March's End

She can feel it slowly growing. All in existence is born of thought. It starts slow and deep, pounding, hiding somewhere in the recesses of her mind. Expectations lead to disappointment, which inevitably gives birth to resentment. Everything buried from years past mutated into fertile embryonies, vibrating, taking on a life of their own.

As March's end nears, thoughts of isolation waver. A new world awaits those who are willing to embrace its damp offerings. Fruitful grounds to transplant the seeds vaulted away, protecting them from winter's crystalline grasp. New vessels to transport thoughts. Pollinating all those she will touch.

From Guest Contributor J. Iner Souster

Moonflowers & Untold Truths

Mother waters her garden at midnight, with tears of the moon, she says. I can sometimes hear her crying, but I don’t tell her. Her garden is beautiful, with pale petals on willowy stems and dew clinging onto their souls, she says. I asked her once to see her budding seeds, but she insists that she must tend to them alone, fragile blooms. I nod because I know she is right, and because I am scared that if I don’t, she will find out, and my heart is too fragile.

Mother’s garden has no flowers, and I am still wilting.

From Guest Contributor Zeyneb Kaya

The Botanist

HUBRIS CONTEST:

Settled at the picnic table, I was teaching my three-year old granddaughter, Natalie, the process of planting seeds. Surrounded by supplies: seeds, cardboard egg cartons, a bag of soil, a big spoon and a spray bottle filled with water, Natalie carefully filled each section of the egg carton with soil. All the while I explained to her how seeds grow into plants if they have sun, water and food. I believed that she thoroughly understood. She was seriously working.

Grandpa joined us and asked, “What are you doing?”

“We are growing eggs!” Natalie boasted.

I’d better wait till she’s four.

From Guest Contributor Patricia Gable

The Sunflower

V’s sitting on the sidewalk in the sun, headphones and cut-offs, and she smiles at you, cigarette in one hand and a big paintbrush in the other, dripping yellow.

“It’s a warning,” you say.

She lifts it to the door of the sky blue bug and pulls out petals, stretching glorious to the handle, the wheel well, and the broken mirror from a perfect oval of shiny black seeds with a tiny white dot on each one and a ladybug the size of your fist right where he took the baseball bat to it.

“No,” she says. “It’s a flower.”

From Guest Contributor Brook Bhagat

Brook Bhagat’s poetry, fiction, non-fiction, and humor have appeared in Monkeybicycle, Empty Mirror Magazine, Harbinger Asylum, Little India, Rat's Ass Review, Lotus-Eater Magazine, Anthem: A Tribute to Leonard Cohen, and other journals and anthologies. She and her husband Gaurav created Blue Planet Journal, which she edits and writes for. She holds an MFA from Lindenwood University, teaches creative writing at a community college, and is writing a novel. Her poetry collection, Only Flying, is due out Nov. 16, 2021 from Unsolicited Press. See more at www.brook-bhagat.com or reach her on Twitter at @BrookBhagat.

Arborists Cultivate Trees That Look Like Cell Towers

They are pollinated by wind, insects, and calls from former porn stars to their fathers. They disperse packets of data via winged and plumed seeds. They host mosses, mistletoe, birds, and full-duplex digital transceivers. Ultra High Frequency bands of bark, cork, geolocation, quinine, tannin, code division, salicin, syrup, microwaves, and tearful confessions. Across their collinear arrays of dipoles, clustered characters of fury, lust, and suicide notes are passed among their branches. And, late at night, handed over from tree to tree, lined along the Interstate, in streams of ones and zeros, the fathers forgive their daughters and invite them home.

Dale Wisely co-edits Right Hand Pointing, One Sentence Poems, Unlost Journal, and Unbroken Journal. www.dalewisely.com/literary

Our Understanding

Will you wait for me? I was distracted in the company of voices. Remembered you when I realized the time.

I race, feet positioning haphazardly over cobblestone. Last narrow lane weaves through a city's historic gate, connects me to the main square where I met you yesterday. Where pigeons scrambled for tossed seeds. Tourists watched.

I see you in the same location with the sun setting behind you. Your body pivots, face gestures into countless expressions. Your hands deliver a new story, in silence.

When you see me, your eyes smile. For you know I understand your art of pantomime.From Guest Contributor Krystyna Fedosejevs

Krystyna writes poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. Her fiction and poetry have recently been published online and in journals at: Nailpolish Stories, 50-Word Stories, 100 word story, A Story in 100 Words, 101 Words, From the Depths (Haunted Waters Press), ShortbreadStories, and espresso stories. Her nonfiction has appeared in flash fiction chronicles and in Wild Lands Advocate. Krystyna resides in Alberta, Canada.

The Day The Sirens Weren’t Kidding

I am the wind that yesterday lifted your hair against the orange sky, cooling your skin. Now, I have arrived to collect respect. I bang on your door. Scream through your trees. You ignore me? I carried the seeds that became these trees that brush the sky. I exhale against the oak standing rigid against my gale, refusing to bend. He groans and snaps before my fury. And you, you who hide in your pretty squares constructed of his branches, think that you are protected from my force. Hear the glass that breaks as I announce that I am more.

From Guest Contributor, Karen Burton

Karen is an MFA student at Lindenwood University in St. Charles, MO.