- Spooky Boyfriend #2
- Donora Hillard
- Juliet Cook
- Becca Sheehan
- Nicole Cartwright Denison
- Donald Illich
- Gena Mohwish
- Peter Schwartz
- Dan Nowak
- Connor Tomas O' Brien
- Russell Jaffe
- Daniel Nester
- Brian Foley
- Susan Slaviero
- Scott Abels
- Kyle Hemmings
- Raffi Robert Kiureghian
- Nicole Steinberg
- Sharon Suzuki-Martinez
Our Mysterious World
for Jack Pendarvis
Pat and Lee are running together,
invisibly,
down an unlit hallway when
we all suddenly wonder,
“Why?”
It’s a dark and stormy,
gay or straight relationship.
Could be the reason.
Or perhaps they have partially severed
heads, so they’re unable to focus.
Unlikely, but unfortunately
possible.
What if they are ghosts or secret robots
or magic gorillas?
Could they be weeping or melting?
Could it just be me?
Maybe they have colonies of social insects
in their pants. Maybe Pat forgot
to pay the power bill. Maybe
they are escaping from beings of fire
and are about to stumble upon
beings of wieners and buns and condiments.
We may never know for sure.
Our house fills with enigmas.
Meanwhile,
off in the night’s forest, a tree falls
making a sound like one hand clapping.
“That would sum it all up. I guess.”
muses Sasquatch,
sipping a cup of questionable tea.
Goodbye Island
Then Marie said, “I’m in love with a man
who is an island.” Of course,
many of us had our doubts.
This did sound familiar.
We said, “Which of our legs
are you trying to pull?”
She stared at us like we were insects
from the future.
Our metaphysical existence
(vis-à-vis Marie)
grew negligible: tenuous, at best.
Further on down the road, we saw the man
for ourselves. We couldn’t help but
admire his thick vegetation,
his long languid beaches, his centuries
of blue-eyed solitude.
We desperately wanted to bear his young,
even the males among us.
Thus we engulfed
his shores with sweet lingering visits.
Soon, Marie saw the man
was no longer her own.
Sadly thereafter, she realized he never was.