I fell asleep at 3:00 a.m.,
 and when I was in deepest REM
 a boulder from a cloud of lead
 hit the floor above my bed.

 Every hair rose on my hide
 as though a yeti got inside, 
the panic-stricken face of night 
fled and left the room too light, 

and dreams I had of steamy trysts 
faded like the morning mists. 
 Was it a boot, a building block
 or Punch & Drop that made that knock? 

Although he wakes me up each day
 with toys like titans rough at play,
 I always get to bed too late
 and, consequently, don’t get eight 

hours of sleep, or even four. 
I will get back at him.

Samantha Bee By Ramona Thompson So one woman called out another woman in a verbal catfight? As if we don’t have bigger problems in this world to focus on May we please just all grow up and move past this silly name calling? Apologies have been made Now let it go There’s kids killing kids in our schools which I am much more offended by How about the rest of you? A catty, thoughtless remark or gun control? Please do tell Which is more important to you? Which is more earth shaking? Which should have all of our attention right now? I think we all know the answer to that! 2018 Ramona Thompson

empty dialogue echoes from days past a silence filled with byproducts of machinery and a crackle of laughter from the logs human expression faint bellows of yawns carve deeply into the oxygen gasping for breath awaiting salvation Dim days, dim darker. taste of coldness resting on my tongue. gently glazing the soul freezing from within. Guess hell aint a bad place to be. Within the warmth of hell fire fireplace... dreams of despair read a book in front of a diorama of Satan’s lair minus the inhabitants.

May stretched its legs into grave. The thunder heralds the rains. A hut on the bank of Kanoli canal Is not re-thatched this year. Her infant’s illness made the doctor gay With all the wages she had kept. Summer takes the last breath, But the coconut leaf thatched roof Is not re-thatched this year. As the widow stands on the threshold, The rain clouds gather over her sky And the wind scatters terror in her corridor. Will the tattered roof be flown away? Will the rain drops make pores On the roof of her life? Where will her child crawl and smile? Question waves are thus getting high. Her cano



I found his obit on Google,
 hadn't seen him, barely thought 
 of him in forty years 
since the day he loaded his car
 with half of everything – blankets, pillows, 
dishes, albums (we fought over 
 who'd get "The Graduate" poster of Hoffman 
 and Anne Bancroft's leg) – and drove off 
 to I-didn't-care-where. 
Once, 20 years later I learned where he was 
 from his buddy John and called. 
He still taught high school and directed 
summer stock in a small midwestern town.

“Poetry is . . .

At the party fire pit, he banters with women he has known since college. Funk from big speakers, eggplant on the grill, Christmas lights strung through an avocado tree. He returns a wooden chair to an ex-girlfriend. He's replaced her broken rung: no scars, no seams, no mismatched stain. He's fixing a bicycle rack for another. All of his exes get along with him and each other, and years pass. Some recycle as do-overs, unable to resist a man in love with love. Before I returned, he assured me he no longer sought perfection, but I soon became "too this, too that" again.

At the party fire pit, he banters with women he has known since college. Funk from big speakers, eggplant on the grill, Christmas lights strung through an avocado tree. He returns a wooden chair to an ex-girlfriend. He’s replaced her broken rung: no scars, no seams, no mismatched stain. He’s fixing a bicycle rack for another. All of his exes get along with him and each other, and years pass. Some recycle as do-overs, unable to resist a man in love with love. Before I returned, he assured me he no longer sought perfection, but I soon became too this, too that again.

Earth 2150, population 15,054,147,886 Fifteen billion people free from fear, famine, disease, the inequalities of scarcity economies. Fifteen billion people at peace, at play, amid plenty, carousing in their virtual unrealities. Fifteen billion people assisted by me, Big Sister, Ginny, the Global Intelligence Network (mark 3.1). Fifteen billion people to educate, entertain, enlighten: my task to optimize their extended existences. Fifteen billion people transfixed as I transmitted images of Tokyo, Sensoji Temple, the alien spaceship. Fifteen billion people intent on the alien ambassador,

her freesias in his colors prison wedding (First published in Chrysanthemum, March 2018, issue #23)