Walking on pinecones

An angry storm

beneath skies of azure blue and gold

I walk wondering why this doesn’t make sense.

Doctors don’t always have the answer     They

suggest answers based upon years of study

and experience, but they are calculated guesses.

The answers are

sometimes within our grasp but if we select the wrong

path

we find ourselves

walking on pinecones with bare feet

a path, I seek to avoid.

I pray for guidance

Endurrrrrrrence

Perserverrrrrrrence

Resilience

for my experience, filled with

Hope.

John Doriot is an award-winning poet and author. He has won 6 Georgia Independent Author of the Year Awards from 2022-2024, of which two of those books were for collections of poetry. He has contributed short stories and poetry to Down in the Dirt, Dark Horses and WestWard Quarterly magazines.

Neighbors

I have seen angels on earth.

They reside in human bodies

with spirits which provided hope,

kindness, the ability to move forward

when the world knocked me down.

If I watched or listened to the

endless noise around me,

I would think evil had dominion.

Yet, I have experienced immobilizing

fear and angels appeared offering

hands of comfort, lifting me up

finding wonder filled with awe,

wisdom draped in glory,

diminishing shadows of doubt.

Fear is an illness.

Angels carry remedies.

It is made from the kindness of man,

the fountain of youth, sought and found.

John Doriot is an award-winning poet and author. He has won 6 Georgia Independent Author of the Year Awards from 2022-2024, of which two of those books were for collections of poetry. He has contributed short stories and poetry to Down in the Dirt, Dark Horses and WestWard Quarterly magazines.

Baby Three Stitch

…is what we called my little brother

when, after jumping on the bed,

(like the monkey in the song)

he fell off and…

the rest is history, I suppose.

But what they don’t tell you about that monkey

is that he was pushed with love.

In his little lifetime that monkey got pummeled

by life,

by me,

by the other three

of us

because we hadn’t learned yet how to dilute affection.

And sure, there was falling off the zipline,

and falling down the stairs,

beating his bloody nose in

and yanking out his hairs,

but on the same day

he was made into “Baby Three Stitch,”

(the little loops of fishing line perfectly

centered on his forehead

like a patch of curly hair)

I hugged his neck so hard

he couldn’t turn it for a week.

It’s a wonder he survived our love,

but he did,

our little monkey.

And now, watching my one-year-old

scoot his boot

in silence on the hardwood,

I predict my daughter will intercept

his little doll neck

before he gets wherever he is going 

in a strangle-grip of love so fierce

her teeth will grit, her eyes pinch, her body shake

with the sheer force of it.

And I think of how it felt to squeeze my brother

in a death grip last Christmas,

and how kind his manly scruff felt on my cheek.

George Evans is a querulous nuisance from Birmingham, Alabama. When he isn't teaching English (and sometimes when he is) he writes for The Quarter(ly) and on his substack: Fourth Castle on the Left. He enjoys stirring compost, throwing children into the air, and maintaining a classroom of ascetic silence.