Poem: Vidhi Ashar, India
Art: Aishwarya Vedula, India
Maxianne Berger, Canada
Jerome Berglund, USA
Terri L. French, USA
Mariel Herbert, USA
Poem: Arvinder Kaur, India
Art: Aishwarya Vedula, India
Nika, Canada
Julie Schwerin, USA
Debbie Strange, Canada
Aishwarya Vedula, India
Poem: Eugeniusz Zacharski, Poland
Art: Jacek Pokrak, Poland
The Recurring Dream of San Francisco
There are usually stairs, and dark buildings, and fog blowing in. Sometimes an encounter with an old lover—oh, you again. Once I found two blankets that were mine, left on a ledge—a man saw me take them and called the cops. It’s an easy city to hide in, and the least occasion is cause for fanfare—say, a meal of Alaskan halibut served by acrobats. And it’s a city made for walking, which I do resolutely, clutching my big red purse—looking for a friend who left my keys on the table, a chain with my childhood name and a rainbow.
colander
the memory
of nevermore
Cynthia Anderson, USA
Overheard at the Welcome Parade
Stella says they don’t speak our language but get free housing, no questions asked. Stella says they lounge in the cafe where her friend works, playing games on phones paid for with our taxes. Stella’s youngest says mothers and babies left behind are killed in missile strikes. It’s true, she says, looking up at her mother, Sister Philomena saw it on breaking news. They can photoshop anything these days, Stella says. Then gives her youngest a clout on the ear.
moment of silence
the bandleader raises
her eyebrow
Roberta Beary, USA/ Ireland
Russet Potatoes & Serotonin
When he’s anxious, I cook him his favorite meal. Meatloaf and mashed potatoes or homemade venison stew. I don’t know whether he knows why I cook him his favorite meals when I do. I imagine he picks up on it, on some level. We have the habit of letting each other engage the time to process big feelings and revelations that come up in life from time to time. A good, honest conversation over a hearty, home-cooked meal made with love can change/save/restore/replenish the world.
sunshine pours
from a leak in the roof
base camp
Erin Castaldi, USA
Promise Keepers
He packs an overnight bag, tossing a worn, black NIV Bible on top of his underwear. “Can’t you stay home with the boys and me this weekend?” I ask. “No, I gotta go,” he says. “This is a big meeting. I’ll come back a better husband and father. A stronger Christian man.”
church supper
women cooking
on the Lord’s day
The boys and I go stay at his grandparents’ vacant house on the mountain. They’ve both been gone a couple years, but I still envision Ruby making fried pies at the gas stove. I tell the boys we are having a sleepover and turn it into an adventure. But, truthfully, I’m angry at my husband. Tired of playing second fiddle to God.
church organist
the way her feet
pound the pedals
When he returns the house will be empty. Oh, we will come back in time for me to make supper. He will say grace, holler at one of the kids for putting his elbows on the table, tell me, “Thank you, honey. It was good.” Then he’ll kiss the top of my head and go out to his shop to tinker ’til bedtime. I’ll scrape what’s left of supper into the dogs’ bowls and go to draw the boys a bath.
Terri L. French, USA
Autopilot
Dad, retired airline pilot, always in control, is driving the car. Unlike me, he’s been an excellent driver all his life. I’ve told him three times to turn off at the next exit. Too late, he drifts onto the exit without slowing. I grab the wheel and scream, slow down, Dad. Unmoved, I see an unacknowledging glaze in his eyes.
gently wetting
a bonsai’s tips—
the feeding bottle
Richard L. Matta, USA
A Different Drum
Every now and then, Neil asks me if I remember meeting so-and-so in Listowel and my answer is when? and, if he says at the all-Ireland Fleadh Cheoil, I laugh loudly as a melange of memories surfaces . . . having another G&T with ice and a slice as traditional tunes and songs tumble out from the pub sessions onto narrow balmy streets, and a stream of strangers to whom he is introducing his new girlfriend; but I do remember PJ, the bodhrán player in Neil’s trad group – a rangy Clareman who migrated over the border to this market town – who percussed the weekly sessions in the Harp and Lion, where he told me that he also made bodhráns, sparking my desire for one.
car park transaction . . .
the new drum’s oily skin
still smelling of goat
Maeve O’Sullivan, Ireland
Explanatory Notes:
Note 1: The All-Ireland Fleadh Cheoil is a large annual Irish music festival, held in August. Each year a single town or city hosts the Fleadh Cheoil.
Note 2: The bodhrán is a frame drum used in Irish music, made with a wooden frame covered with goat skin on one side and usually played with a tipper (stick).
She comes to me
in my dreams, my mother. Spry, and lively (even though she’s dead), a real Spitfire, reminiscent of the nickname given to her as a child of wartimes. She grins and cackles, happier than I ever saw her in life. Happy, that’s the only word for it, as if something is about to happen. She visits me twice that week, flitting about in my dreams, happily waiting . . .
cardiac unit
not ready to party
with her yet
Marianne Paul, Canada
Discharged
In the years after Vietnam, I remember him sitting out on the patio with his cigarettes and cheap beer. Always pouring one out into the dog bowl. I figure he just got tired of drinking alone.
pawn shop
a few purple hearts
gathering dust
Bryan Rickert, USA
Motivational Speech
First, you have to understand that you are nothing. I am something. I’ve been turning around failures for thirty years. Failures like this place. Failures like you. Weekends are for winners. You shouldn’t need training to know how things work around here. Figure it out. Why do you delegate so much? Your team needs to know you can execute. I shouldn’t have to explain myself. What I want is self-evident. When do you get to see your family? Why would they want to see the face of a loser like you? I haven’t seen my family in months. I’m not with my family right now because I am mentoring you. You think I am being hurtful? You should thank me for my coaching. Go read Viktor Frankl. It sounds like you need to figure out your why so you can handle my how. Do you still have a job? Well, for the moment that is up to you.
kindergarten
the children line up behind
the tallest boy
Joshua St. Claire, USA
A List for My Kids of Legitimate Reasons to Interrupt Me While I Am in the Bathroom
the pitter-patter of little feet just the cats
Joshua St. Claire, USA
Dear Daniel
So many girls, dear Bond. So many beds you’ve shared.
Like Anya Amasova with Ringo—whatever did she see in him?
youth club dance
Mam’s mascara
on my ‘stache
Melina Havelock only had eyes for you. And for many years
Eva Green still stalked Casinos as Vesper Lynd. Long after we’d all
undressed Ursula, or searched for a patch of pink on Shirley Eaton’s
golden body. Were you drawn to their names?
flutter of moths
under the porch light
a pouted kiss
Like Mary Goodnight and her good nights, and the chilled smile
of Miranda Frost. What of those lovely ladies Jenny Flex
and Honey Rider, or Elektra King and Kissy Suzuki, alliterative to the end?
They weren’t a touch on Octopussy and Zenia Onatop,
though Plenty O’Toole and Pussy Galore were in the running.
three refusals
at the first fence
pulled up
Yes, there was always that touch of class, never stirred . . .
except when living twice with Aki, or once with Solitaire,
or flying over moon-shadows with Holly Goodhead,
forever haunted by the diamonds of Tiffany Case.
proposing again . . .
the steady rasp
of her emery board
They say you had the hots for fish-mealed Helga Brandt,
for Ruby Bartlett with her chicken salmonella gift,
and even Paris Carver, who never died today, nor tomorrow.
But Tracy Draco was the closest to your heart. A countess,
at her Majesty’s service like Judi, a Dame no less.
ocean tide honeymoon ebbing away
Which brings me to you, dear Bond. You’ve changed.
We all get shorter with age, but you seem to bruise more easily.
And is it my imagination, or are there tears within your eyes?
But then again, who wouldn’t cry?
open marriage her diary locked shut
What man could fail to rage against a pen that holds him
back from she, the One, allowed only to reciprocate
her unrequited love with a wink or the casual throw of a hat?
Spare more than a penny for her heart, dear Bond . . .
7 years ditching her twinsets for leather
. . . before it’s too late.
still not home
the hourglass figure
of an hourglass
Lew Watts, USA
Pilgarlic
What finally broke him seemed so innocuous. After all, we’d being doing it since we met in Yosemite. Signing off our emails with an insult. I believe the earliest may have been “fucktard,” quite innocent in retrospect. I remember toying with a reply of “knobhead” for days before landing on the more delicious “toe-rag.” The next time Rob signed off with “pillock,” which triggered my vile and equally-testicular “cullion.”
We did stray into two words for a while—”sycophantic lickspittle,” “femiculous lubberwort,” and “hercine cockolorum” were paricularly memorable—before reverting to the single expletive: “loblolly,” “poltroon,” and the wonderful “slubberdegullion.” And so it was a surprise one day when he replied with the simple P-word, “pinhead.” Since then, silence.
climbing Mt Baldy . . .
the final pitch
a little hairy
Lew Watts, USA
Each new issue of Prune Juice features a best-of-issue senryu chosen by one of the co-editors.
proxy war chills at Netflix
Tazeen Fatma, India
When we first came up with the idea of introducing a “Best of Issue” award for individual senryu, Antoinette, Peter, and I spoke at length about the qualities we felt constituted a truly great senryu. Ultimately, we settled upon five key criteria: sound, freshness, style, resonance, and, when applicable, humour (of course, not all senryu have to be funny, but we very much enjoy when they are). It’s not necessary for a piece to be strong in all of these areas – and, in fact, some poems are so strong in one respect that the other criteria become an afterthought – but we noticed that the senryu we most admired featured some attention to detail with all of these. It was with this rubric that we assessed the submissions for Issue 39, and it was with this rubric that I picked our first winner.
I should note that the submissions we received for our maiden issue as an editorial team were excellent, which made selecting just one senryu for this award an agonizing task. Special consideration went into many poems, including Jerome Berglund’s topical and well-crafted “masculinity” and Giorgio Bacchi’s hilarious and slightly perverse “new government” – both of which could have easily been selected. However, it was the strength of “proxy war” in all of the aforementioned areas that won out in the end.
At first glance, the poem might appear to be something of a bewildering “word salad.” But after multiple readings, the real skill behind the words starts to shine through. The use of cacophony complements the gravity and immediacy of the “proxy war” subject matter (need I even mention the blue-and-yellow elephant in the room?) The clever inversion of the phrase “Netflix and chill” (usually meant to refer to casual sex), instead produces an effect of uncomfortability or distress. The monoku formatting allows the reader to cluster the words at their own liberty and still arrive at the primary meaning. The central juxtaposition creates ample opportunities for re-readings. (I thought of, for example, macro sociopolitical issues and Ciceronian notions of “bread and circuses” in one reading, and was then drawn to the limited domestic scope and the commentary on streaming culture in the next.) And while this senryu might be more unsettling than it is funny, the truly ironic among us might find something darkly comedic in its larger implications about our current societal struggles and their growing inescapability.
With all this in mind, it was clear to me that Fatma had written something exceptional, and, as a result, I’m thrilled to announce her as the winner of Prune Juice’s inaugural “Best of Issue” award!
Aaron Barry, Co-Editor
May, 2023
a breakthrough
during the climax—
plan b
the aesthetics
of roadside murals
class divide
Aksheeya, India
old pond
the only kind of orgy
I’ve ever seen
Vidhi Ashar, India
h(AI)ku
depression pills for craters on the moon
Marilyn Ashbaugh, USA
amarbel blooming—
dad asks me
for the umpteenth loan
the huge scrotum
of a golden hamster—
new government
Giorgio Bacchi, Italy
lift door opening
the nanosecond
of eye contact
graduation day
a mother’s hat
at a jaunty angle
Ingrid Baluchi, North Macedonia
river swallowing the ten-faced night
Rowan Beckett, USA
morning writing
at the coffee shop
the smell of synonyms
cold front
I end up using
an antonym
Brad Bennett, USA
in Ukraine
another volley of missiles
adjusting the contrast
David A. Berger, USA
masculinity
parts per
million
Jerome Berglund, USA
his old olds
the smell of gas
when it was cheap
art opening
what we see
what we miss
Elizabeth Black, USA
clear night
the death jingle
of a video game
car sputtering
the irrelevance
of the moon
Shawn Blair, USA
just a pig
living in the year
of the rabbit
Ed Bremson, USA
waiting for confession
I notice
The Virgin’s thigh
Marc Brimble, Spain
endangered species
the carousel rider
almost a teenager
Randy Brooks, USA
bugs! he goes pesticidal
Susan Burch, USA
he reads the reviews
but never the books
blind date
Alanna C. Burke, USA
ginger tea
she prefers
abortion this time too
Ram Chandran, India
sunrise between high-rises ancestral wisdom
spring equinox
half-thinking to water
my plants
Hemapriya Chellappan, India
driving wind
a shopping bag explores
my world
Thomas Chockley, USA
play date hiding in a see-through bin
Bill Cooper, USA
v-formation
the purple side
of my brain
Sue Courtney, New Zealand
blood moon
siblings divide
the hospital bill
forever you and AI
Alvin B. Cruz, Philippines
clear skies
I bring along
my own clouds
Dan Curtis, Canada
neighbour’s funeral
my wife cries more
than the widow
Tracy Davidson, UK
fire drill
his false teeth
first
back porch
grandma’s story reduced
to pronouns and verbs
Pat Davis, USA
insomnia—
my daughter and I compare
cannabis products
elehna de sousa, Canada
fretting
before and after
Rachmaninoff
Julie Emerson, Canada
taking the long extraterrestrial view
Robert Epstein, USA
this is the life hey mayfly
Keith Evetts, UK
infinite stars
indefinite
i
David Kāwika Eyre, USA
economy class
for 10 hours
pretzelized
Susan Farner, USA
whipped cream—
turning an anathema
into blessing
my struggles with routine word ladder
Tazeen Fatma, India
The Big Dipper brothers compare the effects of Flomax
Bruce H. Feingold, USA
algorithm
selling me dog food
. . . new emptiness
B.A. France, USA
Wordle
I start with
C-H-E-A-T
fairy tales
mother takes the edge
off the wolf
Terri French, USA
work trip
the loneliness of
the neighborhood bar
Ben Gaa, USA
bed of straw man fallacy
Michael J. Galko, USA
out of the closet
my transformation
to spring shirts
Patrick Gallagher, USA
string theory
slipping a loop
and hopping aboard
shopping list
lottery ticket
a tin of beans
Mark Gilbert, UK
stretching
the truth
relaxed fit
my drive to work
next exit
Mars
LeRoy Gorman, Canada
before baby’s first breath the doctor’s callused hands
John S Green, USA
community garden
this year
more sunflowers
Johnnie Johnson Hafernik, USA
discarded laundry
the life-changing magic
of giving up
Mihan Han, Canada
airing secrets
deciphering our code
in the wet patch
Patricia Hawkhead, UK
the rooster crows his complicated coffee order
Kerry J Heckman, USA
first dry day
the sidewalk chalked
for hopscotch
Frank Higgins, USA
morning shower
I concuss myself
on the safety bar
Ruth Holzer, USA
outback highway
a thousand miles
of fatality markers
Louise Hopewell, Australia
empty nesters
we give our robot vacuum
a name
Lee Hudspeth, USA
ice storm
neighborisms
brewing
Jonathan Humphrey, USA
annual coup overthrowing the sock drawer
Peter Jastermsky, USA
grief season
i put the shell
back where it was
Amoolya Kamalnath, India
falling in love . . .
the softened edges
of his consonants
Julie Bloss Kelsey, USA
mental health workshop
again I cancel
my day off
Ian Kenney, Canada
hospice invoice:
date of arrival
date of departure
Ellen Kom, Canada
his reply
shorter than my question
creeping haze
Nadejda Kostadinova, Bulgaria
March Madness
even grandma checks
the DraftKings line
Douglas J. Lanzo, USA
unresponsive
the companion animal’s
first big test
Michael Henry Lee, USA
high school yearbook
silence
on the dead girl’s page
(b)older
Barrie Levine, USA
hunger moon
last lights go off
in the food court
Angela Leuck, Canada
lunch with the family
just the sound
of forks
Antonietta Losito, Italy
another classmate
I can’t remember
in the obits
all the news fit to print
straight to the recycle bin
Bob Lucky, Portugal
All Hallows Eve—
one more Wednesday
in the nightclub line
Roman Lyakhovetsky, Israel
game night
our daughter
takes over the world
Hannah Mahoney, USA
to my plate
the long journey
steelhead
Annette Makino, USA
living a life
of anonymity
monk’s hood lichen
Sharon Martina, USA
news of war
in the crack of the wall
this anonymous flower
Françoise Maurice, France
when she says Kerouac unidentified butterflies
Tanya McDonald, USA
barbie’s dreamhouse youths knock at the door
Sarah E. Metzler, USA
anthropocene the home I no longer recognize
Akhila Mohan CG, India
mermaid poison
my grandson
writes noir
Wilda Morris, USA
senior wellness check
another inch lost
but to where
Laurie D. Morrissey, USA
campaign promises
a broken record
for funds raised
Spyros Mylonas, USA
Sunday morning
grandmother brushes
her one tooth
Nika, Canada
transpacific storms dry tongues the other side
Subir Ningthouja, India
a gale blowing;
the glossy brochure
full of headstones
Sean O’Connor, Ireland
the stale smokiness of a stranger
library book
Debbie Olson, USA
exp: ides / Mar
Roland Packer, Canada
ambulance siren the beggar bows his head
Pravat Kumar Padhy, India
sundown
a village where everyone
wears my face
Stephanie Palombo, USA
he said she said the shit on the bed
Christopher Patchel, USA
gradatim
building
a
house
within
me
jingkieng jri
I connect
disconnect
& re-connect
Deepa Patil, India
snowblowers the men with their biggest
Marianne Paul, Canada
crazy quilt
scraps of my past
take on new colours
Jacquie Pearce, Canada
coming apart
at the seams – – –
fast fashion
petro c.k., USA
how cold
the meat I have to cook
for dinner
Kamil Plich, Germany
waning moron . . .
half-asleep I misread
the poem’s first line
Thomas Powell, Ireland
a high five
left hanging
situationship
under the influence superior mirage
Ganesh R., India
editor friend
workshopping a poem
she later rejects
Bryan Rickert, USA
no will inside the doctor’s empty can’t
the tales you tell unlocked by face
rs, USA
post-election dinner
a heap of curry leaves
on the trash plate
Srinivasa Rao Sambangi, India
rush hour
that feeling the other line
moves faster
Olivier Schopfer, Switzerland
his habit snorting another line of credit
Julie Schwerin, USA
turning teen to bulimia nervosa
fatty (acid) body shamed the nth time
her worthiness under the scalpel
Teji Sethi, India
milk and pill—
at least some things
work together
Richa Sharma, India
too shy
to make friends
a potted peony
Neena Singh, India
tall poppies
the C-Suite announces
more layoffs
Joshua St. Claire, USA
private room
mother’s smile safe
in a glass of water
Stephenie Story, USA
pastel skies . . .
a lifeless
receiving blanket
Jan Stretch, Canada
silent spring
the drip drip drip
of her taxotere
my religion of glottal stops om
Raghav Prashant Sundar, India
cellblock lighting for beginning readers
a neo-Boolean afraid to change lanes
Patrick Sweeney, Japan
first date
a day lost exploring
my pockets
Herb Tate, UK
in a world
of reality TV
reality
Angela Terry, USA
ski lift conversation passing ravens
Elizabeth McMunn-Tetangco, USA
one-minute phone call
from the favorite son
cicada shell
Elisa Theriana, Indonesia
magenta sky
putting a smile on
bruises
C. X. Turner, United Kingdom
feng shui
I rearrange the people
in my life
Prashanth V, India
parallel universe
my garage band
still rehearsing
Jeffrey Walthall, USA
insisting
he’s not being bullied
the black-eyed boy
Michael Dylan Welch, USA
balletic his tongue ballistic
crayon recycling so many melted hearts
Genevieve Wynand, Canada
Prune Juice Journal of Senryu & Related Forms 
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