Three Prose Poems – Howie Good
Unsolved Mysteries #2
The unbalanced hostage-taker suddenly meekly surrendered to his hostages. In that instant, I became convinced of the essential stupidity of strictly adhering to any single plan. A delegation of angels in a tree outside the synagogue hooted in derision and then rose into the sky and flapped away, leaving mysterious future gaps in the fossil record. And don’t think I didn’t know that with my droopy face and drab old clothes I looked like an unassimilable immigrant from a strange country – someplace dark and rainy and governed by contradiction, where there are no clues or, rather, only false ones.
Mariner’s Harbor
The gray seagulls at the water’s edge watch me with black beady eyes in which I seem to detect glints of sardonic amusement. In the surviving fragment of his book On Analogy, Julius Caesar tells us to “Avoid strange and unfamiliar words as a sailor avoids rocks at sea.” My wife has a long, thin, smile-shaped scar just above her pubis from a Caesarean. Oh, I think, how beautifully torn.
A Theory of Justice
The medical assistant asked in a flat, toneless bureaucratic voice how I would describe the pain. Stabbing? Aching? Sharp? Dull? She entered my answer on the form, but without showing any actual interest. A philosopher once said – or should have – that a society is only as just as its treatment of its most vulnerable members: the old, the sick, the poor, the institutionalized. Using a dropper, I strategically place .50 milliliters of Triple M tincture under my tongue. I wait fifteen, twenty minutes, and then gray-clad troops burst from the treeline with a rebel yell. The tongue is all muscle.
Musings Before a Wake – Sonia Murray
Howie Good is the author of Failed Haiku, a poetry collection that is the co-winner of the 2021 Grey Book Press Chapbook Contest and scheduled for publication in summer 2022.
Sonia Murray was born in London, England & has lived and raised her family in multiple countries including England, Canada, Brazil, and, most recently, the US. She is a painter, photographer, collage artist, sculptor and stone carver. Her work is exhibited in Florida, incl. 3 solo shows. She has collaborated with poets, modern dancers, and other photographers. Her work has been featured at www.aamora.com, a website for international photographers, writers and artists. A large part of her work is dedicated to focusing on improving our world and appreciating the beauty surrounding us. Twitter: @Mu03841066Sonia.
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