The Pretty Peacock
by Lance Allen
What a capricious creature is he?
See how he struts in that coat of his,
Those iridescent eyes staring at nothing
And everything all at once,
A thousand thousand lusty eyes
Dissecting and undressing his prey.
I will track him and I will catch him,
And when I catch him I will kill him,
And when I kill him I will skin him
And make myself a fine coat of broken hearts.
Those hearts, numbered like searing stars,
Will dance across my visage
Like a dazzling bait.
And then they will track me,
Catch me,
Kill me,
Skin me—
And I will be a new coat for another
For the ugly are just as jealous
As anyone far more beautiful than they.
Duality
by Lance Allen
​
What am I?
I am the two who are one,
The Great Androgyny:
The Satyr front
The Nymph back.
Or shall I turn
And reverse the order all anew?
Drink from my hairy teats
Long without milk
Or maybe crawl from a womb
Never made for birth.
What am I?
The Grand Feminine,
The Grand Masculine,
Faulkner’s Cow,
Hemingway’s Bull,
The Apostate Nun,
The Heretical Monk.
I am what I need to be.
​
​
Fire
​
by Jackie Woolums
It licked up my soul,
Sloppy and wet like a dogs tongue,
Consuming everything,
Covering my heart,
Burning it blue and bright,
You lit the fuse,
The one that had be out for so long,
I thought it was a dud,
But the sparks flew,
And my heart felt like it might burst,
And it did, but not the way I thought.
It was happy again.
Your fingertips erase old memories,
The ones I cried over for months,
And now I see new light.
I see your fire,
My fire.
Ours.
​
​
A Day in Creative Writing
By Carrie Wohlschlegel
In memoriam, Dr. William Neal
That poem from creative writing
Took me by surprise.
It talked of your death, and I felt
Like an outsider reading words on a page.
I could picture the written words,
But I wasn’t here to see the images
Haunting everyone else’s minds.
That poem was discussed
In a steady tone. Topics of grief.
Together, they had their time to cry,
But I tried to push that time aside
When I wasn’t surrounded by reminders.
And now I can’t escape the words that explain
The images I didn’t see
On the day I couldn’t grieve
With everyone who knew and loved you.
When I think of that day, another picture comes to mind.
I think of clouds reflected in windows of buildings.
I think of a Greek restaurant and tapas.
I was so excited for free internet until it brought the news
And left my stomach in knots.
I think of the Beatles. “Let it be.”
They’re words of wisdom, in a time of trouble,
That I didn’t want to hear.
I think of new friends, more like strangers,
Providing comfort, not with words,
But with a solid presence in an unknown city.
I have rarely depended on the kindness of strangers,
But I had to then.
I think of a metal poppy mounted on a building,
And paper ones on shirts of passers-by,
They remember. So do I.
None of these thoughts should relate to you
But now they do.
My thoughts do not reflect the words of that poem
I read in creative writing,
Reminding me: I’m an outsider
Looking at a broken moment
I should have been a part of.
I didn’t talk during that class.
I didn’t know what to say.
Instead I returned that poem
With a tear splashed on the paper.
Words are thoughts from the soul,
But so are tears.
​
​
Unqualified
by Alyssa Gnadinger
In memoriam, Dr. William Neal
I could have found a way there—
To the place where everyone said goodbye to you.
I should have.
Instead I sat on the third floor of Carter,
Staring through the rain-streaked glass
At your window.
Wondering how to honor your memory
Without tainting the purity and depth of the love
Of those who held you most dear.
But as for me, I had just begun to know you.
All I knew were the raindrops on your shirt
At fifteen after,
The sarcastic red ‘-2’ on my test
“for my honesty”,
The quivering hands holding a book and
The aged, steady voice reading from it.
I couldn’t bring myself to say the words
That raced around in my head, trying to
Come to grips with the fact that you
Weren’t coming back.
Would they undermine the grief
Which poured from countless hearts
Who had known and loved you far longer
Than I had?
Was I unqualified to mourn?
I didn’t know.
I still don’t.
​
​
Logan
​
By Jourdan Gabbard
​
You fell asleep
While I read aloud Whitman,
Relating to his desperation.
I continued to read
As you started to snore,
Your blond curls
Still soaking my sheets,
Wet from the shower before.
Your shirt is pulled up,
Revealing the thick pink scar on your back,
like a seam holding you together;
I know it still hurts.
Gently, I run my hands over your skin—
Smooth and warm.
You whimper, turn to me,
And smile.
​
​
​
He is
by Aaron C Presley
In memoriam, Dr. William Neal
late for class again—
has anyone seen him?
an older gentleman, who
wears round glasses and a smile.
rushing in,
blue button-down dotted with rain.
apologizing for the lateness;
illegally parked, at least for now.
laughing as his pocket begins to ring;
struggling to turn it off,
sighing, “Shut up!”
and grinning as class begins.
I wrote the paper he suggested;
Oh, he loved Flannery O’Connor.
A good man is just so hard to find,
all too easy to lose.
​
Quiet
by Aaron C Presley
In memoriam, Dr. William Neal
From the outside,
the building resembled a church,
stained glass windows welcomed us in
red velvet pews were waiting
and it felt like hell.
Tears touched
burning faces, dripped down onto
blood red pews, fell silent.
The service ran together;
It seemed to take years—
then suddenly it ended.
We were unprepared.
The rain fell hard against our faces,
no umbrella strong enough to save us,
and the wind was more powerful
than our aching hearts and dragging feet.
​
​
​
​
by Joe Hurtgen
​
I guess I could go blind. Or at least half-blind. There for a while there were flashes, little Xerox machine lights going back and forth somewhere in my eye once an hour and sometimes every few minutes. The left eye in rebellion is one of those slaps in the face from the body, a reminder that no matter what kind of hard work is put into making it strong, it can’t last. Won’t last in fact. It feels, too often, that there are too many things beyond my control, like dreams of fifty foot waves rising above the highway or a past that goes on being untouchable. Without my eyes I would listen to stories and play music, but softly, to spare my hearing.
​
I don’t think I’m going to go blind. Not now. I don’t need to go blind. I need to see the world a little longer now that I’m seeing without illusions casting their shadows across things that are sometimes more beautiful shadowed, sometimes less so.
​
There’s a pool I like to swim in, mostly because I can float on my back and look up at the glass ceiling above, all the concentric circles bisected by steel to form a perfect circle in the middle. I found out that a guy I know swims in the pool three times a week. I said, “I love the glass ceiling there. I really like going on my back to look at it.”
“The glass ceiling?” he said, “In the pool?” He hadn’t ever seen it. Hadn’t noticed it at all. I thought about how I’d look up at it, think “eye of God, eye of God, soul of man,” feel peace imagining the circle looking back at me. I kind of doubt my friend has even bothered to look up even after I told him about it.
I wonder how many people are already blind in a way.
​