by Robert Armstrong

A panoply of sound 

Rings, 

Throughout the crisp 

Spring air, 

While birds shed their 

Winter songs, 

Singing dirges to the 

Snow, 

Flavors of new beginnings 

Roll across my tongue, 

While dark soil toils, 

Between my thumbs, 

Years of compressed flowers, 

Decompose  

To nourish, 

A new year’s  

Buds, 

While trees dance like 

Sprites, 

Swaying to the rhythm 

Of spring, 

The constant thrum 

Of earth, 

Keeps pace with  

My heart, 

Rain drops down, 

Like sheets in the wind, 

Water reflecting  

The light, 

Like stars pooling, 

In the darkest of 

nights. 

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Robert Armstrong is a writer from the Hudson Valley in upstate New York. A former bookseller, he’s been published in a local magazine, Artless & Naked as well as in Mocking Heart Review. A voracious reader of poetry since age eight, he’s influenced by Charles Bukowski, William Wantling, Randall Jarrell, Kim Addonizio, the Beats and Post-Modernists. He’s currently working on poetry chapbooks, short stories, and a fantasy novel.  

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ABOUT THE ARTIST

Rachel Singel is an Associate Professor at the University of Louisville. She received a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Virginia in 2009 and a Masters of Fine Arts in Printmaking from the University Iowa in 2013. Rachel has participated in residencies at the Penland School of Crafts, the Venice Printmaking Studio, Internazionale di Grafica Venezia, Art Print Residence in Barcelona, Spain, and Wharepuke Print Studio in New Zealand. She has studied non-toxic printmaking at the Grafisk Eksperimentarium studio in Andalusia and will be continuing her research at Proyecto´ace in Buenos Aires, Argentina in summer 2021. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally and represented in private, public and museum collections.