Terrene Explorer by S. P. Flannery

Slugs climb from hostas to
stick to windows, basement
portals that these viscous individuals
use to ascend from the ground
of moss and mould, debris where mushrooms
protrude to toxicate terrestrial fauna.
Trails cling and refract sunlight
unobstructed by clouds or night,
this armada races to the edge
where the sea of glass becomes replaced
with aluminum siding, white, abrasive
to a gelatinous epidermal coat.
These invertebrates freefall back,
moist loam soil greets them home
from the xeric realm of outer space.


S. P. Flannery, Madison, USA

Being Young and Green by Isaiah Vianese

after Edna St. Vincent Millay

Summer and the baby ferns
dry to a crisp—sun bleeding them.
The wind takes what is left.
Young, green, hopeful,
they stand along the road,
reaching for the sun,
loving it nonetheless.



Isaiah Vianese, Missouri, USA

Culling by Taylor Graham

I was going to write a poem. Instead, all morning
I’ve been pulling out periwinkle by the roots.
I love periwinkle, its blossoms of a blue shade
I can’t describe except by its own name. But
periwinkle has overgrown my tiny island between
dingy lawn and pebble deck, twining all over
the red-clay Mexican tree-of-life atop a boulder,
which I meant to be a focus – more than that,
a symbol – of the garden. What I’ve torn out,
I’ll stick in the ground on that bare slope above
the field, and hope it grows there. It’s hardy as
human language. It just doesn’t belong where it is,
not so much of it. Let’s say, it’s too much herbage.
What does this have to do with writing a poem?


Taylor Graham, California, USA

it was a spider by Charles Clifford Brooks III

burgundy flora is placed
and eight legs race
from it
across the oak table.

a snow-white spider
the second in three days
she replaces the first one
i killed.

number two is hiding
in a bundle of cockscomb.
one little crystal spinner
at buddha’s feet.

i am a reed
a puff of air
humbled as she weeps
for the first.


Charles Clifford Brookes III

untitled by Regina C J Green

peace
enters
another
child's
ear

through long-winding roads
once the path worn round
the old broken elm
and standing there
contemplating the lapsed sturdiness
of it all

you became the roaming spider and
the hungry locust
the tall valiant grass and
the happy cattail
and every mirrored child
knew his way
from home to there
and back again


Regina C J Green, Florida, USA

July by Aiko Harman

Out on the back porch
watching the dogs catch June bugs
praying for peace.

Red Solo cups clutter the lawn,
saran wrap hugs the leftover
hamburgers until tomorrow.

After dusk, mosquitoes make
blue sparks in the hanging zapper.
Crickets tune on the lawn.

Grandfathers sleep in Lazyboys
in the living room, holding cups
of melting ice on their bellies.

Girls in sundresses catch lightning
bugs along the still lake in mason jars
— nature’s night-lights.

My mother, her sister, sit in the kitchen,
remembering, their staccato voices echo
from the window like two canaries.

I am home. I sleep to the hum
of the fan left on overnight, dry heat,
and summer.



Aiko Harman, Scotland

The Adirondack Chair by Robert Demaree

Between the screened porch and the tool shed,
Back from the pond,
Sat my mother’s white Adirondack chair,
Where she would shell peas
Of a light New Hampshire afternoon 40 Julys ago.
You might call it a yard,
Except for grass there were ferns, maple seedlings, and
Sprouting amid the pine needles
A score of things I could not name.
In time the chair fell apart, began to rot,
Returning to the rocky soil whence it had come.
I could not let the space sit empty.
I got a white Adirondack chair of molded plastic
At the Walmart on the highway,
Near where the farm stand had been.




Robert Demaree, NC, USA

Inheriting a Garden by Taylor Graham

Heavenly bamboo outside my window
amber/tender-green and saffron – never trust
a garden planted by a former owner.
What did she mean? Firethorn and holly,
every bush bears birds and hunger-berries.

Could a garden’s keeper die of roses?

Still, heavenly bamboo draws me into
cantilevered daylight through a lace of oaks.
A place to gather stars, their blossoming
already light-years gone. Who planned
their gardens? Down here, bees weave
silken carpets of rosemary, lavender, and air.


Taylor Graham, California, USA