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 All material contained on this website is © by the author and may not be reproduced at all in any form without the express permission of the author. Internet publishing in no way indicates material to be "public domain" and all copyright laws are applicable.
Michael Lee Johnson’s 1st chapbook of poems and his first paperback of poems
both available for purchase or download at:
“The Lost American: A Tender Touch & A Shade Of Blue” (Chapbook with 57 pages)
http://www.lulu.com/content/936633
“The Lost American II: From Exile to Freedom (Full paperback with 98 pages)
http://www.lulu.com/content/972649
The Lost American: From Exile to Freedom is now available for purchase at iUniverse Publishers: http://www.iuniverse.com/bookstore/book_detail.asp?isbn=0-595-46091-7 The ISBN # is: 0-595-46091-7.
EBook also available at iUniverse at: http://www.iuniverse.com/bookstore/book_detail.asp?isbn=0-595-90391-6 The ISBN # IS: 0-595-90391-6
CONTACT AUTHOR DIRECT USE: poetryman@walla.com
P.O. BOX
Itasca, IL. 60143
Mr. Michael Lee Johnson lives in Chicago, IL. after spending 10 years in Edmonton, Alberta Canada
during the Viet Nam era. He is a freelance writer and poet. He is interested in social, religious topics, and the need for universal health care in the United States. He is presently self-employed, with a previous background in social service areas. He has a B.A. degree in sociology, worked on a Masters Program in Correctional Administration. Recent published poems: The Orange Room Review website: http://www.freewebs.com/theorangeroomreview/; Bolts Of Silk website: http://boltsofsilk.blogspot.com;
The Flask Review: http://www.freewebs.com/theflaskreview/; Apollo’s Lyre, in their webzine: http://www.apollos-lyre.com/; Chantarelle’s Notebook website: http://www.chantarellesnotebook.com;
Fresh! On Line Literary Magazine website: http://members.aol.com/shirgerald/shortst.htm
Mr. Johnson has several poems pending publication March. through July, 2007. I have had a huge box of "unfinished" poems in a large box for 40 years, dating back to 1965-67. They are getting published faster than I can revive or revise them. Yellowed paper, napkins and all. I have not submitted poems since the early 70's, remember, the "old fashioned" way, via mail.
"Speaking of Death", near the bottom here, is a poem dedicated to my loving mother, Edith Freet, who passed to be with Jesus Christ, 01-16-2007.
If you have comments you want to make, or want to see more poetry by Mr Johnson email him at: poetryman@walla.com. Or drop a note to: Advantage Marketing, PO Box, 486, Itasca, IL. 60143-hope to hear from you!
The emerging collected works, a project evolving over time, of Mr. Johnson can be viewed at: www.PoetryPoem.com/poetryman5.
MY WRITING CREDENTIALS CAN BE VIEWED IN DETAIL AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE, NOTE SEVERAL POEMS ON THIS PAGE ARE PUBLISHED OR PENDING PUBLICATION, & CREDIT GIVEN ACCORDINGLY. NOTE THEY ARE COPYRIGHTED.
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MY ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Poem of Sinners & Saints
Sinners hurt.
Moonlight
cracks open
like a walnut,
spreads
soft light
across open
sky.
Sinners hurt.
They dart to alleyways,
bury themselves behind their own trails
shaking fists at the sky;
hiding their nasty nonsense in shame,
city buildings rattle their bricks,
mortar loose at the rib cage.
Where do the sinners break out from
when their deeds are exposed?
All the men think they are sword men
daggers in the darkness.
All the women think they are entry points
spotted lean on the sidewalks past midnight,
nothing but shadows, the twitching of lips..
Women look for no good in their makeup;
no one cares about how men are tempted,
jackals & scavengers in the night.
Thunder hammers their ears,
rain urinates the streets,
mice crawl away to small places.
Footsteps cry in mud molds
as sunlight starts to sprout.
Misdeeds trip into each other blind
as they race off to their morning jobs.
Sprinkles everywhere.
It’s early morning,
crows fly.
Sinners hurt,
staples in women’s lungs
staples in men’s ribs .
Michael Lee Johnson
02-15-07 ©
A Poem Of The Night
a poem
is a thought
of flowers
near frost,
dangling stiff
bitten by
the vampire of
late fall,
hanging desolate
near dusk
from a pot
on a patio porch-
with a yellow bulb
light beaming
conspicuously outward
over chilled
yellow green
glazed grass.
While my cat Nikki
hunches over a coffee,
table, toasty & warm,
nose pressed
super glue
to the window
on guard for
passing birds,
cars-
utility vans
with large bubble eyes.
Michael Lee Johnson
01-27-07 ©
CHILDREN IN THE SKY
There is a full moon,
distant in the sky, tonight,
Grey planets are planted
on an aging white face.
Children, living & dead,
love the moon with small hearts.
Those in heaven already take gold thread,
drop the moon down for us all to see;
Those alive with us, look out their
bedroom windows, tonight, & smile-
Then prayers, then sleep.
Michael Lee Johnson
08-30-1985 ©
WING TIPPED & RESISTING
It made sense to watch him grow;
the foolish things he did to girls,
the endless hours he filled their
bedrooms with delight-I swear
he was an Indiana boy.
He was a whisper of dreams & words.
The pines of Alberta fanned his brain, the
intensity increased the blaze of conviction.
The voices of many personalities
formed in his larynx over the early Indiana years.
Names, ideas, beliefs, & images gathered in a garden
of imagination & sand merged, bred & spread Northward
outward like eagle wings.
It was a cancer without a cure or antibiotic.
The wind had stopped prayer when he was born
& he had felt his own creation with his own breath.
More than new desires or old desires, or old war memories of the past,
this boy was a proclamation of potential rejected by his peers.
But then a war, the Vietnam curse,
a conflict that ripped the internals of a nation/guts wide opened
by opinion & past dreams then men died.
Blue north wind now blows icicles through his hair,
& he works against the wings of the red/white-& blue-eagle-
while blood torn stars blend in his blue eyes
the border of two dissonant countries divide
& another night passes to sleep in exile.
Michael Lee Johnson
02-25-1981 ©
Face On A Bus
face on a bus,
passing by,
nameless,
stares out the framed window,
frozen like skeleton bone-
boredom nibbling away at his time.
Michael Lee Johnson
02-28-1972 ©
(Revised 01-20-07) - Jesus Knelt In Grief
Over The Death Of Children
Breaking out of silence,
Jesus knelt to his knees
in moist desert sand
& wrote messages
with his fingertips
to children-
“water is water, toys are toys,
but by my fingers burn with life,
though I toil over tombs with grief & tears-
I am the living & I am the dead-
I was born to life to bring
new hope into the death of children.
I am the messenger of the morning sun
the prayer book between the morning dew,
& the play fields of your daily adventures.
When I kneel here again, the end will be the end
to all-fire willed into my words-
driftwood & sand turn to stone-
drag my fingers across hot sand once more-
& morning coming without a daybreak.
Birds no longer sing, & crickets lose their songs.”
Michael Lee Johnson
09-12-99 ©
Revised 07-24-21
Flight Of The Eagle
From the dawn, dusty skies
comes the time when
the eagle flies-
without thought,
without aid of wind,
like a kite detached without string,
the eagle in flight leaves no traces,
no trails, no roadways-
never a feather drops
out of the sky.
Michael Lee Johnson
01-26-1881 © - IN DECEMBER
In December Miami sun
stands out on the east coast
of Florida like a full-blossomed orange-
wind torn sunshine eats away
at those Florida skies.-
Spanish accents echo through
Caribbean Boulevard loud
like an old town crier,
misplaced in a metro suburb.
Off the east 90 miles,
westward winds carry inward
the foreign sounds lifting
off Castro’s larynx-
and the faint smell of an
old musty Cuban cigar
touches the sand
& and shoreline.
Michael Lee Johnson
07-07-80 © - Catch On The Fly
Full barrel
up the black asphalt
highway,
53 north
heading to Lake Zurich, IL
Christian talk radio 1660
on the radio dial,
crisp winter day
sunbeams dancing down
on the pavement like midgets.
85 mph in a 65 mph zone,
just to aggravate the police,
black Chevy S10 pick up,
shows what a deviant I am
in dark colors.
Running late for a client appointment.
creating poems on a small hand held recorder
knowing there is not payment for this madness
in this little captured taped area of words.
Headlights down the highway for a legacy
into the future, day dreaming like a fool obsessed.
Working out the layout of this poem or getting my ego in place,
I will catch up with the imagery when I get back home.
This is my life, a poem in the middle of the highway.
Scampering, no one catches me when I’m speeding
like this.
Michael Lee Johnson
03-20-07 ©
Skinny Indiana Boy
With a heart once as big as Texas
or Alberta where he came from,
the draft resister tries to erase
the memory of his sordid past;
coming out of the Rockies,
down over the slate, out of self-imposed exile,
he leaves the northland shaking his bandaged
fists at prairie sky.
He was robbed of his own conviction
by a war that ended, others forgot,
there was nothing left to die for, to wait for,
no more signs to carry in the dark-
only the chill of the northern winter left
to remind him of what he once felt,
once talked about.
The night looked long in his deep green eyes
robbing his faint life away.
The scream of loneliness has turned
his innards inside out to pity.
Non-religious accept for those
weakened moments, empty nights,
vacant lots, he leaves behind lightless
10 years of those silent wars
without refuge.
He no longer speaks with bullets bleeding
from his mouth, he no longer searches
the quiet whispers that echo in the pines.
Now he is at home near the land of Indiana lakes
where in his childhood he created the vision for
his now dead dream, content to say nothing radical anymore-
just glad to be alive.
Michael Lee Johnson
07-21-1980 ©
Neck Traction
Hanging from a rope
cradled in a cloth basket
harness,
I feel like a western
horse rustler,
getting last rites,
while being forced
to stare into my
mirror hanging
from my door as punishment;
just before they kick the door open
& smack the horse on the behind.
My chin is shoved into my cranium.
My eyes are wrinkled up & nearly sealed
like a raisin closing shop in the sun.
A punishment fit for the decrepit,
elderly, lamenting, crippled,-
vertebras with out cushion,
bone spurs pinching nerves for fun.
Punishment for past activities, sins
& lies to the scared one?
I’m trying to read collected poems
by Stanley Kunitz; hold “The
Purpose Driven Life” up high enough
to see my own self esteem.
Squinting between the lines I
sort the pluses of Christianity,
damn the curses of Islam.
30 minutes of torture,
sweat drawn in by a 90 degree room-
savior & redeemer, the electrical fan.
Traction is tearing the chin
out of my TMJ.
Michael Lee Johnson
08-06-2005 ©
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MY NEWS:
In This Place,
Poverty Falls
In this place
night falls
with Linda.
Wrinkled life, wrinkled wishes
race across her face.
Torment bristles with each morning.
Nailed to a cross within her house,
Linda lives.
Everything is a cycle,
a charity or gift.
Poverty is an odor,
it is a smell her
nose is lose with.
In the yard, poverty grass,
Near the old car, poverty grass.
Poverty tastes like metal on her tongue.
On this journey with no applause,
no gas, Nicor shut that off.
No money, laziness shut that off.
House full of bills & debris.
With no relief dollars shrink
in her hand harmlessly.
Rest & wait in welfare lines,
manipulate the coins.
Electric heaters keep the old house warm
and the multiple pets alive.
The microwave heats the plastic salad bowl
filled with water for sponge baths.
The left over water mixes with
hydrogen peroxide brushes her teeth.
Her body pale & spirits bail
out with pills.
Groceries are checks
nourished by food stamps.
Walls come closer in at night.
The wind outside roars
with stolen property inside.
Dreary days, step
into depression;
a slice of her mourning
pronounces her dead.
Being held accountable
in God’s attic she smiles.
Induced my the blue sky,
the night falls.
Michael Lee Johnson
02-01-2007 ©
Cold Gray
Below the clouds
forming in my eyes,
your soft eyes ,
delicate as silk words,
used to support
the love
I held for you.
Cold, now gray, the sea tide
inside turns to poignant foam
upside down & separates-
and only ghosts now live between us.
Yet, dream like, fortune-teller,
bearing no relation to reality-
my heart is beyond the sea now.
A relaxing breeze sweeps
across the flat surface of me.
I write this poem to you
neglectfully sacrificing our love.
I leave big impressions
with a terrible hush inside.
Gray bones now bleach with memories,
I am a solitary figure standing
here, alone, along the shoreline.
Michael Lee Johnson
05-19-1981 ©
(Revised 01-27-07)
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MY FAVORITE LINKS:
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MY RESIDENCE INFO:
City: Itasca
State/Country: Illinois
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BOOKS PUBLISHED:
 Someday I would like to write the book in my head & heart entitled: "The Lost American"
Indian Faces
Leaves painted Indian
Faces, war dancers
Swirl above
The Goddess of fire.
Michael Lee Johnson
08-22-1979 ©
Michelangelo:
Painter & Poet
Michelangelo
with steel balls
& a wire brush
wishing he was
wearing motorcycle leathers,
going wild & crazy,
stares cross eyed at the
Sistine Chapel ceiling-
nose touching moist paint
body stretch out on a plank
bones held by ropes from falling-
painting the face of Jesus
& the Prophets
with a camel hair brush-
in such a position
a genie emerges as a poet-
words not paint
start writing his sonnets,
a second career is born-
nails & thorns
digging at his words:
it is finished.
Michael Lee Johnson
01-22-07 ©
VICKI
It was here in
the breeze...
I thought of you.
Why was it you
threw sunshine
in my eyes?
Why was it you kissed
the sky a tender shade
of blue?
Touch me to the winds...
and I shall carry you
to a long lost love
somewhere beneath the
willow tree
you loved
so much.
Beyond the hidden shadows of my mind,
or beyond the shades that trace across the sky
covering the warming touches of the sun...
all skies are blue,
and all tender whisperings
of the breeze...
are but thoughtful
memories of you.
Michael Lee Johnson
05-11-1968 ©
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 Indiana Poem
Breaking loose from the state line
of Illinois, bursting down the Indiana
toll road , near Lake Station
heading south,
smelling smoke of old
gray steel mills
seeping out
of Gary,
left behind me,
steel men, strong men,
ribs of fire, courage of
union dreamers,
long gone & most laid off,
pension plans stolen,
now gas station employees,
travelers of the
past, snuff chewers,
& labor wages,
small lakes & fishing ponds
with half sunken boats
with tips pointed sky high,
& memories dripping
off the lips of clouds.
I’m banging out 75 mph,
in my raspberry
Geo Tracker;
but as Jesus said: “I tell you
the truth“:
nothing ever changes in
Indiana but the seasons
& the size of the corn ears.
Michael Lee Johnson
02-03-07 ©
Poem: 020307
April, I’ve Been Fooled Before
I blink, the electricity is off.
The day has brought
night to an end on top of me.
Lamp oil and flashlights save me
from myself.
I walk in darkness.
In this darkness I don’t
see my shadow.
When the wind goes still
cold chills down my spine
don’t feel anymore.
I walk in darkness like this
but I’ve been fooled myself before
at Halloween, fears of April thunderstorms.
April thunderstorms have knocked the lighting out of me.
Pulled the electricity out of my sockets, pulled plugs from my condo.
Lying in bed with only this conversation to keep me company.
I feel like an ice tope insulated around in my words,
Looking for images in shadows, quiet corners.
I creep myself alone.
Here I lie on my back in bed, think, try sleep-
with ghosts, witches, spiders, devils,
and all kinds of nasty things.
Nothing brings Christ out of closed wilderness
faster than darkness being alone.
I blink, and electricity is back on.
April, I’ve been fooled like this before.
Michael Lee Johnson
03-29-07 ©
My Own Puppet
Beaten down by
my own puppet
drawn up by my own strings
I don’t know what to do
with myself but hang loose.
I am a swinger of words, & loose conditions.
My fingers hang limp like impotence genitals.
My puppet bows her head with nothing to show for.
A curtsey before her king who has somehow
misplaced his private crown of jewels & golden rings.
Such a humble act, a dancer of sacrifice
lacking joy, but long term the commitment lingers.
Gallant of her victory in void
she smiles with disgust.
Nothing drips from her face but tears.
I am a swinger of words, & loose conditions.
Michael Lee Johnson
03-28-07 ©
Willow Tree & The Rain Falls
Willow tree where the rain falls,
2 loved pets beneath the roots,
gray sand like dandruff
packs them in close and tight.
Thunder at 3:37 am Thursday night
wonder of my dream mind loves
thunder rain.
It is just a part of me, loose with wind.
I know in the a.m. blending in the
moisture birds will chirp sounds
blasting echoes against the surface
of the sun.
Before the dawn light, small minds like my own
become active gearing thoughts toward work.
Economizing each part of me, loose like the wind.
This is the willow tree where the rain falls.
I am self-employed in my primitive occupation
selling pens, pad of paper, calendars, tee shirts
with your name customized on them.
It is just a part of me loose with the wind.
Life as an author is a daily man grind
to coffee grounds & leftovers.
With the thunder, & lack of sleep,
well deserved.
Michael Lee Johnson
03-27-07 ©
Loss
In a field of fresh
cut clover
summer sun,
noon high,
beats down
on open farm spaces,
3 dependent children,
and somewhere
she has lost
her shadow-
and now
she stand still
with nowhere
to go.
Michael Lee Johnson
03-28-07 ©
April, I’ve Been Fooled Before
I blink, the electricity is off.
The day has brought
night to an end on top of me.
Lamp oil and flashlights save me
from myself.
I walk in darkness.
In this darkness I don’t
see my shadow.
When the wind goes still
cold chills down my spine
don’t feel anymore.
I walk in darkness like this
but I’ve been fooled myself before
at Halloween, fears of April thunderstorms.
April thunderstorms have knocked the lighting out of me.
Pulled the electricity out of my sockets, pulled plugs from my condo.
Lying in bed with only this conversation to keep me company.
I feel like an ice tope insulated around in my words,
Looking for images in shadows, quiet corners.
I creep myself alone.
Here I lie on my back in bed, think, try sleep-
with ghosts, witches, spiders, devils,
and all kinds of nasty things.
Nothing brings Christ out of closed wilderness
faster than darkness being alone.
I blink, and electricity is back on.
April, I’ve been fooled like this before.
Michael Lee Johnson
03-29-07 ©
Today
Today there is peace within me.
I trust God that I am exactly
Where I am meant to be.
I have given this control
Of my life over to God,
& taken it away from myself.
This is the gift of faith.
His presence
Settles in my bones.
Michael Lee Johnson
03-24-07 ©
Willow Tree Poem
Wind dancers
dancing to the
willow wind,
leaves swaying
right to left
all day long.
Birds hanging on-
bleaching feathers
out into
the sun.
Michael Lee Johnson
08-02-2006 ©
Speaking Of Death
Speaking of death-
mother, Edith, at 98
in a nursing home
blinded with
macular degeneration,
crippled in pain,
drowning in pills,
I come to you,
blurred eyes, crystal mind,
countenance of grace,
as yesterday’s winds
I have consumed you
& taken you away.
Death hides, but doesn’t divide.
“Where did God disappear to”-
she murmured
over & over again
like running water
or low voices
in prayer:
“Oh, there He is.
Angel of the coming.”
Death hides, but doesn’t divide.
Michael Lee Johnson
01-11-2007 ©
(In loving memory of my mother, Edith Freet who passed to be with Jesus, 01-16-07)
Leaves In December
Leaves, a few stragglers in
December, just before Christmas,
some nailed down crabby to ground frost
some crackled by the bite of nasty wind tones.
Some saved from the matchstick that failed to light.
Some saved from the rake my a forgetful gardener.
For these few freedom dancers
left to struggle with the bitterness:
wind dancers
wind dancers
move your frigid
bodies shaking like icicles
hovering but a jiffy in sky,
kind of sympathetic to the seasons,
reluctant to go, rustic,
not much time more to play.
Michael Lee Johnson
02-12-07 ©
If You Find No Poem
If you find
no poem on
your doorstep
in the morning,
no paper, no knock on your door,
& your life is poorly edited
but no broken dashes
or injured meter
& you don’t wear white
dresses late in life
embroidered with violet
flowers on the collar;
nor do you have
burials daily
across main street,
& no one whispers
in your ear, Emily Dickinson-
you feel alone-
but not reclusive-
the sand lady
still sleeping in your eyes-
wiping your tears away-
if you find
no poem on
your doorstep-
you know your not
from New England.
Michael Lee Johnson
02-22-07 ©
Rainbow in April
April again,
the wind
falls in love with itself
skipping across asphalt
and concrete bare
with the breaking weather.
A rainbow
Is half arched,
broken off deep
into the aorta
of the sky.
It hangs
from elastic
rubber bands
of mixed colors
tipped in God’s
inkwell,
airbrushed
by the fingertips
of Michelangelo.
April again,
the wind steps high.
Michael Lee Johnson
02-12-07 ©
Illinois Trains
Trains, love them, hate them
the way they play sound; songs they sing.
Transformers switch, vibrate the power
into poetry, shake notes out of the sky.
Short stretch, street to street, long stretches,
Chicago, Elgin, Rockford, though prairie towns of Illinois-
running the same rails over, attached to many places.
Shrill sound of horns dig deep in bowel of urban earth
like backhoes; developers changing passing landscapes
with faint, greed filled faces.
As the trains pass to history, train sounds
fall silent, a minor key.
Michael Lee Johnson
03-02-07 ©
Published Articles and Poems
“Amnesty: A War Resister Speaks Out” Jan. 22, 1975, a special feature article in the Edmonton Journal newspaper, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
“Phoney War.” March 6, 1975, an editorial feature in the Edmonton Journal newspaper, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
“Revamping Our Correctional System.” August 1975 addition of Canadian Legion Magazine, Ottawa, Ontario.
“Revamping Our Correctional System:” Sept 6, 1975, reprinted by Athabasca Call weekly newspaper, Athabasca, Alberta, Canada.
“Revamping Our Correctional System.” Feb. 1, 1976, reprinted by the John Howard Society Newsletter, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
“Pine Tree Poem” published in Aim Magazine, Chicago, Illinois, May/June 1975 addition.
“In December”, poem published on -line, Chantarelle’s Notebook website: http://www.chantarellesnotebook.com. Issue #7 of journal published February 4th, 2007.
“Skinny Indiana Boy, poem published 12-12-2006, “Debbie Knows The Wind”, poem published 01-01-07 Purple Dream: http://www.purpledream.com/.
“Children In The Sky”, poem published on-line, The Orange Room Review website: http://www.freewebs.com/theorangeroomreview/. February 2007 issue; “Skinny Indiana Boy” poem
Published on-line, April 2007 issue.
“Bread Crumbs”, poem published on-line January 14, 2007, “Wing Tipped and Resisting”, “From Toronto to Ottawa”, “If I Were Young Again”, select poems published on-line, Bolts Of Silk website: http://boltsofsilk.blogspot.com. A UK blog magazine of poetry. Poems published February -July, 2007.
“If I Were Young Again”, poem scheduled to be published May/June 2007, Muscadine Lines: A Southern Journal, in their webzine: http://www.asouthernjournal.com/index.htm.
“Blackie”, “Jesus Knelt in Grief Over the Death of Children”, and “Bread Crumbs for Starving Birds” poems published Feb. 2007: Apollo’s Lyre, in their webzine: http://www.apollos-lyre.com/.
“Willow Tree Poem, poem scheduled to be published June, 2007 Issue, Languageandculture.net :
http://www.languageandculture.net/.
“While The Seashells Listen …I Think I Love You”, poem published January 20, 2007, Welcome To Love Poetry, Love Poetry.Com: http://www.lovepoetry.com/.
“Speaking Of Death”, poem scheduled to be published in April, 2007, 7th issue, Thick With Conviction, http://www.angelfire.com/poetry/thickwithconviction/. A poem
dedicated to the passing of my mother Edith Freet.
“Face On Bus”, “Michelangelo: Poet and Painter”, poems published Feb. 1st, 2007, Issue 2, The Flask Review: http://www.freewebs.com/theflaskreview/.
“If I Were Young Again”, poem scheduled to be published Spring (Mar-May) 2007, Miller’s Pond: http://millerspondpoetry.com/.
“Flight Of The Eagle”, poem published Feburary 1st, 2007, Fresh! On Line Literary Magazine:
http://members.aol.com/shirgerald/shortst.htm.
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