Judy DeCroce
Poetry Contributor
Kristiana Reed
There is something
in the way you soar;
a love which is visceral
extending beyond
all we could ever hope for
You refuse to give up
even when your wings
are tied and you take flight
on the ground
searching for your ocean sky.
Your eyes always
watching the great above
believing it is
within your feathery touch
and little bird –
it is.
In your metamorphosis
from sparrow
to hawk to eagle.
You fly ever higher,
grow ever brighter
although you are alone
and far from home.
You leave a breadcrumb
legacy shimmering
in gold;
the little bird
who did not listen
to what she was told
but pursued the dreams
she felt deep in her bones. .
Sarah SchaffPoetry Contributor
Sarah Schaff is a writer from Boise, Idaho. They have previously been published in Juke Joint Mag and Independent Variable Magazine.
Satya DashPoetry Contributor
A response to the recent plagiarism controversy re: Ailey O’Toole and Rachel McKibbens
Lannie Stabile
It is slow sludge struggling
through a paper windpipe.
I, myself, am choked,
clogged like a dead
sewer city. My talent is so
shriveled, so flightless, I can’t
even vomit without vomiting.
A bird unspun the
snakes within, feigning veins,
that once fed on my inertia,
occupied space in my throat.
She knew her song like it had
perched on her chest for too
many winters. A stout gremlin
tinkering with her lungs
instead of a plane. And when
she coughed up blud,
I siphoned it from her lips.
Charlotte Hamrick
After the storm we waited
for the return of the birds.
The air around the house
was silent
and devoid of flutterings,
a vacuum of tweets and
whistles. What straggling
flowers were left went
hummingbirdless while
twigs and string were
just
twigs and string
with no hope of sheltering
featherless offspring.
It was strangely quiet,
as though they were all
sucked into a void
somewhere and became
dinosaurs again in
another dimension.
They were a wondrous
memory for a time until
slowly winging their way
back home.
In the leadup to our inaugural issue, flight, we shared a series of micropoems from some talented submitters:
Juliette SebockEditor-In-Chief and Founder
Juliette Sebock is the author of Mistakes Were Made (2017), Micro (2019), How My Cat Saved My Life and Other Poems (2019, Bottlecap Press), and Boleyn (2020, Twist in Time Press), and has work forthcoming or appearing in a wide variety of publications.
She is the founding editor of Nightingale & Sparrow, runs a lifestyle blog, For the Sake of Good Taste, and is a regular contributor with Marías at Sampaguitas, Royal Rose Mag, Memoir Mixtapes, and The Poetry Question. Currently, she is working on a variety of personal and freelance projects.
When she isn’t writing (and sometimes when she is), she can be found with a cup of coffee and her cat, Fitz.
Juliette can be reached at her website or across social media.
Juliette Sebock
Eternal optimist
flying high above the pain,
floating over orchard walls,
away from life, away from here,
banished to the sky
in a prison of restraint,
free from orchard branches, jailhouse bars,
in flight where poachers, gatekeepers can’t reach you.
Still, never still,
fleeing the fears you should have left behind;
nightingale and sparrow in an urgent race
against life, against fear, against time.