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 Aug 2018 Jeff Stier
Akira Chinen
She came to me in a dream
of bones
floating on top of the waters
of a riverbed of death
her cold lips
offered a warm smile
and the promise
of a place better than this
I heard my heartbeat slow
and fade
as I gave into the hope
of drowning
and dropped my bones
one by one
into the peaceful current
of her limbs
and now I can’t remember
my name or my sins
and I am no longer
here or there
but if this dream isn’t lying
I have finally found my home
#dreamweavers
 Aug 2018 Jeff Stier
L B
The Lehigh is chaffing
at the shoulders of her banks
Swollen
with mood of mud
brown and flat and far too fast

She tore those young girls
from their rafts
Decorated the trees
of a midstream island with them
hanging on like the leaves and silt
once did

Their cries swallowed
as she roared past
harvesting souls with clinging hands

Chosen
to be victim
Chosen
for a reason
to be spared
To see the news story, cut and paste the link.

https://www.lehighvalleylive.com/lehigh-county/index.ssf/2018/08/all_accounted_for_fire_chief_s.html
 Aug 2018 Jeff Stier
L B
On rising heat, killdeer flush
to decoy enemy--
threat to its young that roams too close
They rush to skim on hayish blur
wailing over wildflowers drying

Fretful twitter in perpetual flight
swifts-- twirl and hurl their bits of bodies--
debris
from a cumulonimbus of a late-day sky
toward a ridge of stag horn sumac
presuming horizon primordial
behind which time and city-- drift and wobble
on rising heat-- after rush hour

Rising Heat
Rising--
to meet my mind
on its way down
from my post behind
the laundromat
where I view it all--
rising--
where I usually go in search of quiet
to almost hear the ocean
     two hundred miles away
to strain words from wind
     in careless conversation
to wonder over
     missed whispers....

But not today
In rising heat, I went down
in search of something better--
     your eyes again
     solvent for my presence of mind
     dissolvers of hours and the order of things
But I need an excuse!
     To turn, to trespass, to disturb the peace!
     For your eyes again!
And still I need more-- being feverish, weak
Or?
Or... should I take the cure?
     To deny ...To deny

To deny what?
Overtones from a sea of years?
I don't know!  Whatever it was!
Nothing explain it...

I melt... I'm gone....
An old poem that keeps finding itself a need for expression.
 Aug 2018 Jeff Stier
Emily Miller
There’s a silhouette outside my eyelids and a deep, dark color that rose up out of a dream I had as a child.
There’s a forest green and a slow, methodical movement that suddenly becomes lithe and deliberate under the influence of art.
A small part of me recognized him from the visions I created as a child, but I never thought he’d come in the form of someone I love so much.
The best kind of love-
The kind that stays even when the weather is poor
And the roads are winding,
The real kind.
There’s no romance,
No flowery words,
But just like the man from my made-up narratives as a kid,
He’s sturdy
and he feels real.
I can read him and hear him and feel him even when the lights are low and life gets loud,
And he does just fine no matter what.
He survives.
Despite my desperation to escape the company of every other person,
Frantically crawling back to the solitude of my home,
I hesitate to leave his company.
Because friendship is the finest balm
For the singe of human emotion,
Moonbeams and a night breeze after the severe, summer sun.
That’s the truest kind,
The most authentic kind
Of love.
And when I dreamt man as a young girl,
I thought I’d find him under a jasmine arch,
At the end of the isle.
Instead I found him in a classroom,
And became his best friend.
**** the witch
hogtied to this
thin-skinned wagon
packed with privilege
call me wicked
if it makes it easier
view my plight
as one of my own making
I should have done
as I was told

Brand me traitor
as dust obscures
this timeworn scene
I know what it means
to be a whole divided
drawn and quartered
dragged to all four corners
left for buzzards
along the walled
deserted borders

scattered limbs
seeking unity
I reach for what’s mine
only to find
healing hands
too tightly praying
too busy manufacturing
high ground
in this time
of righteousness


Label me other
as I diverge
light the skies
with fireworks red
belt patriot songs
I will not mouth
empty words
to an anthem
I no longer
believe in
As an American, I can't begin to express how sorry I am.  Hang in there with us, this has to be a passing thing...
<3
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