welcome to issue 51 of hedgerow. as always, grateful to contributors & readers alike. october’s resident artist is Alexis Rotella. find out more about the artist behind the art here — https://hedgerowpoems.wordpress.com/poet-artist-in-conversation/

 

with love & kindness.

 

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no moon tonight
in darkness I see
your true colours

Rachel Sutcliffe, from Yorkshire, UK, has suffered from a serious immune disorder for the past 14 years, throughout this time writing has been her therapy, it keeps her from going insane!

 

 

 

Changing seasons

 

 

 

I lock
myself up behind
open windows…
either I’m yours
or I belong to the wind

Sergio A. Ortiz is the founding editor of Undertow Tanka Review. He lives in San Juan Puerto Rico.

 

 

 

A new idea

 

 

 

first light —
the emptiness
I feel
without
you

.

there is always
only now —
the tiny shape
of a flower
fills my world

.

it will not last
this cage
of bones
so sing
while you can

Paul Smith is a poet from Worcester in the UK. Alongside poetry Paul enjoys Japanese style ink painting, building cigar box guitars and playing old time blues.

 

 

 

(Original Photo by Tom Clausen)

 

 

 

wild music
from the various weeds
I don’t pull

Joann Grisetti grew up in Sasebo Japan and eighteen other places. She now lives in Florida with her husband and two sons. Her poetry, photos and stories have appeared in a number of print and online journals.

 

 

 

Purple vase

 

 

 

yellow-billed cuckoo
weaving song
into summer sunlight

.

lonely dawn
a hoodie on a park bench
wet with dew

Anna Cates resides in Wilmington, Ohio with her two beautiful kitties and teaches in Southern New Hampshire University’s online M.F.A. creative writing program. A regular contributor to literary publications, her first full length collection of haiku and other poems, “The Meaning of Life,” is available at Cyberwit.net and Amazon.

 

 

 

Snowy owl / riding its echo / across the lake

 

the art in this issue was brought to you by Alexis Rotella —

I’ve been playing with words since I was a toddler. I remember sitting
on our front stoop in Southwestern Pennsylvania with a handwritten
letter from Uncle Bill to my mother. I thought if I stared at it long
enough I would be able to read…

 

https://hedgerowpoems.wordpress.com/poet-artist-in-conversation/