We have some wonderful new poems from Madlyn Steinhart, Nicole Freezer Rubens, and Carol Ostrow.

Better days ahead

The alarm went off again
Another repeat and routine
Necessary evil
The WORSE part of the marriage vows
You are the one to see your love through
The treatnent commercials make their point
Just once show both sides of the story
You hate Cancer and you want to rid the earth of it
Treating it is one thing
Watching your loved one and yourself deal is quite another
Deal,you will
Places to go and People to see
Ringing tbat bell and he will
It is so much more than ringing the bell
Better days ahead

~Madlyn Epstein Steinhart, author of Put Your Boots on and Dance in the Rain

A Paradox

This is most definitely a statement, not a quiz,

The older I get, the harder it is,

To look and feel younger than my years,

Do most of you share these aging fears?

We wear more makeup to hide the lines,

Buying clothing that never really defines,

The year of our birth,

Striving to hide the extra girth,

That Mother Nature, that dictating witch,

Has given no choices to solve the glitch,

Of looking better the older we get,

I guess, in the end, we must totally accept,

Getting double doses of expensive Botox,

Or accepting the rather simple Paradox:

To get older……start thinking younger!

~ Carol Ostrow, author of Poems from My Pandemic Pen

Late August

The last few moments of summer

slip away

draining drip by drip

into hidden sewers.

The city is emptier

than it should be.

The air fluctuates from thick and dank

to perfection

blotting my exposed sun kissed limbs.

As I pass the trash cans

the odor makes me flinch.

All garbage smells the same

like all Subway sandwich shop

franchises along the highways.

The sunsets keep edging up

like the long shot race horse

that pulls ahead

and shocks the crowd,

even though all horses in a race

are fast.

I expect this late August mood

as its own season.

I look back and assess

if it felt like summer,

but my definition of summer

is largely based on a pubescent 6^th grade ending

and sleepaway camp beginning.

I look ahead at September

as a gateway to starting over,

even though it’s the 9^th month

out of 12.

Fall quietly remains my hope

whispering the tone of new beginnings

in my ear,

again and again.

~Nicole Freezer Rubens, author of “The Long Pause and the Short Breathe”

PLACID CONUNDRUMS

MANHATTAN HAIKU

Green in the city

Causing a quick double take

Hallucination

QUEENS HAIKU

The old grey hydrant

Sits so undisturbed today

Who will turn it on

BRONX HAIKU

Man sits on a bench

Surrounded by pink flowers

Is he blue waiting

STATEN ISLAND HAIKU

Cold white picket fence

Pavement covered in tan leaves

Son stops to bereave

BROOKLYN HAIKU

The wall was red brick

I lay my head on the dent

Siren rang for days

~Marjorie J. Levine, author of Road Trips