James Kangas: Magnetic Field

In a Chicago bar, in my 20s, I learned

to prop myself up for half the night, nurse

two drinks maybe, stare at anyone I thought

I might love, leave, if lucky, with an evening

star for the Farwell Beach playground, say,

for a little--communion. We might seesaw,

swing, stick our feet in the water, go round

and round the simple carousel (hinging,

of course, on his playfulness) till the sun

rose over the lake like a ruddy lover, Somehow,

looking back, that part seems the best. I was

always hungry, he seemed, always, beautiful.

Then, when finally our hopeful bodies

begged us for deliverance, I’d sometimes push

to exchange the next move for a number,

which, if I dialled it later, might bring

back that magic ache (the ache

of two magnets held a bare millimetre apart),

denial the weird force holding us

in a kind of union.

[Originally published in Wilde Magazine Issue 1, Winter 2012]

James Kangas is a retired librarian living in Flint, Michigan. His work has been published in Adroit Journal, Free State Review, New World Writing, Tampa Review, West Branch, et al. His chapbook, Breath of Eden (Sibling Rivalry Press), was published in 2019.

Jane-Rebecca Cannarella: Pour

The pot boils canned soup—

peeled label fraying,

plucked from a sidewalk cabinet

two years expired.

Jane-Rebecca Cannarella (she/her) is a writer and editor living in West Philadelphia. She edits HOOT Review, and Meow Meow Pow Pow Lit. Jane-Rebecca is the author of Thirst and Frost (Vegetarian Alcoholic Press), and other collections. 

Brian Palmu: Rogue Butterwort

There they go, Ashley and Tad,

the hiking group’s organizers

pressing impatiently up

the path, striking saxifrage

and vetch with artisanal

switches as we lag behind.

Tad stops, bends by an outcrop,

buffaloed by an unknown

species, its platypus beak’s

greasy green leaves clustered under

a single purple flower

floating, an in memoriam

for dead ants on a battlefield.

He sticks a pinkie in the heart

of the plant’s velcro gob which

munches Tad’s digit up to

the second knuckle, both leaders

open-mouthed in disbelief.

The other hikers relax,

bemused, as Rhonda pretends

to fumble through her backpack

for a first-aid kit while Tad,

blood spilling in red slashes

across the adhesive plates,

beseeches all of us face

by face, then wincing, carries

his hand like a transplanted heart.

Brian Palmu is a poet and critic currently living in Victoria, B.C., Canada. His two chapbooks are Sunset Mathematics (Frog Hollow Press, 2017) and Parade (Anstruther Press, 2024).

Gifford Savage: Cold Comfort

He stands front of City Hall

framed by shimmering Christmas lights.

Florid face set hard as flint

finger-pointing, fist-pumping,

spewing fire-and-brimstone fury.

MAGA hat incongruous on the Belfast street.

Judgement cast like stones:

YOU’RE A SINNER,

YOU’RE ON THE ROAD TO HELL!

Lusting for an argument, for confrontation.

Shoppers quicken pace, hurry past.

PREPARE TO MEET THY GOD.

But what kind of God, I wonder, 

is this angry man expecting,

and where is he to be found?

Roiling vitriol pours across the road,

brings no solace to the huddled figure

blanketed against December’s bite.

Pleading eyes hope for a spare coin,

anxious faces rush by, avert their eyes,

clutching wrapped gifts of perfume and gold.

In the distance a children’s choir is singing,

lilting voices lightly drifting down,

familiar lyrics falling soft as snow,

crushed underfoot on crowded pavements:

with the poor and meek and lowly,

                  lived on earth our Saviour holy.

Gifford Savage is from Bangor and is a Diocesan Lay Reader in the Church of Ireland. His poetry has appeared in a number of journals including Honest Ulsterman, The Storms, Flight of the Dragonfly, The Bangor Literary Journal, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Agape Review and The New Verse News.

Catherine Arra: Love Poem

Summer to autumn, leaves pirouette, 

lissome and limber, garnish green in harvest gold.

Deer brindle to blend in forest dusk,

sun sets with longer arms to reach shorter days.

A first snow pantomimes the story of our year, covers

tired roots tucked deep for sleep in burnt umber.

You come to me this late-November morning, cover

me with your lissome-limbs,

tributaries to a core root.

Catherine Arra is a native of the Hudson Valley in upstate New York where she lives with wildlife and changing seasons until winter when she migrates to the Space Coast of Florida. Arra teaches part-time and facilitates local writing groups. Find her at www.catherinearra.com

Mary Howlett: Teacher Training College

(circa 1974)

My father drops me at the side gate in his navy,

beat up Ford Anglia. I’ll leave you here so…

I wait until the car rounds the bend,

smoke billowing from the exhaust,

smell of Sweet Afton on my coat.

I’m glad the other students are not around

to see my hand me downs, worn shoes,

polished to within an inch of their lives.

The battered mustard suitcase makes me stand out.

Assigned a cubicle at the back wall of the dormitory,

a sort of consolation prize, punishment for daring to be here.

I pull across the curtain, wash myself in the enamel basin

with cold water, cry myself to sleep.

The Dublin girls with loud, put-on accents,

I avoid them, they seem to be everywhere.

They ask me where I’m from, I invent a posh address

in Cork city. The male students parade around

the corridors strutting their stuff, young peacocks,

puffing out their chests, making shapes. I avoid them too.

Sister Bernadette, my art teacher, takes a shine to me,

sure there’s nothing wrong in being from Cork, she giggles.

We sit most evenings in the quiet refectory, we talk about Cork things,

how to mix colours, find the right hues, how to make macramé wall hangings.

Her brown habit a burden on her small frame.

She whispers that she once loved a man, he is in her thoughts

every night as she kneels by her bed above the Sanctuary.         

Mary Howlett is a poet and artist, her art has been published in The Waxed Lemon, Drawn to the Light Press and the Bangor Literary Journal. Her poetry can be found in literary journals including Wexford Women Writing Undercover, Poetry As Commemoration UCD, The Ireland Collection UK, and elsewhere

Mathieu Cailler: Sanguine

I was 16

when I turned the snowy bend in the old Chevy

and crunched the rabbit with two jolts of Goodyears

we had just been laughing on the way home from South Bend

talking about how we were going to apply to Notre Dame

and the 24-21 thriller in OT

we warmed our hands in front of the car heater,

played with the radio dial,

and pondered if we should stop for coffee and pie

I was about to tell you, I loved you,

when I relaxed and crushed the animal

I punched the brakes and cast a red hue

over the scene before taking to the cold

to check on the carnage

I kneeled over the body when you,

standing by the bed,

called out,

Did it suffer?

I lay my hand on its blood-stained coat, bent down,

and whispered something of an agnostic prayer

Then you approached, and we transferred the body

onto some sticks and moved the roadkill like pallbearers

to a tall snowdrift

We then returned to the vehicle and let the shaking subside,

and you whispered, That’s what you’re supposed to do—

you’re supposed to hit the animal, not swerve

I returned my hands to the grooves in the steering wheel

as you told me there are plenty of rabbits

And I nodded and rumbled off, understanding that even

the most cautious sometimes needed to draw blood and kill

Mathieu Cailler is the author of seven books. His work has appeared in over one hundred publications, including the Saturday Evening Post and the Los Angeles Times. He is the winner of a Pushcart Prize; a Readers' Favourite Award; and the Paris, Los Angeles, and New England Book Festival Prizes.

Top 10 most read poems of 2024

In the first year of Poem Alone, since we launched on 1st January, we've published over 200 poems! That figure has only been achieved due to the great submissions received across the year - to everyone that sent in their work for consideration, many thanks for letting us read your work.

To celebrate our first year, here is the ten top most read poems from the blog in 2024:

1. ‘A Cardiac Cold Myth’ by Kushal Poddar

2. ‘Silence’ by Petar Penda

3. ‘Poetry is dead’ by Howie Good

4. ‘Wild Roses’ by Jacquie Bryson

5. ‘The Worst Part of Being Past 65’ by Jacqueline Jules

6. ‘untitled’ by Katerina Stoykova

7. ‘Great Uncle Harry’ by Lesléa Newman

8. ‘Spring Day’ by Maurice Devitt

9. ‘Mr Casey’ by Peter Adair

10=. ‘Bear Hunt’ by Jacqueline Jules

10=. ‘Reasons to choose a hotel’ by Emma Lee

In the number one spot, Kushal Poddar was the very first poet we published on the blog, so it's fitting that we also close 2024 with another poem from him.

As always, submissions are open, and we look forward to more great work in 2025!

Kushal Poddar: Rugged Velvet

We find the amethyst 

on the backseat of the bus. 

We lost it there one 

humid night ago.

Why didn't anyone find it, take it?

Why don't you show any surprise?

At home a rustling in my pocket

becomes a bee, dead, rugged

and raw like a crystal.

Instead of the usual blue

tonight blooms a pink neon dot

on the mind's strip 

Mood wears a translucent bedsheet.

Without reason I fall

in love with you again.

Kushal Poddar is the author of A White Cane For The Blind Lane' and 'How To Burn Memories Using a Pocket Torch' has ten books to his credit. He is a journalist, father of a four-year-old, illustrator, and an editor. His works have been translated into twelve languages and published across the globe. 

Jeff Burt: My Daughter’s First Recital

Cheeks filled with powder

like fingerprints lost in wax,

dimples smoothed, wrinkles contracted

as shallow lakes in summer—

the audience see themselves in her,

and thus, she enters them.

Thickened lengthened lacquered

lashes beat largo, butterfly

fanned wings to an older song.

Parisian decoration, adornment,

fluttering in the wink, she opens

a picture-window over clear still water.

In bright lights, glossed lips reflect,

project, appear to hover in front of her face,

an invitation to the world to pay attention,

fuchsia pink, fez-red,

add and sum like layers of paint,

she speaks through lifted leg,

phrase in thrusted wrist,

like mist over a morning river,

lifts a flat canvas to a new dimension.

All the world a stage.

Clown one time, phantom the next.

She has an argument with the world,

tears colouring cheeks like creeks

over flattened land, gloss thinned

by the tongue wetting lips

heated by a war with motion,

dance done, curtain drawn,

needing another’s comfort,

mask removed, phantom vanished,

enamel worn, looking for her mother’s face.

Jeff Burt lives in California, and contributed to Sheila-Na-Gig, Williwaw Journal, Rat's Ass Review, and many others. More work can be found at www.jeff-burt.com