 Crucifix, by Jerzy Jarnuszkiewicz (Poland) 1968–71 Present Absence 1. Built over barracks By concrete and glass Buildings of national Catholic pride Along with the chapel behind. Christ stretches arms points his legs Metal black over white chapel wall Symmetrical body with no cross to bear Hovers in clean modern air Majestically simple and straight (Chapel of the Catholic University of Lublin, 31 August 2023)  Christ Bearing the Cross, by unknown artist (Poland?) 1733(?) Photo courtesy of the author. 2. In a tunnel like stairway Sheltered, concealed Leading up to the stations of sorrow Humble niche and a bench for Humble devotion and rest. It houses an image Simple and childish Peeled off and stained. Light blue skies. Flat green hills. Cross looming heavy and dark Diagonally leaned. Its bearer removed An empty, bright space A body no more (Sanctuary of Our Lady of Kazimierz, 31 August 2023) Shlomi Efrati Shlomi Efrati was born and raised in Kibbutz Yavneh, Israel, and studied Talmud at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He currently lives in Leuven, Belgium. He enjoys the meticulous study of ancient texts and the ongoing attempt to perceive the worlds from which they emerged.
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 Landscape with the Rest on the Flight into Egypt, by Rembrandt van Rijn (Netherlands) 1647 Resting While Flying It’s the fire that draws them in. This thing that burns, that flings heat and light from inside itself. It draws them like a corpse draws flies – child, goats, cow, shepherd, the reflections in the water, the whole forest, sky and pond, all of it falling toward the fire, as if fire were a gravitational force, a collapsing in instead of a forcing out, a warm pair of arms gathering you close, a way to escape the dark, to find that sleep you’ve longed for – a bed of coals, pillow of flame. José A. Alcántara José A. Alcántara has worked at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station, on a fishing boat in Alaska, as a baker in Montana, and as a calculus teacher in Cartagena, Colombia. He is the author of The Bitten World: Poems (Tebot Bach, 2022). His poetry has appeared in American Life in Poetry, Ploughshares, Poetry Northwest, and Rattle. He lives in western Colorado and wherever he happens to pitch his tent.  Blue Moon Reverie, by Brent Skinner (USA) 2018 Blue Moon Reverie Blue Moon, again we meet at the sentineled wood, the dance of light beyond, from which, before, we’ve always moved on, each to our own next day. Yet, haven’t we known this moment would come? I must gain passage through. Highborn friend, play your light through the sentinels’ boughs that I might find my way to that shimmery place. My heart longs to abide in such mystical shine. Adieu then, yet when next you greet the night, lend ear: if still I have body to sing, hear my unworldly song. Darrell Petska Darrell Petska, a retired university engineering editor and Wisconsin poet, has published in journals such as The Ekphrastic Review, Third Wednesday Magazine, Muddy River Poetry Review, and Verse-Virtual (see conservancies.wordpress.com). Petska is collaborating with Brent Skinner, who lives in Minnesota and has an estate planning and probate law practice in Wisconsin. Skinner's passion is creating works of art. A serendipitous encounter reunited poet and artist after their lives diverged more than 50 years ago.  A big congratulations to our Best Microfiction nominees this year.
Every year, the series Best Microfiction anthologies honours the short form and the small press with a collection of stellar shorts. The series was founded by Meg Pokrass and Gary Fincke. We are thrilled to announce our nominees. Please join us in congratulating these writers on their amazing stories. ** Light and Colour Like Clutching the Shadow of an Old Lover, by Joy Dube https://www.ekphrastic.net/the-ekphrastic-review/light-and-colour-like-clutching-the-shadow-of-an-old-lover-by-joy-dube The Long View, by Pamela Painter (scroll down to read) https://www.ekphrastic.net/the-ekphrastic-challenges/ekphrastic-writing-responses-george-washington-carver After, by Robert E. Ray https://www.ekphrastic.net/the-ekphrastic-challenges/alexander-harrison-ekphrastic-writing-responses Notes on Lost Highway, by Clare Welsh https://www.ekphrastic.net/the-ekphrastic-review/notes-on-lost-highway-by-clare-welsh We Walked Out of the Forest, by Francine Witte (scroll down to read) https://www.ekphrastic.net/the-ekphrastic-challenges/ekphrastic-writing-responses-george-washington-carver The Princess Loses Her Way, Strips Naked, Steals Money, and We are Thrown Off-Kilter, by Joy Dubé11/19/2023  The Beauty of Case Batllo, photography by Theodor Vasile, via Unspash 2020 The Princess Loses Her Way, Strips Naked, Steals Money, and We are Thrown Off-kilter La Casa Batlló in Barcelona by Antoní Gaudi, Summer 1981 We walk by la Casa Batlló (mejor que Disney, verdad?) to buy bread, cheese, olives. Antoní Gaudi’s blue tile castle dreamworld soars high in Barcelona’s sky. Fish markets teem with what else but fish. Sunlight sparkles a façade curved by membranes, skulls and bones, our insides turned outside like so many red roses offered to the princess. She sleeps a forever sleep behind wooden casements, wavy doors, flowing arches. Not leaning out of a window, not unravelling her golden tresses. She hasn’t yet learnt not to trust the dragon, its fish-scale back, undulating ceramic spells above a magic temple. Later that night la mujerona in a bar describes in painful detail her sex change operation (Ay, qué dolor!). We listen, we party, we read poetry – António Machado, Rubén Darío, Jorge Borges. The princess awakens, transformed into una pasajota – fed up with empty promises of religion and la república, she appears on a red-tiled balcony, smoking, drinking, dancing naked. She pockets our money and disappears, still naked. The dragon in hot pursuit. La Casa Batlló was our last stop, but it threw us off-kilter. Its dreamy spirals hold us hostage for one last visit, one last photo. We stare in wonder, kiltering, like ceramic eggs rolling toward the edge of a table. Joy Dubé "I am Joy Dubé, living on Vancouver Island, B.C., Canada. I write poetry to explore meaning and to connect more deeply with people and places around me. I love words and many times I find I do not know the meanings of words until I juxtapose them with other words in a creative way. I try to give voice to a unique way of looking and feeling. Using art as a visual prompt is a challenge I enjoy."  The Dream by Henri Rousseau (France) 1910 The Eyes Are Looking All the eyes are looking. The woman looks from the couch at the many animals and plants in the jungle around her. What kind of world do they have here? she wonders, crossing bare legs before her. She sets an arm over the couch back and takes in the scene eagerly. A lioness stares at her from the ferns. What is she, reclining in that golden curve? the tawny creature wonders. I've never encountered another such creature. Close by, a snake studies the woman from among the plants. Too curious, he thinks as he poises upright on his pink belly and stretches forward. Does she walk on her legs? Or does she slither like me? Elsewhere, other animals look too. The elephant amid the dark trees has an eye on both her and us. What might they mean looking on us here? he thinks. And who is she, lying out by the tall plants, turning her head everywhere? He curls his trunk as if he would put these questions aloud. The bird, poised in the orange tree, gives our group a close study. So many people out there, she thinks, black wings tucked in closely, keeping her profile to us. Who might they be? Why have they come? Monkeys crouch in the sweep of branches around the bird, gazing intently, too. What strange creatures there, the dark-furred one muses. They look and look. They never get their fill of it. His cousin in the orange tree thinks, The people are very different. They come in many sizes and colors. And they're wrapped in even more colours. What a great mix they are! Near at hand, the lion amid the tall flowers’ glares. What do those creatures out there want? he thinks. Don't they see this is our home? They'd better watch out if they would take care. Amid the many animals and plants, a dark-skinned man plays on a wooden flute. He fingers its holes intently and sees that we give him much attention. He plays on, as if to make the charm last. Yet his music pours forth unheard by us across the divide. What might his melody sound like? we wonder, a smile at our lips. The woman, who can hear, doesn't turn from him once. Norbert Kovacs Norbert Kovacs lives and writes in Hartford, Connecticut. He loves visiting art museums, especially the Met in New York. He has published stories recently in Blink-Ink, The Ekphrastic Review, and MacQueen's Quinterly. His website: www.norbertkovacs.net.  Winter Road, by Rosemary Komori (Canada) contemporary Country Road for Andrew “It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures.” Brother André The air is cold, but not as cold as it would usually be in January. You are dressed for the journey: jacket, touque, gloves, and boots. The dirt road is not wet or icy, but made uneven by tire tracks, so you have to watch your step. The tire tracks are not fresh and there are no cars on the road. There are no people, no animals– even your cell phone is quiet. You learn to accept the silence, feel your breath expand your lungs, and fully connect with the moment. About half a kilometre ahead, two clusters of leafless trees, one on either side of the road, seem to rise from patches of snow. A mist blurs the trees like a dream and covers what lies beyond them. But you keep walking. Patrick Connors "Country Road" originally appeared with the photograph in Over the Garden Fence, an online newsletter released by Sheila Tucker in February of 2023. With text only, it was published in Poetry & Performance, Volume 1, by DesignWiseStudios, in June 2023. Patrick Connors' first chapbook, Scarborough Songs, was released by Lyricalmyrical Press in 2013, and charted on the Toronto Poetry Map. Other publication credits include The Toronto Quarterly; Spadina Literary Review; Sharing Spaces; Tamaracks; and Tending the Fire. His first full collection, The Other Life, was released in 2021 by Mosaic Press.His new chapbook, Worth the Wait, was released this spring by Cactus Press. Join him on Twitter: https://twitter.com/81912CON  Translucid, photography by Lúcia Leão (USA, b. Brazil) contemporary Translúcido Escrevo de memória o que está por vir. Um olho de vidro de Murano preto, o outro em movimento sob o cabelo estirado. São brincos. Escuros de poças vivas e secas que ladeiam o meu rosto. E agora o seu, quando experimento decorar esse momento infantil, um pêndulo preso só com as mãos, criando em você um pirata para a expedição afinal. É um horário da manhã como aqueles que se prendem à família em ossos. Frescor adquirido por séculos de evolução pelos nossos sobrenomes aleatórios. Há muitas formas de reduzir lembranças a um fino aroma de restaurante, mas hoje é o caldo que tem na falta de nobreza uma absoluta dignidade. Com as mãos miúdas você pega o sinuoso e mínimo metal que prende a pedra, tenta furar a língua com a ponta, como argola. A sua experimentação rebola a história da moda e a sua risada rivaliza com os mitos que esqueci que aprendi. Você pega um alfinete de lapela com uma pérola incrustada e coloca na beira da manta do filho que sai da maternidade e que logo irá para a escola. É um passatempo a passagem — fogo-metal-vidro-sorte. Não sei se beijo sua testa de criança ou vejo pela última vez seu rosto sobre a minha morte. Há uma nesga de verde entre as hipóteses. ** Translucid I write from memory what is yet to come. One black Murano glass eye, the other moving under the stretched hair. They are earrings. Dark puddles alive and dry that side my face. And now yours, when I experiment decorating this childish moment, a pendulum held only by the hands, turning you into a pirate for the expedition, at last. It is a time in the morning like those that bond families to bones. A freshness acquired during centuries of evolution through our last names randomly assigned. There are many ways to reduce memories to an upscale restaurant aroma, but today it is the broth that borrows from the absent nobility an absolute dignity. With small hands you take the sinuous and minimal metal that holds the stone, try to pierce your tongue with the tip, like a hoop. Your experiment makes the history of fashion shake, and your laughter rivals the myths that I forgot that I learned. You take a lapel pin with an encrusted pearl and place it on the fringe of your son’s blanket who is leaving the maternity and who will go to school soon. It is a pastime, the passage — fire-metal-glass-luck. I don’t know whether I kiss your infant forehead or if I see for the last time your face over my death muck. There is a sliver of green between the hypotheses. Lúcia Leão Lúcia Leão is a translator and writer originally from Brazil living in the U.S. She has poems published in literary magazines in the U.S. and two books published in Brazil, a collection of short stories and a book for young adults.  Sailboat Seascape on Sunset, by Tatyana Pchelnikova (Ukraine) 2021 The Way of Explorers In the land of Pablo Neruda’s socks no gift is simple. And that’s a law of nature, like gravity. When he saw he had entered new territory, he charted the quantum mechanics of it--how alternate realities exist in this very moment. And so, all the care that goes into raising sheep and gathering wool and knitting socks is transformed into a universe of worlds within worlds and all we need is the ability to see it. That land is part of an archipelago. You can jaunt to the land where an onion is a flower and it is okay to cry-- and to the land where age is not a measure of time, but a ladder made of air. He died half a century ago but the portal he inked will transport you there. And then there is a land with a magic fig tree. Just ask Ross Gay. He’ll give the coordinates. That tree holds the power to transform passers by into community. Not where you set down roots, but where you let the roots someone planted long ago pull water from the earth to mix with sunlight and chlorophyll to produce a sugary potion that can make busy people slow down and commune with each other--strangers, that’s who--to create a kind of plenty even the yellow jackets are willing to share. And while you’re talking to him, ask him to draw you a map to the land where the act of buttoning a shirt can plant a seed and if you connect the dots you can cultivate your own magic fig tree. With ode as sextant, constellations of islands that harbour enchantment remain to be discovered. Some not far from the routes you’ve traced and retraced, some along large tracts where humans have yet to go. They call to you, a world away. Tatyana Pchelnikova shows what you need is a schooner, nimble enough to skip through storm and glassy lull alike, powered by the Earth’s own breath, headsail touched by the alchemy of the setting sun. That, and to give yourself permission to go aboard. Becky DeVito Becky DeVito has used poetry as a means of working her way through trauma. Her experiences writing poetry led her to investigate the ways in which poets come to new insights through the process of drafting and revising their poems for her doctoral dissertation. She is a professor of psychology at the Capital campus of CT State Community College in Hartford, Connecticut. Her poems have been published in The Ekphrastic Review, Frogpond, Mobius: The Journal of Social Change, Naugatuck River Review, The New Verse News, Ribbons: Tanka Society of America Journal, and others. Join her on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram.  Thank you to everyone who supports The Ekphrastic Review. A big shout out to our editors and social media team who so generously devote their time to making this happen and spreading the word. Thank you to those of you who responded to this call already to support us. 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