The Cymbal Player As bows and fingers quiver strings, as lungs and lips whip up the air, as notes soar...

by Lew Icarus Bede "A sonnet is a coin: its face reveals The soul—its converse, to what Power 'tis due:...

  Self-Love Some tenderhearted people claim We’re deficient self-esteem; Yes, a collective sense of shame Made despondency mainstream. While gloom...

Wordsworth’s Lament I wandered lonely as a cloud—Oh dear! I watched the dance of daffodils—Oh my! When on my couch...

  The toys we buy at Christmastime (The decorations, too), Don’t come from elves in Santa’s shop, As we’ve been...

On the occasion of his birthday, 160 years ago, on February 27, 1848  At the Solitary Age of Twelve—Seven and...

  Budding darkness, in your starkness, void of noise and light, deliver me from what I see ’fore day turns...

  Living with Omnibenevolence Each one of us is furnished with an expiration date, And no one living has the...

Confucius Institute Workers (Excerpt) For Xinqun Note: Confucius Institutes are being or have been set up at major universities throughout...

gone the time for finding fault for finger-pointing and assault frantic now the SOS our ship of state is in...

It’s a vicious process, sonnet writing. It seems as every time I near the goal a syllable or rhyme eludes...

He that hath ears to hear, let him hear. The misreporting of great Caesar’s death Errs by one gross omission....

This life—O, how much more of it remains? The night is brief. Toward those short trees, we saw a bird,...

Which Is the Grandest Name of All? Which is the grandest name of all? Churchill, Churchill, Churchill! Winter sere or...

“But it was not pleasant to fire at the back of an unoffending individual…so I let him alone.” —Major Patrick...

Tonight, I saw the moon Stalking me, watching me Hiding surreptitiously. She knows I know she's there She knows I...

There once was a girl named Shelly. who bought a pet fish by the deli. But to her surprise, with...

Insomnia Many's the night I lie in bed with words to write that fill my head. They twist and turn...

She sits in thoughtful silence, chin in hand, That old blue skirt hem covers her thin knees. Gazing west, the...

Fenghan Gao was an outstanding artist of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1912 AD). He had profound wisdom and was multi-talented; he...

  I fear no more the settling of the night Or mind its grey, evaporating shades; Mine ears are deaf...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjc_6R0ang8&feature=youtu.be   It was once thought that swallows wintered on the moon, or morphed into field mice beneath the autumn...

. by David Bellemare Gosselin Today, seldom is Edgar Allan Poe's voice heard as it's drowned out by the popular...

  Like feathered tip of swooping sparrow Our kinship cuts like that of arrows A brother’s love has weakened me...

In another lifetime I was William Blake When I saw his work That was my take He wrote about love...

The sparkle on the river, the lights from distant shore, the cold and bitter glitter, the beckoning of more, Is...

Those Days and These “‘. . . Macbeth does murther sleep.’” —William Shakespeare If only such a villain were __Alone...

  Between the trees, along the path I hear the woodpecker tap tap tap. Beneath the bridge, cyclists roll through...

Flower of Choice On native Australian flowers The wattle bears her gold in early spring As luminescent beads on woody...

  How wonderful of God to hold us together, When man is prone to tear us part, Said the surgical...

By Carter Davis Johnson In a period where American literature was considered peripheral and amateur, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) helped create...

Jeremiah 52 When Judah rebelled against the Chaldean horde, They sought to gain freedom without help from the Lord, Trusting,...

(All poetry by Bruce Dale Wise) Hylas and the Nymphs by Beau Ecs Wilder John William Waterhouse's "Hylas and the...

I’m born from a forked tongue’s hissing mutter, An ungrounded half-truth, forceless and tame. Just like a spark struck from...

  Sun slowly dipping in the western sky; the winds are light and the pine boughs tossing. From their warm,...

  A robin should fly south before the snow, With others in the flocks of migrant birds, Quite safe amid...

First Place ($500 Prize): C.B. Anderson, Massachusetts “Stonewalls Sometimes a Prison Make” “Praise for the Mother of Summer” “Meritocracy” "Verification"...

Read about last night's lunar eclipse here. Thoughts on January 31, 2018’s Complete Lunar Eclipse Reflected Glory, full and bright,...

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I wandered, drunk and weary, Over many a quaint and dimlit alley of forgotten...

  The Last Time I Saw Paris You have imagined how it was, I expect: Troy’s famous towers burning, the...