by Abdul Malik Mandani

If you can but see,
the height of desperation
where death is deemed
more desirable than
the pitiable plights of
the people of Palestine.

Why no one in this
momentous a moment
call out the name of the killer?

The wantonness of the world
The inhumanity of man
The gullibility of god
The irrationality of religion
The impotency of prayer
The prostitution of justice;

Where do one seek the salve
for the suffering souls?

by Asahi Yuki

Leaving the body with a cloud of glowing ink
Caenorhabditis elegans
Glows a little brighter before dying
That special light, fluorescent
Reminiscent of a soul’s departure from the body

Blue incandescent dye flowing
Like blood, so distinguishable
A signal that it is dying
Just a little more brilliant
Before darkness falls

Admire the sparkling blue
The precious ink
Before it is gone
That special color
Disappears in a blink

by sarfrazlodhi

This morning,
a sparrow landed on the grocery cart
abandoned in the parking lot,
its wire frame still cold with yesterday’s rain.

The bird tilted its head
as if asking why we leave our burdens
halfway to the place they belong.

No one answered.
Engines coughed,
doors slammed,
a receipt tumbled like thin scripture
across the asphalt.

But the sparrow sang anyway
a sermon smaller than a coin,
and worth more
than everything
we forgot to carry home.

by Sherry

by Sheikha A.

Pain travels from bone to bone ––
moon intended for earth stays

on its quest for truth. At the curb
of defiance, she remembers a lark

on one winter night staring into
an owl's eyes; daisies that held

within petals a precarious string
of dew as a sky soaked up land's

bellowing. Her bones shiver off
fireflies forming hives of light

on her skin –– sightless dreams:
mirrors reflecting one heaven

barren from drought of conquest.
She remembers almond groves

by Michael R. Burch

Massive, gray, these leaden waves
bear their unchanging burden—
the sameness of each day to day

while the wind seems to struggle to say
something half-submerged planks at the mouth of the bay
might nuzzle limp seaweed to understand.

Now collapsing dull waves drain away
from the unenticing land;
shrieking gulls shadow fish through salt spray—
whitish streaks on a fogged silver mirror.

Sizzling lightning impresses its brand.
Unseen fingers scribble something in the wet sand.

by Claudia Cross

In the graveyard, shadows weaving, where the mourners, softly grieving,
Come to whisper, hearts still heaving, for the souls that lie below.
I, a figure dark and looming, with my gaze in twilight blooming,
In the gloom, with eyes consuming, watch the sorrowed ebb and flow.

by B.R.Sep

The gloomy sloshing brine
Laps absently at the bow.
The somber waves allow
No light, no shine.

Dim but not darkness,
The sky rests above the mast.
Here the clouds are dear and gast,
On she goes, aimless.

The Eagle, Firebrand,
And Romney,
Gliding through the sea
Hopelessly toward land.

On land raged a battle of wits,
Life was on the line,
Only the ones with the strongest minds,
The eloquent, the mad, the scientists.

by Fabiyas M V

by Sanad Ali Rizvi

I was sitting beside a lake on an evening,
A lake forgotten, with hopes teeming
Odd that a lake was crying of tears,
Watching the villagers before leaving

The lake never saw greatness flowing,
Truly a bizarre behaviour it was showing
Then how come the villagers left it,
That one day it shall flow, after knowing

They abandoned the lake, and its fate,
Now the lake was trying to get a mate
Thus, I went to it and asked for a hand,
That the lake might get dry in the wait