the third step from the bottom of the staircase to the third floor scoffs at me with his endlessly startling creak
there are nails in most of the walls
it took 20 hours to drive the fine paintings and sculptures safely
yet my beloved pieces of oils and acrylics are still sitting in the garage
the nails still naked and bare revealing 1/2 an inch of space into the drywall
we are just too tired to hang anything up right now
we opt out so we can climb into bed and touch legs under the covers
its hurricane season, and that might contribute to the river rising behind the picket fence
when i heard it was hurricane season
my husband and I brainstormed ways to keep our furniture upright on the dock
i suggested we tie a fishing line with a bobber into each cushion and chair leg
this way we can see where the winds took our belongings based on the colored floating pokeball shaped objects circling with the whirlpools and the tides
he suggested nails
so we can permanently secure our furniture against the storms and against my far out ideas
i think thats why we work
even in a house falling apart, we aren’t.
because even if only one of us can remember what we actually need in a given moment
I know we will both remember that we need each other at every moment.
“down with the cold”
she came down with the cold
we blink in constant flutters trying to flash backwards in our memories the way we’d imagine in an old sci fi film
walking backwards in the snow hiding in a bush so we can hope to confuse our monsters without confusing ourselves as well
initially she bubbled at the rate of bachelorette champagne
screams were out of sheer excitement and fury belonged to the fits of laughter
originally her nails came pristine, her skin youthful and well moisturized
shed never thought to wear pants or gloves, didn’t own a scarf or winter coats
she wore shorts, because shed never been looked at by a strange man in ways that gave her goosebumps
her shirt need not be too long in the sleeves yet, no desire to hide her tightly scrunched fists inside the fabrics of the day
the first time her skin crawled was the second day one man whom she previously had no interaction with decided the fastest way to touch a woman was to just do it whenever he felt the urge
his urge turned her urgency to get off the train a town too early into a best case scenario
30 miles from home, but shed at least face the foot deep snow in the safety of her own company
she was already feeling frost bitten, but nothing a warm cup of herbal tea and an affirmation meditation couldn’t kick
or after a few days of disassociating from any part of her had previously utilized the railways
a week later she gets herself a bus pass the towns move by much slower this way but she quietly enjoyed seeing trees holding their ground blur in flashes she told herself that a jacket happens sometimes that she can be strong and let parts of herself blur past
the bus driver offers her a free week of transit in exchange for a free night of her time
he seemed fine but it wasn’t until after that line, she realized the weather was changing in front of her eyes
what first could be spring, a route of life not endangered or forcibly shared turned winter, where any fruit unpicked might as well be dead with the fields
we recall her lively self when she was warm but she didn’t even call us to help her get herself down off the weakening stem supporting her blooms
and so we will always remember how it happened
when she came down with the cold
“Finding the light”
Finding the light.
I wrote the words
but I felt as though I was writing out false scripture
“looking for the light” sure
“does light ever come?” absolutely
but being in the now and the present tense verbiage of finding the light
its surreal.
and a bit comical. it looks nothing at all like i thought it would
yet when I saw it and recognized it as my own
Familiarity finally found me.
The sunshine flooding my body
giving me a first glimpse of the carvings on walls
the very ones id been blindly etching in for decades
the scratches in the bricks weren’t as finite as I had previously accepted
I had made peace with the brutality of squinting to counteract my bad eye sight
to convince my eyes that the depths of the shadows must have been objects
even if they weren’t there
even if their existence doesn’t matter in the slightest
the designs of my surroundings was almost the hill I had chosen to die on
She had been persistent for days instinctually yearning and fighting for her right to exist how she feels she is meant to I never wanted to argue with her I had no negative intent as I convinced her to move i even bribed her once I had finally memorized her name and gained her trust the next time I saw her she made an unforgettable sound a shriek so different than even her angriest moments when i got close enough I saw her being strangled by a four foot snake inside her coop and right in front of her nest protecting her instincts, herself, her.. the snake took his prey into the woods 10 warm eggs exposed for the first time .. her life’s work.
“extraordinary invisibility”
I’ve made such a comfortable home in the silences between the crashes
i know how to be so silent
so quiet, no intruding even in the room my body exists in
I can make so little known of who I am
i can sit still and say nothing
move no muscles
forget i have them
or bones
a backbone
a spine
a soul
So silent in between the waves you wouldn’t even think you heard me
my chest would rise and fall, but with no visual you might glance, look away, and forget to ever glance back
because there didn’t seem to be anything there the first time
if they saw me, was it so brutal, vile, a hostility with no empathetic capability
no humanic mutuality
no mutual humanity
if they return one day claiming an empty room
will you believe them?
will you ask them what I said?
Will they say “nothing”
will you ask me what they saw
will they report
“an empty void”
“a wasted space”
will they say
“nothing”
“Escalating”
My poems are evolving
a stable deescalation of my methods and religions
i wouldn’t say so much in a crime scene fashion
but it almost appears that way as parts of my own soul splatter all over a page
The experts will appear after the fact and examine my work
declare my purpose beneficial to humanity or against the natural law
I read the fine print, as have they.
why in all of my actions do their stamps of approval always resonate tenfold of my own
no one taught me this brutal art of self-expression, my manifest is still unwritten
my experiences permanent and heavy
immobile like a circle of boulders unable to scatter the rolling hills.
will they wonder how I got here?
why i cant leave,
move on,
subside,
digress.
black ops, but just empty instead of crossed out
there are no warrants shown to demand my thoughts
I haven’t been discovered, condemned, tried
i dont even need to be prompted or triggered
because even though the judges haven’t signed the pages yet, my brain feels warranted in its autonomy
my words my choice
freedom of thoughts, but approval always seems to have a price too high to cover…
of course keep in mind that that does not include gratuity or the price to bring to light what taunts me in the dark
I come with a pen to an untouched possibility
even if i poured my soul in a deep dark stain
would I still leave no trace?
“Believer”
I believed I could see it but as it turns out, believing isn’t seeing
or maybe she wasn’t seeing anyone right now double booked, called in sick, on one of her sabbaticals
maybe what she held up as the upmost of faith, regardless of its legitimacy, overwhelmed her as she looked at the path in front of her in that moment
all of the worst case scenarios lined up for role call. Standing in a brutally strong stance with facial expressions, so confident, so sure.
At attention to detail, but positively the battalion of her own doubts.
so tall someone her size wouldn’t be able to look past the wall of Murphys Law.
So instead of coming to her own table with whatever she could
she gave up her seat, let it all go with 110% effort,
as if to disappoint in full and not over and over again
not repeatedly in the tiny ways she forgot or rain checked or just got too caught up in all of the fault lines of her worn hands
she isn’t a fortune teller, but somehow she is convinced that the future will go along just fine without her, because today shes keeping the curtains closed
because of her doubt in her own beliefs
Bio: I have spent my whole life stumbling over jumbled thoughts. As I grow, I feel most connected to myself through my ability to write. The works of artists like Jasmine Mans and Alysia Harris have echoed in my mind for years. I hope to find deeper connections to the world around me through those who are brave enough to do the same. If I am lucky enough to share my words with those who want to read them, I hope their experience takes them further to their own feelings. Poetry may be extremely personal to the author, but the interpretation is profoundly unique to each one of us.
the clues hidden in the cues of body language and verbal inflections
we can choose to refuse to name each hue
all we know is the colors are beautiful
beautiful like a yearning to celebrate every holiday even the ones we dont truly understand
timeless like slow motion scenes of our adolescent selves left behind
but joyously running from candy egg to candy egg
the infinite possibility creating realities that sound like a day dream
but we are encapsulated in this in-between
this sprint of half confidence and pure determination to conquer each discovery
colors will fade, shells will crack and biodegrade
but the joys of each step in this capsule with you
will keep me young forever
-Haven’t Had a Moment-
I haven't had a moment to write
or maybe ive had the moment but not the energy
maybe ive had a moment but i just havent found the snug hiding spot yet
a place with hundreds of hums from the wildlife booming beyond the wooden structures
and if the space is just right with a perfect amount of light, I still hadnt been able to write
Is it terrible to admit, I just haven’t had a moment
Or I have, but not one where the warm bits of my soul and the cold stings of realities steady into a coherent fashion
my favorite teeshirt didn’t sit just right and the nest of a bun was too tight but too loose
I've thought about taking a moment
but a moment too tight
then the words just don't roll off my brain when you spill letters from the vocabulary of my insane it will read much too vain
i want you to hear me for all of the intonation of the constant stimulation of these endless thoughts that make sense but only in certain structures
and without the right mind and rhyme and and without the right moment
i forget how to be a poet
Bio for Alexis Murphy: I have spent my whole life stumbling over jumbled thoughts. As I grow, I feel most connected to myself through my ability to write. The works of artists like Jasmine Mans and Alysia Harris have echoed in my mind for years. I hope to find deeper connections to the world around me through those who are brave enough to do the same. If I am lucky enough to share my words with those who want to read them, I hope their experience takes them further to their own feelings. Poetry may be extremely personal to the author, but the interpretation is profoundly unique to each one of us.
If bullets returned like boomerangs, how many holes would show in his pierced chest
when swords drawn in the name of security
push outward against the odds of total loss
what of our original purposes will be misunderstood, if our reasoning wont show engraved in our bones the way we planned
how lost will our clocks be when we dismantle the faces, just struggling to turn back any hands revealing facts
not emotions.
not religion.
not perception.
will an eye gouged of two different faces on two different sides of a battlefield help anyone to see more clearly
or will senses now forcibly heightened convince our nerves that our pain is personal and too intense for amicable resolution
do the souls birthed by women of different lives taken too early bring mothers to their knees in opposite fashions
or will her collapse look eerily identical when cradling a corpse of her homemade heart
no longer beating
can you hear her wails like echoes
so impactful a canyon is unnecessary
would you still have courage to tell her all of this ‘necessary’ was truly necessary?
have the bullets returned to you yet?
how many holes? how fast are you bleeding out?
do we even have time for another verse?
‘Comparing our Bones. Part 2”by Alexis Murphy
I never knew her before she was known as the girl blown to pieces before the forsaken mission of proving a point settling a score or calling a bluff
it had nothing to do with her but that might have been her inevitable downfall her choices were never in her control no multiverse with better scenarios existed in her community
not to them
she knew that better than she would ever know herself
spoken for words chosen by others only to return a response to her superiors when given permission navigate the bespoke nuances of ancient principles
taught and preached like a game of telephone except no one picks up so dont dare call out on your own
we never knew her her brilliant mind shackled in silence is she understood now?
did this plot have a foreshadow when the sun cast one behind her outlining a silhouette but never details
is it too painful to grasp that until now, we never saw her what was inside her soul? not just the fragments of her body
of which we are now listening to what her eyes once tried to tell us
just her eyes
now gone
now buried under vengeance and the determination of morphed values
she never knew herself, even as bright as she was never allowed the chance never allowed
she knew so much, but eyes can only scream coherently when connecting with someone
who has the decency to make eye contact
ROSARY by Paula Puolakka
Remember to read Outside the narrow Segments And truly Rely on the force of Your ROSARY.
FATHER by Paula Puolakka
Fear nothing And find your saint: Then, you will be focused and He - God - will support you in Everything, Reminded the good FATHER.
The Legion of the Lost by Mohit Saini
Beneath a sky of smoldering steel, Where bayonets twist like shadows' teeth, A row of skulls, pale and unreal, Guards tombs they never chose to keep.
Fire licks the gun and bone, Each spark a wail, each ember a moan. War etches faces—not with might, But shattered masks of endless night.
Helmets leer, their sockets bare, No gaze remains, only charred air. And in the hush, the ashes sigh Of battles fled and dead lullabies.
Who answers now in dust and gloom? What banner flies where none resumes? Only phantoms, flame-fed, rise, Marching in lines that fire denies.
Heavy Metal by Lynn White
Consumed by flames metal melts consumed by flames into skeletons consumed by flames fresh faces form and consumed by flames revert to ore and earth and dust and shocked by awe even heavy metal melts.
Bio for Alexis Murphy: I have spent my whole life stumbling over jumbled thoughts. As I grow, I feel most connected to myself through my ability to write. The works of artists like Jasmine Mans and Alysia Harris have echoed in my mind for years. I hope to find deeper connections to the world around me through those who are brave enough to do the same. If I am lucky enough to share my words with those who want to read them, I hope their experience takes them further to their own feelings. Poetry may be extremely personal to the author, but the interpretation is profoundly unique to each one of us.
Bio: Paula Puolakka (1982) is a Healing Communicator (JYU) and an Expert in Service Design (The Finnish Institute for Enterprise Management.) Currently, she’s studying: her mentors are the good Fathers (x 2) of the Roman Catholic Church (in Finland.)
Mr. Mohit Saini is an Assistant Professor at Compucom Institute of Technology & Management in Jaipur. With 8 years of experience in the field of language and linguistics, He has contributed significantly to research and education in these areas. His expertise includes literature, second language acquisition, Psycholinguistic, English grammar, multilingual education, and the implementation of language policies in higher education. Residing in the culturally rich city of Jaipur.
Bio for Alexis Murphy: I have spent my whole life stumbling over jumbled thoughts. As I grow, I feel most connected to myself through my ability to write. The works of artists like Jasmine Mans and Alysia Harris have echoed in my mind for years. I hope to find deeper connections to the world around me through those who are brave enough to do the same. If I am lucky enough to share my words with those who want to read them, I hope their experience takes them further to their own feelings. Poetry may be extremely personal to the author, but the interpretation is profoundly unique to each one of us.
‘nighty night’
I’m sitting here listening to you snore
too late into the night to act on my desire to nudge you awake just to loop you in
to update you
of the infatuation I’m constantly experiencing and bathing in laying by your side.
I hate the night, because some nights I cant fully stomach the harsh noise of nightmares that sound deafening all around you, in memories only you can hear.
but silence with you is hardly quiet, more like serene. Calm, safe, sturdy.
My anxiety is nicer next to you,
my skepticism more patient.
sleeping farthest from the door matters now, because you remind me that I matter now.
the ending of the dream always concludes more gracefully cloaked in your safe keeping and my nightmares approach with less confidence
being loved by you invalidates their power to be anything other than a bad dream.
Sleeping next to you has redefined the hours between the sunset and sunrise into something it has never ever been
for me, you stole night and gave me safe.
Anomaly.
There is no betrayal I have found that matches the pain of feeling betrayal from family. When we are born and children, our parents and siblings provide a universal animalistic part of our wellbeing and our ability to experience and feel love and care.
When your natural born protectors and carers refuse or aren’t capable of that responsibility, the result is relatively unavoidable. The child lost or never acknowledged was left in that moment in time. We kept growing, kept trying, kept trying to keep up. But children aren’t capable of filling the holes of parents sustainably. We aren’t adults, we aren’t parents.. and most importantly we are refused any reliable frame of reference.
For whatever reason we wear the failures of our parents, caregivers, and family like tattoos that cant be erased. Our experiences or lack thereof as helpless, unknowing children, cannot be changed now.
If parents failed in their lives, and children are the second chance, eventually the faults wont be easily concealed. No surprise if clothes and masks are handed to us or thrown our direction by those who failed us. They can’t rid you of your power as an adult, but maybe things can be covered, or turned away from. Maybe if they continue to navigate the faults of their own actions they can avoid confrontation.
If you were left behind, if you were the scapegoat, you might have also been the perfectionist. Desperately trying to prove to those not keeping us safe that we are worth it. Trying to make a minor’s voice heard over those of blood with tape over our mouths.
They know you are exceptional. They know you reached heights beyond your reach that they had never thought to show you. Maybe trying to bury the ugly parts of our time under their watch helps them to believe that they finally did it right. You are extraordinary, you always were, and while it probably looked like you had it all handled, i know you probably appeared that way because you desperately wanted your guardians to hold their hand out. It is our natural born instinct to protect our young, and your natural born right to seek shelter from your parents who brought you along. Their inability to execute those standards is a failure on their part.
HOWEVER: The distance you have gone by yourself holding your own hands, teaching and learning by your self. Feeling mistakes and pain you weren’t supposed to know about as a child and surviving anyways and furthermore thriving. That is a miracle and you are an anomaly.
They may never look you in the eye and acknowledge their failures to you. They were adults then and they are still adults now. You survived them.
•You single-handedly created success out of unfathomable circumstances.
•They had failures in perfect circumstances with the human you are. the child you were for them.
As a child of our own parenting, we overcompensate, we react, we perfect or give up. You as an individual may always be robbed of what they withheld. That hole in you that is half full may never be level with the rest of you. It is good to feel that, to grieve that, to accept that.
An anomaly can never sit flush with things beneath, nor should they. There is an entire population of individuals who were given the same hand. Find those orphans, survivors, siblings. you deserve the standard you have achieved for yourself. People out there just like you are wondering around feeling unable to squeeze into boxes too small, or boxes blown to pieces around them. Can you imagine the creations of miracles that find one another?
That is your future, an amazing future, all of your own doing. You shouldn’t have to squeeze and you should never have to beg for space. You have earned expansion. The world needs your expansion, so the next generation of boxes are never that small again.
“the elements”
Its quiet.
A silas sized hole in the home I only notice because I had never experienced the possibility of being whole
but when the joys in life start to duplicate in front of your eyes, a love so pure, your odds are better with a casino jackpot
than replicating the emotions that take my cold worn scales into the sun when my blood runs too cold for my own wellbeing wise like reptiles with the knowledge of several generations washing up on shore all at once
not in a violent way, but watching what you thought you understand pull away just to return a brutal tower of force defying the laws of nature like water defying gravity
flood gates opening, not religious but I will never stop worshiping at your feet both literally and figuratively
frequently exclaiming how tougher parts of your body and soul are still capable of being nurtured, softened, detoxed. capable and deserving.
admiring you isn’t work, its as easy as breathing to me now
and I’ve finally caught up to myself, and found a tiny window of time to actually focus on my breathing
its amazing what grows with unpolluted oxygen, organic substance
fresh herbs and dried bath teas, opening up your personal relationship with the simple pleasures of life.
you are mine
Be A Flower Child
So caught up in your ways That the thoughts never cross your mind Except they do all the time Because those thoughts control you Because maybe their thoughts control you
Enlightened you the warrior in the battle against yourself
Society bridging the gaps in the mind Or eroding the edges of a river with pollution
Filling your head with the deepest fears of existence Never ceasing to exist themselves But you tend to
Because existence means pain means power and bodily remains Heaped up in a pile an earths pile high Because all we did with our mind Was get high To get rid of the anxiety of being To get rid of the anxiety of life To get rid of the anxiety of self.
Be a flower child.
“wet paint”
for a true lover of fine art i was never any good at painting
i reminded myself of this when i bought a canvas and some oil paints
all shades of muted rose and muted forests
i might have almost coated the canvas in its entirety
a foundational layer in a subtle shade
pushed the brush from corner to corner to try and cover all of my bases
and it was going fine
the painting part was going fine
it was the waiting and the drying and the waiting
trying to force the interactions between the paint and the air hopelessly attempting to speed up the already perfectly productive symbiotic experience that was in motion
i was watching paint dry in the appropriate fashion and was somehow still trying to figure out where I had gone wrong
why it wasn’t a masterpiece yet why it was taking so long why I’m not yet van gogh in craft just in thoughts or irrationalities
even my painting is demanding or was the art teaching the artist
was this my canvas just reprimanding?
art reminding me every time i try to touch something that has plenty of time
repeating each morning that nothing good cures overnight
nothing of value becomes for the sake of it
should i stop starting my day with the poke of my ring finger into a blob of color not ready to be touched
should I refrain from adding another one of my fingerprints to a page that insists isn’t ready for me
will I ever amount to Modigliani or will my life conclude through a leap out a window
will my legacy leave me a widow with no capacity for existence without the one who keeps me grounded
can I regulate myself?
am I only as valuable along side the ones who promise me that if I sit still long enough, I may someday find recognition of each impression of my own soul
the real cost of a sincere masterpiece is never the art
Fevers of the Mind 