Offerings from:

Michelle Mead     Alien
   
                          Sarah Ashwood   The Door                                                     
Matt Zanders      Reflections       
Alex Hounchell  
                       
Nils Parkman
Look to the Future
Your Smile

Arial Leigh Davis
The Lock Box
Daniel Walker
Stranger in the Mirror

Holmes Gray
Lost Causes    and     Stars

Ashutosh Ghildiyal   Romancing the Pen

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The Lock Box               by Arial Leigh Davis


It sits there watching me
with it's wicked, closed eyes
keeping secrets.
It's the secrets I despise.

Every day it mocks me
in it's sleek, efficient way.
keeping secrets.
It's the secrets I must sway.

Finally, I give in to my weakness
I move towards this object of so much
desire
obsession
compulsion
and I open it...

Forgive me

It sits there watching me
with empty, open eyes
telling secrets.
It's me that I despise.
Arial Leigh Davis is a student at her local Community College, struggling to find herself and a  path in life...or so she says. She writes poetry to ease the voices in her head.
Lost Causes              by Holmes Gray


I walk among the ashes of civilization
alone

A paper flutters by
the corners burnt and torn
but I can still see the headlines

I kick it away and continue to walk
alone

I hear a hiss...an awful sound
an animal perhaps, or what's left of it
fearing me as much as I fear it

And I continue my walk
alone

My legs ache, my throat is parched
my lungs burn from breathing fire
but I can not stop my walk.

I can not stop my walk
alone

If anyone else is out there
If anyoe else survived
I must find them.

I stumble as I walk
alone

I clutch my sole possession
found among the debris intact
a leather bound book

I fall to the ground
alone
Look to the Future        By Nils Parkman


A perfect reflection of the past
hides in misty revelation...
I see this in my crystal ball.

When the fog clears
and the truth is exposed
my eyes will finally see

A vision of the present flickers...
another of my magic tricks,
it beckons to my call.

Now with a simple spell
I will your future tell
that'll be twenty-five cash up front please...

Holmes is a dedicated staff member who regularly contributes to our site.  Even when we don't ask for it....or really want it.
Nils Parkman has never previously been published.  He enjoys talking long walks on rainy nights, searching for inspiration and killing two birds with one stone.  (exercise and showers)  He submits regularly- but most of it's giibberish.  (his words)
Stranger in the Mirror
by Daniel Walker

Long time passed since my image was reflected
Lifetime passed, friendships gone...neglected.
neglected.
Dreams I once had have fallen by the wayside
Nightmares are all that remain.

Love of life has become tortured  existence
Love at all is fashionably  resistant
then fleeting...and then gone.

Long time now since my image has been faded
Lifetime gone, my viewpoint now is jaded
jaded
Dreams now come in bright day light
While I lay here, hidden from the world.

Love of life has become tortured  existence
Love at all is fashionably  resistant
then fleeting...and then gone.

See myself, reflected in your eyes
Shining with lust, trusting alibis
Seeking answers to questions never asked
Looking to the future, trying to escape the past
never dying.
yet always....searching.

Daniel Walker is a semi-retired vampire hunter living in an underground Metropolis and writing his memoirs in blood. (or red ink, whichever is the handiest at the time)

     ROMANCING THE PEN
      by   Ashutosh Ghildiyal


  My silly pen scribbles
Loftiest and poorest
Crystallized moments
Elucidated concepts 

Connecting with thoughts
Copulating with feelings

  In the oddest of times
Frivolous instances 

Wherein the surreal
The material
Interject 

Ejecting
Brimful of immaterial
Verbal Compositions



We will be offering more of Mr. Ghildiyal's inspiring poetry soon....please feel free to visit his site to learn about him.
Two of his poems were featured in our July print issue.

Website: http://ashutosh-ghildiyal.blogspot.com
Poetry Offerings from around the globe
Reflection
by Matt  Zanders and Alex Hounchell

I see you in the water
You look like me
Obviously you are not what I thought you would be

Maybe you’re a magical deformity?
Maybe you’re magic is a form of mimicry.

Do you mimic people to feel as though you were free?
You are cursed under the water forever and eternity.

People walk by and look upon you while they see only themselves
You only see the opportunity to get above
beyond these binds that keep you in this cell

You are a creature of diversity
Someday whether it is far or near you will be set free.
Welcome  our latest poet/writer.  He is a young man that resides in Kansas, and while this poem is his first actual publication, he is diligently working on a writing career.
Your Smile
by Nils Parkman

The first time I saw you smile I held you in my arms
your tiny face looked up at me
I won't believe it was just a little gas, like they said.

The years flew by as I watched you grow
we had our share of tears
but your smile shone through it all, keeping me focused.

Through scraped knees, bumps and bruises we struggled
as you learned the difficult lessons of life
still smiling, knowing that one day you would understand.

And now,
my own body is weak and frail, I am unable to guide you
Yet you smile.
and it is your smile that lets me know that you will carry on
Dedication:
"For Samuel, Andy/“Maul’s” son, who enjoyed the first draft."


The worlds of fantasy are worlds greatly alike, and yet unlike, our own...
  SDCA 
                       
Bio:
A genuine “Okie from Muskogee,” Sarah Ashwood is a full-time college student working towards a B.A. in English with an emphasis on creative writing from American Military University. Her work has appeared in such publications as Art and Prose, Aoife’s Kiss, Flashing Swords Press, Mindflights, Outdoors Spectacular, The Lorelei Signal, Abandoned Towers, New Myths, TeenAge, Silver Blade, Wanderings Magazine, Devozine, and The Digital Dragon. As of September 2009, future work will appear in Homeschooling Today, The APUS Eagle, Dunesteef Audio Fiction, and The Opinion Guy. Sarah’s first book, a volume of poetry titled A Minstrel's Musings, was published by Cyberwizard Productions in April 2009. In 2010, Sarah’s Young Adult fantasy novel, Knight’s Rebirth, will be published by the same. Along with her cousin, Carol Green, Sarah is co-editor of the fantasy ezine, Moon Drenched Fables. For more information, please visit www.sarahashwood.com.


The Door

Dark it looms and grey and bleak
I shrink in bed, afraid to peek—
Within that door, dismal and cold
Gateway to a realm untold

I know, just know, that monsters lurk—
Fearsome pirates, thieving Turks—
Saliva-dripping jaws agape
Spirits with sheets about them draped

My closet door, it sucks me in
Wants to pull me deep within
I cringe in bed, try to resist
The lure of siren song and kiss

If I give in, will I be killed
By chainsaw man with patchy beard?
Or maybe I’ll absorbed be
Into blacker realms and bloody seas?

From out the darkness, I fear will fly
A winged vampire, swooping nigh
An axe murderer or old lady’s ghost
A vengeful corpse with impish host

Don’t think I’ll go, but here I can’t—
Stay without my bedtime lamp
My closet door won’t let me be
To Mom and Dad’s room I will flee! 
New
Poems added

Stars
by Holmes Gray

Twinkle, twinkle little ball of gas
with a mass so dense you'd squash me as I pass,
if you didn't burn me up first

Gravitational monster of the sky
bringer of light, and life
giver of galaxies
center of our worlds
without you we would perish

twinkle, twinkle little red dwarf
dwindling to become what?
A black hole to suck out all life?

Are there others who gaze up at you and wonder?
Are there life forms so different from me that I could never even imagine, much less believe?
Do you know?
Or care?

twinkle, twinkle little ball of gas
keep on shining- not a lot to ask
things could be worse.
Alien
by Michelle Mead

Remaining with those who love this desolate place,
a ball of rock and water called earth in outer space,
run by sad and busy beings called(in) the human race,
yet other creatures not among them see their true disgrace

His moon face hiding from the places sun had burned,
his rice paper flesh the color of seashells overturned,
in his eyes he carried the home where he’d soon return,
and the secrets there that no mere human could discern

But when he blinked slowly at the woman wearing green,
her skin a shade of olive, her hair a dark black sheen,
he swore she could see his reason, his hesitation to take a breath
for humans are the aliens, who give earth a prolonged death   

Michelle Mead is a writer from the Hudson Valley of New York. She is the Co-Editor of a local children’s magazine called "Whimsy" (for which she writes poetry, book reviews and interviews with authors and illustrators.She has been published in various ezines( The Clockwise Cat, multiple issues of EMG-Zine) as well as in the literary magazines "Songs of Innocence (And Experience)," "Trespass" and "Polluto" and in her chapbook "Moongirls and Nightdreams." 

I came , I saw , and then forgot why I came, so I left
                                 
by Ted Golden