Daily Verse
Week 1, March 2025
Metamorphosis
By Concetta Pipia 3rd March 2025
In the mirror’s gaze, a face half-known,
Shifts like shadows cast by candle’s flame.
Eyes, once anchors, drift in seas alone,
Lips whisper secrets, mouthing my name.
Flesh dissolves to vapor, bone to mist,
A chrysalis of thought, I am unmade.
Time’s cruel needle weaves its endless twist,
Stitching seams where old and new cascade.
From ashes of the past, I rise, reborn,
A phoenix forged in fires of forlorn.
Perpetual Autumn
By Parminder Singh 5th March 2025
The maples should have shed their amber crown,
December winds should strip the branches bare,
Yet still these leaves refuse to settle down—
Like memories that linger in the air.
The calendar insists the season's passed,
But something in me keeps October here:
Each morning wears the colors of the last,
The twilight holds its golden atmosphere.
My neighbors' gardens turn to winter's rest,
While in my yard, the autumn light remains,
Like some perpetual and welcome guest
That builds its home in November's domains.
The world may rush toward spring's relentless birth,
While autumn's embers smolder in my earth.
Haiku on Thresholds & Transformations
By Robert Witmer 4th March 2025
perfectly useless
a leaf falls
on a sunny day
stars on a string
a child in heaven
flying kites
rain shower
a ballerina
on roller skates
Haiku
By Hifsa Ashraf 6th March 2025
clouds at dusk
the deep furrows
of a plowed field
mid-winter fog—
the headless sparrows
on a balcony wall
homecoming…
dripping from the icicles
moonlight
Hope
By Balesh Jindal 7th February 2025
When the deadly, damned dust
Settles in nasty, naked corners.
When the trough of tears
Dry up on their way to a cry.
I open my chafing mouth to smile at
Solitary strangers, more lonely than I.
When I felt a choke and a gag,
When the seething world seemed to
Sink swiftly beneath sodden feet,
It is when the purple clouds come
Agonizing and angered,
Decadent in derision.
This is when I looked out at the sea,
With not any hope.
Sobbing, searching, scanning the horizon.
I will not sink,
I shall not sink
Holding on to little wimpy, wispy
Creepers of hope,
Standing tall I waited,
Hoping for A New Beginning
Biographies of Poets
Concetta Pipia was born and raised in New York City and is a published poet and writer of verse and prose. Her poetry appears in National and International anthologies and literary magazines. Ms. Pipia is a member of the Editorial Board of "Different Truths" as well as a member of Writers Capital International.
Robert Witmer has resided in Japan for the past 45 years. Now an emeritus professor, he has had the opportunity to teach courses in poetry and creative writing not only at his home university in Tokyo but also in India. His poems and prose poetry have appeared in many print and online journals and books. His first book of poetry, a collection of haiku titled Finding a Way, was published in 2016. A second book of poetry, titled Serendipity, was published in 2023. An author’s page for Robert Witmer can be found at both the Poets & Writers and AuthorsDen websites.
Parminder Singh is an IT Professional-turned-educator, and has overall experience of over two decades in the fields of software development, project management, digitization and teaching. He currently works as Assistant Professor of English at Dev Samaj College for Women, Chandigarh. He specializes in Cultural Studies and Digital Humanities. He is a multilingual poet, translator, short-story writer, and has national and international publications. He has been a key contributor in setting up Panjab Digital Library. He has received Jathedar G. S. Tohra Award for his Punjabi translation of P. S. Sachdeva’s Appreciating Sikhism and has co-translated Sudeep Sen’s poetry into Punjabi titled Gau-Dhoorh Vela.
Hifsa Ashraf is an award-winning multilingual poet, author, editor, and social activist from Rawalpindi, Pakistan. She is a pioneer in her country for writing modern Japanese style micropoetry in English. Her work has been widely published in international journals, newspapers, magazines, blogs and anthologies. She is the author of six individual and three collaborative micropoetry books. Please follow her on social media at @hifsays.
Balesh Jindal is a graduate of Lady Hardinge Medical College and has a medical practice for forty years. She wanted to study in London to become a paediatrician, yet found herself practicing in a remote village. She loves writing & reading poetry in her spare time
Week 2, March 2025
Whispers of the Sky
By Harsimranjeet Kaur 10th March 2025
The wind hums secrets only I can hear,
A call to the heavens, crisp and clear.
With wings of will and a heart of fire,
I rise to meet the sky’s desire.
Each take-off births a brand-new tale,
Through shifting winds and fleeting trails.
No landing mirrors the one before,
Each a lesson, a gift, and more.
From Leh’s proud peaks wrapped in frost,
To Andaman waves where time feels lost.
From western sands to Vijayanagar’s green,
I traverse realms few have seen.
Mountains bow as I carve the air,
Oceans ripple beneath my stare.
Every view, a canvas vast,
Moments fleeting, yet built to last.
This is no journey of flight alone,
But a symphony of duty, my soul’s tone.
As a woman of strength in skies unbound,
I claim my place where courage is found.
The blue is endless, my spirit too,
Bound by purpose, loyal, true.
For in this dance with the clouds above,
I find my mission, my purpose, my love.
Haiku on Frosted memories
by Neena Singh 9th January 2025
frosted windows
every morning star
a reminder of you
a snowdrift morning
we turn inward
finding ourselves
in a world
of glimmering silver
gone but not forgotten
ice spirals folded
into sunrise
Nullity
By Sunil Kaushal 12th March 2025
Nothingness nibbles on what's left of me
night closing in faster
than the years
I've waded through somehow
swinging the baton
for orchestras
in other people's dramas.
The honey of my eyes
no longer languishes,
not that it's dried,
reciprocity smells of hemlock
the taste of that goblet lingers on my lips turning blue.
Hurrying down dust laden roads
I gather the hem of my newly laundered dress
rid of all stains rusty or dusty
fearful that the void of nullity
catching up fast
will quaff me in a mouthful.
If the road bends
I will have reached home.
Cherita
By Susan Burch 13th February 2025
bags of mulch
stacked around
the house
this grief
still too heavy
to unload
like James Earl Jones
a deep booming voice
in my head says
the sparrows have chosen!
it is your tree they will nest in
through the winter
a tick burrowing
under my skin
a tiny insult
that turns out
was a bullseye
all along
Icicles of Yore
By Santosh Bakaya 14th February 2025
I glimpse a silver-hued expanse and watch entranced.
Snowflakes dance and prance, exhilarated.Within my heart, a silence resounds, but is soon replaced
by faint stirrings of nostalgia.
My soul is ablaze
in the warmth of those memories buried under frost.No longer do I feel lost as the frost melts,
pelting me with silver pebbles of juvenilia.
“We need to shovel the snow.”
I hear Papa’s baritone and see Mom
standing on the patio with two mugs of kehwa.“First have the kehwa, then shovel it!”
The snowman peers wearing Papa’s glasses.
My kid brother hurls a ball of snow at me.
“Hey, Mister, how dare you throw things at your elder sister? “
I yell a full-throated yell. He goes pell-mell
guffawing a guffaw, laced with frost.
Ice clinks in my glass.
Memory chunks tarry a bit- then pass.
Icicles of various sizes full of pleasant surprises.
Is that my kid bro in boxing gloves turning blue in rage?
The cranky fellow oft displayed his versatility in crazy pranks.
I chuckle at a secret thought.
What if a resurrected Picasso adds my bro’s blue nose
to his repertoire of the Blue Period,
with an added embellishment -a red rose
stuck to the lapel of his hand –me- down black coat,
about which he was always complaining?
While travelling in the train once,
the poor fellow had been mistaken for a ticket collector,
clad in a coat two sizes bigger for his lanky figure!
Thankfully that memory chunk lies buried under frost.
But my soul is ablaze in the warmth of those frosted memories.
Biographies of Poets
Sqn Ldr Harsimranjeet Kaur is a proud military aviator with over nine years of dedicated service to the nation. She lives by the motto “Service Before Self.” With a degree in engineering, she combines technical expertise with a passion for transformative change. Beyond the cockpit, she is an avid writer and traveler, finding inspiration in the skies she traverses and the stories she uncovers.
Dr Sunil Kaushal, is a gynaecologist, poet, essayist, translator and editor. *Her twice awarded memoir, "Gypsy Wanderings and Random Reflections" won the prestigious Nissim International Award for Non-Fiction, along with Golden Book Award. She was awarded the Women Achiever’s Award 2019, besides several others. She has been translated into French, Greek, German, Punjabi, and Chinese. Always in love with life keeps her vibrant at eighty, reflecting in her life and writings.
Tamali Neogi is an upcoming poet who loves to read and write poetry in all he spare time
Santosh Bakaya is an award winning poet, novelist, biographer, TEDx Speaker, acclaimed for poetic biography, Ballad of Bapu, Dr. Santosh Bakaya’ has authored twenty- three books encompassing multiple genres. Reuel International Awardee [Poetry, 2014], Setu International Awardee for ‘stellar contribution to world literature’, 2018 [Pittsburgh, USA], WE EUNICE DE SOUZA [WE Literary Community, 2023], for ‘rich and diverse contribution to Poetry, literature and Learning’, she runs a column, Morning Meanderings [Learning and Creativity. Com]. Her recently published works are What is the Meter of the Dictionary? The Catnaman [With Dr. Sunil Sharma] & For Better or Verse [With Ramendra Kumar and Dr. Ampat Koshy].
Susan Burch began writing tanka poetry in April 2013. Then haiku, senryu, haibun, gembun, tanka prose, sedoka, sedoka prose, and cherita. When she writes, she lets the poem be what wants it to be. All the poems in this book wanted to be cherita, and were kept together on purpose, as a collection. None of them were previously published. Susan was the Vice President of The Tanka Society of America from 2017- 2024. She was also the Editor of Haiku in Action from 2023-2024. Susan resides in Hagerstown, Maryland, USA, with her amazing husband, Sexy Beast, and daughter, British Baby. She enjoys reading, doing puzzles, birding, and watching Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders: Making the Team.
Week 3, February 2025
The Last Time
By Shivshankar Menon 17th February 2025
The last time Grandmother addressed
Me was from her favourite
Morning seat by the window, her book
Of devotions open at one
Sunlit page unread. She spoke slowly,
Holding my hand, of the old
Family home, of ancient scandals and
Feuds, squabbles and partitions
While I listened, watching her faraway eyes
And marvelling at the rich flow
Of family lore. Only a year later did that tide
Of nonagenarian reminiscence
Take on new meaning when, coming home
I ran down to her room and
Found her sitting in the same old chair with
The same old book open on her lap.
Now too the pages remained unturned but
Her hands rested on them inert ;
When I approached she looked up slowly
And stared at me blankly
Clearly with no notion of who I was, before
Turning wordlessly away
Haiku
by Steliana A Voicu 18th February 2025
amethyst sky -
we dance in the same rhythm
as snowflakes
hide and seek…
the moon through the icicles
at the house eaves
frost evening -
the raccoon sneaks away
in the back yard
Lace
By Deborah Bennett 19th February 2025
i am holding the lace
my grandmother tatted
a hundred years ago
i am the keeper of
the yellowed thread
she carried north
from mississippi
running from mississippi
ojibwa for "big river"
for how wide the water was
between containment and freedom
for how wide the world
between horror and beauty
i am touching the lace
my grandmother touched
thinking about what it was
to be starved and sustained
by knots and loops
by curves and stitches
by row on row of
snow-shaped rings
that held all the pieces
together
Poems
By Alison Nuorto
Aubade
As he kissed her sleeping form,
His hair fanned her face like a bouquet of feathers.
She awoke to the bitter scent of loss.
Like crushed blooms in Autumn.
White Lines
Let me slip into you.
Into your spaces.
Where our lines blur and meld,
And I can no longer be mapped or traced.
Seawater
I’m a husk;
All lashed kernel and hollowed hubris.
Hewn from the withering vine.
But plunge me in seawater and I’ll shine,
like the newly presented babe; birthed from the core.
Propelled to Galilee,
my shedding will lead to salvage.
Bottled Love
By Ketaki Mazumdar 21st February 2025
Autumn shivers.
I remember Indian Summers and
Grandma preparing jars of mangoe pickles,
raw, firm, drenched with sun,
that I helped pluck.
Mangoes bite sized, doused with home fiery ground masalas.
Shaken firmly,
Mixed with oil...
Spooned into jars...
Many hot noons of watching and waiting and drooling...
On hot roof tops..
Memories,
I carried across oceans,
Across seasons...
Precious stock of
Enticement.
Every bite a delight...
As falling leaves drifted across glazed windows,
As high rises, with powdered snow, stared at me,
The warmth of my grandma's love, Overwhelmed the corners of my heart.
Her hand knitted red and orange cosy scarf,
Her green and red, floating in oil... Mangoe pickle,
My sustenance.
Delighted my Autumn heart!
Biographies of Poets
Shivshankar Menon served for many years in the History faculty of St Stephen's College, Delhi. He now lives in his hometown Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, and devotes himself to studies in Russian language and literature.
Steliana Cristina Voicu lives in Ploieşti, Romania and loves painting, poetry, Japanese culture, photography and astronomy. Her haiku, tanka, haiga, poetry, short-prose have been published worldwide, including Asahi Haikuist Network, Daily Haiga, The Wise Owl-The Daily Verse, Under the Bashō, Chrysanthemum and others. She is founder and editor of Enchanted Garden Haiku Journal-Romania.
Deborah A. Bennett is an American poet whose poetic work consists mostly of haiku and senryu. Her poems have most recently appeared in Acorn Haiku, Fresh Out Magazine and The Mamba, Journal of the Africa Haiku Network.
Santosh Bakaya is an award winning poet, novelist, biographer, TEDx Speaker, acclaimed for poetic biography, Ballad of Bapu, Dr. Santosh Bakaya’ has authored twenty- three books encompassing multiple genres. Reuel International Awardee [Poetry, 2014], Setu International Awardee for ‘stellar contribution to world literature’, 2018 [Pittsburgh, USA], WE EUNICE DE SOUZA [WE Literary Community, 2023], for ‘rich and diverse contribution to Poetry, literature and Learning’, she runs a column, Morning Meanderings [Learning and Creativity. Com]. Her recently published works are What is the Meter of the Dictionary? The Catnaman [With Dr. Sunil Sharma] & For Better or Verse [With Ramendra Kumar and Dr. Ampat Koshy].
Ketaki Mazumdar is an educationist and a poet. She is a recipient of many awards. Her poetry reflects her excitement with the beauty of nature, emotions of grief, joy, love and also gently touches on the spirituality and mysticism of life.
Week 4, February 2025
January Winter
By Sushant Thapa 24th February 2025
Wintering is an art.
When the winter sun
kisses the earth
its light parda seeks
an embrace.
Memories are trust
that seeks the warmth.
The mirror lake
freezes,
yet, I play with
the candleof my frosted memories.
You shape up
and form a soul
that seeks my sight,
I carry your heart
and hear all the anticipations
to embrace the forgotten book
of wintry recollections.
January winter is a memory book.
The snow falls
from the apple tree,
I cherish the fireplace
and its nostalgia.
I fondly remember you
peeling layers of winter
from my heart.
Now, you are a frozen lake -
a mirror that I carry
in my soul.
Micro Poems
by Belinda Behne 25th February 2025
morning lookout
waiting for the red fox
coyote appears
sticky fingers
of love
pry open my heart
following the rainbow
we share
the pot of gold
Snowy day Poem
By Kavita Ezekiel, 26th February, 2025
When the snow is on the ground
And the silence makes no sound
From earth to heaven all is white
From faraway the sun shines bright
All the birds seem to have flown
To a place they call their home
They will return when the snow has gone
Once more to sing their sweet sweet songs.
But wait I see a magpie hopping
From every branch the snow is dropping
Blue and white feathers against the light
I bet 'twill be a quiet night.
Some more snow fell all last night
He shoveled the sidewalk with all his might
A lone squirrel scampering on the high line
Like a tightrope walker balancing fine
No birds today, some sun, grey clouds
White trees praying with their heads bowed
Blessed to have nowhere to go
Will read and write and take things slow
But wait there's laundry and plenty of dishes
No Fairy Godmother to grant my wishes!
Don't know what tomorrow will bring
Be gone winter, come quickly Spring.Poet's Note: I live in a part of Canada which experiences five long months of winter. Many of my poems describe the landscape and the sights and sounds of this season. Some of the poems are rhyming in nature and use humor as a means to cope with the silence.
A Risky Affair
By Edilson Ferriera 27th February 2025
Sometimes I visit the past, long ago, perilous
and suspicious a world.
The road I take has been built entirely by me,
in very hard a way no one at least dreams of.
Rough a path and full of so many deviations,
that even I, well used to, go so timorous.
Now, it is clear there were no other choices,
for only this way would lead me where I am.
Where and what I must be ever since I was.
On this visit, I see friends, lovers, enemies,
grandfathers and cousins, see also myself.
Then, undoubtedly alive, they talk to me,
ask for news and soon we are laughing,
like old comrades who were absent for so long.
On leaving, one or other intends to follow me,
but I go home alone.
I suspect that the past is jealous of its deeds
and hides from us how it has weaved them.
I think we must go there so few times
we are capable of.
Biographies of Poets
Sushant Thapa is a Nepalese poet. He has published seven book of English Poems and his latest book is titled "Finding My Soul in Kathmandu" published by Ukiyoto Publishing. Sushant holds an MA in English Literature from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. He teaches English Language and Literature to University level students in Biratnagar, Nepal. He is widely published in print, online and school book.