Invisible Sun

Steven Gelberg

My humanity’s skin

Fits me.

I am its strengths

Its weaknesses.

From a childhood

Of secrets,

Being good,

Invisible, the good girl-

Comes this ability-

To see and hear,

To not be seen,

To be the observer.

Yet, in the hidden

Corners lies danger.

The soul risks slow submersion

When hidden in the dark.

When the good girl

Becomes the grounding,

The listener, the receiver,

Obscured from the light,

Death begins its

Slow creep.

Innocuously, like

Mitosis, splitting

The self from

Self, light, and air.

It is insidious and

It is death.

She becomes a secret.

She becomes the lie.

She becomes others lies.

She becomes invisible.

Turning towards the

Dungeon’s door,

The tearing of tectonic

Magnitude, she walks away,

Into the light.

kimsmith

Dancing in the Sunshine

Manolis Tsantakis

Exhaling

 

So ugly,

You were beautiful

In your elegant stubbornness;

Your life gift

 

Sitting on the porch

I rocked you in my arms;

The prairie house

Held us in the

Big sky.

 

The cornfield,

Harvested, stubbled,

Enchanted as the

Ladybugs swarmed

 

The only moment

Of distress, the prick

Of the needle-

Irritated you.

 

So, I told

You stories of

Being a baby

About shots myself.

 

I told you love.

I told you goodbye.

I told you, it is okay.

And, you knew.

 

So, we rocked

 

As we

 

Exhaled

In

Love.

 

kimsmith