22 poets being published in the 2016 San Gabriel Valley Poetry Calendar

MICHELLE ANGELINI
DANNY P. BARBARE
JACK G. BOWMAN
CALOKIE
DON KINGFISHER CAMPBELL
MARC CARVER
BEVERLY M. COLLINS
DAN DIAMOND
JEFFREY R. GRUBERT
CHARLES HARMON
ANITA HOLZBERG
BRIONY JAMES
JEFFRY MICHAEL JENSEN
JOAN McNERNEY
THELMA T. REYNA
LING SENA
RUSSELL SMITH
LUKE STILWELL
AMBIKA TALWAR
JOHN R. TOWNSEND
LORI WALL-HOLLOWAY
LYNN WHITE

The 2016 SGVPC is available in two sizes, digest (5 1/2 x 8 1/2), and desktop/wall (8 1/2 x 11). Either way, they're just $5 a copy. Come to the publication parties on Saturday, December 19th and 26th at 3pm inside the backroom of the Santa Catalina Branch Library on 999 E. Washington Blvd. in Pasadena to pick up yours. Can't make it to the readings? Order copies of the calendar via http://paypal.com, select Send Money to make payment ($7 each, includes $2 shipping) to kingfisher1031@charter.net.

16 poets read from SGVPQ 68

MARIA A. ARANA
baby makes…

baby makes fake mommy kill herself

hurts so bad to see her body mangled with therocks

white hair

white heart

impure

baby makes you burn yourself

the skin scorches

and you stand there gawking at the blisters

baby looks the other way and other babies dothe same

can’t stand baby murderers

but babies kill without remorse

baby shoots daddy

baby stabs mommy

baby sleeps with teeny baby

they watch and learn

and learn to watch

mimicking society

adults should fear their blank stares

baby isn’t baby anymore

JACK G. BOWMAN
Gathering Intel

The forehead opens up to the left

a blue gloved scientist peeks inside,

he smiles as he examines the workings;

LED lights flash and microprocessors buzz quietly

and the droid for his part, waits

as if this were a usual exam

a small set of tweezers move in and out,

a tool pokes into a lateral aperture

and shifts down, then out,

the researcher sighs and after a last look

closes him back up

"all set to go, remember blend in Charlie."

they do a battery of 47 tests on the new adjustment,

elapsed time 2,000,000,000s of a second

test number 46 is a little off,

but still within normal limits

 a young observing assistant asks

"Why that Dr.?"

"Personality."

CALOKIE
Christmas of ’68 

The first time I traveled by plane was the Christmas of ’68 

when Cheryl and I took Luke, 9 months old, to visit my mother 

and stepdad, Jimmy, who he would later call Mo and Po.

Luke was born two weeks before Martin Luther King was assassinated one year from the day he spoke in opposition to the Vietnam War from the pulpit of the Riverside Church in New York City.

In June that year, just when it seemed Robert Kennedy was on 

the verge of ending the war in Vietnam after winning the California Democratic Presidential primary, he was murdered like his brother.

Thus by removing the greatest obstacle in “Lord, love me, I’m 

a liberal” Hubert Humphrey’s way, the “Masters of War”

were free to continue their carnage.

Jesus Christ, I wondered!

What kind of a world has my beautiful boy been born.

I did not feel like eating but the next day, I broke my fast 

by pigging out on peanut butter spread on crackers.

In August we watched on our black and white TV at the 1968 

Democratic Convention in Chicago, Daley’s blue bullies charge 

with clubs swinging a crowd of anti-war demonstrators shouting,

            THE WHOLE WORLD IS WATCHING!

            THE WHOLE WORLD IS WATCHING!

            THE WHOLE WORLD IS WATCHING!

Of course Tricky Dick who I voted for in 1960 was elected 

that November. Mom and Jimmy probably voted for Nixon 

but this was Christmas and as the head of our family, Grandma 

would say for family gatherings, “Never argue politics or religion.”

Besides Mom caught the Hong Kong Flu from Cheryl 

who got it from Luke who unlike Mama and Mo recovered quickly.

Christmas Eve on Mom and Jim’s color TV, I watched world premiere of “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.” That night it snowed and I woke up to a rare white Christmas in Oklahoma.

When we returned to our Pasadena home, a month before Luke’s year old birthday, Richard Nixon was inaugurated President of the United States

DON KINGFISHER CAMPBELL
Three Layer Brownie

Via biting wind and salivic surf, he eats through, purchased from a petite waterfall-haired cheerful teenage student, a chocolate mesa, to create a crumbly cliff revealing baked layering of a heated past. The recently refrigerated Saran-wrapped surface of crusty dark brown plated mantle, held up by the deeper darker nearly black Oreonic cream-filled muddy subsoil, in turn supported by an array of larger melted chips like gigantic boulders buried in a blonde cake base, methodically vanishes. All washed down an over half-century old teaching throat in waves of bubbly cranberry red water encased in lightweight recyclable aluminum from the virtually empty great dispensing machine monolith in the busy teacher’s cafeteria rectangle.

BEVERLY M. COLLINS
Quicksand

He could make your fingertips

crave the softness of a moment,

your brown eyes blind

to heartbreak.

He laughed in the face of thunder

through a storm.

He was ruff in the right way and

smooth when it counted.

All Brilliance, quirky, serious-fun and warm.

He knew his a way around silence.

Hide secrets between raindrops,

fell through hard times and

held dreams of heaven's gate

He had a smile like a warning

that his kiss was habit-forming

He was quicksand and it was too late.

POET COOPER
Lost Tooth

in the bathroom sink—the red

bull dances, dances

one wheel up over the curb, lifted

white primer truck, with aftermarket

fenders.  The lost tooth

in the bathroom sink the red bull

dances, dances, the boy with ink hands screaming on

a street tattoos wings on the open

mouthed buildings, the lost

tooth in the bathroom sink the red

stained towel held

to her opened skull

Widow-maker draws her smiles in lap

dance-chances, romances, our names

lost in bathroom

sinks where we mirror eyed

red bull dances, dances.

SEVEN DHAR
One Morning in Mei

I wake with woodcutting on my mind

Bury my adze with delight

But morning comes too soon

And I retire to such time

When I can call out, Timber!

Warm in the morning light

Time grows thin, hatchet in hand,

I seek the woods by Jungle Thi

Where Tygress purrs and her fur aligns

Pounces the path and wood alights

Scratching post territory defines

Spray and spray such scent,

Maul the bone, lick feline accent:

"Me came many a weary way

Wandering wilderness where to allay

Gnawing of trembling tum'

My bloat the rumble of bubbling gum

Here I'll mine soft ivory, the licking kind

Its fine marrow warm pearly white

So wending through the forest maze

Until on woodcutter I set my gaze"

Soon goes before some wild cat

How my morning turns a harrowing tale

Two span between her padded track

And I'm still here the morrow to sail

Josiah Bowman reads

MARK A. FISHER
theme park

buses disgorge

their masses

to queue into

serpentine lines

of tourists seeking out

local cuisine

“double double”

they each say

to then wait

and wait

for their misnamed

fast food

e-ticket

G.T. FOSTER
The  ' Word

The word has stayi'g power

Most slurs do

Very few actually from

that regio' of West Africa

It's their call

Thi'k it empowers them

somehow to use it thus

A way to say I'm better

But it will  'ot be boxed-i'

'ow it has crossed over

Heard Mexica' boy use

i' hallway Jefferso' High

School, South Los A'geles

That's  my 'igger, he shouted!

I rose from my desk a'd walked

quickly to door a'd looked dow'

the hall to see two Latio' s arms

arou'd each the other's  'eck a'd

shoulder

Same voice blurted a'ew:

Youse my 'igger

Old black a'd hurt what's to say?

'either of the two were bor'  here

But that hateful old word was lear'ed here!

ROSE ANNA HINES
Gardener’s Burial

Earth to earth

ashes to ashes.

When I leave this garden

may my blood and bone

feed the earth.

Grow exotic fungi,

or sharp bitty watercress for crisp salads.

Or sweet drip-juice-all-over-your t-shirt apricots

or purple ruffle basil for pesto sauce and linguini.

Or peanuts for some child’s peanut-butter and jelly sandwich

or lavender for Drakkar Noir

to touch some rugged man’s face

and haunt a woman’s dreams.

Or plain grass for some cat or dog to eat.

or pansies, daffodils  and roses

to inspire a van Gogh or Okeef.

Or a pesky weed that grows

regardless of how often it is pulled

and how dry it seems to get

and doesn’t let concrete or cursing stop it.

JAN SEE KING
Ever Alive 

Jasper sun on water

       on

patience

         an

      Earth laurel

              avidly

      fragrant

              follows—

      sapphire

                eyes

        beguiling

                  depth.

                    It, cerulean,

                   renews

            morning lelahel

                          keeps

                          river

                             nuances

                               gold.

 When overcome morning

like down rolls clouds

over what it must no

longer see—fire in

California trees, rods

that bow washed fishes

slung writhing with wrath.

When power reasons that

son evermore is alive

and patient, it ) wine

from a vineyard, star

from a temple watch,

seed begun from the burnt

forest ( edges into spent

rule a seduction rivers

know—thunder over rock

lifting lambs’ wool, rolling

testimonies to the naked

edges listening.  Day and

night song in tongues—

barley burbling droplet brides

who may marry the dead

and carry them river alive.

MINA V. KIRBY
Ric’s Story

A man once stood

at the edge of the Bixby Creek Bridge

in Bug Sur

the wind blowing his hair askew

his intent to plunge

into the dark moving waters

below

He imagined that the impact

on the water’s surface

would break his neck

keeping him from experiencing the agony

of drowning

Almost immediately

his worries and pains

would float away with the stream

He stood

looked out at the cloudless blue sky

for what would be the last time

Just a small climb over the guard rail

an slight outward tip forward

he could let gravity

take care of the rest

He would have

no more financial woes

or fights with his family

no more feelings of being

not quite good enough

no more unsuccessful struggles

to succeed

But then

just for a moment

he let his mind stray

to a memory

of holding his daughter’s tiny hand

as he pointed out small creatures

in a tide pool

Unbidden

another picture appeared

of the day they went to the church picnic

of his gawky young son’s grin

and shout of joy

when they won that silly three-legged race

together

Suddenly he felt an intense longing

to enfold his wife in his arms

to feel her warm body next to his

let their tears mingle

to begin yet one more time

the work of living

together

He turned

walked away from the bridge

telling himself

that on some future dark day

he could come back again

After all

the bridge would always be there

But in that short time

standing there in the wind

something in him had changed

and he knew

as clearly as he had ever understood

anything in his life

that he never would

This is a true story. After a very successful life,

 Ric passed away peacefully many years later, at age 78.

THELMA T. REYNA
Ideology

2015

“…race is a social construct, with very little or no biological

basis. Race exists only because of racist ideologies.”

--E.E. Telles (2004). Race in Another America….

took only 2 weeks after the last rhodesian to set

demons loose: fire-stoking monsters crawling in

midnight dirt to burn what they cannot squelch

seven black churches dissolved to earth,

brick skeletons stuffed with ash and beams,

crufixes scorched like wildfire limbs, hymnals

charcoal skins curling under pews

the charleston 9, swathed in our nation’s tears,

suffused with grace, inspiring grace,

were barely in the ground

ideology is cloth bigots fold themselves into, melting

in threads, banners and bars, souls draped on rags,

brains deadened with myth and pseudo-gods to justify

how others are inferior

JOSHUA ROARK
Body Language

Not all, but some in the classroom laugh,

young fleshy noises bubbling up

around your words, cutting instructions in half.

You smile at their smiles and take your cue to shut-up.

The pencil ends wiggle in their growing grips

like the tails of so many happy little dogs.

“Let the words fall out,” you tell them. “Feel the drips

and let honesty spring from your young mind’s fog.”

Not all, but some scribble honestly on the page,

their hands dancing a quick beat of hurt and play

to create, to dig, to lift and reach and rage

toward the graphite honesty they struggle to say.

“But why’s it gotta be honest?” she asks through her gum.

You shrug.  She shrugs.  They write.  Not all, but some.

CaLokie and Marvin L. Dorsey read...

LUKE STILWELL
The Irish Version

Are you hungry?

Hey, come on.

ARE you hungry?

I’m feeling something.

I asked you a direction question soldier!

Soldier?

Sorry, channeling Sarah O’Conner in Terminator.

I think that’s Sarah Conner.

It’s the Irish version.

I don’t think there is an Irish version.

Wait a minute, are you really going to blog this? That?

What?

The above.

I can’t even remember which one of us is represents which side.

Careful meticulous writer you are. Anyway… hungry now?

A little. Maybe. I feel a twinge.

We all pray upon your twinge.

Pray harder.

LORI WALL-HOLLOWAY

Make Believe

Another generation takes

on role of Mistress Puppeteer

and brings to life a world

once alive 25 years before

She chooses small brown

plastic bears strewn over

table and sets them inside

toy schoolhouse to pretend

“Little Bear, let me go

on the swing first,” calls

out a bear before another

cries from the seesaw,

“Play with me.”

Mistress Puppeteer commands

bear students to dance until -

Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle

A small bell positioned

in building’s tower

marks end of recess

and bears march inside

where lessons begin

30 poets being published in SGVPQ 68

MARIA A. ARANA
JACK G. BOWMAN
CALOKIE
DON KINGFISHER CAMPBELL
BEVERLY M. COLLINS
POET COOPER
SEVEN DHAR
ROBIN WYATT DUNN
MARK A. FISHER
GREGORY FOSTER
KATHLEEN GUNTON
CHARLES HARMON
LINDA MARIE HILTON
ROSE ANNA HINES
ALEX ANDREW HUGHES
JEFFRY MICHAEL JENSEN
JAN SEE KING
MINA V. KIRBY
DEBORAH P KOLODJI
MARIE LECRIVAIN
JOAN McNERNEY
KATHERINE NORLAND
THELMA T. REYNA
JOSHUA ROARK
LING SENA
LUKE STILWELL
JERI THOMPSON
TIM TIPTON
MAJA TROCHIMCZYK
LORI WALL-HOLLOWAY

18 poets read from SGVPQ 67

LORI WALL-HOLLOWAY

Rainstorm

Light illuminates darkness ushered

in by loud thunder that shakes ground

accompanied by water pounding

the earth.

The splash of tires on rain soaked streets

are calming to hear while cuddled
in warm bed inside home.

BRIAN THORPE

I Saw An Old Man Weeping Alone

I saw an old man weeping alone as he sat on a city bench.
His open sobs seemed even louder than the urban
din that enveloped us.
His tears were more torrential than a hundred summer storms.

A multitude scurried past him,
paying little if any attention,
let alone allowing the time to inquire as to what it was that saddened him so, or offer a gentle touch.

I did take notice but I didn't act,
steeped, mired, consumed as I was in
some myopic maelstrom of vain distractions.
My head was tilted down, my jacket collar turned up as if
to brave a blizzard.
And thus I moved past him, icy and brisk like a north Atlantic wind.

I came to the end of the block and something unseen compelled me to turn around.
When I did the bench was empty. The doleful man had been swallowed by the chaos of concrete and car horns.
I went on my way, tossing the image and sounds of him behind me as if they were handfuls of worthless coins.

I made my way to an amber lit tavern.
Once inside, I bathed luxuriously in oceans of Bushmill's
and rivers of Merlot, while the juke box kept me sweetly
sated with Nashville cliches and moldy oldies.

Yet above the clinking of ice, the drunken laughter,
at the bartender's jokes, the riffs of Chuck Berry and the twang
of Hank Sr., I could hear the old man's sobs as though from a distant vale.
They became faint words of admonition.
His remembered tears were now a message scrawled on
the bar with invisible ink.

What if, they wrote, there comes an hour when some chill pair of hands takes hold of me like a set of medieval shackles,
rendering me motionless and, as such, a victim to some onslaught of grief.

What will it be about or threaten to become?
The death of a lover, a terminal malady, the imminence of war or some epic upheaval?
Faith  elusive, abandoned, misplaced or betrayed?
Mirages once prized by a cocky, foolish boy esteemed and
exalted them years before to venerated plateaus, only to have them, in more wizened years, reveal the true nature of what they'd always been:
Paint by number portraits, sophistries cloaked in the
tongues of wisdom, salacious encounters disguised as love,
All as void of any true value as the ring in a crackerjack box!

And should the sundial signal that moment, will I take the place of the old man who sat on the bench so distraught and abandoned?
Will a blind, impervious, throng whirl around me as it had him?
Will I silently beg for comfort like Oliver Twist with my bowl in hand?
And should I look up, will you be the ones who keep walking,
uncaring, remote and awaiting your turn to weep?