Opinions Are Like
 
I don't watch TV and I don't feel left out.
My news is what I experience through the day .

No weird voiced anchor need to inform me how to think  .
And I knew how to die all on my own .

I didn't bask in the sun cause I preferred to wait it out in the shade .

No one mans opinion would change the view but it certainly could stir some shit.

And lighting fires for the sake of seeing it burn was for the anarchist pricks.
Who do not  care about more than watching chaos spread .

The faces I've seen don't reflect the horror stories they would have you believe .


And if you stand alone you just stand out by default .

You can't win but you must not come to a standstill either .

Just keep your thoughts close your friends few .

Embrace silence read constantly and prove someone wrong..

Nothing beats a fail like a try.


( John Patrick Robbins Is a barroom poet and editor of The Rye Whiskey Review . His work has been published with The Beautiful Space,  Romingos Porch , Red Fez, Rasputin , Outlaw Poetry , Piker Press, Blue Pepper , Boned Magazine, Horror Sleaze Trash , Inbetween Hangovers , Your One Phone Call, Spill The Words , Drinkers Only , Pyre Publishing.)

The instruction is really simple when you lose your mind come back

fan
oscillates
 
the calendar
scratches at the door
 
rubble of moonlight
 
cartography of smoke
through
the pluck to the
jugged heart
 
a genuflection
before the crepitus
 
their gift
 
the fabulous clam
of
gibbous youth
 
happy mourners
 
in greek
idiot
means
a person of peculiar nature
 
as it turns out
i didn’t miss
blueberry season
 
lo sone deficiente
 

Volunteer
 
This man was old,
but perhaps wise enough
to share his wisdom.
 
Look, these are
my anti-pretense glasses;
they have special lenses.
 
Up close, she noticed
the frames were empty,
but his heart was full.
 
They walked slowly,
the length of the garden,
near the brick rotunda.
 
They keep the crazies there,
under special lock & key
like human safe deposit boxes.
 
She thanked him for this info.
His tone was cautionary,
wishing this on no one.
 
How many languages do I speak?
I can mumble incoherently
in any language, if the mood’s right.
 
He sounded resigned
where hope once attended him,
but he told her he liked her.
 
She brought him back to his room;
You should look me up
if you ever return here.
 
Before she left, he asked
to touch the pulse of her vitality:
she was touched.

 
Premonition
 
Which came first,
insomnia or failure?
Ignored explorations
into linguistic habits
knocked at his conscience.
A world in a phrase,
tied together by a pair
of fancy socks & four humors
was the restless supposition
of his personal hell.
He had no idea
how he arrived here,
no clearer notion
of how to escape.
Even climbing babies
eventually walked upright,
but most didn’t get far -
diverted by shiny objects
& prospects of easy change. 
He hadn’t a painter’s eye,
but still keenly observed
the silent nature
of humans to please,
how motionlessness can lead
to deeper understanding,
how the lack of sleep leaves
more time to ponder.
He visualizes
layers of silence
stratified into flavors,
delicacies that give up
subtle nuance.
All the while
the poor & sickly
whisper shouts
& whimper at illness
that forms their
world abandoned,
rife with uncivil strife,
drawn to ghastly sunset. 
He views haggard reflection,
sends out pleas to be held,
knowing even inside
hollow chambers of
echoing disappointment,
love has its proper place.


Stasis
Breath held
in hopes of stopping onslaught.
This eyes-closed-shut fantasy
harbors verge of expectation,
glimmer of faith in the DNA
that progress is soon forthcoming.

The truth is a series of questions,
an exasperated sigh, sad realization.
Like weather, the violence is here,
daily occurrence, uncommonly common.

Sips become gulps,
glasses are emptied, skies darkened.
Hot it hits gullet, reward
for random screaming.
 
Panic sets in:
names are mispronounced,
a medical condition
where all fades to black.

Smell this truth on my breath:
no catchphrase
can remedy our dilemmas.
We carry on, bravely ignorant,
hoping yet to survive.

​
(Gary Glauber is a writer and teacher based in New York. His collections are available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.)

Just For A Moment
 
Waiting to be released from the ward,
I play ping pong with Wesley.
We are laughing, I keep missing the ball.
I’m surprised at his patience with me.
 
A social worker calls him away,
when he returns he’s pale.
I see him slide down against
the wall, arms wrap around drawn-up knees.
His head down, his shirt over his head.
His bipolar features paranoia, and he is already
in mental lock down.
 
I go to him when my ride arrives,
bend a bit, place my hand on his shoulder,
and quietly tell him, “My ride’s here.
I’m going to miss you.
I feel like we were friends in another life.”
I start to drop my hand down his arm
before the inches between us
grow into feet. As I get to his forearm,
he grabs mine and holds on tight,
just for a moment, just enough for goodbye.
 
 
The Girl Who Stays One Day
 
She’s going into prostitution
when she’s 18, she brags.
Daddy broke her down like a puzzle,
and she leans all her pieces
against Wesley
whenever he stands still.
She writes on his hand,
property of,  in felt tip pen,
which he shows me days later.
 
I avoid her eyes
as we pass each other in the ward.
She wears midnight like a cape.
Her face, a kaleidoscope of shadows.

( Jeri Thompson has appeared in Chiron, Anti-Heroin Review among others.)
 

​ON THE WAY
Summer heat moves all the kids to dream of Tastee Freez.
 Ice cream shop down a country road is subtle magic.
The crick flows all the way down the hollow
 as it rambles down through Victory
on its way to meet the Yough in Sutersville.
We’d take the same route to the Tastee Freez,
promise of a cool heaven
at the confluence of crick and river.
 Past Pat’s house, where the crick dips under the road next to the firehall,
 is a child-high wall of concrete.
Someone (we blamed BJ, the Big Kid)
had left minnows to die and dry in the sun.
Silver grey scales split open,
 little white bones inside.
Eyes round, black, staring.
 A country child knows about death.
We see road kill bloated and lying in the sun,
 flies swarming on dried blood.
 We see dead carcass in the forest,
bleached skulls of deer.
The empty eye sockets of those dead minnows
 left a cold, uncanny chill in my gut,
 like I’d swallowed an ice cube whole.
 Not five feet away was a telephone pole,
 the very one where tractor would meet wood,
and crush my father, several summers later.
 The very same spot.
Bottom of Skillet Hill.
Crick rushes underground,
 and the shadow dwells,
and the minnows stare,
dead eyes seeing all. 

( Chani Zwibel is a graduate of Agnes Scott College, who was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but now dwells in Marietta, Georgia, with her husband and their dog. She is an associate editor with Madness Muse Press. She enjoys writing poetry after nature walks and daydreaming.)