Misdirecting Merlin by Kevin Cadwallender

if you had known
would you have said?
in all the magic of our
being together,
a darkness.

was it trickery?
did you weave love
into a shawl?
did you wrap
yourself in it
to save you
from darkness?

if I had been Merlin
I could not have cast a spell
to redeem you.
I am the shabbiest
of conjurors
drawing nothing
from the hat but
my hands, gloved
by your darkness now
and infecting all light.

My cloak hangs
on your bedroom door,
stars long dead still visible.





Kevin Cadwallender, Scotland

Bound to Place by Vivian Faith Prescott

Children know haa áan—our land,
ways-of-knowing. Language binds them
to place, my incantations. Fish spawning
in streams, bear cubs birthing in dens.
Children, a seasonal calendar, interwoven.

Daughter born during the Child Moon—Dís yádi

Daughter in the Black Bear Month, S’eek dísi—

..............Month-When-Black-Bear-Cubs-Are-Born

Another daughter born in At gadaxit dísi—

.............The-Birth-Moon-When-Animals-Give-Birth

Son born in At gadaxit yinna dísi—the Breeding Month.

This animal landscape.





Vivian Faith Prescott, Alaska, USA

Lunchtime Dispatch from Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary by Gail Goepfert

The green anole lizards along, puffs out
the dewlap under its neck, inches across
the weathered fence rail, postures
in the shade of his tiny domain.

The pileated woodpecker sports
his red workhat, pries off long slivers of wood in search
of carpenter ants buried in the hollow-topped cypress—
home, kitchen, and drum.

The red-shouldered hawk cruises
the swamp understory, scouts
perches and preens, then performs its sky-dance—
an artist’s flipbook in flight.

The great egret, white in a field
of lettuce greens, edges forward in the shallows,
neck first, zen-master of patience
keen-eyed hunter as it stalks its prey.

The nursery log, fallen cypress
opens light in the canopy—
welcomes seedlings
insects, mosses, and ferns.

I set out hungry and fill my plate.


Gail Goepfert, USA

star ash fire by Joseph Mayo Wristen

looking to understand
what it was like
to have walked here
before star ash fire,

circle of city lights
surrounded by desert rock
pyramids, scorpion shadow
migrating to birth’s field

mountain Blue Bird nesting
against sage nectar time’s
Saquaro forest stretched
across sand painted earth

October moon rising in Sagittarius

sandstone monument
surround by spiritual
red drop wind chants
layered canyon walls
earth’s endless colors
giving us the ability
to recognize the different
choices civilization has made

looking to understand
what it was like
to have walked here
before star ash fire


Joseph Mayo Wristen, USA

Testimony by Brittany Michelson

Do not hold anything I’ve said or done against me
I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth
And nothing but the truth
So help me stars
Raising my right hand and placing it
On your heart
I make a solemn oath
To unlearn the sound of you

I do not recall the exact lighting condition that day
Nor the precise weather forecast
On the night
You struck a chord in me
But I know the feeling of tiny wings
Caught in a flame





Brittany Michelson