Magazine
Jason Baldinger: “a time capsule of dust”
Stephen Barile: “Cedar Crest Cove”
Jane-Rebecca Cannarella: “Quilted Rainbows”
Lorraine Caputo: “And That Wind Twirls”
Rick Christiansen: “Borrowed Blood”
John Dorsey: “Jerry Garcia & German Root Beer”
Howie Good: “Uketopia”
John Grey: “Flower People”
Judy Lorenzen: “Anyway”
Tim Peeler: “Untitled”
LB Sedlacek: “Art vs Life (Dream 09/19/15)”
What We’re Here for
for bart solarczyk & bob phillips
your whole generation
seemed to know
how to swat away a compliment
kind words tossed
into a river
full of mud & rust
born out of houses
with tin roofs & tar paper hearts
by men & women
who knew the weight
of factory gloves
after so many years
their fingers piercing
the very edges of time
even poems are just about
doing the job
like pushing a mop
or wiping sweat
away from your heart
after the loss of a friend or a spouse or your sanity
knowing that’s just what time does
knowing you just have to keep putting the work in
because that’s what we’re here for.
About the Author: John Dorsey is the former Poet Laureate of Belle, MO. He is the author of several collections of poetry, including Which Way to the River: Selected Poems: 2016-2020 (OAC Books, 2020), Sundown at the Redneck Carnival, (Spartan Press, 2022, and Pocatello Wildflower, (Crisis Chronicles Press, 2023). He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.
Image Credit: Carol M. Highsmith “Historic house with tin roof in Eutaw, Alabama” (2010) Public domain image courtesy of The Library of Congress
Poem for Kacie
after you check my blood pressure
you smile while threatening
to steal my prized winter coat
asking where i got it
on a cold day in ohio
so vivid that we can both almost still see it
even though you were never there
after nearly fifteen years
one of the sleeves
coming apart at the seams
will require another glaze of gorilla glue
before the winter sets in
but like you
some things are one of a kind
i want to take you back into my past
when everything still felt soft
& smelled like a field of red carnations
where you could feel my heart beating
as i imagined
wiping the snow
from your lips
& placing the coat
over your slim shoulders in repose.
About the Author: John Dorsey is the former poet laureate of Belle, Missouri and the author of Pocatello Wildflower. He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.
Image Credit: Harris & Ewing “Snow” (1936) Public domain image courtesy of The Library of Congress
On a Cold Afternoon at the Sit-N-Bull
the kid behind the counter
hesitantly asks
what happened to my eye
& i hold in my anger
just long enough to remember
that this is the only place in town
to get a halfway decent hamburger
where the coffee doesn’t taste like generational poverty
even though the water
comes from that very same river
& i imagine his ancestors wearing coonskin caps
wiping the dirt from his face
& i wonder what happened
to my eye too
& all of the things it once saw
wiped away
like smudges of memory
like the manners we rarely use anymore
there are some questions
we just shouldn’t ask.
About the Author: John Dorsey is the former poet laureate of Belle, Missouri and the author of Pocatello Wildflower. He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.
Image Credit: Carol M. Highsmith “Modern diner, Pawtucket, Rhode Island” Public domain image courtesy of The Library of Congress
Poem After Listening to Philip Levine
after this
everything becomes a grease stain
in a field of tired hands
caught in the rain
where the paradise of youth
just boxes you in
until you can’t breathe
you lick memories from your fingers
to fill your stomach in the late afternoon
until the blood from a day’s work tastes like honey
until flowers that should be sweet
just seem flawed
& that’s exactly
what you like about them.
About the Author: John Dorsey is the former poet laureate of Belle, Missouri and the author of Pocatello Wildflower. He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.
Image Credit: Chase Dimock “Yellow Daisies” (2023)
What to Do After You Don’t Die on the Table get up write a few things down shake thinking they missed something.
About the Author: John Dorsey is the former poet laureate of Belle, Missouri and the author of Pocatello Wildflower. He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.
Image Credit: “Operating room – eye institute” Public domain image courtesy of the Library of Congress
On the Prospect of Dying in December not the end of the year but maybe the end of your life & you don’t know if you should buy another calendar you didn’t buy the one you have now given away by the local bank curling at the bottom after an already brutal summer you think about the winter of 1996 just before your grandfather closed his eyes one last time while smiling knowing the battle was almost over thinking about when you sold calendars over the holidays for the local bookstore mostly of swimsuit models who are grandmothers now & kittens that are long dead & butterflies that have flown away & you wonder how long it will be for you on an unusually cool august morning waiting for your ride it won’t be long now.
About the Author: John Dorsey is the former poet laureate of Belle, Missouri and the author of Pocatello Wildflower. He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.
Image Credit: Harris & Ewing “Washington Snow Scenes” (1924) Public domain image courtesy of the Library of Congress
Poem for Tohm Bakelas you are an old soul with a heart full of stencils with love mimeographed inside your chest a born reader a black rabbit trapped in a dusty shed with empty cigarette cartons & forgotten words of wisdom hidden away in a field in new jersey or some ohio trailer park filled with myth your laugh is warhol’s never ending telephone a collect call into the past they don’t make them like you anymore brother they never did.
About the Author: John Dorsey is the former poet laureate of Belle, Missouri and the author of Pocatello Wildflower. He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.
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Image Credit: John Margolies “Enterprise, Seaside Heights, New Jersey” (1978) Public domain image courtesy of the Library of Congress
Eating Gus’s World Famous Fried Chicken with Larry Gawel this is life how it’s supposed to be larry with a long dangling mop of silver hair just off the highway resting his arm on a rainy friday afternoon talking about alaska denver spain & tokyo & this garage has never felt so small a leaky freighter of all the things i’ll never do now as hummingbirds wait out the weather by my window we run into town for stamps & chocolate ice cream my friend brian felster’s life began & ended on a boat in alaska in 1982 before he died at 48 surrounded by love richard hugo laughed by a stream with buddha on a deserted montana hiking path in the middle of the afternoon larry’s glasses are drenched in rain as we come in from outside he is a springsteen song always born to run & he will never die or run out of chicken.
About the Author: John Dorsey is the former poet laureate of Belle, Missouri and the author of Pocatello Wildflower. He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.
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Image Credit: John Margolies “Chicken cowboy billboard, Elko, Nevada” (1991) Public domain image courtesy of the Library of Congress
Cancer Song #9 your first mri you have to be pulled out 3 times hardly able to breathe now they place a towel over your face & offer you a warm blanket & some easy listening music piped into your headphones & it almost feels like you’re on vacation & you dream about staying in there forever safe from the outside world somewhere cancer & time can’t follow you & you think about squeezing a button & ordering a cold drink & asking about the inflight movie.
About the Author: John Dorsey is the former poet laureate of Belle, Missouri and the author of Pocatello Wildflower. He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com
Image Credit: Chase Dimock “Tunnel” (2021)
As It Ought To Be 