ODDITY 26
When Dreams Wither
Ann Christine Tabaka
There is some deep meaning hidden within.
Egg shells crack open spilling desires. No one
told me how to pray. Last year’s nest is dry. I
hold it in my trembling hands, searching for
answers. Truth is a festering of blowflies,
sucking life from my womb. I am old and
forgotten. Barren. Parts of me crumble into
dust. The willow nods. Leaves shower down as
I place the nest gently on the ground. She folds
her branched arms in on me. We weep.
Ann Christine Tabaka was nominated for the 2017 Pushcart Prize in Poetry. She is the winner of Spillwords Press 2020 Publication of the Year, her bio is featured in the “Who’s Who of Emerging Writers 2020 and 2021,” published by Sweetycat Press. She is the author of 15 poetry books, and 1 short story book. She lives in Delaware, USA. She loves gardening and cooking. Chris lives with her husband and four cats. Her most recent credits are: The Phoenix; Eclipse Lit, Carolina Muse, Sand Hills Literary Magazine, Ephemeral Literary Review, The Elevation Review, The Closed Eye Open, North Dakota Quarterly, Tangled Locks Journal, Wild Roof Journal, The American Writers Review, Black Moon Magazine, Pacific Review, The Silver Blade, Pomona Valley Review, West Texas Literary Review.
From A to B
Tony Pena
Seems like only last summer my fingers
used to dance the twist around the dial
to tune in a song that immortalizes
the moment till the playlist bores to
tears and then on to the next pleasure,
but lately the joyride, like many a tryst,
has given way to nothing but a heavy
lidded hope that the traffic lights play
nice enough to get my old ass home to
a spot where something triggers anything.
Tony Pena was the 2017-2018 Poet Laureate for the city of Beacon, New York.
A volume of poetry and flash fiction, "Blood and Beats and Rock n Roll," is available now at Amazon. Colorful compositions and caterwauling with a couple of chords can be seen at:
Blue
Nivedita Dey
Blue sadness is the sadness of vast outskirts. It is the sadness of melting ice cubes, of glow-worms and house cats. It is the sadness of your favourite book endings, of library desks and fallen leaves. It is the sadness of sidewalks, of shapeless clouds and shop windows. It is the sadness of moonlight patterns on green walls.
It is the sadness of the blue dot that our earth appears to be, when seen from the outer space.
Blue sadness is the sadness of adolescents with freckles and popsicles. It is the sadness of the hooting of an owl in the middle of the night, of a new language and of bathtubs.
Nivedita wanted to be a writer ever since she found out what words are capable of. For her,
poetry is a tool, to defend herself and her existence from the bleakness of life. In the face of
the absurd, her poetry is what defines her authenticity.