Category: heat (Issue No. III)

Oracle

Charles Venable

god never withheld visions
even joseph owned a bronze bowl
for scrying
imagine
it filled with burnt bones
am i still the boy
my brothers threw in the hole?

pareidola

man’s tendency to see patterns
where there are none
this finger bone reveals
his brothers are alive
this knuckle tells him
throw benjamin in prison

and grow up like his father
a deceiver
lord over his brothers
set above them
in famine
banished to this land
their descendants enslaved

but god sends messages
to men like moses
signs like the burning bush
demand
we remove our shoes and sandals
this is holy ground
it says
cinders burn bare feet.

apophenia

man’s curse to see connections
where there are none
if a bush
combusts
speaks
it might be god
go free his people from bondage

and grow up a prophet
but for forty years
in the wilderness
wander
a generation dies
punishment
for listening to a burning bush

or listening to a talking donkey
like balaam
the oracle called to curse israel
he did the wise thing
struck it with his staff
just in case
it wasn’t a sign of

schizophrenia

man’s disease to hear voices
where there are none
or for balaam
god’s voice
it was wise to obey
a talking donkey.

and grow up forgotten,
save sunday school lessons
he is the fool
the donkey saw
an angel on the road
he didn’t know

i asked god
for a vision of the future,
no bronze bowl
no burning bush
no talking donkey
i prayed and prayed
and prayed

Charles Venable

A cold glass of water against this heat

Laurie Koensgen

I can’t let it rest
on the table without
causing a ring—

a humid halo,
a planet’s misty caul,
concentric swells a fish makes
in the stillness
of a lake

or, as if you wet your finger
in the pool of your tongue
and circle my glass’s rim
until it performs a singing bowl’s
holy solo.

My fingers trace
the wet ring on my thigh.
Glass in hand, I wait for you.

Laurie Koensgen

how to swim

Rick White

don’t let me interrupt myself steve
i’m a motherfucking serial killer
holy blast radius
pharmaceutical winter

i’m your haunted parentheticals
your white noise ghost
chewing on waves of interference
dancing on the tips of useless prose

i’ve stared down xanax nightmares
in taxidermy bars
i’m the locum doctor
in the for-your-own-good ward

i’ve danced with graceless liars
foxed the chickens in
belted strapped and tripwired
til the filaments go dim

so fill me to the widest part
so i have room to breathe
sanctify your indiscretions
wrought beautifully in porcelain

wake me up in gardens made of night time
beat me til my hands and feet cave in
meet me by a moonlit pool at midnight
i’ll teach you how to swim

Rick White

That Summer We Knew Each Other

Kassandra Montag

Almost every weekend that summer,
you would join me on the porch at dusk.
As the night wore on we could see a raccoon
or possum stalking past, nothing visible
but its eyes and the silhouette of fur.

We are the sum of our parts, you would say.
Or, I am not living, only existing.

Words nothing like your flannel shirt,
or the glow of the streetlights,
or the thick scent of pine trees.

That August two hard rains fell.
Before and after heat hung in the air
like claws stuck in prey and steam caught in my throat.

I heard yesterday that you got a job
with a logging company up north.
That you don’t speak to many people.
You read books, smoke, sit on your porch at night.

Once that August I opened your cedar box
to reach for a cigar and when I looked up
you were watching me.

Your look reminded me of a photo
I saw earlier that summer in a psychiatric museum.
The man was chained to a wall with an iron ring
around his neck, his feet bound with cloth.

An hour before the photo he may have been spun in a cage
or shaken or kicked or doused with water,
and still he remained tucked away.
He stared at the camera with his deep-set eyes

Please, interfere with me.

Kassandra Montag

Declaration

Megha Sood

I draw that circle of protection around me
keeping me safe,
breathing in the shadows
of simmering love
and gulping the elixir
the concoction of love;
the reason for my sustenance,
like those mahogany swinging in the wild.

The nape of my neck
feeling the apricity
a warm embrace;
as if the skin speaks of your love
the warm undulation to which
my heaving chest conforms
a feeling so sublime.

The symphony to which my breast syncopates
you are carved inside my soul
deeply seeded,
like those endless moles
which your gelid fingers counted
in the frothy moonlight
on my undulating back.

As it rises and falls back with passion
that smoldering aroma,
of your breath interlaced with mine.
It births a thousand poem
those gyrating hips,
in that naked moment
when your heart
called me, mine.

Megha Sood

Enjoying Emerald Isle

Catherine A. Coundjeris

Days like poetry
Stretch out forever
In a shimmering light
On summer beaches.
The roar of the serf
Lulling me to sleep.
Shrimp for dinner on
Every long summer day.
Tortoise and dolphin pass by.
Terns and ghost crabs
Caught on film
Pelicans making their daily journey
From one side of the beach to the other.
Contentment like the warm waves of air
All around with sky and water.
Time is liquid here
And the heat a second skin.
We wear next to nothing
Morning, noon, and night,
Swimming with the rays
Both sunshine and fish.
An occasional shark
Six foot and gray,
But mostly all together in one house
Enjoying Emerald Isle.

Catherine A. Coundjeris

Heart of the Fire

Essie Dee

Shades of violet in the sky
Sunset
Iridescent patio lights
Dance in a gentle breeze
Cicadas and crickets sing love songs
Before the bass kicks in
Low and pulsing
An engaged heartbeat
Whoops of joy, glasses clink
Cheers to a long weekend
Campfire set, bodies sway
Volume and bottle count steadily increase
A few too many had
Eyes meet through smokey haze
Curve of lip, raised eyebrow
A desired understanding
An approach, flickers of light
Cast shadows on his face, in her eyes
Two move to the music
Hands and forms press into one another
In the background cheers erupt
Acknowledging the inevitable
But they do not hear
Their song is heartbeat, quick breath and thoughts
Of what may be on a sticky summer night

Essie Dee