I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Spillwords Press NYC, Dagmara, and staff for the honor of being nominated for Publication of the Year for 2025 for “Worn Slap Out.” Thank you to all those who voted for me in June. This is a piece written in the North Carolina dialect from the…
Tag: God
“Freezer Burn” Live Featured on IndiaMasticadores
Snow had fallen for five days in a row, and we were no longer allowed outside. Yet, my hateful sisters, Ruth and Elizabeth, somehow obtained mom’s approval to drive to the deli right up the street. Mom gave them money for sandwiches and hot cocoa. They both stuck their tongues out at me as they…
”Red Ball” Now On Hotel Masticadores
Red Ball Hannah wept silently into her dusty apron. She spun her thin face around, much like a donut, awaiting its freckling of powdered sugar. Tears cast their agonies upon hand-stitched hydrangeas, petunias, and magnolias while honeybees clung close with their bulging pollen-laden legs. Ruth had spent six months embroidering this apron for her and…
TREES LEAN
Winter winds weep as they lay their sorrow in the folds of my dress Crows bleed feathers as their skin grows loose from painful hunger Brown eyes deposit luster within a hollow oyster where the sun hides Sepia runs a palette of winter grays upon the face of a swollen clown Whitewashed boulders bleached from a tired sun, mark her…
Tender Embraces – Visit Gifted
Tender Embraces – Visit Gifted light embraces us gifts abundant manna from heavenpure joy clings, and anchors us, like the song of treeseach child buzzes around us, like gold pollen to bees smiles sway like timeless joy and wrap us like a giftwords of reason spill over us like a starlit waterfallhummingbirds dance as they…
Barbara Leonhard’s Review Of “One Petal At A Time” On Roi Fainéant Press
Thank you, Barbara Leonhard (Barbara’s Blog), editor of MasticadoresUSA, for this amazing review and submitting it to Roi Fainéant Press (Roi Fainéant Page)! Barbara’s Review of “One Petal At A Time” The title of Joni Karen Caggiano’s powerful poetry collection, One Petal at a Time, makes me recall what I used to say as a child…
The Calling Ocean
The Calling Ocean a trail of love springs forth with morning gloriesrain disperses drops, on steaming, searing sandtemperate waves leave kisses on briny shoreslike a ring placed on the ankle of a new bridemoonlight is tasting the glitter of dusk of a regalement of tearsshifting like sighs of lost sand dollars on ocean’s symphonic shoredraped…
“Stranger” Now Live On Hotel Masticadores
Stranger round, dark like chocolateleft one slightly crossedare the wistful eyesof this old, hopeful soulI hear chaotic guilt andempty questions recitedas the jumbled memoirsof a lone stranger, lingerson a time-worn piereyes like glass marbleshe scans his fishing lineGod hears his prayers To continue reading, please go to Hotel Masticadores, and be sure to like, subscribe…
Publication of the Month and More . . .
I wanted to say a very special thanks to friends, readers of SpillWords Press NYC, and my family for taking precious time and effort to like the original post and then for voting for me. I feel extremely celebrated when my work is published by SpillWords. When my first Spillwords publication in March of 2020,…
JuneTeenth
old cow skin whip, laden with wire and glasssteals black flesh with every beastly lashdog-tired bones, left cotton in bollthis beating has freed a weary soul slaves sing their stories in the fieldnews, and prayers for those who healchildren stolen from a young momJosiah Henson, hero, valiant, no uncle tom emancipation, Lincoln sign, so why…