New poems: Rus Khomutoff

 

Regular contributor Rus reads his new poem on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHumffmSCok

Video 3:02, the reading of his poem starts 1:57.

Featuring Sushant Thapa

1. City 

 

 

A city skyline 

has no border. 

Her caricature is to 

imitate human life 

and make it glorious. 

The city sleeps with her eyes open, 

she has to safeguard her  

respect, smiles

and veiled shyness. 

Tomorrow she will bring 

memories of other places. 

She does not want to be 

the mirror of one tabloid sky, 

she wants to zoom in, 

to read her ancient uprisings. 

When a foreign memory conquers  

which face will the city show? 

                                                                                                 

2. By the Lake

 

There was a lake here once

Now my feet are not wet, 

I no longer understand 

And cannot rejoice, my stand here. 

Swimming I know not, 

But I preferred the lake-face

Of this land. 

Now any speck of the night 

Wants to flower 

By the early morning here. 

The lake water is cool no more, 

The faces that reflect themselves 

Have drunk of dried thirst. 

My fellow pal, 

Cannot get the location of this land. 

There was a lake here once,

He does not believe his eyes now 

And he cannot even believe his memory. 

Now the green pool is sucked dry. 

Who drank the lake water? 

Any myths could take the swans away

And they have.  

Once here the lake wind blew and stirred

The love among long wanderers 

Who lost their nakedness 

Under the howling moon 

Heard in reflection in the lake water. 

 

 

                                                                                       

3. Paper Memory

 

The floating papers 

Touch the water 

Spilled on the floor. 

There is coldness, 

When the water 

Soaks the paper whole. 

My ink dissolves 

It mixes with the water. 

Your name was written in that paper. 

My sunshine is melting like ice. 

The nights are also cold

Like all those melted ices. 

In a drop of water 

I see my heaven.  

I have known the cost

Of this coldness 

The paper has left me wanting more. 

Photographs of yours 

In an empty house 

Resemble still life. 

 

 

 

                                                                                     

4. After You Left

 

Like a shadow 

I saw you going. 

You were a moonlight, 

You were a dew 

Still on the leaf. 

My winter's language of 

Affection was your warmth. 

I saw you leave

Like a thread 

Being pulled. 

That dew became a tear 

Yet, memories remain. 

They say it is easy to write 

A love poem. 

But I say it is difficult when 

You have given your loving heart, 

And art can't bring it all back. 

But I have trustful and colorful memories; 

They get strong with the door 

To reach your abode. 

I haven't learnt to not think in love. 

 

 

                                                                                   

5. Love Poem

 

Pauses in rain 

Is never announced;

It just happens. 

Only spring announces its arrival. 

Flowers begin to dance

There is fragrance sprayed 

In the air. 

Remember, when we met

In the spring? 

Spring announces its arrival 

Because we wait for it. 

I waited for your arrival

And you came. 

And you came not in winter 

But it was spring 

Marked in my blooming love diary. 

That diary is a love calendar now. 

Go like the spring 

With little bit of future anticipations, 

And soft kisses of love poems. 

 

 

                                                                                      

6. Sketch of Myself 

My child loves to 

Grab her new diary. 

 

She wants to draw and write 

Before her pen arrives

 

My mother wants to play with the child, 

But the child wants to write. 

 

An old age, 

Wants to free the body with an hour of play

 

But here, a child counts her scores of arts:

More drawings of Mermaids and Barbie

 

In the child's eye, even time could be drawn

And then hours would sink to seconds. 

 

I think that when I write my thoughts, 

I write before I think

 

But before that, 

My child draws a picture of me. 

 

I am a picture. 

I am a sketch.

 

The endless depiction of color, 

What color suits me?

 

My child leaves me colorless, but 

My clothes are stars-studded,

 

I aim for the sun in the snow

To wake up and rise.

 

Isn't any normal day, 

A sketch of myself? 

 

Or I may think, 

Stars need no colors, 

 

I can still be them, but 

Can the stars be me? 

 

 

 

Bio: Sushant Thapa is a Nepalese poet from Biratnagar-13, Nepal who holds a Master’s degree in English literature from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. He has published four books of poetry namely: The Poetic Burden and Other Poems (Authorspress, New Delhi, 2020), Abstraction and Other Poems (Impspired, UK, 2021), Minutes of Merit (Haoajan, Kolkata, 2021), and Love’s Cradle (World Inkers Printing and Publishing, New York, USA and Senegal, Africa, 2023). Sushant has been published in places like Sahitya Post, The Gorkha Times, The Kathmandu Post, The Poet Magazine, The Piker Press, Trouvaille Review, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Impspired, Harbinger Asylum, New York Parrot, Pratik Magazine, The Beatnik Cowboy, The Dope Fiend Daily, Atunis Poetry, EKL Review, The Kolkata Arts, Dissident Voice, Journal of Expressive Writing, As It Ought To Be Magazine, Spillwords, Mad Swirl, Ink Pantry, International Times and Outlook India among many.

Featuring Eric D. Goodman

 

The Web in Your Path

 

As you walk along the trail 

and your face encounters a spider’s web,

resist the instinct to thrash your arms 

violently around, to clear the web away 

from the path, to swipe at it with a stick, 

or force your way through.

 

Consider the work that has gone into it.

Not only the hours of hard labor—

frantic spinning of thread throughout the night—

but the artistry.

 

How would you feel if some animal 

larger than you came tromping through your yard 

and bumped into your home, took out 

a window or busted through a corner?

 

What if this large animal—a bear, 

perhaps a giant—

became irritated by your irrelevant shack 

and thrashed angrily about, demolishing

your roof, your secure home, tearing it

down to its foundation?

 

Think of how hard you worked to create 

this safe place for your family—

this home where you can eat and rest,

snuggle with your loved ones,

maybe play a board game or watch a movie.

 

All of those hours of work in the office, 

or at the restaurant waiting on stuck-up 

bougie couples who think they’re better 

because of their clothes or cars or stocks—

 

half a life working toward earning 

mortgage money. All to create 

this perfect little web.

 

When you encounter the web in the path,

step calmly back, gently pinch the thread 

affixed to your face, and walk around the trees 

or bushes upon which the spider’s home is attached.

 

That way, someone else will destroy it instead of you.

 

And years from now when you are left alone 

in a dilapidated shack that drips leaf-infused 

scum from your leaking roof, you can rest 

assured that your predicament 

is through no fault of your own.   

 

 

Power of Positive Thinking

 

I'm going to a new home, 

where the servers are all robots, 

and the food is made of dreams.

 

I'm not afraid, 

because I know that anything is possible

in this all-inclusive resort.

 

I'll see my loved ones daily:

the living ones will grudgingly stop by,

and the dead are sure to flirt with my daydreams.

 

Luxurious, adjustable bed,

cable TV, and a cabin companion

for cards, conversation, and laughter.

 

Gourmet meals, 

unlimited snacks and drinks,

and the recreation area drenched in sunlight.

 

In our new palace, the rules don't matter, 

and the only thing that counts is an appreciation

for beautiful memories of warm, fuzzy moments gone by.

 

I'll make myself happy there, 

in the land of the living dead, 

my Hospice.

Pests

 

In the cubed wastelands of the office,

an abandoned ghost town,

tumbleweeds collect under plywood desks,

against felt walls and corners,

no open space to roam.

 

Mouse’s homeland is abundant 

with abandoned foods:

 

cookies and crackers, trail mix and packaged pies

all left behind, well preserved, easy to access.

 

Nearly three rings around the sun—

a paradise of plenty, six square meals a day—

no predators.

 

The pandemic wears on, 

food becomes harder to find, 

and, once found, is barely palatable.

 

The distant companion at cube 3416 WHR

looks weak, too weak to put up a fight,

still enough meat on the bones, 

at least at the moment. 

 

It’s an option, these final crumbs consumed.

 

People gradually return to their cubes,

not as often as before, only occasionally,

half a dozen sunrises between intrusions.

 

Pizza crusts, crackers, cookies, crumbs, 

scarce, but replenished. 

 

Mouse’s distant companion never

looked so relieved. 

Celebratory Condolence

 

Sometimes I worry 

that I might say the wrong thing 

on a sympathy card,

or birthday card,

 

or worse, that I might

mix up the cards:

 

my over-the-hill, fifty-year-old friend receiving

“I know this is a difficult time for you, 

but you will get through this,”

 

making him worry that this side of 

the mid-life line is not all

it’s cracked up to be;

 

my mourning colleague, fingertips damp

from corralling tears, reading,

 

“Celebrate this day! Now begins the exciting

next chapter in your life. The best days

are yet to come!”

 

and sniveling herself from sorrow to anger, 

determined to give me a piece of her mind.

 

Perhaps “thinking of you” is the safest phrase,

whether offering congratulation or condolence,

followed by “thoughts and prayers” 

and an affectionate signature.

Barefoot

 

The girl with hunger in her eyes 

wanted to scream,

to brush the glitter of her hometown from her stilettos,

and cartwheel to freedom.

 

Her sense of not belonging in the city’s pulse:

a secret so dark and deep

it could never be shared,

(though everyone close to her

could smell it).

 

He took her hand,

led her to his car,

coerced her away from the city’s disco and glitter 

to a barefoot world she thought she wanted

 

where the only sound is the wind, 

the only glitter is the stars, 

the only dance music 

is the beating of her heart next to his.

Eric D. Goodman lives and writes in Maryland, where he’s remained sheltered in place during the pandemic and beyond, spending a portion of his hermithood writing poetry. His first book of poetry, Faraway Tables, is coming in spring 2024 from Yorkshire Press. He’s author ofWrecks and Ruins (Loyola University’s Apprentice House Press, 2022) The Color of Jadeite (Apprentice House, 2020), Setting the Family Free(Apprentice House, 2019), Womb: a novel in utero (Merge Publishing, 2017) Tracks: A Novel in Stories (Atticus Books, 2011), and Flightless Goose, (Writers Lair Books, 2008). More than a hundred short stories, articles, travel stories, and poems have been published in literary journals, magazines, and periodicals. Learn more about Eric and his writing at www.EricDGoodman.com.