anima
the woman lives inside him.
she doesn’t say much
she won’t always answer calls
since when he’s drinking
he usually drives until kentucky
she doesn’t rag him about smoking,
amused at how he’s happy
when it’s almost gone
until it’s gone.
he tries to touch her everywhere
turgid fingers grasping air
once they almost made a baby
he likes to say with sighs
now it’s early morning
just before the light
he’s crying out her name
as she stands inside him
polishing his eyes
BIO: Tom Weiss
I grew up on a cattle ranch on the eastern margin of The Everglades in an area that is now suburban Ft. Lauderdale. Having attended boys boarding schools from the second grade through high school likely twisted my psyche; but, I seem to write mostly love poems, so there you go.
I moved to Knoxville in 1974 intending to stay a year, and I’ve been here ever since, so it looks like I’m here to stay.
I spent a lifetime toiling in commercial real estate management and development until the pandemic retired me kicking and screaming, kindly allowing me to come out of the literary closet. My publishing history extends all the way back to December 2021. Nine poems have been published in four journals to date as I’m also working on my short fiction voice. Appearing in this journal with these remarkable photographers is a waking wet dream.
Tom Weiss
2614 Fairmont Blvd.
Knoxville, TN 37917
865.607.5500
BIO: Donna Dangott
Donna Dangott is recognized as an emerging American photographic artist. After a thirty-year hiatus from a public creative career she returned to a very robust photographic art practice in 2020. Since then, she has exhibited her work extensively across the US in group and solo exhibitions. Her award-winning works range from the realistic to the surreal, often blurring the line between fact and fiction. The imaginative and sometimes haunting images that she creates explore many different themes. She frequently weaves together elements of our tangible external physical environment with our less tangible, but equally relevant internal psychological and emotional realms. She explores relationships of all kinds–human to human, and also, human to the natural world that we all inhabit. Her work is often informed by contemporary social, environmental and political issues, as well as, personal history, memory, and dreams. She has developed a unique style which combines her experience as a biomedical illustrator, graphic designer, and a fine art photographer. She received her BFA in Photography from Austin Peay State University in Clarksville, TN in 1988. Over the years she has worked with both analog and digital equipment and techniques. Currently, she is devoted to exploring a range of digital image capture and creation methods. She periodically incorporates hand-applied pigments and evidence of the artist’s hand directly into her image making process. Her works reside in many private, public and corporate collections, and have appeared in a broad range of virtual and print publications over the years.
