Editor's Note: Apologies. This was supposed to post automatically on Dec. 29 and it did not. Posting it manually today (Dec. 31). So sorry! Thanks everyone!

**
on the painting The Adoration of the Magi by Joseph van Bredael

joseph
you painted  
a story of near   far   far off
the secret gospel code
of who was in and who was out
like all parables we’re there:
some moving on yet huddled for safety in their travel
some with bodies also huddled close
around the canopy of a house falling
into a stable of shambles
pressed together like wheat bending under wind
and  then there are some among the crowd
men from the East
the distant ancient enemy
who carried off His history’s people
now have returned with its own treasures
presenting to this child the priceless omens of His distant costly gift

Sister Lou Ella Hickman

Sister Lou Ella has a master’s in theology from St. Mary’s University in San Antonio and is a former teacher and librarian. She is a certified spiritual director as well as a poet and writer.  Her poems have appeared in numerous magazines such as America, US Catholic, Commonweal, The Christian Century, Presence, Prism, and several anthologies.  She was a Pushcart nominee in 2017 and 2020. Five poems from her book, she: robed and words, set to music by James Lee III were performed on May 11, 2021. The soloist was the opera singer Susanna Phillips, principal clarinetist Anthony McGill of the New York Philharmonic and Grammy® nominated pianist Mayra Huang.  The arrangement was part of a concert held at Y92 in New York City. The group of songs is entitled “Chavah’s Daughters Speak.” Another concert was held in Cleveland, Ohio on March 28, 2023.  The soloist was Elena Perroni.

**

The Mission Tree

Christmas is standing alone as a far off encounter
Then the day comes where perfection must be found
An ornament, a testament to all that is natural-
Casting drudgery aside to climb the mountain in hope
Father, son, daughter, mother, brother, sister all along
Shielded from boredom on a glistening winters day
Talk of the mission paramount at the table the night before
The plan, the saw, the axe, the readiness- the size discussed
Waiting to be felled as a fallen soldier taken to soon
Armored with thorns and a resilient sap greenly hiding
Among the many there are candidates, which to be found Just
But there is one that must be-the one, the chosen one
Who will decide the merits of what is rich and what is gold
The youngest, the oldest - those in between being undecided
It is all too much trouble, please just pick, pick one, pick me
What voice is that surrendering to the family - Beauty
It is I, for I am the perfect tree; have you seen another fairer’
A child knows do not argue -this is the tree
the mission tree

MWPiercy

Michael W. Piercy: "At the intersection of Art, Poetry and Contradiction, you will find my work, you will find me. Taking on memories and the present moment. Thinking- With an eye that shadows the natural world. Philosophy, Theology and Science are at the core of my writing. I have found that I am a synthesizer- managing ideas which do not always cohere. Trying to manipulate- Ideas."  

**

Innkeeper

Something happened in the dark
that suddenly was not dark
but full of burning light…and song--
crazed fools singing in the midst 
of Roman occupation--and in the dead of winter
when there’s little enough to celebrate. 

Bethlehem heaves with footsore pilgrims.
Each bed & board is full this week.
Even my shed out back was booked
by a weary carpenter & his wife.
Humbly they were glad to share
with donkeys, cattle, camels there.

Today I wake to bedlam in my small estate!
The pasture’s crammed with wayfarers—more 
than I can count. Has all the world gone mad? 
From the tavern’s balcony I see travellers 
never known before to mingle. What mystery 
is here? Sure, something happened overnight.

Shepherds I see—though not their flocks;
tradesmen with their wares—and do my eyes 
betray me?—regal folk with glorious clothes…
treasures in the straw. Must I join this tumult
of gathered folk? Yes, now I shall run fast!
Something happened in the dark.

They’ve torn away the stable walls to let the people see. 
The child new-born sits open-eyed
upon his mother’s knee; chuckling with delight,
he raises happy hands: sages, kings & beggars
fall to the ground to honour the child. 
I gaze on him, and he on me.

Never have I witnessed such a wonder.
Who cares for censuses, or for Roman laws
when God has come to stay with us?
Yes, something happened in the night!

Lizzie Ballagher

​Ballagher has travelled widely and lived for years in different countries: a kind of life that has greatly affected her writing. This year wintering in Pennsylvania, she is for the first time in many decades contemplating the beauty of the North American wilderness in winter.  Her work also appears intermittently at https://lizzieballagherpoetry.wordpress.com/

**

Adoration of the Magi

Holiday Express -- No room at the Inn.
Hyatt -- Try down the road.
Red Roof -- Sorry.
Courtyard -- Nothing.
Radisson -- All booked.
Travelodge -- No vacancy.
Marriott -- Full up.
Hampton -- You should’ve called ahead.
Ramada -- Shriners in town.
Motel 6 -- You're in luck.

David Jibson

David Jibson (past contributor) lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He is the managing editor of 3rd Wednesday, an independent quarterly journal of literary and visual arts, a board member of the Poetry Society of Michigan and an events coordinator for The Crazy Wisdom Poetry Circle. He is retired from a long career in Social Work, most recently with a Hospice agency. His poetry has been published in dozens of journals in print and online.

**

The (Timeless) Adoration of the Magi, by Van Bredael

Long before peasants or kings gave a darn,And long before Ann Landers;
Jesus was born in a ramshackle barn
In 18th-century Flanders.

Magi and peasants, St. Mary and Joe
Wear clothes in the old fashion,
Down in the corner, crown-bearer in tow,
A Prince bends knee with passion.

He wears a cape and a Renaissance sword,
A clear anachronism.
So is the skyline that he’s looking toward,
A time-travel collision.

Jesus seems neither to notice nor care;
He stretches out his fingers.
Then, for us now, with us here, with them there,
His Incarnation lingers.

James A. Tweedie

James A. Tweedie is a formal poet living in Long Beach, Washington, with four books of poetry published by Dunecrest Press. He is the winner of the 2021 Society of Classical Poets International Poetry Competition, a Laureate's Choice in the 2021 Maria W. Faust Sonnet Contest, a First Prize winner in the 2022 100 Days of Dante Poetry Competition, and recipient of the quarterly prize for Best Poem by the Lyric.

**

Fresh From Above

The heavens are opening and delivering light
In the form of flesh, fresh from above
To those in ramshackled shelters or gilded glory.

News is breaking like the day,
Washing away shadows and forms,
And defining the face of hope.

The cry of a babe takes away the breath
Of wanderers, seekers, and finders,
A birth, known before conceived, is being recorded.

The Word is becoming known by word of mouth,
Surety is being captured, captivating us,
All the earth is Bethlehem.

We are there, all of us,
Juxtaposed with those opposed,
Being united by one who can’t yet speak.

​Donna Harlan

Donna Harlan has published one collection of poetry titled Bench by the Pond. She is a reader for three literary journals and has had her works featured in several publications. She resides in Jonesborough, Tennessee with her husband where they delight in watching the sun rise and set over the lake every day.

**

Denial
 
It's the things on the periphery that don't get noticed. The falcon in the white of the cloud. The dark cloud retreating (we know why). To the left, the town in its grey stone stiffness, no apology to the life in the foreground. The buildings on the right, pushing against each other and the river, going about business denying the distraction, oblivious of what is to come. There are people ignoring the commotion, hawking their wares or walking a horse into the river in anticipation of future baptisms. This is the world, this is the steely cast of life that spreads beyond whatever miracle is hatching in the foreground. So why is the falcon not joining the small birds on the roof of the barn?

Amy Jones Sedivy​

Amy Jones Sedivy grew up in Los Angeles and has lived in many of L.A.’s neighbourhoods. She admits that the best was her childhood home a block from the beach. Amy currently lives in the NELA neighborhood of Highland Park with her artist-husband and their princess-dog. She spends her time reading, writing, and exploring the rest of Los Angeles. Amy’s most recent stories have been published in (mac)ro(mic), Made in L.A. Beyond the Precipice anthology, Big Whoopie Deal, and The Write Launch.

**

It's About Knowing Jesus

Those two in the middle look like a marriage
and the one on his own in a starlit carriage 
seen cradling a star above his nodding crown 
looking like an infant in a glowing kaftan gown.

Those five lit candles of different shapes & sizes 
could they have a significant meaning? 
The three in the foreground share gifts & spices
like three wise Kings, come supervening.

I mean, there is something here familiar. 
Thou I've never visited this Bethlehem town
there is something here, here like, sand scripture
it's about knowing Jesus didn't die and didn't drown.

Mark Andrew Heathcote

 Mark Andrew Heathcote is an adult learning difficulties support worker. He has poems published in journals, magazines, and anthologies online and in print. He resides in the UK and is from Manchester. Mark is the author of In Perpetuity and Back on Earth, two books of poems published by Creative Talents Unleashed.

**

In Bethlehem... 
 
Oh come! 
Let us adore him! 
know not the reason 
he is born to 
pave our way 
 
Oh come! 
Let us adore him! 
questions unasked 
answered 
in him today 
 
Oh come! 
Let us adore him! 
follow his footsteps 
peasant, scribe 
humble serf 
 
Oh come! 
Let us adore him! 
while his life unfolds 
therein lies our worth 
 
Jane Lang 
 
Jane Lang’s work has appeared in online publications including Quill and Parchment, the Avocet, Creative Inspirations, The Ekphrastic Review, and published in several anthologies. She has written and given two chap books to family and friends in lieu of Christmas cards. Jane lives in the Pacific Northwest. ​

**
​
Too Many Walked Into an Inn

The painter Joe Van B had stopped to paint
the throng he saw that gathered out in back.
Confessing that he had a slight constraint--
his funds were sparse since income had been slack.
 
“I’m sorry, there’s no place for you to stay;
the manger has a pregnant bride and groom.
You see, we’re celebrating Three Kings Day.
I’m booked up to the hilt, so there’s no room.”
 
But since the innkeep loved the finer arts
he offered him a cot behind the bar
and though, at best, he’d sleep in fits and starts,
he’d get to paint before his au revoir.
 
The hotelier allowed him one free drink,
obliging him, since he lacked wherewithal,
to paint his mistress, washing at the sink.
Her painting tantalizes from their wall.
 
An old man and a lady wandered in--
“Big Joe and Mary! Say, long time no see.
This day, each year, I wonder how you’ve been.
Your room’s upstairs, the one out back’s not free.”
 
The night wore on and three more guys arrived,
dressed up like magi, tipping on the cheap.
They asked the innkeep, could it be contrived
for them to feed their camels and to sleep.
 
The barkeep poured—the water changed its hue.
Amazed, he said, “Out back, behind the shed,
to make accommodations maybe you
can turn some hay into a king-sized bed.”
 
That’s how it’s told in Barkeep Twelve, verse Nine,
“The Guys Who Turned Their Water Into Wine.”

Ken Gosse

Ken Gosse prefers to write rhymed, humorous verse using traditional forms. He was first published in First Literary Review–East in November 2016, since then in The Ekphrastic Review, Pure Slush, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Home Planet News, and others. Raised in the Chicago suburbs, now retired, he and his wife have lived in Mesa, AZ, over twenty years, usually with rescue dogs and cats underfoot.

**

Saviour
 
Tiny hut of hay.
Inside a baby is born,
the king, our saviour.
 
Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher​
 
Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher has been writing since 2010 and has had many micro-flash fiction stories published. In 2018 her book Shorts for the Short Story Enthusiasts, was published, The Importance of Being Short, in 2019 and In A Flash in 2022. She currently resides on Long Island, New York with her husband Richard and dogs Lucy and Breanna.

**

Adoration
 
The inn’s roof, windows and shed  
are broken but not sad –
they knew they were made to come
to that state at that exact moment
in order to set up the manger
to accommodate the birth
of the humblest hearts changer.
 
It was a census time, so math ruled the day  
in many ways, forms and shapes –
from his immaculate conception to his birth,
converged with the Magi’s promptly calculated trip,
crisscrossed with the comet’s precise guiding,
paralleled by the shepherds timely welcoming,  
all enshrined into an inn’s marginal backstage –
a world coming of age on history’s blank page. 
 
The birds knew it perfect right 
and, on their part, they flew around to scheme
the perspectives of these coinciding lines.
The comet, on its side, shined in so bright
a contrast over this so grey a place,
it was pointless to try escape its spells.
The people, themselves, were magnetized
by the gracious babe and his serene mum,
so their upshot was plump and prime – awe.
 
Today’s draw:
how did those bookless farmers know
when, how, why, what    
 was happening in the world
and were aware of its significance
from the start, while we,
after ages of wonders and miles of pages,
still keep searching for proof crumbs
like some pathetic existential glums.
 
Math is not a poet,
yet here its exacting vein cuts through
each event as a poetic refrain
embracing contrasts better than any rhetoric tract
and so poignantly against that crumbling old fact
ready to clear the space for the newborn’s
divine plan to take place.
Roman governor’s carpe diem live –
by fine metrics and aligned antipodes
he’s made alert to an all-changing birth.
 
The bird on the hanging window sees
our predicament and ponders in disbelief
while balancing the old timber’s wobbling
by deftly tuning to the matrix
of the universal rhymed throbbing,
which at that moment is so openly astonishing   
that the crowd keeps coming and pouring
swerving everyone on the way
and trooping around the three Magi
whose arrival turns into a festival
celebrating the divine in our very own
human form for the very first time.
Adoration is thy name.
 
In governor’s tongue - ad/to orare/speak,
adorare, or – the word, the one in the beginning
of all beginnings, tuned to the meaning
of all meanings, so, what we are witnessing here
is an ever-expanding adoring
without which the gist can’t be grasped
in the vast and loud speaking space,
unless we take our daily bread –
the mathematical refrain that keeps us rhymed
during our peripatetic soul searching
like the bird’s equilibrium on the rostrum’s wobbling.
Their landing’s balancing act.
Our adoration’s subliminal impact.       
   
Ekaterina Dukas
 
Ekaterina Dukas, MA, has studied and taught linguistics and culture at Universities of Sofia, Delhi and London and authored a book on Mediaeval Art for the British Library. She writes poetry as a pilgrimage to the meaning. Her poems have been honoured by the The Ekphrastic Review pleasurably often. Her poetry collection Ekphrasticon is published by Europa Edizioni, 2021.

**



A Remarkable Day 

"He's God in human form!" whispers the crowd
In motley clothes and groups of twos and threes
Beneath the bulky, partly-aqua sky.
As nighttime slowly drops, birds meet the breeze
And soar towards the heavens, grand and proud.

Under the shanty's thatched roof sits a mother.
A blue cloak, one white tunic, and a veil
Make up her dress. Her eyes endear The Child
All humbly, and her soul is chanting, 'Hail!',
Aware her Son is not like any other.

Three men of kingly rank have gathered here
To show their reverence to Him through gold
Censers and myrrh while bowing. They are garbed
In striking gowns, have horses, and look old.
Their true devotion fills the atmosphere.

Although The King is born, His home is small,
Haunted by cats and pigeons, and straw-made,
To show God chose to dwell among the simple
And that He's only Son has come to aid
Humanity and deliver us all.

None knew they were to get abundant grace
Yet rushed on hearing "Come and see the Boy!"--
Some children, elderlies, and Roman guards;
Though some hearts harbour doubts and some great joy,
Each eye's fixed to this Baby's lucent face.

Shamik Banerjee

Shamik Banerjee is a poet from India. When he is not writing, he can be found strolling the hills surrounding his homestead. His poems have appeared in Fevers of the Mind, Lothlorien Poetry Journal and Westward Quarterly, among others.

**


​

Dear Ekphrastic Challengees,

We would like to present you an Ekphrastic challenge with an exciting art piece by Benjamin Von Wong. He is an artist and activist on the quest to make a positive, unforgettable impact…and that seems quite right challenge-wise, right at the end of 2023, while being ushered into 2024!

Your prompt for this challenge is Von Wong’s installation called the Giant Plastic Tap, an art piece that spews out the plastics that were collected from the large slums of Kibera in Nairobi, Kenya. It was set up at the United Nations’ Office in Nairobi (10 miles from Kibera!), when meetings were held there to discuss a Global Plastic Treaty. 

You can look for more information @ https://turnofftheplastictap.com/ ; other work by Von Wong is at hand @ https://www.vonwong.com/ (Please, do take a look at his fascinating portfolio, e.g. his Epic Stormchasing Portraits re Cowspiracy & Climate Change…surreal!).

I think Von Wong’s work is just amazing and very inspiring…and I think it will surely enable you to write some fine words to highlight your ideas on the “plastic conversation”.

Thank you for submitting your writing, I am looking forward to reading your pieces. Thank you Benjamin for granting us permission, and thank you Lorette for making this ekphrastic challenge happen!

Be well, wishing you a healthy and safe 2024 already, 

Kate Copeland

**
​
Join us for biweekly ekphrastic writing challenges. See why so many writers are hooked on ekphrasis! We feature some of the most accomplished, influential writers working today, and we also welcome emerging or first time writers and those who simply want to experience art in a deeper way or try something creative. 

The prompt this time is Giant Plastic Tap, by Benjamin Von Wong. Deadline is January 5, 2024. 

You can submit poetry, creative nonfiction, flash fiction, microfiction, or any other form creative writing you like. 1000 words max please.

The Rules

1. Use this visual art prompt as a springboard for your writing. It can be a poem or short prose (fiction or nonfiction.) You can research the artwork or artist and use your discoveries to fuel your writing, or you can let the image alone provoke your imagination.

2. Write as many poems and stories as you like. Send only your best works or final draft, not everything you wrote down. (Please note, experimental formats are difficult to publish online. We will consider them but they present technical difficulties with web software that may not be easily resolved.) Please copy and paste your submission into the body of the email, even if you include an attachment such as Word or PDF.

3. There is no mandatory submission fee, but we ask you to consider a voluntary donation to show your support to the time, management, maintenance, and promotion of The Ekphrastic Review. It takes an incredible amount of time to curate the journal, read regular and contest submissions, etc. Paying all expenses out of pocket is also prohibitive. Thank you. A voluntary gift does not affect the selection process in any way.​

4. USE THIS EMAIL ONLY.

Send your work to [email protected]. Challenge submissions sent to the other inboxes will most likely be lost as those are read in chronological order of receipt, weeks or longer behind, and are not seen at all by guest editors. They will be discarded. Sorry.

5.Include VON WONG CHALLENGE in the subject line.

6. Include your name and a brief bio. If you do not include your bio, it will not be included with your work, if accepted. Even if you have already written for The Ekphrastic Review or submitted other works and your bio is "on file" you must include it in your challenge submission. 

7. Late submissions will be discarded. Sorry. 

8. Deadline is midnight EST, January 5, 2024.

9. Please do not send revisions, corrections, or changes to your poetry or your biography after the fact. If it's not ready yet, hang on to it until it is.

10. Selected submissions will be published together, with the prompt, one week after the deadline.

11. Due to the demands of the increasing volume of submissions, we do not send out sorry notices or yes letters for challenge submissions. You will see what poetry and stories have been selected when the responses are posted one week after the deadline. Understand that we value your participation as part of our ekphrastic community, but we can only choose a handful of the many entries we receive. 

12. A word on the selection process: we strive for a balance between rewarding regular participants and sharing the voices of writers who are new to our family. We also look for a variety of perspectives and styles, and a range of interesting takes on the painting. It is difficult to reproduce experimental formatting, so unfortunately we won't choose many with unusual spacing or typography. 

13. By submitting to The Ekphrastic Review, you are also automatically joining our subscribers' list. Your submission is your permission. We don't send spam and we don't send many emails- you will not receive forty-four emails a day! Our newsletter occasionally updates you on some of the  challenges, news, contests, prize nominations, ekphrastic happenings, prompt ebooks, workshops, and more. 
​
​14. Rinse and repeat with upcoming ekphrastic writing challenges!
​
15. Please share this prompt with your writing groups, Facebook groups, social media circles, and anywhere else you can. The simple act of sharing brings readers to The Ekphrastic Review, and that is the best way to support the poets and writers on our pages!

16. Check this space every Friday for new challenges and selected responses, alternating weekly.

War

Then suddenly, from the clouds beyond 
the street lights and broken city
full of maybes and broad cuts in the asphalt,
hate plowed into the cul-de-sac of our world.

It was after the full moon rose behind the storm clouds 
and after those clouds turned the night to liquid, 
when October turned fire-weather--lightning or bombs,
it was hard to tell which--burst from sky 
and left a momentary sketch
on the retinas of our surprise.

Evolving from an imagined backstory,
I see pieces of the war machine sweeping away
everything:  a circus wheel, a gear, a wing, 
a broken window, a table tennis game, a book, 
a stolen poet, a fractured child.
And I wonder how much more must break,
how much more must we watch fall apart.

Julene Waffle

Julene Waffle, a graduate of Hartwick College and Binghamton University, is a teacher in rural NYS, an entrepreneur, a nature lover, a wife, a mother of three boys, two dogs, three cats, a bearded dragon, and, of course, she’s a writer. She finds pleasure in juggling these jobs while seeming like she has it all together. Her work has appeared in The Adroit Journal Blog, NCTE’s English Journal, Mslexia, The Bangalore Review, The Ekphrastic Review, among others. Her work also appears in several anthologies, and her chapbook So I Will Remember. Learn more at www.wafflepoetry.com.

**

Flying Machines

Were those dreams with you
behind the counter
through all your long years
in retail purgatory?
Or did they wait
like seeds in the desert
for the rains to come
quickening at last
to rise unfurling
leaves like wings
into the welcome air?
Was the freedom you found
in that small attic space
what saints found
in their bare cloisters
prophets and philosophers
in their barren caves?
Freedom to unleash
fantastic dreams
rising higher
than the eagles
riding the updrafts
like lethal angels
full of grace

free from earth
with all the snags and stops
that kept your wings clipped
while you bought and sold
each day's account
one more stone
to keep you grounded
until you retired
finding room enough
in a narrow attic 
to unpack your dreams
making endless images
of flying machines
drawn in ink
and watercolour wash
with such assurance
even the most fanciful
painted like a gypsy caravan
looks ready
to lift off the page
and fly

Mary McCarthy

Mary McCarthy is a retired Registered Nurse who has always been a writer. Her work has appeared in many journals and anthologies, including The Ekphrastic World, edited by Lorette C. Luzajic, The Plague Papers, edited by Robbi Nester, and recent issues of Gyroscope, 3rd Wednesday, Caustic Frolic, Inscribe, and Verse Virtual. Her collection How to Become Invisible is now available from Kelsay books.

**

Casting No Shadows

like fresh smoke
stealing out
the long-necked chimney
far above
the crematory walls,
we drift atop
the river of shimmer
past space and time.

We shift with rain
that sent the earth
wafting up the window
by your very own bed.
They are watering the plants
you had said, then
taking it all
in your last breath.

Splashes leap,
spreads below a green solace
mobbed by leathery brown
peeling bark, almost pleasing.
We meet and part
like light and cloud swaying in the wind.
We are lost to an empty dream.

Abha Das Sarma

An engineer and management consultant by profession, Abha Das Sarma enjoys writing. Besides having a blog of over 200 poems (http://dassarmafamily.blogspot.com), her poems have appeared in Muddy River Poetry Review, Spillwords, Verse-Virtual, Visual Verse, Sparks of Calliope, Trouvaille Review, Silver Birch Press, Blue Heron Review, here and elsewhere. Having spent her growing up years in small towns of northern India, she currently lives in Bengaluru.

**

I Think I Am Flying

I think I am flying!

My mind...double-sided art.

Inhabited by thoughts, ideas, and dreams impossible to fake. Now, I am ending up looking with my closed eyes into my burning heart. An intricate mechanism of singularities. They are always there. When I wake up, when I sleep, when I stay, when I weep. When I feel...Sometimes I feel an immense precipice in myself, my throbbing aorta wanting to leave my still body, to live the life I am living inside, stubbornly, together with the festering riot of my sinews, my veins, and my skin. My wholeness aches in a metaphysical pain beyond myself.

Deep innuendoes are crawling into my aching self. The one who wants to evade my life’s circularity, travelling in my space of flying wheels. There is nothing like it. It is my cabinet of curiosities. When it is too much, it is the only place that contains me, being like a mirror to my intimation, where things are smooth. But, until today, I couldn’t find the key. It is the first time in ages that I can enter. The key was there the whole time. In the same spot. Thus, I couldn’t see it because it was me who was not there.

My flying wheels—my happy place, a realm of my experimental joy.

Oppressive, the barometric pressure, disguised in excitement, invites my normality-shaped loneliness to wait for me. Eventually, I am stepping into the imponderability of the room, into my freedom, caged in a thought.

In my room of flying wonders, my eyes become spinning wheels, guilty of making me suspiciously alive, as my ears contribute to the noise of my silence, ill-heard by my mind.

Worn, I kiss my morning with hope, and the wheels give me a timeless merriment.

I think I am flying!  In daring volutes of foreign loops. I am there... flying in my secret departure, unaware of my destination but inconceivably happy. I am playing, swinging,  in this whirlpool of flying machines that are carrying out a radious siege of circles, twists, and upside-down dreams.

Suddenly, the stern doctor opens the door brutally, with an inexplicable sense of entitlement. I am indulging myself in the pleasure of righteous indignation. Then, falling is my only choice. Falling into the same bed where gravity has been dragging me into a painful reality. The reality… etching deeper into my ultimate verse of pain. Since the accident, the bed has been my pre-elegiac station, where I haven’t got other alternatives but flying with my mind, committing a majestic censorship of my thoughts, parched well, linked to my numb body, which forgot to wander.

‘’How are we today?’’

I cried so many times, with no voice. I screamed, buried in my weeping moan, repeating all over again in my head. I think I am flying!

Laura (Grá) Adumitroaie

Laura (Grá) Adumitroaie is an Irish-Romanian children’s book author, poetess, Monessori teacher, writer, therapist, blogger, and linguist with a PhD in Semiotics, living in Blessingtom, Co. Wicklow, Ireland. She published a book called Poems of Absolution to honour the presence of her daughter in her life. She is a member of a few writing groups in Dublin and Blessington. She loves art in any form, being very fond of Klimt, Andy Warhol, Tom Waits, and Nick Cave. Laura is currently involved in a few writing projects regarding raising awareness for children’s mental health, as well as creative and therapeutic writing workshops. Her life is dedicated to children, art and dreams. To learn more about her, visit www.ajourneyto.net.
​

**

Thank you Note to Charles

Only an outsider artist can design an outsider other the flying machine able to reach the heavens of my dreamscape. Undefeated by failure, undaunted by ridicule and mockery--we lift, soar, and drift, fueled by imagined possibilities, and the silver lining of clouds --

to hover above
an imaginary Spring
in a Winter's dream.

Karen "Fitz" FitzGerald

Karen "Fitz" FitzGerald, genre fluid, continues along the path of emerging writer, ever grateful for opportunities to submit her work, and especially to affordable venues.

**

I Have Questions

Mr. Dellschau,

You passed away 100 years ago, your work sat ignored for another 50, discovered by happenstance in a gutter after a fire in your house.

I have questions.

And I’ve enlisted the assistance of psychic J’air Boudare who has communicated with Da Vinci, Klint, and Bosch, and is herself the daughter of a pilot and flight attendant. For transparency, I’m afraid of flying myself though it’s more claustrophobia than anything; we don’t need to get into that here. J’air has agreed to conduct the interview and suggested I submit questions in advance for your consideration.

I have a blog and a podcast called: I Have Questions. But we don’t need to go into what blogs and podcasts are. For all I know you may be familiar with them being the visionary you were, in addition to having been a butcher and early avid cyclist who worked in an attic, ahead of your time, fanciful in your imaginations, meticulous in your water colours, and incredibly original with your collages, which in my view are metaphors for life— pieces of art pasted, patched, and intricately woven together in original ways, like us; maybe the most organic of all expressions.

> J’air, are you getting all this? Too much backstory? Am I excessively side-barring? I’m assuming Mr. Dellschau has nothing but time, but who knows.

Okay, I’ll paint the picture for our interview. We’re in your attic studio, both of us under 5’ 5”, so we don’t need to duck under a slanted roof, there’s a glass dome and lots of light. Birds fly above, beside, and under us. Your pipe is unlit. On your bench sits a stack of sketchpads, butcher paper, and tea with strudel that stepdaughter Elizabeth brought on a tray.

Well sir, I’m drawn to your art and drawn by your story. It must’ve surprised you when your work appeared in shows with DaVinci, exhibited in New York and abroad. Critics call you an original visionary artist. But I’d like to start at the beginning, or at least early on, a broad cut view of who you were, starting with your life as a butcher. 

I have questions.

1). How did you get your start as a butcher and what was your favourite tool? One knife in particular? Favourite cut of meat? And this may sound strange, but I wonder since you used a lot of red in your work, and Hemingway had an artist friend named John Fulton who rose though the bullfighting ranks in Spain, rare for a non-Spaniard, and who used blood from bulls he killed in his paintings, did you ever use blood from butchered meat in your own watercolours? 

> J’air. Is that too weird to ask?? Too creepy?

Okay maybe so. Let me ask you this— when times were slow behind the counter did you ever paint on butcher paper and dream that someday you’d devote yourself to flying machines?

2). You belonged to a secret club of aeronauts in the Sonora desert. One member invented an anti-gravity gas for lift off and propulsion. Yet research was never able to confirm the existence of the Sonora Aero Club or any of its members. Did it exist? Why the secrecy? There were theories of possible alien encounters. Care to comment?

3). I understand you were a draftsman and not a pilot or builder. Did your own long and difficult overland and over-sea travels inspire your flying machine designs? 

4). In your lifetime you never showed your work to anyone. Why did you keep your beautiful art secret? Does it bother you that you’ve became famous, your work widely seen in traveling exhibits, that you’ve inspired artists and writers alike to be visionary? That they’ve attached that name to your work and placed you in a genre, posted your art on Youtube and that today, right now in fact your work is being pondered, admired, written, and talked about? And if so, will you forgive me?

> J’air I’m getting into the weeds here. Too many questions? Too much off topic and personal? Some label Dellschau’s art, stories, and journals pure fantasy. But does that even matter, or in any way limit the truth of his visions? That label just seems so beside the point. Okay. Let’s keep going.

5). You ended up in Texas, maybe California, too. Did you ever miss Prussia? Perhaps dream of flying back to where you were born, landing in a pasture, and giving others a thrill that exceeded their wildest dreams?

6). Did your Flying Machine exceed your own wildest dreams? Was it in fact a dream? A continuous one? Do you despise me for asking?

7). A late bloomer at 69, do you have any advice to others who wish to pursue their art after putting it off for most of their lives?

8). Your name was misspelled on your headstone. They also left off one of your two middle initials. So disrespectful. Would you like me to correct that? I could start a Go Fund me drive. Create an App. 

> J’air, would he know what an App is? I just don’t know if he is in some sort of all-knowing place or what, you know. I’m in the dark here. Obviously. Okay.

9). Finally, Mr. Dellschau I love your art, admire how you didn’t feel the need to show it, monetize it, or create a brand. So pure. You even used codes in your work. Would you prefer that I keep this interview in my sketchpad? (I use them, too, though I noticed you used grids. I prefer unlined myself!). If this is your preference, please tell J’air, or show me a sign. I respect your privacy, even 100 years later. Especially so. Yes, I have questions. I also understand some mysteries are best left intact.

> J’air, did you get all that? Hey J’air, are you still with me here?

Guy Biederman

Guy Biederman is a card-carrying genius with a fake ID. He’s a short story midwife, pareidolia doula, and a Tuxedo cat valet who writes between naps, lives on a houseboat, and walks the planks daily. It’s all true, especially the fiction. Except for the part about not liking to fly.

**

NB Super Star

But what of fiction, what of fact,
incredible men, Wright or not,
Da Vinci codes that whirl about,
and Swift Laputa, flying high,
for Texas, San Antonio?

From magic carpets to balloons,
dirigibles, for him in draught,
flights of fancy, Sonora Club,
his Aero bubbles, Gas NB,
noted fuel, gravity free.

In ornamental borders style,
those watercolours, likened jewels, 
imagination in full flight -
these circus banners, advert clowns,
domain of Fool who wears the crown.

Though Dellschau - name means Super Star -
his works were serendipity,
their preservation also chance.
A grave mistake, his spell ignored, 
but mood flew on, think Pythonesque.

Stephen Kingsnorth

Stephen Kingsnorth (Cambridge M.A., English & Religious Studies), retired to Wales, UK, from ministry in the Methodist Church due to Parkinson’s Disease, has had pieces curated by on-line poetry sites, printed journals and anthologies, including The Ekphrastic Review.  His blog is at https://poetrykingsnorth.wordpress.com

**

1911 and Then Some…
 
Before he became ‘my father’ he was an astronaut.
No, not to the moon, just into the sky on dodgy wings.
 
He tested the new contraptions.
Most test pilots died.
He told me that he ‘listened to the engine’…
and knew. 
They had this communion.
Later he became an engineer.
 
But before he could settle on solid earth,
he took this brand-new toy to join a far-away war
and promptly crashed into a Bulgarian spinach field;
the local black smith and the local apothecary 
got him back on his… no, not feet,
allowed him to continue his way to Turkey.
 
Through the Balkans, not above and over. 
There were upwinds and downwinds
bouncing his flimsy flying machine between 
the unforgiving mountains.
Looked like Snoopy as pilot.
God only knows who took the photo.
 
Showing off, he crashed into a river near Istanbul.
At the time it was still known as Constantinople.
He and his passenger, a Turkish officer,
spent the rest of their war in a hospital
overlooking the Bosphorus--
eyes travelling all the way to Asia.
He didn’t want to fight, just fly.
Didn’t do either.

Rose Mary Boehm

Rose Mary Boehm is a German-born British national living and writing in Lima, Peru, and author of two novels as well as seven poetry collections. Her poetry has been published widely in mostly US poetry reviews (online and print). She was three times nominated for a Pushcart and once for Best of Net. Her latest: Do Oceans Have Underwater Borders? (Kelsay Books July 2022), Whistling in the Dark (Cyberwit July 2022), and Saudade (December 2022) are available on Amazon. A new collection, Life Stuff, has been published by Kelsay Books. https://www.rose-mary-boehm-poet.com/

**

Wonder

Yes, it will also be comfortable.
The two of us standing, talking
as the slow wheels turn in a multitude of colours,
like the intricate workings of the brain,
a most extraordinary invention.

I can see quite clearly the beauty of the universe.
It’s jewelled borders, it’s names and numbers,
and how we can float above it
yet also fit within it exactly,
It is rather like a dream or a fancy but exciting.

Would you like to join me?

Louise Warren

​Louise Warren’s first collection A Child’s Last Picture of the Zoo won the Cinnamon Press debut poetry competition and was published in 2012. A pamphlet In the scullery with John Keats also published by Cinnamon came out in 2016. Her poems have been widely published in magazines including Ambit, The Butchers Dog, Stand, Poetry Wales and Rialto. In 2018 she won first prize in the Prole Laureate Poetry Competition with her poem The Marshes which appears in the  pamphlet John Dust illustrated by the artist John Duffin and published in 2019 by V.Press. Her latest poetry pamphlet is Sometime, in a Churchyard, a collaboration with the artist Charlotte Harker published in 2023 by Paekakariki Press.

**

Flying Machines That Also Teach Greek

Step right up! Step right up to the incredible Ekphrastic Express! Where to, sir or madam?
            (idioekphrasis)

Standard features of our Vogel 457 Series include patented anti-gravity technology, separate cabins for first and economy class, semi-private viewing windows, and a central dining and dancing area for your aviation pleasure.
            (panekphrasis)

Complimentary in-flight phonographs play favorites from Blues, Broadway and Jazz.
            (phonoekphrasis)

We’ve got experiences for every budget—anybody can travel from any place with new VR/AR Escapes.
            (neoekphrasis)

Fancy a seat on our Time Travel Line, with routes direct to King Tut?
            (metaekphrasis)

Let me call your attention to the Broad Cutt’s fully rotating propeller, offering luxurious maneuverability. 
            (oligoekphrasis)

This balanced four-cylinder design ensures every voyage is supersonicserene.
             (morphekphrasis)

All Aeros fleet models were designed by visionary draftsman Charles A.A. Dellschau.
            (proekphrasis)

Consider a visit to Alamo City heritage centres, which house his earliest works.
            (topoekphrasis)

Judi Mae “JM” Huck

Judi Mae “JM” Huck is an arts administrator currently based in Las Vegas, Nevada. She is the Clark County Poet Laureate coordinator and a teaching artist for both literary and visual arts. Follow her on Instagram @bandittrl. ​

**

It Seems Like Only Yesterday
a pantoum

It seems like only yesterday . . .
The first time I flew in a plane.
High over San Francisco Bay;
It seemed I’d entered God’s domain.

The first time I flew in a plane
I soared into bright heaven’s skies.
I felt I’d entered God’s domain,
To see the world through angels’ eyes.

I soared into bright heaven’s skies,
The world below looked, oh-so small.
To see the world through angel’s eyes
From where I soared above it all.

The world below looked, oh-so small--
And even the suburban sprawl
From where I soared above it all
Was beautiful, as I recall.

And even the suburban sprawl
High over San Francisco Bay
Was beautiful, as I recall.
It seems like only yesterday . . .

​James A. Tweedie

​James A. Tweedie has lived in California, Utah, Scotland, Australia, Hawaii, and presently in Long Beach, Washington. He has published six novels, four collections of poetry, and one collection of short stories with Dunecrest Press. His award-winning poetry has appeared both nationally and internationally in both online and print media. Among his awards for poetry are First Place honours in the Society of Classical Poets 2021 International Poetry Competition; Quarterly Prize Best Poem from The Lyric; First Place in the 2022 100 Days of Dante Poetry Competition; and the Laureate Choice Award in the 2021 Maria W. Faust Sonnet Contest.

**

she was given many names

Waste of space.  Never be worth a damn.  Daydreamer, mind-wanderer, head full of fluff.  Hearer of ugly words that floated past.  Never-let-them-sticker.  Receiver of whallops that landed across the back of the neck, kicks on the behind.  Bone-song singer, cut mender, jaw clencher, skull healer.  Lifting-chin-out-of-the-dirt expert.  Girl getting on with it.  Nose stuck in a book.  Imagineer.  Scryer, diviner.  Second-sight seer, third-eye wrangler, fourth-generation witch.  Never focussed on the here-and-now.  Needlesmith.  Stitch saver.  Fabric salvager.  Green magic user.  Branch bender.  Willow weaver.  Tent pitcher of a space-bound teepee.  Binder of the incantations of control.  Wielder of the hazel bough.  Maker of cunning devices.  Hidden message revealer.  Shaper of ends.  Whisperer of words of power.  Flame trainer.  Keen-eyed watcher of the birds, gleaner of the secrets of thermal hover, the lifting thrust of a wing.  Balloon inflator.  Gravity tamer.  Close companion of the moon, a confidant privy to its moods and passions, its orbital vagaries, its beautiful sulks and pouts, its winsome tidal tiffs.  Shaman of rockets, blesser of intricate mechanisms.  Cloud mapper.  Craft steerer, obstacle navigator.  Celestial pilot.  Conjurer of alchemical energy.  Miracle worker.  Escape artist.  Freedom taster.

Emily Tee

Emily Tee writes poetry and flash fiction.  She's had pieces published in The Ekphrastic Review challenges, Visual Verse, Blue Heron Review, Scavengers Lit and elsewhere online, and in print with Poetry Scotland and Sunday Mornings at the River's Poetry Diary 2024. She lives in the UK.

**

A Well Grounded Gentleman
 
The ginger dessert undulates below like the orange zest on last night’s Old Fashioneds. My head swims from too much bourbon and the machine’s buzzing reverberates painfully. The engine rumbles and roars and we continue to ascend. When Marie and I were first courting, we enjoyed a hot-air balloon ride and the delight of feeling weightless in the wind, but rocket ships are not my thing. 
 
As my ears pop, I contemplate why I ever acquiesced to this flight. I stand encased in metal—rivets and bolts sealing out the natural air and thick glass windows reminding me of my aerial captivity. Charles should never have insisted we drink so much, if he intended to fly this high. Now I wonder whether I can endure the whole journey without evacuating last night’s indulgences.
 
Charles thinks he’s sharing a privilege. That I, his former business partner, should consider myself fortunate to be joining one of his maiden voyages. And yet, I can’t help considering the cost. He’s spent the better part of a decade on this project and sacrificed dozens of relationships in service of this machine. Maybe I’m too simple a man, but I see no need to fly higher than the clouds. What more is there to see? Give me terra firma every day. Give me horses and cars that streak across the land, and fine-boned beauties who lay across the grass. True splendor is in surface contact, not in levitation.
 
We used to build buildings. Now Charles insists upon escaping our foundations. But what if these bolts don’t hold? What if we simply explode as the pressure overwhelms? Maybe that’s his plan. Maybe he has no desire to return to Earth. I suspect he’s never gotten over my rejection. My lack of interest in any partnership beyond business. Still, I have done nothing to make him feel small. If anything, I’ve gone out of my way to pretend he never crossed a line. Why else would I be here? 
 
And yet, I must return. I must insist he bring me back down. To my beloved Marie and to my girls. To my horses and to my gardens. To my Eden, that awaits below. I’m sorry he doesn’t have love on the ground, but he’s no more likely to find it in the sky. And every man who has ever flown ends up buried in the soil.

Coleman Bigelow

Coleman Bigelow is a Pushcart Prize and Best MicroFiction nominated author whose work has appeared recently in Bending Genres, Emerge Journal, Hyacinth Review and The Dribble Drabble Review. His first chapbook In Rare Cases and Other Unfortunate Circumstances was published in May. Find more at: www.colemanbigelow.com or follow him on Twitter: @ColemanBigelow and Instagram: @cbigswrites.


**

Flying Machines

For early aviators of the sky,
Log-cabin-like designs are comic, as
You cannot fly a circus wagon high:
Its comfort tantalizes, but it has 
No force to lift it up and make the earth
Grow distant. They would say the pictures are
Miraculous as art, but have no worth
As blueprints for a means to travel far ...
Charles Dellschau would dissent. He would have said
His quaint designs weren't meant for flights that go
In space, but flights of fancy, which can head
North, east, south, west, straight up or down below
Earth's oceans—they can take you anywhere,
So long as you imagine it is there!

Mike Mesterton-Gibbons

Mike Mesterton-Gibbons is a Professor Emeritus of Mathematics at Florida State University who has returned to live in his native England.  His acrostic sonnets have appeared in Autumn Sky Poetry Daily, Better Than Starbucks, the Creativity Webzine, Current Conservation, the Daily Mail, the Ekphrastic Review, Grand Little Things, Light, Lighten Up Online, MONO., the New Verse News, Oddball Magazine, Rat’s Ass Review, the Satirist, the Washington Post and WestWard Quarterly.

4. USE THIS EMAIL ONLY.

Send your work to [email protected]. Challenge submissions sent to the other inboxes will most likely be lost as those are read in chronological order of receipt, weeks or longer behind, and are not seen at all by guest editors. They will be discarded. Sorry.

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8. Deadline is midnight EST, December 22, 2023.

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10. Selected submissions will be published together, with the prompt, one week after the deadline.

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12. A word on the selection process: we strive for a balance between rewarding regular participants and sharing the voices of writers who are new to our family. We also look for a variety of perspectives and styles, and a range of interesting takes on the painting. It is difficult to reproduce experimental formatting, so unfortunately we won't choose many with unusual spacing or typography. 

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