moon
wounds with its clarity,
I rise and write a list--
things to remember,
and things I should forget.
When your name is on both of them,
a tiny bone snaps near my heart
 
But maybe even God had doubts.
Perhaps after six long days, he, too,
made lists to forget and hold onto.
Maybe he pondered his books,
Genesis to Exodus,
reconsidered Eve’s guilt,
golden juice of apple
dripping sweet from her mouth.
 
Maybe if he had it all to do over,
God would change his mind about Eden
with its serpents and sins,
dictate a new, shorter list to Moses.
One that commands nothing
except we hold on to love,
in whatever form it finds us.
 
~ Susan Clayton-Goldner

                                           ~ For John Keats
 
                                          Now this a kind of elemental faith
                                          knowing it’s happening yet
                                          unable to see- 
                                          trusting the word of others
                                          rather than frying one’s own eyes-
                                          named for the goddess of love
                                          this planet   the most satanic
                                          the most terrible-
                                          were it to be swallowed by the sun
                                          it would make but little difference-
                                          now all of its horrible truths
                                          its sulphuric acid atmosphere
                                          its acne of live lava flow
                                          have created in these few hours
                                          a thing of sublime beauty
                                          a black pearl of celestial geometry
                                          a perfectly round sunspot
                                          tiny and darker than night
                                          traversing the lower half
                                          of a huge golden orb
                                         
                                          Were it possible
                                          from our sweet green bower
                                          of ferns and azalea we’d gaze
                                          through filters obscurely at
                                          the starkest of all cosmic truths-
                                          beauty is hell   and hell is beauty
 
                                            ~ Daniel Williams

Everyone in my family has to fight the bear.
The bear is old, older than my grandfather’s
 
grandfather & his teeth are long
& yellow. I know his stratagems.
 
Say I’m at the airport: the bald man
at the bar with the blazer & briefcase
 
could be the bear: he could tear
out my eyeballs & the last thing they’d see
 
is my blood on the business bear’s coat.
So I’m careful. I plan every egress;
 
I check beneath my car. I rarely sleep
& when I sleep I sleep with bear mace
 
under the pillow. So far the pillow
is not the bear. And you my dear--
 
I believe you’re not the bear.
Those lips I love are not ursine & you
 
never roar plucking salmon from a stream.
Thank you, for staying despite him.
 
Go on—sleep and I’ll keep vigil:
all night the willow will rasp
 
our window. Far below will be homes,
fields, all the wide earth rustling
 
with the gentle snuffling of the bear. 
 
~ J.G. McClure

I swore I wouldn’t do it
yet here I am, it’s 2 a.m. and I’m doing it
but it’s just too, too addictive
I could be writing instead
or reading one of the greats
but now I’m out there-fair game
with all the others
but I had to answer, didn’t I?
become a friend of a friend and a friend
to someone else’s friend
and so on and so on…
even with someone I never met
or someone I never cared to meet
or someone I bumped into in the supermarket
and they hugged me because, after all
hadn’t I just become a friend ?
and even my son asked to be friends
and there I was, posted on events
caught by someone’s I-phone or lens
and damn, how I wanted my face
off this mega mainstream of mass media--
but what could I do?
and wouldn’t it be insulting
to say no even to the friends of the friends I would never know
but who wanted to know me
so I had to check the YES box because
wouldn’t I be considered unsocial if I did otherwise
and all the mystery if being who I am
would be lost just because
I couldn’t X the box that said NO?

~ Gloria g. Murray

Curtained continent ripples
Time, pressure, sliding
White-on- white turns crystal blue in the sunlight
Blue-on-blue gleaming
Flowing water creaks, rumbles
Hear the heartbeat of a glacier
Drip
Drip
Drip
 
Blazing
Beaming
White-turquoise-blue ice
Melting
Hear the boom
Throbbing
Thunder
Splash.
 
~ Vincent J. Tomeo

Facebook. Bookface.
Is it Myspace? Or your space?
My house? Or your place?
I must read
My news feed.
 
On my wall
Voices call.
Who are they all?
The world’s too small.
 
379 Friends.
Who comprehends?
Did I offend?
Can friends mend?
A message I’ll send.
 
Need to tweet
To the beat.
Hectic pace.
Rat race.
It’s a disgrace.
I need some grace.
Where’s your face?
 
Wet tongue kisses
She dismisses.
Two big brown eyes
Plead: Please arise!
Away from the screen,
The forest is green,
Peaceful, serene.

~ Yvona Fast

A man and his knife.
In one story, madness.
In another, the calm table
carves itself
for the many guests.
 
The morning arrives.
The day extends itself.
 
History is stitched
from fragments and remnants
into a carpet
that waits to be understood.

~ Ian Randall Wilson

Old Pythagoras warned, putting democracy into the fickle hands of those who decide their votes listening to an eloquent line or those hypnotized by a persuading line, is fatuous and dangerous.  And Pythagoras thought, if a candidate rises in polls,  the opponent knows the riser must be attacked, and closet dirt dug up; after all, the hoi polloi must know for whom to change their vote without good reason.  “Athenian democracy voted to kill Socrates,” was Plato’s lament, who did not even always agree with old Pythagoras and wondered if when people chose their leader they precluded the competent to sit in power seats.  Today, glancing back at the bloody waters of the Caribbean, where, the most democratic groups known to history were pirate decks of buccaneer ships, where by custom,  the captain was elected by his outlaw crew(democratically),  making it clear a system of political organization can never be a question of moral or immoral,  yet who doubts while standing in the wake of the Caribbean waves that pursuit of power often wafts a stink.  

~ Reed Vernick

                                             Sometimes I know just what to wear:
                                             outfits pop whole from my closet
                                             brilliant from the head of Hera;
                                             other days, I try three sweaters,
                                             end by switching pants I put on first.
                                             Is it true you’re depressed when you
                                             can’t decide what to wear and spend
                                             too much time pairing clothes?
                                             or am I just Lady Perfection
                                             with too much time on her hands,
                                             calling for the number one best match?
                                             If I set them out the night before,
                                             those neatly laid out clothes rebel,
                                             insisting they will not do today;
                                             if I choose a shirt that’s seldom worn,
                                             it whispers there’s a reason for neglect:
                                             I should just discard the miscreant.
                                             I’m not depressed, just overwhelmed:
                                             the stunning array of color in my closet
                                             shames by endless possibility.  

                                             ~ Janet M. Powers

Hello from Local Gems Press,

We'd like to announce that we are making a major change to The Poeteer---but it's a good one we promise! We've been getting so many submissions and the publication is growing so much in popularity that we decided to add an online journal component to the publication. This way more people will be able to share and appreciate the wonderful and relevant poetry that the Poeteer has accumulated.

Don't worry print lovers---the print version will still be coming out! (We would NEVER get rid of print!)

So sit back and enjoy as our first online edition of the Poeteer will be coming shortly!