june - july 2007
Issue 12
All work copyright the
respective owner.  
Nothing may be
reproduced without
consent.
VISUAL ART and POEMS


Click each image to see a larger size.
Hobo High Wire

Vinnie flew in
like so many others,
chirping away
as if everyone
didn’t know the song.

With winter’s snow
on the frosted branches
it gets harder to find a meal.

“Hobo High Wire”
is what the locals call it—
—line up
and come in for a landing
because the generosity  is free.

Otherwise
there’s a constant
chill in the air,
like the everyday  indifference
of the uncaring.

Birds of a feather
weather together
and Vinnie would surely agree—
—homing in
on a familiar routine,
he folds his wings
and walks pigeon-toed
to a hot dinner and a slice of bread
                                                     .
This hunger
swallowed by charity
is only momentary,
and the acceptance
and knowing of that is necessary,  
for everyone takes flight
out of here
after everything is served
and the pots and pans
have been put away.

Beyond
the soup kitchen reprieve,
flocks and flocks
of formations
fall from the sky
and return unwanted
to the parks
and alleyways
of the city—

—among them
Vinnie flutters in,
lands in a shivering crowd,
and huddles up on a railing
covered with newly fallen snow—

—for there is no flying south here,
when the cold north wind
is all you have come to know.
String on a Pole

String on a pole—

the wind catches it
and it flutters
and undulates
like the cilia
of a microscopic creature.

Colorless
and barely seen
it only offers a minimum

and yet
a hungry donkey
still chases after it

pulling along a corporate cart

while a fat cat sits
and tugs at the reins

wearing an Alice in Wonderland smile
and a fashionable tailored suit.


Dreaming
of a dangling carrot

caught between
the industry downsize
and the temp agency scam

a poor beast of burden
reaches for empty air

with no choice
but to take something
for less.


A whip
is not necessary here

for the bridal bit
and harness
are willing implements

as the string on a pole
appears weightless

like a gift
never given

or a promise
never met.
"Hawaiian in Ohio"
"Rusted Garden"
"Waiting"
"_o_"
Joe Balaz lives in northeast Ohio .  He previously lived in Hawai’i .  He is the author of Domino Buzz, a cd of music-
poetry www.joebalaz.com.  He is also coauthor of JOMA-online, an online gallery of concrete poetry and photography
with photo-artist Mary Ellen Derwis www.jomaonline.com. His writing has appeared in The Honolulu Advertiser, Hawai’i
Review, boundary 2: an international journal of literature and culture, The Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Scrawling Wall,
Kaimana—Literary Arts Hawai’i, Navigating Islands and Continents: Conversations and Contestations in and around
the Pacific, Pidgins and Creoles (United Kingdom), Ho’omanoa: An Anthology of Contemporary Hawaiian Literature,
Honolulu Weekly, Ramrod—A Literary and Art Journal of Hawai’i, Wisconsin Review, Whetu Moana: Contemporary
Polynesian Poems in English (New Zealand), Chaminade Literary Review, ‘Oiwi—A Native Hawaiian Journal, Tinfish,
Hapa, Salome: A Literary Dance Magazine, Seaweeds and Constructions, Saving Place: An Ecocomposition Reader,
Bamboo Ridge, Outch: An International Haiku Magazine (Japan), Hybolics and Mana: A South Pacific Journal of
Language and Literature (Fiji).  His recent work has appeared in or is forthcoming from Icon, Oregon Literary Review
and AdmitTwo.