Skyline Summer Poetry 2009

Zero to Forever Introduction by Victoria Valentine

Poets in Volume 2 Issue 2

Patty Mager

Joan McNerney

Roger G. Singer

Terry E. Lockett

r.j. Nicolet

jacob erin-cilberto

Simon Perchik

Elizabeth Colby

Amitabh Mitra

THE CHILL OF REALITY

Patty Mager

LAST SUMMER

Joan McNerney

Golden sunshine spilling
over cathedrals of trees
forest of summer.

Your eyes are oceans of light
beams of light soft beaming
dancing through rivers of memory.

Forest of rivers
drowning in oceans of eyes.
Your eyes when sunset spreads
over sand dunes warm golden.

Stars gliding past heaven
as night explodes in
cathedrals of light.

We bed down together in
forest of memories
your body so strong golden
last summer with you.

Joan McNerney's poetry has been included in numerous literary magazines such as Boston Review of the Arts, Kalliope, Mudfish, Spectrum and Word Thursdays. Four of her books have been published by fine literary presses. She has performed at the National Arts Club, State University of New York, Oneonta, McNay Art Institute and other distinguished venues. A recent reading was sponsored by the American Academy of Poetry. Her latest title is Having Lunch with the Sky, A.P.D. Press, Albany, New York.

FULL OF EMPTY

Roger G. Singer

The rising aroma

Of fresh bread

Circled up with intent

In the tight

Shaded alley

Attacking the senses

Of appetites

Full of empty.

MY FOOTSTEPS
 

Roger G. Singer

Easy calling

Back doors

   Tempt my travel

   To the surface,

Pushing my feet

Into go.

 
All open roads

I claim as

   Mine,

   With promise

Of leaving

The new and old

Far behind.

 
The voices of

   Footsteps,

   My footsteps,

   Slap my ears

With the only

Company I am

Bound to.

Roger G. Singer  began writing poetry when he was in the military many years ago, for relaxation and to express his thoughts in an abstract form.  Roger enjoy the challenge poetry offers, unlike the articles he has written, which are straight forward.  Poetry allows the writer to step to the side from general thoughts, thus creating a miniature story which in and of itself can bifurcate into other levels of literary form.

SATURDAY NIGHT IN KESARIANI

For Matera Mou

Terry E. Lockett

I'd forgotten all about it

until I heard the tune again

it had been on a cassette- a gift from my cousin.

Listening to it as I flew from Kriti-

legs honed by the steep grade

of my Grandfather's White Mountains,

palms and soles varnished in sands

that warmed to the marrow.

Sobbing, but the window only reflected

the shimmer of Pelekus on my neck

sparking gold in my eyes

a face bronzed as Tyche

to guard me in passage.

 

The music lamented, ebbed

then rose in waves.

My heart full with the gift from my cousin

and the greater one

from my mother- at birth.

Terry fell in love with the sound of poetry as a small child and began writing poems before she learned cursive. She has provided services to foster children and their families in Central Washington for over two decades.  Terry was the winner of the 2007 Yakima Valley Allied Arts Juried Poetry Contest. Terry has had recent publications in the WPA´s Whispers & Shouts, Words-Myth, Poetry Super Highway and  Skyline. Her poems will also be featured in the summer edition of Weber: Journal of the Contemporary West. Listen to the "tune" referred to in this poem.

Terry and her mother "Matera Mou"

(inspired by "The Kiss of Peace" a photograph by Julia Margaret Cameron - 1864)

r.j. Nicolet

May I rest in you... enormously?
I have lost my way, traveling to Heaven
On foot.
If I could just but sleep, a second hand
To the six,
In your arms...
When I wake; I will lift silently
My canvas sack and gently tread
From your immensity.

I heard of rainbows, true love and magical
Storytellers, in Heaven.
But the wind has whipped circle after circle
And the rain has fallen for days -
Rushing every ancient stream
Into bullying rapid rivers, that have
Overcrowded the lakes into one
Magnanimous waterfall...
Flooding the oceans, over the shores.
Covering all the land mass with blue sea.

My eyes hurt
But over the mountain I saw
The rays of sunshine,
That are coming from your hands.
My body is weak, my spirit weary.
I ask - shamelessly,
May I rest in you... enormously?

(The Kiss Of Peace by Julia Margaret Cameron )

Poet's Biography unavailable at this time.

GOD, I LOVE SPRING

jacob erin-cilberto

drive me bored,

i'm too titillated at the moment

that song on the radio is gaining momentum

i want to steer into a tree

and cap a good day off with a bang

yesterday's regrets are bumper stickers

you shouldn't be able to read

unless you are too close to me

and if that's true, let's accelerate together

sing along to the tune

my heart is losing its fizz

the speedometer is racing like my intent

the leaves are beckoning,

but they are crooked,

my emotions a windy pattern

my bark deafening

but the biting sadness

is the shadow of the big oak

that will punctuate my life.

jacob erin-cilberto lives and teaches in Southern Illinois. He has written and published poetry since 1970 and enjoys teaching poetry workshops to spread his love for the genre. He was nominated for a Pushcart award for 2006-2008. jacob has reviewed poetry books for Skyline and Water Forest Press.

Simon Perchik

*

All summer and one branch

behind the other, warming up

--where can this tree go

without taking along the sky

who will betray it, look back

the way postcards picture cold days

wedged between the little fires

on your breath

--what are headwinds to these leaves

who remember when even the sky

had no color, the sun

a relentless blue and roots once wings

touch down over some fragrance

deep in the Earth and never returned

--you will mail view after daring view

till one card losing speed

and inside its colors a thin plume

pulling you east to west

to that first rainbow leaning too far

--you forget to breathe! an address

so beautiful and you are there

planting a garden :card after card

and small flowers again airborne

--you were there! the sky

had eagles in its mouth, the emptiness

beginning to take place

Simon Perchik is an attorney whose poems have appeared in Partisan Review, The New Yorker, Skyline Magazine and elsewhere. Family of Man (Pavement Saw Press) is scheduled for Fall 2009. For more information, including his essay “Magic, Illusion and Other Realities” and a complete bibliography, please visit his website at www.geocities.com/simonthepoet.

FLOAT

Elizabeth Colby

Exhausted, unaware of inspiration
She spins like a leaf
In breezy autumn


Inspiration hides in creases of her brain
Then escapes, floating above her

Just out of reach
Summoning her, seducing her
Manipulating her into pure madness

Inspiration; that small, fleeting fly
With weak wings and broken legs
Only able to float most days
With little chance to soar and fly

Yet once in a while
One soft blink and you will miss
That Great, Rare Flight
Of the fickle, fragile thing
That is called inspiration

Elizabeth Colby is a a poet and teacher. Some of her poems have been in international anthologies and online. She has been published in The Eclectic Muse, Soul Fountain, and in a local poetry magazine called Seraphim. Elizabeth is also shopping around a poetry manuscript called "Ivory Wings, Filthy Feet." She has been writing and reading poetry for fifteen years. Elizabeth has a Bachelors degree in English from Idaho State University. My full-time job is as a teacher. Elizabeth teaches six and seven-year - olds. Her creativity comes in handy as a teacher. Elizabeth also holds a Writers' Workshop for seven, eight and nine-year-olds.

Poem and Drawing by Amitabh Mitra

Amitabh Mitra is a poet, artist, publisher and a medical doctor based in East London, South Africa. A widely published poet in the web and print, Amitabh has held many exhibitions of his poetry art. ‘A Slow Train to Gwalior’ is a CD of his ten most popular love poems recited against a background of Indian and African traditional music. A documentary film incorporating his love poems is being produced in South Africa. He represented South africa at the World Literature Festival in Oslo September 2008. Check his web site www.amitabhmitra.com

http://poetsprintery.book.co.za

 

Dr. Mitra will be giving some performance poetry on the 9 July at the Words Festival part of the International Grahamstown Festival 2009. A short film showing the fusion of words, colors, music and events would also be shown in the film festival circuit.

Hudson View Digests will be distributed to all poets. Tonight, An Anthology of World Love Poetry will be sold at the festival.

Six of Amitabh's multimedia works incorporating colors and words are being exhibited during this period.  Amitabh's coffee table book 'A Slow Train to Gwalior' which has poems and water colors is planned for release soon.

 

http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/invited/502557/4493981dbbdc0998087d6b90127cb64f

 

Read Loving You  Poetry and Art by Amitabh Mitra

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