Community Voices

Robert Witmer
Tokyo, Japan

“If only we could placate the world’s rage with a drop of poetry or of love . . . .”
— Pablo Neruda

unemployed youth
a roll of the dice
against a brick wall

eyes shut tight
the stone sleeps
in a fist

light bleeding
through stained glass
the rubble still warm

bomb site
nothing but a staircase
beneath the pale stars

war graves
the silence
of forgetful flags

life after death
the hidden truth
maggots

dreams clot
the bloodstream of time
fighting for peace

summit meeting
the overwhelming presence
of nothingness

shouldering responsibility
he listens carefully
to his parrot

cover-up
blaming the system
for the fig leaf

absence of doubt
the poisoned chalice
we swallow with a yawn

online news paper over the past

hope
a spark
on the anvil

prayer flags
different colors
pointing in the same direction

By Robert Witmer
Tokyo, Japan

The Cuban Missile Crisis. I was in grade school and we had drills. The same loud alarm as a fire drill, but a different experience altogether. Instead of walking single file out to the playground, joking around with your friends, we had to sit against a wall in a dark corridor hugging our knees to our hearts. Dead silence was expected. But sometimes we whispered. Kid stuff.

spring rain
children holding umbrellas
upside down

(First published in Presence, Issue #81, March 2025.)