Pantoum Poems
First-World Guilt
Thomas Quitzau
November 26, 2022
When I think that I might utter something
Profound, provocative, of great import
Connected to millions in social sport
When I pretend, I am worldly knowing!
Profound…provocative…of great import…
Shame on me that most of my time is spent
(When I pretend I am worldly knowing!)
Not among the needy, the pained, the poor
Shames me to own most of my time is spent
In this minuscule mind to me You’ve lent
Not with the needy, the pained, or the poor
As gravity pulls me hard to hard floor
And this minuscule mind You’ve lent to me
Tricked by Your Earth’s hypnotic false rhythm
Back hard to hard floor gravity pulls me
Home, fed, wondering why I’m not with ’em
Thomas Quitzau grew up in the Gulf Coast region and worked for over 30 years in Houston, Texas. A self-ascribed member of the ZenJourno School of poetry, Tom recently relocated with his family to Long Island, New York where he teaches and writes.
In Her Diminishing World
Betsy Joseph
October 29, 2022
“Where did you go?” I once dared to ask
my mother grown small in her diminishing world.
Her eyes were ungazing, her features a mask,
as pieces of wordless thought simply swirled.
My mother, grown small in her diminishing world,
knows not the time or the day.
Pieces of wordless thought simply swirl
and she wishes they would settle and stay.
My mother knows not the time or the day.
As musical notes flutter and fall,
she so wishes they would settle and stay,
yet they tease her and float down the hall.
As she listens to notes flutter and fall,
her eyes ungazing, her features a mask,
the notes still tease her and float down the hall.
Wiser at last, I choose not to ask.
Betsy Joseph lives in Dallas and has poems that have appeared in a number of journals and anthologies. She is the author of two poetry books published by Lamar University Literary Press: Only So Many Autumns (2019) and most recently, Relatively Speaking (2022), a collaborative collection with her brother, poet Chip Dameron. In addition, she and her husband, photographer Bruce Jordan, have produced two books, Benches and Lighthouses, which pair her haiku with his black and white photography.
Shadow Mirror
Margo Stutts Toombs
October 22, 2022
Shadow mirror tucked in a back corner
Clothed in dust and cobwebs
A Dorian Gray to hold her nightmares
Frozen in glass and tarnished silver
Clothed in dust and cobwebs
Old fears hide in the dark
Frozen in glass and tarnished silver.
She feels it in her heart.
Old fears hide in the dark
Growing like a virus
She feels it in her heart.
Salvation waits in the sunlight.
Growing like a virus
Her Dorian mirror horrifies
Until she thrusts it into the sunlight
And scrubs the mirror tucked in a back corner.
Margo Stutts Toombs enjoys creating and performing poetry. Her work lives in FreezeRay Poetry, Untameable City - Mutabilis Press, the Texas Poetry Calendar, Love over 60: An Anthology of Women’s Poems, The Ekphrastic Review, the Friendswood Library Ekphrastic Poetry Contest, Equinox, and Synkronicity. She performs spoken-word poetry at fringe festivals.
On Birthdays, She Wears Red
Amy L. Greenspan
October 15, 2022
A 90th birthday arrives,
unseen by the woman in red,
who once greeted this day with delight
and predictions of terrible weather.
Unseen by the woman in red,
our names fall through brain holes,
and predictions of terrible weather
repeat in looping cycles.
Our names fall through brain holes,
and words (“Where’s the time gone?”)
repeat in looping cycles,
meaning sucked into the void.
And words (“Where’s the time gone?”)
let us pretend normalcy.
Meaning sucked into the void,
we gather, celebrate the day.
Let’s pretend normalcy!
Ice cream, presents, cake!
We gather, celebrate the day
a 90th birthday arrives.
Amy L. Greenspan spent much of her career as Managing Editor for a legal publishing company. Her poems appear in multiple editions of the Texas Poetry Calendar, as well as collections including Weaving the Terrain: 100-Word Southwestern Poems, Lifting the Sky: Southwestern Haiku and Haiga, di-verse-city, cattails, and Haiku Presence.
Wednesday Blues
John Rutherford
October 8, 2022
The printer’s broken down again,
the copies crooked, the paper torn.
I straighten it out between phone calls
and cut my thumb for the trouble.
The copies crooked, the paper torn,
the service tech can’t come today,
and cutting my thumb for the trouble
I put some sticking plaster on.
The service tech won’t come today,
so there isn’t much else I can do
except admire my plastered thumb
and twiddle it with the other.
There isn’t much for me to do,
some emails, maybe, answer phones
or just twiddle here about my desk
until I’m relieved for lunchtime.
John Rutherford is a poet writing in Beaumont, Texas. Since 2018 he has been an employee in the Department of English at Lamar University.
Night of the Pump Jacks
Sandi Stromberg
October 1, 2022
The lamppost casts shadows through swaying trees.
My eyes won’t close in this unfamiliar room.
Dark dressers, bedside tables, a trunk or two,
like a movie scene from an Egyptian tomb.
My ears won’t close in this unfamiliar room,
where metal scrapes and clunks, reverberates,
like echoes in a pillaged Egyptian tomb.
I curl under covers afraid of whom I do not know.
Metal scrapes metal with a screaming screech.
Is it the vengeful cry of an unchained spirit?
I burrow to hide from whom I do not know,
alone in this eerie, secluded room.
Is it the vengeful cry of an unchained spirit?
I shiver checking windows—closed and locked.
Alone in this eerie, secluded room.
The crank and clank continue their grating sound.
Windows closed and firmly locked, I shiver.
No one will know to come if a spirit enters.
The crank and clank resound, resound, resound.
Has the Mummy risen to take its due?
No one will come if a spirit enters
this room of dark dressers, a trunk or two.
Has the Mummy risen to take its due
as the lamppost casts shadows through swaying trees?
Sandi Stromberg led a nomadic life until she arrived in Houston, Texas, where putting down roots in gumbo earth has been challenging and rewarding. Her poetry has been nominated three times for a Pushcart and twice for Best of the Net. Recent publications include Panoply: The Literary Zine, The Ekphrastic Review, MockingHeart Review, San Pedro River Review, and the Texas Poetry Assignment.