In a Vacuum
by I. E. Sbace Weruld
We are reassured by the scientists
that there can’t be a vacuum. It’s too dumb.
Then what is this place, this strange existence
that we’re in—this space-time continuum?
When so many things collide and scatter,
how can one be sure things really matter?
Everywhere one goes, we’re living in a
vacuum. They say it can’t be—every day.
And yet, here we are again in a vacuum.
It doesn’t go away. It continues on
each and every day, evening, noon, and dawn,
all the time. In fact, it seems to ac-cum-
u-late. Everywhere we go, we are, oh,
in a vacuum that we know can’t be. No.
Mr. I. E. Sbace Weruld is a poet of the Cosmic Universe.
~~~
Haiku
by “Clear Dew” Ibuse
Before the Sun rose,
Jupiter and Venus soared
o’erhead with the stars.
Tanka
by “Clear Dew” Ibuse
Rising in the East,
the yellow-white disc at dusk,
is the Full Corn Moon.
It made him rise up to see
a boon, a busk, and a beast.
“Clear Dew” Ibuse is a poet of traditional haiku.
~~~
Haiku
by “Wired Clues” Abe
On the gray cement,
at the corner of the porch—
one cicada’s scorched.
Tanka
by “Wired Clues” Abe
There are so many…
clocks tick on across the globe…
each one on its own.
And all of them are on time.
Is it pleasure that they bring?
“Wired Clues” Abe is a poet of Japanese haiku in a postShiki world. Emperor Meijo (1852-1912) the author of thousands of tanka, informs the above tanka.
~~~
Shang High Way
by Aw “Curbside” Lee
Shanghai-way roads and ramps through levels interweave
around skyscrapers rising over river winds.
At night in dark blue light, the cars in curving vees,
in lines of white and red, shine in ten million minds.
Although they seem like neon video-game tracks
of futuristic megatropolis designs,
they are quite real, concrete, geometric facts,
an overpowering of towering displays,
in glass and steel, reeling skyward to the max.
The city tentacles, a myriad arrays,
veer everywhere one thinks to look, to lounge, or leave.
It’s like a giant birthday cake with too much glaze.
Aw “Curbside “的美式拼法” Lee is a poet of China.
~~~
And So Brought This to Pass
by Esecwiel Barud
Now Joseph was taken down to Egypt, and Potiphar, an officer of the Pharaoh, who in the guard bought him from the Ishmaelites who had brought him down there. The Lord was with Joseph, and so he became a successful man; and he was in the house of his master the Egyptian; and his master saw that the Lord was with him; and that the Lord caused all that he did to prosper in his hands. So Joseph found favor in his sight and attended him; and he was made the boss, that is, the overseer of his house, and put him in charge of all that he had.
Esecwiel Barud is a poet of ancient Israel. In the above prosem, Joseph (c. 1912 BC – c. 1872 BC) was a noted, though nearly undatable, figure.
~~~
A Memory Retrieved
by Cawb Edius Reel
While watching action film The Bourne Identity
on DVD, and seeing lots of crashing cars unwind,
a thing he had forgotten came back suddenly,
that had already slipped forever from his mind.
Two days ago, when he was turning from one road
onto another, th’ other driver just went blind
and started turning into him. The episode
would definitely have left an accidental dent,
if he had not immediately swerved. Dude, whoa!
He slammed the brakes in time. There was no fender bent.
The crisis was averted—unexpectedly—
now, too, his memory retrieved from that event.
Cawb Edius Reel is a poet of film. Robert Ludlum (1927-2001) was a PostModern American proset.
~~~
Newsreel:
In Jülich, Germany, supercomputer Jupiter,
unveiled, performs more than a billion billion calcs per sec.
~~~
In th’ Inverted Bowl
by Wilude Scabere
When shall we meet again? In lightning, thunder, and in rain,
when wild winds are blowing hard, and rains swirl down Earth’s drain?
The Sun has set, the night dark black, the weather stark and grim;
the Moon is lost behind the shrouds, the tempest-tossed clouds swim.
Here is no heath beneath the bleak and wrecking swirling wreaked;
the hurly-burly keeps us up, the heaving heavens leaked.
The black cat’s frightened, hiding from resounding, pounding booms.
It is as if the very present, whirling world is doomed.
Why have we reached this kingdom’s realm that overwhelms one’s soul?
What is this place so fresh, yet fearsome, in th’ inverted bowl?
Wilude Scabere is a poet of Shakespearean histrionics. William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was a noted British Baroque dramatic playwright.
~~~
Vergil’s Tomb, 1782
by Basil Drew Eceu
He captured it all—
the Moon in the night sky amidst the clouds,
a surreal light,
one that Vergil himself might have seen
and did write about,
a scene that betokened the Romantic Age,
the end of Enlightenment
for the time being—
crumbling stone steps,
stairs seemingly leading nowhere,
shrubs and trees
making more ominous
the already moodily felt landscape,
dreams of doom
finely crystalized,
terse and relaxed, laid back but
alert, as if some fear had seized upon something alarming,
something very disturbing—
Joseph Wright of Derby.
Basil Drew Eceu is a poet of British painting. Joseph Wright of Derby (1734-1797) was a NeoClassical British painter of the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution. The painting referenced in this free verse is from 1782.
~~~
Richard Osman
by Edwar Lee Subic
He read a recent novel; it was just a paused respite,
that is, “The Thursday Murder Club”, by Richard Osman typed.
The prose was thoughtful, and the story, cleverly portrayed;
it was a charming mystery, so pleasantly displayed.
It was that very English practice, facing death with calm;
from Doyle through Christie, dealing with the worst of life with balm.
Edwar Lee Subic is a poet of PostModern and NewMillennial British writing. Richard Osman is a contemporary British mystery writer. Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) and Agatha Christie (1890-1976) were noted British mystery writers.
~~~
Newsreel:
The US killed eleven people in a drug attack
upon Tren de Aragua’s Caribbean vessel cache.
~~~
Post Whitmanic Apostrophe
by Usa W. Celebride
Everywhere Rome was in America in the Twentieth Century
since Vergil,
but there was more in America than that,
and this is not the first place Rome has retouched,
eternal Rome,
eternal America,
here where the eagles soar high in the air,
higher, o, higher
that rocky hills or heaving oceans,
high, high, high up in the sky
circling round,
round,
round,
silent above
the forests, the farms, and the factories;
here where the people rule
over the people—
an extreme experiment
of nature’s
nurtured in homes all across the land
between the Atlantic and the Pacific,
between Aristotle and Plato,
here in the nation of freedom, o,
and the country of God.
It has now been proved—
the people exude power,
the people together are power,
a force,
a strength,
a might,
mightier that even the mighty walls of Rome.
An invisible will with a magnificent must,
at times terrible,
at times magnificent.
America.
Usa W. Celebride is a poet of America. Walt Whitman (1819-1992) was a Realist American poet. Vergil (70 BC – 19 BC) was a Golden Age Roman poet.
~~~
Newsreel:
The refugee Iryna Zarutska was stabbed to death
upon a Chalotte light rail train, bereft of life…of breath.
Charlotte is a city in North Carolina with a population of around 850,000.
~~~
On an Undeclared War, a Docupoem
by Caud Bile Sewer
Precursor chemicals from Shanghai bound for Mexico,
tons of N-methyl formamide and benzyl alcohol,
were seized off Panama enroute to Sinaloa labs,
in China’s surreptitious war against Americans.
Both chemicals are used in making meth and fentanyl,
and each alone weighed more than some three-hundred-thousand pounds.
The drug cartel churns out about a ton of meth each week,
worth as much as a billion dollars on, say, Houston’s streets.
To haul this load would take two dozen semis just to move;
the scale is industrial, and deadly, war-approved.
Caud Bile Sewer is a poet of drugs and dregs. Houston is a city in Texas of about 2,300,000.
~~~
Urban America
by Urbawel Cidese
There in the throes of the urban landscape
skyscrapers rose across America:
Chicago, Cleveland, Austin, San Jose,
Philadelphia, Dallas, Atlanta,
Columbus, Detroit, Boston, Baltimore,
Cleveland, St. Louis, Houston, New Orleans,
Indianapolis, Miami, New York,
Seattle, San Francisco, Washington,
San Diego, Tampa, Los Angeles,
Phoenix, San Antonio, Milwaukee
Buffalo, Memphis, Minneapolis,
Oakland, Cincinnati, Kansas City.
The names go on and the buildings go up.
In city after city the heights jump.
There is no near end. It seems to go on…
in day after day, in dawn after dawn.
Urbawel Cidese is a poet of urban landscapes.
~~~
Newsreel:
The grisly act, this horrid fact, more blood has now been spilled.
At Utah Valley College, Charlie Kirk was shot and killed.
The hate continues unabated; death claims one more day.
Assassination rears its ugly head, two-hundred yards away.
~~~
The Tent Was Vast
by Rudi E. Welec, “Abs”
The tent was vast, in canvas cast, and coloured tan.
Right at its top in spot light swung two acrobats.
One lean but stocky guy stretched out in quite a span;
he hung from some thick rope by bending knees held fast.
he wore a flesh-toned tank-top, tight upon his chest,
and slippers on his feet, up past the tent post mast.
The other slimmer guy was similarly dressed.
He’d just released the bar and rolled up in a ball.
He soared unbound, in peril, high above no net.
One saw in awe the danger and the risk involved,
relying on the strength and placement of one man.
His ass was on the line. One hoped he wouldn’t fall.
The Hiker Got
by Rudi E. Welec, “Abs”
The hiker got together with some friends. He placed
thick socks upon his feet, and big boots over those,
which he tied snugly up, so tight and neatly laced.
He put a back pack on his shoulders, bare, exposed.
It was a summer day. He did not want to sweat.
He started, like the others, on balls of his toes,
and down the cleared, tree-lined, sun-filtered trail he went.
He loved the cool and shady patterns on his skin.
He traveled for kilometers enjoying it.
He felt so peaceful, hips, thighs, knees and shins.
He loved the atmosphere, the nice and easy pace;
but at th’ end his feet dragged and face sagged with chagrin.
Body, Mind, and Will
by Rudi E. Welec, “Abs”
He was back at it—exercising—body, mind and will.
He worked on varied parts, from toes and feet, up to his fill.
He panted mightily as he went through his varied steps,
that concentrated on his arms, his torso and his legs.
He did his best to tense and stretch, to build his muscle mass,
to work the smooth, the skeletal, as well as cardiac.
He worked his ass off, and his calves, his shoulders and his back.
He kept on panting, panting, panting, panting to the last.
Rudi E. Welec, “Abs”, is a poet of exercise.
~~~
A Cat Named Mr. Kitty
by Wic E. Ruse Blade
There once was a cat named Magiggy,
who ate very much like a piggie.
He scarfed down the treats
and fresh crunchy eats,
which made him a rather large biggie.
Wic E. Ruse Blade was a poet of waggery.