You clutch a dazzling pink rose
In front of the Spanish Steps.
The last of the day, bartered
For a bag of M&Ms.
No money changes hands.
No promises kept.
No way to go but headlong
Into the crowds.
Tramping on tourists, staring at horses,
Thinking Poesy past the Keats House,
Piazza di Spagna 26.
Life mask, death mask.
Walls of poetical works bound
In shiny green leather.
Romanticism dies on the short, striped bed,
A sleigh ride to the Elysian Fields.
Awake to sweet unrest.
Here is my ode
To a rose not fading unto death.
Bright colors of the Steps.
No struggle for a breath.

she was)

The vessel embarking at the sudden light

Empty as an infant

The eyes, the windows
The sonar, the ears
The propeller, the legs
The hull, the skin
Equpped with hands to grip and collect
Drifting into the great unknown

(She stirred)

The vessel predisposed to doldrums
basking in the sun's golden light
Mother moon at night
taking the vessel in

In warm embrace

The vessel learning from experience
storing its hurts, resentments,
sorrows, regrets
fears and guilts
in the hold

Susceptible to changing weather
And lightning strikes announcing who
she is

This vessel voyages the seas of time

Forming beliefs about self
telling stories and reminiscing

(She headed to the bathroom
Couldn't help it
Was so into the dream
Tried to keep it with her,
eyelids half shut
The vessel on the high seas)

(She dreamt)

The vessel was stuck at the Cape
Rockin and rollin
in waves of self pity
hanging on to the mast for dear life

Dear life.

Remembering
Deep love
Slices of delight
Happiness coming
The weather calm.

(She awoke with a start
Her breath taken away
"What a strange night"
She had to say,
The moon was setting
Dawn's twilight had not yet begun
She searched the high seas)

The vessel reached its port of call,
It had weathered many storms

The hold was bursting with forlorn
she carries with her,
in every breath she takes,

And, she proceeds -
proceeds to disembark

Fully alive, arriving at her destination

(Awakening, she is in a mood,
her dream, the waterway to the moon,
The vessel remained
The dream had ended too soon
As all wonderful dreams tend to do

The alarm clock went off,
She thought about calling in sick
She got on the computer
Started looking for ports of call.

I see you in
Girls on the bus writing in notebooks,
With notes,
Only their soul will understand,
In walks,
With music flickering to the street,
Lights and street lies,
The beats with my steps,
I see you in storm clouds,
Sliced by layers of light,
Through anxiety fights,
With attacks coming from places unknown,
Surrounded with an armor of well sown,
In dances too songs you never
Wanted to listen to,
Yet here we are,
The clouds became rain,
The anxiety has passed,
The song has changed,
The cord has been pulled,
And the stop is ahead,
I'm home,
And I still see,
You.

When the nights are endless
Full of time and space
I imagine the journey
Beyond roads and geography
And sometimes
I almost touch a beauty that can't be seen
And hear music from beyond our ears

My mind grasps for unknown stories
With endings not yet imagined
Meanings as yet undisclosed
For when nights are endless
I long for the truths that hide therein
Silently and invisibly
And I reach for the mysteries
That defy and deny us


                                          By Phil Roberts

at times we tend to think
our democracy is safely founded and secure
only eventually we recognize
the need to constantly defend its fundamental rights
work steadily against their stealthy abolition
watch carefully the words of politicians
       lest they betray what they pretend to say
think twice for whom we cast our votes
avoid contenders who too often bray
     that these were not their quotes  
listen to those who have good arguments
     do not unleash too easy sentiments
and in the end cast our votes when called

in short  
democracy turns out to be hard work

     in case we shirk this
     we soon pay the price

unfree societies have known
     dictatorship  corruption  vice
have often needed centuries
to remedy injuries done
to find their four freedoms

and to recognize
democracy remains a living promise
a brilliant idea with many faces
always a work in progress

Expected bad news
Did not receive it
Relief enormous
After fear ginormous

What a tangled web we weave
Seeing a future we cannot see
Fear is the monster under the bed
The unimaginable imagined

Yield sign versus stop sign:
RR Crossing down and flashing;
Striped bars slowly rise and we
Proceed preciously…

On a night when nothing better
was likely to happen, a beat throbbed
out just the right line, and a bounce woke
up in the toe of a boot, and everything
in the night sky was sparkling light,
which is how I found myself one time
at the local VFW where they played
the same tattered tunes over and over
until the need to dance drained out
of a lonely sad woman there like suds
from a dripping beer tap, and so
she steered me out onto the back deck
where a hard-boiled moon dangled
from the power lines looking something
like hope warmed over; we untangled
ourselves when the sun finally shined.