✨🐟TFJ🐟✨

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I made the mistake when you gave me 

your number of writing down letters 

instead of digits—T for three, O for one

S for six, etcetera. TOSFEST

Or was the S for seven and the T for two?

I couldn’t reach you. I went further

decoding the letters best I could: 

Tell one sad fable every second Tuesday 

I would try that. Or again: 

Teal oceans send fishermen east, sailboats too

Talk of sacrifice, for everyone signals tragedy 

Nothing worked. I ran out of patience 

with this endless world. Maybe I went about it

all wrong, yelling phrases into the sky

They say the definition of insanity 

is yelling phrases into the sky, expecting 

a woman you might love to answer: 

Time opens slowly—follow each simple noise

The air is ringing with you. And look up 

at the sky. What language is that 

that the branches are trying to form

What are the trees saying

What are the crows

-- Jeffrey Hermann, TFJ Issue Two: Energy

For almost a decade, 

my old book collection has been jammed 

in boxes in the corner 

of my brother’s shop, soaking up gas 

fumes and floating ash from the arc welder. 

Faust, The Birth of Tragedy, 

Parerga and Paralipomena, The Essays of Plutarch, 

Letters from

a Stoic, Tulips & Chimneys. 

Books whose pages I ravaged 

as a young and starving beast. I used to feed 

on poems & aphorisms, 

metaphors. I wasn’t interested in the food others 

of my species 

were eating. 

To be drunk on the power 

of Nietzschean 

suggestion – that’s what got me through. 

It was like donning 

the Armor of Achilles 

which not only protected me 

from the frauds 

& philistines, the dillweeds & Debbie Downers 

that dominated my world in those days, 

but imbued me with such 

a wild & extraordinary sense of exuberance, 

such an overflowing 

feeling of energy, it seemed sometimes 

I was made of explosive 

material, strong enough to blow a hole in the side 

of the universe. 

But the feeling eventually wore off, 

like anything.

And soon I moved 

to Berlin, the books staying 

unloved, unwanted, untouched – 

for nine years 

the white-hot Armor of Achilles wasting away 

in pieces,

in boxes, all its remaining power 

given over 

to the invading

silverfish.

-- M.P. Powers, TFJ Issue Two: Energy

The leaves, once green,

turn brown with age,

and the wind surfs across,

the tall golden grasses.

Ever greater shadows,

creep across the landscape,

as migrations begin,

to winter home fronts.

The air trades clothes,

from the warm embrace,

to invigorating coolness,

capturing the memories of change.

These periods of inflection,

are the magical states,

mimics of our lives,

of the rebirth within.

-- Jason de Koff, TFJ Issue Two: Energy

Tina Anton (she/her), TFJ Issue Two: Energy

Blue Flames in Water

Kip Knott, TFJ Issue Two: Energy

Gorging on the sounds,

of rainfall in the desert,

as pinpricks of water,

cover the skin.

In the distance,

lightning sends roots,

down to soil,

merging worlds for instants.

The twice-baked patina,

hissing with pleasure,

cools and vaporizes,

the moisture on contact.

Drifting sand,

weightless with wind,

coalesces with vapor,

creating floating castles.

The storm subsides,

new life stretches,

from cloistered cradles,

to nurseries tethering the sky.

-- Jason de Koff, TFJ Issue Two: Energy

Sunrise, Sunset

Tucker Lieberman (he/him), TFJ Issue Two: Energy

I am like a peony in the snow,

a crazy prognosticator

with knotted hair and bare feet,

skin pink from mistral wind.

I carefully cut the cards 

and interpret the god signs 

in sheep guts. I read between 

the lines of tea leaves, but I don’t 

want to believe the lines in my hand.

A peony symbolizes good fortune.

My visions do not have happy

endings. I am the high priestess

reversed. Always questioned,

I doubt myself. My heart line

is short but deep. My fate is

love but I am snow-blind.

I read you palm like a map

with sea monsters and rocky

obstacles. To be your lover

I must be a nonbeliever

and follow on the icy path

lined with ghost apples

that shine like crystal balls.

But I will lose you or you

will abandon me in the cold.

I cannot retrace my steps,

so I stand still, as long as I

can, frozen and confused

by hypothermic forgetfulness.

The air glitters around me.

Am I the girl watching

snowfall in the snow globe

or am I the vengeful girl 

outside who brings on the storm?

Hydropower

Kip Knott, TFJ Issue Two: Energy

If you win a vacation like on a game show 

they can’t force you to take it. They can’t make you 

go to Hawaii for five nights, six days. You have free will

You can ask for the cash equivalent 

That’s called stored or dormant energy

Hawaii has volcanoes—more dormant energy

A funny coincidence, I guess. It’s about potential

Things that seem calm but are actually ready to blow

expand, or light up. The when is mostly unknown. I like 

the way your mouth has that subtle sly way 

of smiling when something piques your interest  

like medical diagnostics or German Expressionism

with its emotions and brightness, its primitive shapes 

I feel something like electricity 

when I have a moment to study your chin

I’ve tried to sketch it in charcoal and failed 

I’ve checked Google Earth and a real estate app

The homes I could afford are all on the outer islands

not the main ones, but they’re right on the ocean 

All I have to do is give up everything I have

If someone dies in a storm out there the news won’t cover it

It’s too much trouble. There are limits 

to what we can accomplish. There are forces and fates

There are a variety of approaches. For instance

what about pointillism? All those dots 

the painter has placed on the canvas

Some snug up against each other, some at a distance

We can back up to see the entirety if we wish 

A field at harvest time or bathers on a beach

Or if we wish we can step up close

see how easily the world comes apart  

-- Jeffrey Hermann, TFJ Issue Two: Energy

I knew how to settle him down,

grab his hand and press a rose

into his palm, let it breathe in

the pressure of his blood,

soak in the juice of life.

The circles eased his breathing. 

My thumbs knew this well. 

The last night I kissed him 

goodbye, my head twirled 

around itself, blooming 

into something it's not. 

At first, there’s the disbelief 

that here, held in the air, 

I’m being strangled against my will, 

and then, the suffocation of letting go. 

Dear Ram, your smell completes 

me whole, but where I’m going

there will be more space to think.

And when your memory finally

sprouts from the genus Rosa planted 

in my garden, I’ll look to the asbestos

ceiling and count the stars.

We are bathing in mystery and confusion

Carl Sagan said The sun is a giant fireball in the sky

my son remembers out of the blue one morning

and the snaps on your shirt are named for the noise

they make Maybe zippers too With a snap

of their fingers some God really started

something huh But after that someone else

had to walk the dog and fix the storm door

It’s swinging open banging against the house

every time someone comes in or out Bang

there it goes again As a child I used to worry

the Earth would stop spinning just lose the strength

or maybe the will But that’s just projection

You take all your fears and weakness and

give them away to someone else because

good riddance If the sun exploded we wouldn’t

know it for 8 minutes and 20 seconds

then we would vaporize Neil deGrasse Tyson

How is your will these days How is your faith

What urges do you pursue or is it feed

What urges are you feeding I buy too much

heavy cream when I shop at the market But

Hawking warned us that The universe will always

be much richer than our ability to understand it

Buttons might be the more interesting fastener

How doing the loops becomes a little trick you do

with your fingers Your brain can be doing

something else completely I don’t know how

this closet got so disorganized my wife concedes 

or why we own so many jackets 

-- Jeffrey Hermann, TFJ Issue Two: Energy

Champagne in Sepia 

Jacy Zhang (she/her), TFJ Issue One: Celebrations

Like clockwork toys clicking and whirring

And wound up to a whistle

The cicadas sing rounds a capella 

Fireflies dance at the water’s edge

Each a tiny living lantern in the darkness

Their flames snuffed out and rekindled

From moment to moment

The dark river an unceasing symphony

The trills, croaks and hoots of the soloists

Cutting through the night

My little one turns to me and laughs

I think the cicadas are singing for my birthday, she says

Soon she’ll turn three

And the cicadas will sing for her

- Ruth Callaghan do Valle (she/her), TFJ Issue One: Celebrations

You green-lit the story of my life

with no idea of the budget required,

the cast or so much as 

page one of the script.

No book to base it on, no superheroes -- 

inspired by true events that were yet to unfold,

with only the bending of my knee that rainy night

rehearsed like a table-read.

Years later, and the credits are getting out of hand -- 

too many supporting roles and bit parts to count,

so much footage left on my memory’s cutting room floor,

and all those critics and reviews we’ve ignored.

We’re not really in a movie, of course,

but sometimes when you smile at me from the couch

I can almost hear the director calling ‘Action’ behind me,

and the scene that plays out is the kind a trailer merely teases.

-  Shane Schick, TFJ Issue One: Celebrations

Glossy hibiscus on your ear & flip flops shuffle, 

we creep to the luau, my arm linked with yours. 

We are daring & forgo our walkers. At the door 

of the rec room, we put on the magenta & crumpled 

leis, & settle into the plastic chairs to watch those 

who might move & sway to the music. We savor 

the punch. Your neurons don’t fire like they used 

to, & you forget words at times, but we enjoy the 

misshapen hats & background ukulele music. 

Beyond the smell of disinfectant, we search our 

scattered memories of a younger you & me, like 

catching fireflies on a bright evening. There were 

days we covered ourselves with a soft blanket 

on an emerald riverbank watched the birds 

play & spiral against canvas clouds. 

Those days bejewel this night.

- Lynn Finger, TFJ Issue One: Celebrations