Tag: Poetry of Loss

Yvonne Morris: “Floodlight”

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Floodlight

The moon’s blank tambourine
amplifies the drizzle’s guitar—

fragile droplets bruised become
sunlit wires of rain. The rising

world finds ruined fountains,
broken stonework converted

to carry running streams.
The wounded sleep to dream

again, when the day’s pain
assembles then disbands.

Loss stretches forward
to its instruments, unpacks

the stars, unravels the tide.
Morning pools the night.

About the Author:  Yvonne Morris lives and works in a small town in Kentucky. Her most recent chapbook is Busy Being Eve (Bass Clef Books, 2022). Her work has appeared in The Galway Review, The Santa Clara Review, Cathexis Northwest Press, The Wild Roof Journal, The Write Launch, and elsewhere.

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Image Credit: Edvard Munch “White Night” (1890) Public domain image courtesy of Artvee

Agnes Vojta: “The Pope Coffin”

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The Pope Coffin

I do not know whether dad
believed in heaven.
He had a sense for the sacred.
Sometimes all you see is the fruit;
the root remains secret.

My father never discussed death,
except to say he wanted a coffin
like Pope John Paul II: clear
lines, no frivolous embellishments –
an architect’s choice.

The minister spoke about the city-to-come,
solemn and hopeful, consoling
without the saccharine promises
dad would have hated. One must leave
space for uncertainty.

About the Author: Agnes Vojta grew up in Germany and now lives in Rolla, Missouri where she teaches physics at Missouri S&T and hikes the Ozarks. She is the author of Porous Land, The Eden of Perhaps, and A Coracle for Dreams, all published by Spartan Press. Most recently, she has been collaborating with eight other poets on the book Wild Muse: Ozarks Nature Poetry (Cornerpost Press, 2022.) Her poems have appeared in a variety of magazines; you can read some of them on her website agnesvojta.com.

Image Credit: Jules-Edmond-Charles Lachaise “Design for a ceiling with trompe l’oeil balustrade and sky” Public domain image courtesy of Artvee

Agnes Vojta: “The Topography of Grief”

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The Topography of Grief

The topography of grief is karst,
riddled with sinkholes
that suddenly open
under your feet, swallow you whole.

I don’t know what I expected
to feel. Not this emptiness.
Not nothing. I don’t cry
at the sight of my dad’s signature.

The letter from probate court
I’ve been expecting. I know
what it contains: a form letter
and a copy of dad’s will.

I cry when I pack his chessboard,
lay the wooden pieces to rest
in their velvet-lined compartments,
close the box, latch the lid.

About the Author: Agnes Vojta grew up in Germany and now lives in Rolla, Missouri where she teaches physics at Missouri S&T and hikes the Ozarks. She is the author of Porous Land, The Eden of Perhaps, and A Coracle for Dreams, all published by Spartan Press. Most recently, she has been collaborating with eight other poets on the book Wild Muse: Ozarks Nature Poetry (Cornerpost Press, 2022.) Her poems have appeared in a variety of magazines; you can read some of them on her website agnesvojta.com.

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Image Credit: Chase Dimock “Utah Karst” (2021)

Troy Schoultz: “Abbotsford Cemetery”

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About the Author: Troy Schoultz is a lifelong Wisconsin resident. His poems, stories, and reviews have appeared in Seattle Review, Rattle, Slipstream, Chiron Review, Fish Drum, Santa Monica Review, Steel Toe Review, Midwestern Gothic, Palooka and many others in the U.S. and U.K. since 1997. He is the author of two chapbooks and three full-length collections.  His interests and influences include rock and roll, vinyl LPs, found objects, the paranormal, abandoned places, folklore, old cemeteries, and the number five. He hosts and produces S’kosh: The Oshkosh Podcast. For more information check out https://troyschoultz.wixsite.com/website

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Image Credit: Chase Dimock “Crow on a Fence” (2021)

Susan Cossette: “The Persistence of Memory”

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The Persistence of Memory

If novelists die before they finish their stories
whole worlds evaporate.
Snowy trees at grey solstice sunset,
bare branches twisted with awful secrets.
Sad lines of cars inch home,
tiny ants high over the I-394 overpass.
Each with its own self-contained history.

Twenty or so mourners, some in person, 
others on webcam, gather for a pandemic-age wake.
Families open Christmas presents
in front of the TV Yule log instead of a fireplace.
Everyone stops existing.

I am not afraid 
because I write poetry 
and once I finish a poem it is done.
The next one is a zygote in my mental ovaries
that hasn’t found a sperm cell to coax it to life.

Left behind like overripe cheese,
or ice cream melting in the sun.

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About the Author: Susan Cossette lives and writes in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Author of Peggy Sue Messed Up, she is a recipient of the University of Connecticut’s Wallace Stevens Poetry Prize. A two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Rust and Moth, Vita Brevis, ONE ART, As it Ought to Be,Anti-Heroin Chic, The Amethyst Review, Crow & Cross Keys, Loch Raven Review, and in the anthologies Fast Fallen Women (Woodhall Press) Tuesdays at Curley’s (Yuganta Press),and After the Equinox.

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More by Susan Cossette:

She Waits Behind the Drapes

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Image Credit: Marjory Collins “Washington, D.C. Salvage drive, Victory Program. Books and old lantern stored in District wholesale junk company warehouse” (1942) The Library of Congress. Public Domain

Laura Grace Weldon: “Butternut Ridge Cemetery”

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Butternut Ridge Cemetery 

From the back seat my six-year-old asks
about the grandfather who died
when she was four months in the womb.
She wants to know about his favorite color
and what he likes to eat, correcting herself
to say “liked” to eat. She wants to know
what being dead means, for real.

I know children ask full force till
they get what they need, like the time
my oldest asked why people have skin
darker than his, and seconds into
my big-wattage answer
interrupted to ask
why faucets turn “this way”
twisting his hand, “to make it hot.”

But she doesn’t stop asking
and since we’re driving past
the cemetery that minute, I pull in.
She skips around his gravestone
as if in a park, touching dusty
pebbles and leggy buttercups, before
announcing to air and ground
and everything between,
“I’m sorry you’re dead Grandpa.
You would have loved me.”

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About the Author:  Laura Grace Weldon has published three poetry collections: Portals (Middle Creek 2021), Blackbird (Grayson 2019), and Tending (Aldrich 2013). She was named 2019 Ohio Poet of the Year. Laura works as a book editor, teaches writing, and maxes out her library card each week.  lauragraceweldon.com

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Image Credit: Chase Dimock “Small Sunflower” (2021)

John Dorsey: “Walt Disney and Richard Branson Will Meet Again at Freedom Mausoleum”

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Walt Disney and Richard Branson Will Meet Again at Freedom Mausoleum

past lives are all we have here
the grass kept green for golf tees
& billionaires in a space race with mortality

smoke coming from burning buildings of the dead
& the stained glass ears of a technicolor mouse
who makes us all feel safe.

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About the Author: John Dorsey lived for several years in Toledo, Ohio. He is the author of several collections of poetry, including Teaching the Dead to Sing: The Outlaw’s Prayer (Rose of Sharon Press, 2006), Sodomy is a City in New Jersey (American Mettle Books, 2010), Tombstone Factory, (Epic Rites Press, 2013), Appalachian Frankenstein (GTK Press, 2015) Being the Fire (Tangerine Press, 2016) and Shoot the Messenger (Red Flag Poetry, 2017),Your Daughter’s Country (Blue Horse Press, 2019), and Which Way to the River: Selected Poems 2016-2020 (OAC Books, 2020). His work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, and the Stanley Hanks Memorial Poetry Prize. He was the winner of the 2019 Terri Award given out at the Poetry Rendezvous. He may be reached at archerevans@yahoo.com.

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More By John Dorsey:

Anthony Bourdain Crosses the River of the Dead

Punk Rock at 45

Perpetual Motion

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Image Credit: John Margolies “Mouse hole, Mauro’s mini golf, Hazel Park, Michigan” (1986) The Library of Congress

AIOTB Magazine Announces Our Nominees for the 2021 Best of the Net Anthology

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As It Ought To Be Magazine is proud to announce our nominees for the 2021 Best of the Net Anthology, published by Sundress Publications.

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Nadia Arioli: On “I Walk Without Echo” By Kay Sage

Frank Gallimore: The Shape of My Name

Ken Hines: What the Children Know

Dan Overgaard: Drifting Off

Ilari Pass: Delayed Rays of a Star

Melody Wang: All That My Mother Cultivates

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Congratulations to our nominees, and thank you to everyone who contributed to AIOTB Magazine this year!

-Chase Dimock
Managing Editor

Imran Boe Khan: “A Thousand Miles from Your Bedside”

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A Thousand Miles from Your Bedside

I’ve watched you lose life
in measures I cannot grasp.

Distance was the only way to escape
the time loop back to my origin story.

I’d like to say I travelled
to reinvent myself

though I know I just wanted a reason
to not be the one closing your eyes.

They are emissaries from your conscience;
I fear the contradictions they carry.

I have spent my years pursuing an unreachable remoteness,

knowing my life has been yours to roam through
like a mother tasting her own poisoned milk.

While I cower beneath a son’s first day at school,

a daughter’s graduation party, I can feel those eyes
fumbling their ways softly across my face,
lighting a wick beneath the chiselled brow
they cannot read.

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About the Author: Imran Boe Khan has work appearing in places such as the Rumpus, Sixth Finch, Cosmonauts Avenue, Yes, Poetry, and The Bitter Oleander. A previous winner of the Thomas Hardy Prize, Imran is a lecturer at Bournemouth University, and lives in Christchurch, Dorset.

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Image Credit: Broncia Koller-Pinell “A Bedroom Interior” (1895) Public Domain

Jeremy Nathan Marks: “Edgemere Road”

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Edgemere Road

-for Ruth and Milton in memoriam

When there were pictures
on the wall
the house seemed larger
end tables in the hall
and someone answering
the phone

Telemarketers and fundraisers
would call but now no one does
because mail and bills are forwarded
to next of kin.

I remember both of you
moving from room
to room
creaking floors
and chiming clocks
every one of which spoke
of a particular purchase
or repair
work histories and earnings
wood grain walls
appliance doors grasped with a turning
of plumbing fixtures foot prints in linoleum.

I remember how you fed squirrels
picked beetles off of your plum tree
admired that flaming sugar maple
across the street

You cultivated tomatoes
and were proud to be
the first and only owners
of your house

You paid your bills and cut your grass
did all of the things responsible home owners do
taking a particular joy in your obligations because

They were yours.

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About the Author: Jeremy Nathan Marks lives in Canada. Brand new work appears/is appearing in Unlikely Stories, The Pangolin Review, Every Day Fiction, Bluepepper, Sledgehammer Lit, Ginosko Review, and New Reader Magazine.

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More by Jeremy Nathan Marks:

Plus Ten

Frontiers are Frontiers but Once

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Image Credit: Marion Post Wolcott “Mr. and Mrs. Elvin Wilkins (Rosa) discussing whether or not they will buy this linoleum for their kitchen floor. They decided it was too light and not wide enough and that they would wait. They came to Durham, North Carolina from their farm near Stem, Granville County, to sell their tobacco at auction and to do some general shopping” (1939) The Library of Congress