Valerie Frost: Miss Counsel

She keeps the record narrow.

I keep testing jurisdiction.

Every time I call her Counsel,

she files another objection.

Sustained.

Fine.

I’ll rephrase.

Tell me why your poker face

keeps entering evidence

when nobody called it

to the stand.

Tell me why

you cross-examine a room

with one raised eyebrow

then act surprised

when I request

a sidebar.

Counsel,

I am trying very hard

to respect procedure.

You are making

procedure difficult.

There are rules here.

Probably.

There are boundaries,

precedent,

ethical obligations—

and apparently

an unreasonable amount

of eye contact.

I move to strike.

You deny the motion.

Naturally.

So we continue:

your argument precise,

my attention compromised,

both of us pretending

this proceeding concerns

something else entirely.

You keep asking

for evidence.

I keep reminding you

that circumstantial

still counts.

You say

speculation.

I say

pattern.

You say

objection.

I say

noted.

Counsel, Counsel—

please stop looking at me

like you already know

what I’m going to say.

Or don’t.

Actually,

withdrawn.

No further questions.

For now.

Because you keep

the record narrow,

and I keep

testing jurisdiction,

and every time

I call you Counsel

you file

another objection

and still—

you do not

move to dismiss.

 

Valerie Frost lives in Central Kentucky with her three joyful kiddos. Her poems have appeared in Eastern Iowa Review, ONE ART, Eunoia Review, and elsewhere.

Laura O'Hare: Examining Pavements

 

Laura O'Hare has had several poems published in the late 1990’s, in 2025 and 2026. She has performed her own and other peoples poems in the Crescent Arts Centre open mic nights, and at the end of term show for the Crescent Writers Read.

Shontay Luna: Me, to the Exercise Instructor

Dude,

I can 

tell you 

love

to dance.

I like to 

dance, too.

But I’m 

new to your

class and to 

the steps

of your 

routine.

I’m not used 

to freeform 

but find myself

more often than 

not, improvising 

to the point of

marching in place.

While I patiently

wait for you to take

it down a notch,

emerge from being

in the zone, to a

sequence that I can 

actually

follow.

Shontay Luna is the author of four chapbooks; most recently ‘The Goddess Journal.’ Credits include Rigorous, Bombfire and Brittle Paper, among others. After majoring in Poetry at Columbia College Chicago, she remains there with her pens and notebooks. IG: @shontayluna

Keith Robert Stewart: Death of An Artist

Houses were easy to draw,

With a door and four squares.

Smoke from the chimney was

Always a curly telephone cable,

Curtains were spotted butterfly wings.

Each line had an absolute simplicity.

Each blot was confident in its

Placement.

Painting and drawing were easy.

Confidence oozed from my fingers,

Certain that I could represent

A house on my page.

Years later I had to

Pick up the brush again.

O Level Art was a chore.

In drawing, the rubber was used

More often than the pencil.

I struggled to represent the detail,

Doubting my strokes and dashes.

Gone was the innocent eye,

The naïve gullibility of a child.

The beautiful simplicity was lost.

Keith Robert Stewart has been writing poems since childhood (1970s?!) and has recently plucked up the courage to read publicly and submit for publication.