Welcome to the October 2006 issue of the

New Writer’s Showcase at Poet’s Ink.

Like a frozen beast from the Pleistocene Epoch,
I am preserved.

My yellow hair is carefully creased
Across my forehead.
Limbs twisted and broken:
Encased in a silent, cold tomb.

The pain, like hope, has disappeared
Over the endless, airless hours.
I have nothing by my thoughts
And they, like unprotected plants,
Are dying from an early frost.

Rick Fowler

Rick teaches High School English in Northwestern Michigan. When he’s not busy grading papers, he writes outdoor-related articles for a number of publications

Decisions and Un-Scathed Heartbeats

It tackles the big egg.
Its tail dissolves.
No umbilical cords.

The pill-forcer,
the laughing joker.

Swallow
the pill and
bile.

Poor life
didn’t have
a chance
to shoot the
target.

I’m selfish but
it’ll be okay now.
No more paper tears.
Which mistake

did I make
again?

Mary X

Mary lives in London where she studies Art, Art History, and Design. Her motto is “Live to embrace and embrace to live.”

Short Cut

Scatter, cops are coming,
pounding the pavement, everyone’s running.
Ten men to one,
now ten men are gone,
Leaving one wounded by the gun.
Someone smashed his legs
so he can’t run.
Ten fleeing men saying:
“What have we done?”
“What have we done?”

Just leave him for dead
or spray him instead.
Two bullets scream out the barrel,
ripping straight through, hollowing out his head.
All he had was a paycheck-pocket full of green.
Now he lays there empty, blood rolling down red.

He should have taken the long way
but he took a short cut instead.
Shaving off ten minutes,
he lays there cold, empty and red.
Stolen his life, now he’s dead…

With ten fleeing men saying:
“What have we done?”
“What have we done?”

Chris McInnes

Sleep Eternal

I long for sleep eternal
And wonder why I wake.
Yet not for me do I arise,
But for my Master’s sake.

Mike Andrews

Mike is a business consultant and writer in North-Central Ohio. He can be reached through his email at oholymike@hotmail.com.

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