I passed it unawares, others fallen, rotting with perfume pervasive as the gnats forming my halo and feasting delicately on the membranes of my ears and eyes.
I knew the yew had metaphorical heft, but failed to remember the sources. Nowadays memory fails faster than legs which also begin to falter halfway.
Nothing prepares you for death— isn’t quite true. We know in our bones that shadow from the hill will only lengthen as the day wears on.
Yew, I never knew you in your glory, having never walked these woods. But is it a crime to feel no sadness for a tree that perished naturally?
I walk toward a clearing, heavy in my heart and heavier-legged as I seek something more than communion with a natural death.
Salvatore Difalco is a Sicilian Canadian poet and storyteller. His work appears in a number of print and online journals.
I have stolen the dandelions scattered their seeds across
fields of tulips and tamarind I have felt desire crack
my lips apart under the weight of its slippery skin
What fresh figs, what sunny flowers What breaking hearts
rot beneath the hills beneath sticky sidewalk pavements
We grow older but not duller hovering translucent over
calendar time
Sara Whittemore is a poet living in Houston, Texas. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the Jack Kerouac School at Naropa. Her work has recently appeared in Interim Magazine, Juniper Press and Tiny Spoon, and others. In addition to being a poet she is an artist, alien and cat person. You can find her on instagram @sarafromsaturn.
brutalized attacked and slandered beaten throughout centuries wandering through a mist of sorrow through world wars through a cemetery the size of the Sea of Reeds
then blessed by God and nations and given back their homeland holy land returned to Zion oh Israel oh holy land oh El Elohe Yisrael oh The Mighty One God of Israel
how terrifying you’ve become how brutal your power how punishing your vengeance how bloody your hands
you’ve let loose the leash of the angels of the apocalypse upon your neighbors and upon their land God’s hell has risen
now the broken people now the occupied the scattered descendants of the conquered bombed to dust their hospitals their places of worship their schools their people their children their lineage their line of hope obliterated in the constant barrage of revenge
only the law of God matters El Elohe Yisrael only the law of Israel above the laws of men of war of nations above the internationals from above comes the law from above the blessing of violations of wanton cruelty from above the blessings of starvation the blessings of suffering the blessings of obliteration of the grave of the dark
terror begets terror begets terror begets the horror show begets infinite suffering a sea of tears a grand canyon of corpses
for your neighbors not mercy but broken bones not compassion but severed bodies for your neighbors there is no salt no bread no wine but disease starvation and poisoned water
oh Palestine the world watches and not much is done and what is done seems as spit into the wind as spit on to the face of Palestine
Palestine no mother’s day Palestine no fourth of July Palestine no apple pie no answers from Salat no call from God no response from the deepening chorus of mourning echoing out toward Mecca and bouncing off the Kaaba
Ted Vaca is a Denver area based poet and performer. He began writing steadily in the late 1980’s in his home state of California. He has been published in numerous publications and has self-published two chapbooks. He is a member of the 1995 Asheville National Slam Poetry Championship team. He is a founding member of The Mercury Cafe Poetry Slam, (Denver, CO.) established in 2000, and ongoing since then. He is the coach of the 2006 Mercury Cafe Slam Championship team. He has hosted countless poetry readings and slams and special events throughout his 35-plus years in catering toward poetic pursuits.
Ted is an award winner of Colorado’s Lulu award for accomplishments in poetry and The James Ryan Morris Tombstone award.
Ted has worked for Art from Ashes, a Colorado based not for profit that encourages and teaches healing through art therapy, catering to youth in illness and at risk.
south broadway press 
