Drossos Skyllas: Ekphrastic Writing Responses

Wisconsin Ice Cave, by Drossos Skyllas (USA, b. Greece) 1950

Tough Old Bird
 
An overcoat encased the passenger seat 
as if the presence of a man
the illusion of safety. 
As she ascended the valley
the all-season ice cave 
her hands gripped the steering wheel.
The one-hundred-mile drive 
offered a paycheque 
familiarity
and time with her mother. 
This went on for years.
The neighbour told me 
she’s a tough old bird.
He wasn’t wrong.
 
When we moved from nice to ice
she’d no choice in the matter.
As the icicles formed around us 
we smiled our way through the deep freeze
overcompensated 
to warm the frozen landscape. 
Chin up
she’d repeat. 
 
In the end
scattered across the garage floor
I discovered her tote bags
toiletries for all those back-and-forth trips. 
 
I’ve similar bags
followed my mother’s lead
became a tough old bird
stayed
because the view is beautiful.

Jeannie E. Roberts

Jeannie E. Roberts is the daughter of a Swedish immigrant mother and the author of nine books, including On a Clear Night, I Can Hear My Body Sing (Kelsay Books, 2025). A Midwesterner with roots in Minnesota and Wisconsin, her work appears in books, online magazines, print journals and anthologies. An award-winning artist and poet, she serves as a poetry editor for the online literary magazine Halfway Down the Stairs, is an Eric Hoffer and a two-time Best of the Net award nominee and finds joy spending time outdoors and with loved ones.

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​​Behind His Eyes
 
It’s so easy to disparage those
who send a chill down your spine,
give you goosebumps, make your
blood run cold every time they open
their mouth, judge them even more
harshly when they don’t know how
to close it.

Have you ever once stepped behind
his eyes? When did he ever have what
you take for granted? Take an inventory.
What are you thankful for? Health, family,
love, security? When did he ever grow
up with any of these?

Call him a Scrooge if you will, but when
was Christmas ever Christmas for him?
From the heart, the mouth speaks. Didn’t
you learn that in Sunday School? It takes
more than bottles of milk hanging down
from wires to keep an infant from dying
from failure to thrive.

Sometimes a heart stops working years
before it stops beating. They found your
Grandfather in the dead of winter sitting
on a park bench, frozen solid, blue skin,
mouth gaping, icicles hanging from his
stiff upper lip. If you step behind his
eyes now, can you tell me his icicles
and your heart are not melting?

Todd Matson

Todd Matson is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in North Carolina, United States.  His poetry has been published Feminine Collective, San Antonio Review, The Brussels Review, and featured in Poetry for Mental Health.  He has also written lyrics for songs recorded by several contemporary Christian music artists, including Brent Lamb, Connie Scott and The Gaither Vocal Band.

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Wisconsin Ice Cave

​Hear the 
shimmering 
stalactites  
l e n g t h e n i n g…
See them 
w i n d o w i n g 
Wisconsin wonders:
Blue lakes.
White mountains.
Green trees.
Breathe in a snow globe.
Breathe out a sigh.

Mona Voelkel

Before Mona Voelkel was a full-time writer, she was a reading specialist in New York. She is the author of two picture books, Stanley and the Wild Words and the Moonbeam Award-winning, Moon Choo-Choo. Her poetry has appeared in Little Thoughts Press, The Dirigible Balloon, and The Milford Journal.

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“every year my invitation”
 
i will be your ending
my look is a lost beginning
the wrong turns and dark doors come inside
with fallen leaves and ragged carpets of ice and 
snow furrows and your end you will find it in my 
jaws my teeth will tear and erode and be the last picture
you see your eyes unfold and ice will float 
in your veins and the frozen seas
those currents in your mind will let out the last 
thought the last cry the last broken word the
sweet ice leaves nothing behind and your 
heart will slide down my throat and i will open 
and close my mouth my wind my breath will
chew the leftover pieces meat and bone
and my throat will entice and draw you down
deep and deeper my cave will cure and polish you 
i will pull you close so deep down low 
and your bones stripped clean by ice wind and a
blizzard of the soul your voice will be muted dying
whispers and frozen throat and my teeth still glisten 
white and like smooth hollow pearl walls the 
last thing they will say the echoes in a hall of white 
rock and ice the only thing of note 
the empty tones and voices
your bones no headstones the voices say
to anyone at the small service 
witnesses to the soft poplar pews polar walls
those last words will be that winter 
winter took a bite
out of him 
whoever he was
and never let him go
my cave my river
your everlasting night

mike sluchinski

mike sluchinski is a recent pushcart prize nominee and grateful to be read in mantis, failed haiku, inlandia journal, kaleidotrope, eternal haunted summer, the literary review of canada, the coachella review, welter, poemeleon, lit shark, proud to be vol. 13&14, the ekphrastic review, kelp journal, the fib review, syncopation lit. journal, south florida poetry journal (soflopojo), freefall, pulpmag, in parentheses, and more coming!

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Knowing the Way

A subdued landscape covered in snow
where trees are sleeping.

Along the riverbank trees and water
are seamless in their harmony.

The scene is crystal clear
yet icicles form to cloud our view.

In the stillness there is an awareness that
stirs the senses, calms the restless mind.

Dan Hardison

Dan Hardison is a writer and artist living in Wilmington, North Carolina, USA. His writing has appeared at Calliope, The Wise Owl, The  Ravens Perch, Cattails, Contemporary Haibun Online, and other print and online journals. He received an Honorable Mention at Ekphrasis 2024,  Craven Arts Council North Carolina. His illustrated self-published book  Quietude is available from Lulu Press. His work can be found at his  blog Some Tomorrow’s Morning.  http://www.danhardison.blogspot.com

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Limpid Winter Morn

Ice stalactites stilly align
in geometric harmony.

The cave mouth opens 
double-wide 
in craggy canines 
dripping downward.

Amanda Weir-Gertzog

Amanda Weir-Gertzog is a neuroqueer, chronically ill poet from New York who lives, writes, and edits in the American South. Her poems have been published in Exist Otherwise, One Sentence Poems, and elsewhere. A nap goddess and bookworm, she basks in the wonder of sweet tea and cozy gray cardigans.

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One Hundred Sixth Graders at Camp Linwood
 
Buses carry us to Northwest Jersey
away from city dirt to country pines.
 
Camp Linwood, they say you’re mighty fine,
It takes so long to get there, we’re driving all the time.
 
A three-day nature retreat, no homework.
We claim our bunks, pushing others aside.
 
The meatballs at Linwood, they say are mighty fine
One rolled off the table and killed a friend of mine.
 
Armed with itemized lists, we scavenge groves
for feather, slingshot twig, pinecone for prize. 
 
It’s cold, wet. My socks are grimy, soaked through.
What’s on the menu? I want to dine.
 
It’s not Ma’s roast beef or the Colonel’s wings.
Just tuna noodle casserole, a crime. 
 
The first aid at Camp Linwood they say is mighty fine.
Connie got a splinter. The funeral's at nine.
 
Chilled to the bone, we warm up by the fire
to toast marshmallows and sing songs that rhyme.
 
The milk at Camp Linwood they say is mighty fine,
It heals cuts and bruises but tastes like iodine.
 
Morning in the woods in mittens and scarves.
We bring back leaves and sticks, but all the while:
 
A cumulus cloud. Cardinal. White squirrel.
We lie in the snow and make angels fly.
 
There’s time before dinner to play ping-pong.
I win! And after hamburgers and fries
 
we get our parts for skits. We act silly
when tired teachers snore to lullaby. 
 
Under a litter of stars, we clasp hands.
We see clear to the moon’s indigo sky. 
 
While we may sing: Ma, I want to go home. 
Decades later,  camp memories rewind.
 
Barbara Krasner

Barbara Krasner, MFA, asked fellow Kearnians (NJ) on Facebook, who remembered Camp Linwood. Her query generated 117 comments and fond memories from nearly sixty years ago. Barbara has written four books about her hometown and uses the setting as a base for literary work. Find her at www.barbarakrasner.com.
 
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​

Tomb of Vibrance  

Lying here, half open eyes, that distant lake is so blue. 
That which saved my life, this cave of ice, 
Soon it may come to be a tomb. A wandering soul, the bitter cold, 
Shall forgiveness fall on me?  

Three towering pines, a restless mind, the mortal body ruled 
With flakes already flurrying, I’d struck out like a fool.  
But nature knows no mercy, for the vanity of man  
Toward the destination, will point a frost bit, blackened hand. 

So lovely are the colors when a storm comes to break 
The skies that had been overcast, vibrance, overtakes.  
Sickles hang down toward frosted ground, glimmering like swords.  
A warning left to wanderers who seek to understand our world. 

Such an end to the journey, to freeze here, in this cave 
In the snow-covered hills, above a vast, and grand blue lake. 
Resisting all temptation, to close my weary eyes, I slowly  
Crawl forward, though intense, the pain inside.  

My gaze glazes over, blinded by golden sunny rays. 
Suddenly, I am no longer lying in this cave.  
Gone to fly with eagles, soaring over water crystal clear, 
Plummeting down, seeking now, a glimpse into the mirror.  

John Ford 

John Ford is an up-and-coming writer from Colorado Springs, Colorado. Writing was not  an initial career choice, but rather an awakening coming in the last years of his twenties. John  is a father, partner, blue collar man, and a devoted poet. He works in the field of horticulture  and is a proud owner and sole operator of a small landscaping business. He has published  numerous poems, flash fiction, and a one act play, in the academic journal Parley. John is currently pursuing an undergraduate in creative writing at Piks Peak State College in Colorado Springs and intends to complete an MFA program in the future. For now, the writing has led to here. 

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fissure

a piercing silence hovers,
covers me in waves--

I shift, adrift, a secret
unfolding between

hidden spells cast by dreams--
suspended inside,

frozen images inscribed
on my synapses 

rise like revelations from 
winter’s cryptic abyss

Kerfe Roig

A resident of New York City, Kerfe Roig enjoys transforming words and images into something new.  Follow her explorations on her blogs,https://methodtwomadness.wordpress.com/  (which she does with her friend Nina), and https://kblog.blog/.

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Haiku

​Between the ice swords,
step through the mouth of the cave
to bath in sun shine

Marge Pellegrino

Marge Pellegrino’s poetry has appeared in anthologies including Amaranth Review, Writing Out of the Darkness, Arizona: 100 Years, 100 Poems, !00 Poets, and The Sculpture Speaks: A Refugee’s Story of Survival, and online in The Ekphrastic Review,  Blue Guitar, Long Island Journal and Unstrung. Her youth novel Journey of Dreams was a Smithsonian Notable, and Southwest Best Book. Neon Words: 10 Brilliant Ways to Light Up Your Writing inspires. Her essays have appeared in Multilingualism Studies, Anthropology Now, Knee Brace Press and The Story Beast.

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Clean Air Act

’Tis crisp clean air that clarifies   
perspective, textures in our site,
this study, clime and atmosphere,
shapes moulded by the weather’s marks.
A chill is channelled through the pane,
sharp scape of scarp from scree to tree
where placid lake takes azure hues.

Surrounding frame for window, cave,
bears gentle powdered flaky hoar -
then onward to the climb through fall,
those upward pines past downward frieze,
the one designed, the other, chance -
in pointed meet, green cream insert,
with back up range of summit snow.

Note conifers of symmetry, 
uneven scene of icicles -
both adverts, renaissance evoked.
Dabs miniscule, luminous oil,
reflective surfaces, his skill,
though undiscovered till his death;
another chill for canvassed work.

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 and published by on-line poetry sites, printed journals and anthologies, including The Ekphrastic Review.  He has, like so many, been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net.  His blog is at https://poetrykingsnorth.wordpress.com

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Step Out...
 
of your tidy ice cave, 
dutiful Wisconsinite!
 
What’s that you say?
 
Too many ice-teeth
gleaming, polished, white--
 
those fangs you fear 
to navigate?
 
Go on, take courage.
 
Beyond, you’ll find a world 
of coolest symmetry 
 
and calm; winter’s not 
the vicious predator 
 
you think it is.
 
Dive, fly into 
blue perfections--
 
deepest lakes
and arcing skies; 
 
tread down 
 
snow-furrowed paths 
between the firs
 
to find the wonder
of a wider winter,
 
dear Cheesehead!
 
For December’s moon
is mouth-watering
 
and made of
best Wisconsin cheese!
 
Lizzie Ballagher

A published novelist between 1984 and 1996 in North America, Australasia, the UK, Netherlands and Sweden (pen-name Elizabeth Gibson), Ballagher now writes poetry rather than fiction. Her work has been featured in a variety of magazines and webzines: Words for the Wild, Poetry on the Lake, Nitrogen House, The Ekphrastic Review, and Poetry Space.  She blogs at https://www.lizzieballagherpoetry.wordpress.com/

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Cold Haiku

One glacial window
Open space on rare splendor
Last space to escape
 
Jean Bourque

Jean lives in Montreal. This is his first attempt at haiku.

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​A Humble Request

Dear Reader,

It’s that time of year again (yes, that time of year) where grass is replaced with snow, water solidifies to ice, and all the trees turn from greens to fall colors before shedding their leaves for the entirety of winter.

Except for evergreens, of course.

Anyways, I digress.

It’s that time of year where everyone goes out to build snowmen. That time of year where exploring the wondrous mountainsides of nature is a daily occurrence. That time of year where imagination and reality run free. The holidays within winter are great for this…but also for the other side of humanity.

You know…the hunters.

I write to humbly request that you stop looking for my cousin, Bigfoot, and me. We would like to be able to walk around, rest, and live in peace. We leave you strange creatures alone, so why can’t you do the same for us? Please. This is all we ask. It is the holidays. The season of giving and being kind to each other.

With kind regards,
Yeti (or, as you like to call me, The Abominable Snowman)

P.S. – If you wonder about my penmanship and intellect, I’m not a dumb Yeti; Saint Nicholas made sure of that.

Happy Holidays!

Katie L. Davey ​

Katie L. Davey is an aspiring author from the rural parts of St. Louis, Missouri. She acquired her BFA in Creative Writing, with minors in Equestrian Studies and Psychology, at Stephens College in May 2024. There she worked on Harbinger Magazine as a staff intern and is a member of Stephens College's chapter of Sigma Tau Delta. She has published five pieces through five separate challenges for The Ekphrastic Review, the most recent being "Hope Overshadowed" as part of the Smith Challenge. 

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The Poland Express
 
In winter, I hear trees screaming and echoing off
Cave walls, begging and bleeding over the virgin
Iridescent landscape, ripe with polished sugar
Crystals worshiping sun gods and whispering
Lies to lumberjacks revving their chainsaws’
Engines, whirring and whistling like trains
Sent to Poland ... never to return home

Michelle Hoover

Michelle Hoover is an amateur poet and professional wiseacre. She lives near a mountain on unceded Ute territory with her onery feline, Stevie, the Magnificent Marshmallow. She enjoys her toes in the grass, a hardy laugh, and a backstroke under a starry sky. Her work can be found in The Ekphrastic Review and The Haiku Foundation. 

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Sitting with It 
 
I like the winter on a canvas, in a frame, through a window: 
frosted landscapes, houses strung with fairylights, evergreen forests reflected impressionistically
on the surface of frozen lakes.
I don’t like the cold.

I don’t want to be the kind of person who likes to look at pretty things but wants nothing else to
do with them. 
I’ve dated that kind of person: 
he wanted me to “send pix” but never answered the phone when I called, he wanted me to do everything with my lips except speak
because once I started talking I “ruined it.” (What was “it?” I think “it” was me.)

Am I that kind of person?
I don't like the cold, but I am listening. 

How long will the snowmelt drip-drip-drip from the eaves of my roof before it freezes again?
Which colors did the artist mix together to paint that December sky? What sacred geometry
patterns the snowflakes? What kind of person am I?

“Just sit with it,” is my therapist’s favourite thing to say. (What is “it?” Is “it” me?)
She recommends cognitive defusion exercises.
I visualize my thoughts as leaves floating down a stream. I imagine them as uninvited guests at a dinner party. I put a frame around them in my mind so I can look at them instead of through
them.
The idea is to separate myself from my thoughts but

I’m not sure that I have edges. My mother sneezes and I cover my own mouth. Breaking up with
the pix guy broke my heart. I can feel the chill through the window pane.
I can even feel the chill through the canvas.

Isn’t it all part of the bigger picture? (“It?” Me?) 

I’m the kind of person who can’t stop asking questions long enough to hear the answers. 
 
Gracie Lyle

Gracie Lyle is a writer from Brooklyn, NY. Her work has appeared in Elegant Literature, 101 Words, and is forthcoming in Blood+Honey. You can find her online @gracielyle.bsky.social

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Winter Worn
 
In the distance 
blue warms the thaw.
White expanse of mountains
an exhale 
of held breath. 
 
In the distance 
a dream of green,
fjord of wonders. 
Blank pages of days.
Epiphany of sight. 
 
In the distance 
a misted mirage. 
The world reveals itself 
again.
Hibernation over. 
 
But here, the deep bite 
of winter;
jagged icicle teeth,
the grip
of an existential predator. 

Siobhán Mc Laughlin

Siobhán Mc Laughlin is a poet and creative writing facilitator from Ireland. Her poems have appeared on numerous occasions in The Ekphrastic Review. Other publications include Hive Nature Poetry Journal, Drawn to the Light Press, The Poetry Village and more. Winter is definitely not, her favourite season. 

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Fanged with Icicles

This Ogre lurks amidst us
in the mist of whitened fog. 
The mouth, fanged with icicles,
frames the trees of peace
quaking silently with
no one near to hear.
Left from frozen glaciers
exploring passageways of rocks.
The question is of purpose.
Are Ogres here to guard us
against our inner demons?
To escape within a landscape
of surrealism?
This Ogre howls prayers
with a lowing, gaping maw
like that of largemouth bass
caught in water basins 
of Wisconsin.
Such Ogres lurk among us
in the back throats of existence.
We simply fail to listen. 
   
Cynthia Dorfman

Cynthia Dorfman has felt the polar vortex from her condo in Wisconsin where bitter cold can jolt her creativity. A member of the Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets, her work appears in its 2025 calendar and Bramble literary journal.

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Cloistered

The ice constructs a nest that keeps me warm
I’ve lived here snugly since I was a child
I’m not sure if my life would fit the norm
but I eschew the base, taboo or wild

The view I see outside my door is grand
the colours permeating all the white
I must confess I hunger for that land
but cold might freeze my bones, and beasts may bite

The scent of trees soothes as it mystifies
the sapphire heavens spark imagination
the distant mountains point me to the skies
but ice stalactites threaten laceration 

and why should I not be content to stay
with all that I have ever known or loved
with nature viewable but kept at bay
I touch with hands hygienic, chaste and gloved 

Julia Denton

Julia Denton grew up in Atlanta, Georgia and currently lives in northern Virginia. She recently completed her Diploma in Creative Writing at Oxford University.

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