JOSHUA MICHAEL STEWART I’m originally from Sandusky Ohio, but have been living In Western MA, since 1988. I received my BA from the University of Massachusetts in History, and now work as a counselor to those with mental disabilities. My poems have been published in Rattle, Sanskrit, The South Boston Literary Gazette, Maelstrom, www.DeepCleveland.com and will soon have work in Wavelength, The Unknown Writer and The White Heron. I won first prize in poetry from the South Boston Literary Gazette. I also have a web site: www.authorsden.com/joshuamichaelstewart.

SPORK © Joshua Michael Stewart *after Charles Simic* Like the homeless man that bums for quarters in front of the drugstore its middle tooth is missing, lost while prying off a bottle cap. I don’t think it’s ever killed anyone, but since it was replaced by inherited silverware, and demoted to digging out pebbles lodged in the tread of sneakers I’ve waken in the night to diabolical muttering coming from the junk drawer. first published at www.deepcleveland.com WHAT DID I TELL YOU ABOUT TOUCHING THINGS THAT AREN'T YOURS © Joshua Michael Stewart *July 28, 1965* A mother is sitting up late tonight; She's knitting a one-armed sweater. When headlights streak across the ceiling, she lifts her head, stares out a dark window, and sits back down. On the radio: Vietnam. In a fireplace a fire burns. A grandfather clock chimes. In the kitchen, three mice draw straws, deciding which will lunge for the cheese in the trap. first published in the South Boston Literary Gazette WHEN THE FAITHLESS BOWS HIS HEAD BEFORE FAITH © Joshua Michael Stewart In the soft light of morning people are walking out into their lives, hoping today will justify pulling their personal histories out of the trash. I, on the other hand, have little faith in faith, and spend the day in my pajamas. It’s snowing. White powder slithers down the street like a snake, tempting me to indulge in hot, apple cider. Through the stereo Ella and Louis duet on: I’ve got Your Love to keep Me Warm. This year was Satchmo’s centennial. This year my mother erased her stretch marks and forgot I was born. I’m thinking about the letter I need to write to Death requesting an extension on my visa. What can I say in my own defense— I had a very unfortunate childhood? The schools I attended were poorly funded? I didn’t understand the question? I need more time? Nothing left to do but put pen to paper, scratch across blue lines and pray for immortality. Out on the front lawn sunlight glistens through the lightning shaped branches of a silver birch. There’s something in the way ice congeals around a naked branch and the two transform into a goddess. One I so desperately want to believe in. EARLY APRIL © Joshua Michael Stewart I didn’t take notice of the little girl speaking to the headless doll or the ghosts drawing war plans in the dirt I barley lifted my head when the corpse in the burned-out jeep called out my highschool nickname and when the old woman with the right side of her body melting like wax raised the tin cup of her children’s ashes I crossed the cratered street careful not to scuff my new shoes separately things happen simultaneously a man carts his dead son in a makeshift wheelbarrow a woman sings gershwin weeding her garden is it cruel to go on living crueler to taste someone else’s blood as you wipe the cherry pie from your mouth sitting at this desk watching budding trees bend in the mist and crow of a gray morning I know nothing about war except my father’s yellowing photos a smooth faced boy in a cocked sailor cap I know nothing about war except his complete silence when preparing a roast or planting flowers I know nothing about war and those hearts built out of spent matchsticks belong to those who dream in flames I am to remember this I am to keep the mirrors unveiled I am to keep a room in which I do not enter

RICHARD VALLANCE About Richard Vallance Born in Guelph, Ontario, Canada, March 11th., 1945, Richard is a member of AuthorsDen, under his family name, Richard Vallance Janke.  A graduate of Wilfred Laurier University (1968) and The University of Western Ontario (MLS), he is fluently bilingual in English and French, and reads Spanish and Italian, ancient Greek and Latin well.  He wrote his first poems at the ages of 17 and 18, in 1962-63.  For years, Richard wrote mainly in the field of Library and Information Science. At Chicago, in October, 1983, he won the $1,000 Data Courier Award for Excellence in Online Published Papers for an article in Online, Vol. 7, no. 5. Poetry: While he wrote some 200 poems before the age of 47, since then Richard has composed over 1,500 poems. His first published poem was, “Lasts the First Light”, in Arts and Literature Review (Canada, 1972). In 1998, he published his first full book of poetry, A Quilt of Sonnets: Forty Four Familiar Poems, Ottawa: Providence Road Press, © 1998. 56 pp. ISBN 1-896243-07-x. In February, 2001, Richard founded his first poetry discussion group, Describe Adonis, for sonneteers. We have since grown to 10 poetry, art and digital photography groups, which you may find at our discussion forum: la nouvelle Pléiade = The New Pleiades ©. Richard's poetry page is Poesie’s laissez-faire Faire Foire, a clearing-house for poets from nations like Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, France and the Netherlands. PLFFF features sonnets and contemporary poems, updated quarterly, a links page to sites of other poets, and grants the monthly Prix laissez-faire Faire Foire Award . PLFFF is a member of Phenomenal Men of The Web: Arts & Humanities . Richard is the Editor of 2 Canadian poetry E-Zines.  These are advertised monthly at the end of The Vallance Review in Poetry Life and Times.  In the Winter of 2003, a third E-Zine, Kawasaki Zen Haiku, will be a showcase for haikuists. Since September, 2001, Richard has been the poetry reviewer for Poetry Life and Times, which features the monthly Vallance Review. He is also regular contributor to the same E-Zine.  Richard is also often featured with the U.S. Amerindian E-Zine, Autumn Leaves. CD-ROM Books: 1. The New Millennium Dawn Anthology (Kedco Press): 10 of Richard's poems were included in Millennium Dawn: an Anthology of Award Winning Fantasy Stories, Poetry, Novels etc.,  Kedco Studios Press, Las Vegas, NV, © 2002  ISBN 1-878431-38-2. 2. Richard’s latest CD-ROM book, Canadian Spirit Voices, © 2003, ISBN: 1-878431-44-7, is in its final pre-publication stages, and will be published by Kedco in the Spring of 2003.  You may view a summary of the book here:  Pre-publication Notice. To contact the author, please e-mail: Richard Vallance (Yahoo) (for inquiries on our poetry discussion groups) – OR –  Richard Vallance (Activator Mail) for poetry-related inquiries or submissions to our Canadian E-Zines).

CARNELIAN * © Richard Vallance 1998 & 1999 Do colours dashed as well as they surround dusk’s well fanned hills send us any inkling why the nightingale lilts her love’s longing songs in strokes of all too well hushed plaintive sound? Or why our indefinite midnight skies commend coloraturas to the moon, or why the carnelian sun must dawn with wings of roses, whose Advents spell noon? Under the alders where you and I rest, Just listen. Listen, Who? Who shall arrest us beggars who crave signs from in between 1 and 2 beats or 0 1 and idem? All the long daylight’s familiar refrains some goddess plays us anomalous strains. [* from Canadian Spirit Voices by Richard Vallance published by Kedco Studios, Las Vegas, Nevada. Sonnet from chapter 8, Voices of The Starry Paths, Poem 4 = v8-4.htm Also on AUTHORSDEN: Richard Vallance Janke: Poetry: Carnelian] LOVE IS NOT LOVE © Richard Vallance April 9, 2003 For/ pour Louis-Dominique Genest With my profoundest thanks to William Shakespeare, and his Sonnet 116, “Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments…” Conclusion: love is not love if one care Depends on expectations, either yours Or relatively mine, dear Friend. How fair Is love if either angels or the scores Of galaxies who play to Earth, or stars Composed by them, or well rhymed verses may Conduct the mindful soul to heal those scars Hearts scored, all excel those dreams we play Largo to ourselves? Or may sleep appease Enough such secret griefs as aspire so To hear that music of the Pleiades, Whose arcane spheres one Voice commends to glow? If this be so, will verse or death compose Love's breath, as evanescent as one rose? Previously published in AUTHORSDEN: Richard Vallance: Poetry: Love is Not Love Poema Quinti Horatii Flacci © Richard Vallance 1997 & 2002 XIV Vides ut alta stet nive candidum Vides ut alta stet nive candidum Soracte nec iam sustineant onus silvae laborantes geluque flumina constiterint acuto. Dissolve frigus ligna super foco large reponens atque benignius deprome quadrimum Sabina, O Thaliarche, merum diota. Permitte divis cetera, qui simul stravere ventos aequore fervido deproeliantis, nec cupressi nec veteres agitantur orni. Quid sit futurum cras, fuge quaerere, et quem Fors dierum cumque dabit, lucro adpone, nec dulcis amores sperne puer neque tu choreas, Donec virenti canities abest morosa, nunc et campus et areae lenesque sub noctem susurri conposita repetantur hora, Nunc et latentis proditor intumo gratus puellae risus ab angulo pignusque dereptum lacertis aut digito male pertinaci. XIV Love’s Blessings See you? — where almighty Soracte’s peak, All adrift in gossamer snows, towers Over riverbeds frozen far below, Mirrored in its cold lake’s forest bowers? Let’s chase off that cold, and toss lots of logs On our fire! Taliarchus, we’ll decant My well casked four year old red Sabine wine From jars, for its soft bouquet will enchant! Shall we trust our Fate, why not? — to the gods? When once they’re stilled, hoar winds that crossly cross The roiling seas, the cypress cease to sigh, As the mountain ash cease as soon to toss. What if? – ask not – or what tomorrow brings; Pray, we’ll enjoy our small fair lot today, For you are young; so let us flirt with love and lend ourselves to dances and fair play. For yet a while, because the thin white hair Poor old age wears, wears not us or our fields, With moonlight hush! No, let's hear sweet-nothings Sighed where to your arms your belovèd yields. Yes, listen where her dulcet laughter plays Song along with yours, in your secret lair, Where, you, still a boy, tug from her lithe arm A token bracelet, and caress her hair. FROM: Canadian Spirit Voices, Las Vegas, NV, © 2003 ISBN 1-878431-44-7 CHAPTER 11: Translations: Poem 14 = rv11-14.htm Previously published on AUTHORSDEN: See you? — where almighty Soracte’s peak (translation: Horace, 65 - 8 B.C.) STABBED © Richard Vallance 1997 & 2002 A fluttered hand, a flick of silk across that tattered cradle found her screaming back some fifty years listening for snakes in every sound, in sounds on spiders' shadowed walls, in sounds of fingers rifling trees, in sounds of mommy's shrieks & cries, and daddy's whacks, and Earnest’s pleas. She rocked that crib, half paralyzed, with a faraway look in her glazed eyes. She dared not speak, but often screamed. She bit her nails raw: and felt three. That rape’s black spirit racked her life until she stabbed him with his knife. ® 1998 & 1999 by Richard Vallance FROM: Canadian Spirit Voices, Kedco Studios, Las Vegas, NV, © 2003 , ISBN 1-878431-44-7 CHAPTER 5: FLAMES OF PASSION POEM 11 rv5-11.htm Previously published on AUTHORSDEN: Richard Vallance: Poetry: Stabbed My Carousel Home is: From here you may reach all our Yahoo Poetry Groups, our E-Zines and lots of poetry by many fine poets.

Jan Sand in New York JAN SAND, poet and illustrator from New York, is a regular contributor to Poetry Life & Times and the newsgroup alt.arts.poetry.comments. A great deal of his work is about animals, or science fiction. Recently Jan was published by Kedco Studios Artist Profile Press, on their latest CD ROM e-book, "A Way With Words (Poetry Real and Surreal), which also includes complete books by Dale Houstman, Sara L. Russell and Keith Gabriel Hendricks. Jan's illustrated book on the CD is called "Wild Figments And Odd Conjectures", which is also sold separately, in a limited-edition "single" CD. To see an illustrated article about Jan's poems, visit the November '98 issue of Poetry Life & Times, and scroll down past the Editor's Letter. He also has his own poetry pages on Charlotte's Web at Artvilla.

MANIC PANIC © Jan Sand The dangers of defense Are accountably immense As the things of everyday can testify. Everything with edges Sharp enough to trim the hedges Can decapitate, or at least, put out an eye. With a mien most fundamentalist And a sharpened ice cream stick Any nut can take his pick Of any installation list, Atomic power station, Capitol of the nation, Anywhere or any place To turn the Feds into disgrace With explosions, soil erosions, or massive defecation. From any source, with no remorse, The terror can emit To cause a public fit. A mass of horrid stomach gas, a psychotic horse, A strategic loosened shoelace, The ace of spades out of place, Anything could smash the nation. A bumblebee inside the pants Of the minister of finance Could initiate frightful deflation. So how can we Be calm, be free Coldly sweating through our lives at nights? We must dare to foreswear Matches, scissors, remain bare Doff all clothes from underwear to tights. Naked then, women and men, Every one, surely then, Could never hide anything offensive. Calm and nude We could conclude It’s reasonless to be apprehensive So imbued, husbands and wives, Children, dogs And pet frogs Can inhabit safe and pointless lives. DANDELIONS © Jan Sand Their tousled blond heads explode into existence In rowdy mobs on bland green lawns Evoking fury at their persistence, Violating urban strictures, evenings and dawn And in the blast of noonday light Where their glowing yellow swarm Is condemned as hoodlum blight To the serenity, the tame verdant norm So treasured in the mindless blank conformity That paves the outer reaches of the metropol. The inhabitants, enraged at the enormity Of this yellow peril produce the spinning knives that roll To hum and whirl and sever, to guillotine The festive heads, flick them in a golden shower In fierce dispatch from the scene. But the yellow crowd will have its hour. Stealthily it creeps in again, Blooms to produce its ghostly spheres To dissipate in fertility, when A mobile misty fog appears, Aeronauts in multiforce To invade new territory A lawn perhaps, a golf course, Distributing new golden glory Launched to live and fight again The sterility of men. SOCIAL EVOLUTION © Jan Sand The huge stone men do not move. They merely display outlines Against the moving sky. The light changes, morning to dusk And by these moderations Their assumed intent has been implied. The interpreters wear solemn robes, Speak in close gesture and whispers. They cautiously admit no error. Like talus at a mountain base, The errors accumulate, interact. At end it is this mountain shard That dispenses authority. The stone men become irrelevant. The rubbish rules. LITERACY © Jan Sand The word, this witchery of lines Curved and straight to sound Where silent thought combines The magic of the old and new found. To minds not rigid disciplined To know an “A”, a “Z”, an “O”, Not captured and tightly pinned By schoolings that bestow Confinement, a cage that frees, These graphic spider webs do not Spellbind. They hold no keys To who, to where, to why, to what. But those who drop into the net Of sentences, of words in train, Of starfields of the alphabet That limn the shine of thought in brain Will plumb the universe of minds That glow with wonder and with thought, Will live delighted with their finds And bless the day they had been caught.