By Flapper Press:
Flapper Press is proud to announce our 2023 nominations for
Best of the Net in Poetry!
For the past three years, we have had the honor of nominating our poets and their work to the award-based anthology series Best of the Net. This year was particularly difficult to narrow down, as our poetry submissions have grown substantially, poetry flooding in from across the globe. It is all very exciting, and we want to thank all of our poets for sending us their work this past year.
Best of the Net was created by Sundress Publications in 2006 to support the work of online literary magazines, journals, small presses, and all those who submit their work to these digital publications. The Best of the Net anthology is available at the end of every January, with submissions open from July 1to September 30 each year.
If you are interested in submitting a story, work of nonfiction, artwork, or poetry to Flapper Press, please visit our Submission Guidelines for more information!
Without further ado, here are our 2023 Best of the Net nominations for Poetry!
Congratulations!
I’ve written about my mother a lot; in fact, more than any other person in my life. It was already so before she died 20 years ago but moved into hyper-drive upon her passing. Mainly, I think I’ve been working out the demons of our relationship, which was wonderful and terrible in equal measure. And this poem, my newest about her, is no different. One more in a long line of exorcisms. Not of her, but of pain, which still mimics hers.
You Look Just Like Your Mother
All the church ladies have said this for years
You look just like your mother
There’s an uh huh and a head shake and a Praise Jesus
because they miss her
gone too young
and my sole haunting
I shake off the dread I feel that I look like her
Not because my mother wasn’t beautiful
Not because I didn’t love her
She wore the shroud of not enough
of self-absorption of addiction
And I dread these very shrouds that
want to smother and prickle me
like static cling
like the firecracker that was my mother
in all the ways good and bad
And when she was good she was very very good and when she was bad…
I stop myself passing mirrors
with the stunning revelation of
our twin-ness
I pray to embrace it
to welcome the compliment
when all I want to do is block it
A weapon hurled my way
And even with that especially sweet smell
of soaked charred ash
vacuum-sealing every lung of me
my mother never fails to wink and shimmy and
whisper tickles in my ear because
it’s how she casts her spells
And whether I want her or not
she is refracted off me
Flashes of light bouncing
on the ceiling and wall
a mirror ball
Because
She lived awkward radiant messy
A force on my planet that dented mountains
and cracked the stubborn earth
In "October Weave," I plunked my thoughts about families during a visit to family. I think my own extended family may be the patchwork that remakes itself, but I'm not sure.
October Weave
Some do not find family
until we fabricate it
from strangers and oddballs.
Some find family strange.
We get labeled “oddballs,”
prefer “black sheep” and flourish.
Some strange families remake
themselves at intervals—
patch the quilt with fabric scraps
found on the closet floor,
discarded for a tear
in a matriarch’s blouse
featuring acorns and leaves
in browns and yellows—colors
of fall. The cloth spread now
accents themes once background.
We love the branches, hiding
before, their abrupt twists
away from the ground, up
or suddenly left, a warp,
believe it or not, of purple.
This poem was inspired by Bob Hicok’s poem “How Origami Was Invented.” I wanted to capture my stream of consciousness in its rawest form while being vulnerable about my insecurities.
How Fish Were Invented
In kindergarten, we had two
pet goldfish. They say that
goldfish are smart. I didn’t think so.
In kindergarten, we were drawing fish, because
we had just finished reading The Rainbow Fish, and
my classmates marveled at mine, all innocent and wide-eyed,
like fish. “It’s better than Mrs. Culbertson’s.”
In kindergarten, we were spelling
fish: “f, i, s, h,” and I knew that
the plural of fish is still fish, and I thought that
the f in fish looked more like a two-legged alligator than a fish.
In fifth grade, my handwriting
was a fish. It
took hold of my pencil
took hold of my hand
took hold of my mind. It
took me minutes to write out
a single sentence. At least my handwriting looked
like a printer’s, all
straight lines and
straight curves, never
straight enough.
Now,
it’s just chicken scratch, but chickens are better
than fish. In my physics class, we were learning about entropy,
disorder, like coffee spilled haphazardly onto a page.
I don’t even drink coffee. I
prefer water, water
that stills in an empty fishbowl,
broken by a dip of a toe,
or just broken.
I felt like a fish.
I never liked fish.
I love the way that writing makes me feel. It helps me get thoughts and feelings out
that I may be unable to do so through speaking.
If I Could Pause For a Moment
The trees sing me a song of strength and resilience
Wisdom and scars radiate through their veins Their branches reach out and beg me to listen If I could pause for a moment, I could take it all in.
The birds sing me a song of contentment and freedom
Journey and adventure radiate through their veins
Their voices call out and beg me to listen
If I could pause for a moment, I could take it all in.
The ocean sings me a song of abundance and caution
Vastness and surrender radiate through her veins
She runs towards my feet and begs me to listen
If I could pause for a moment, I could take it all in.
The sun sings me a song of hope and forgiveness
Comfort and warmth radiate through her veins
She nudges my body and begs me to listen
If I could pause for a moment, I could take it all in.
The stars sing me a song of mercy and beauty
Illumination and brilliance radiate through their veins
They captivate my eyes and beg me to listen
If I could pause for a moment, I could take it all in.
The moon sings me a song of adjustment and stability
Perseverance and grace radiate through his veins
His soul permeates me and begs me to listen
If I could pause for a moment, I could take it all in.
My daughter sings me a song of life and its meaning
Love and connection radiate through her veins She shows me myself and begs me to listen I pause for a moment and I take it all in.
The awareness and emotion that come with this presence
Are all that I’ve needed to see that I’m whole
A new day is dawning and its beauty delights me
The live long light is like a dream
The time is ours to spend.
Legacy
Anna Maria García
My grandmother told me that I was born Anna Maria García. But somewhere between the birth canal, incubator, and maternity ward, my name included more letters and the last name that belong to another family. I have a feeling that a lack of a Navajo translator, a white nurse and my mothers death had conspired to provide for me a persona that was not me nor mine. Therefore, the logic was that I died on the same day I was born I am not a life or a definition, just a notion.
Lordes Maria García
I spied on her and thought it was wrong. I was a voyeur in my parents' attempt at making love. It was not making love really: it was having sex under a pine tree. They did not utter words of sensuality, nor did they acknowledge their love for each other. It was just heavy breathing and mimicking each other’s body movements. I became a possibility when my father stopped his movements and said, "Shit!" It was not a glorious beginning for me, but I believe my mother created an essence for me that day. Thus, my mother was not flesh to me, just a feeling.
Hope Maria García
My grandmother journey to California and married four times. She ran away from home at thirteen and married that Sarracino boy who later changed his name to Lincoln because he liked the 16th president of the United States and smoked punching cigars to make an impression at the tribal offices. Later she married a soldier named Newsome. She moved to Nevada with him but he gambled his fortune and love away.
She came home to Laguna as a García woman. The stories about her third marriage are vague. No one knows who she married or what she was called. She was just Hope. Her last marriage was to Anaya‘s cousin Bardo, the one who worked for the railroad: he was the steady one who loved green chili and the Detroit Lions.
He was my true grandfather and I think he would have enjoyed my face to my company. Unfortunately, he died two months before my mother was born. A railroad tie fell on him, and he turned gray just before he died.
Hope died in May when my mother was born. I like to think that Hope died of a broken heart, but the women in my family die at childbirth.
Maria García
I once saw a black-and-white picture of Georgia O’Keeffe walking towards the camera. She had a calico dress and scarf that covered her head like those grandmas at the Navajo Nation’s Fair. She really looked Navajo in the picture.
I have no idea what Maria looked like. She probably looked like my Grandmother Hope but maybe, just maybe, she looked like Georgia O’Keefe in that black-and-white picture I saw in the museum.
It was a face with lines of wisdom and eyes that had seen love, hope, and tragedy. It was a face that was inquisitive. It was the face that captured knowledge just like the canyons capture the rain water. It was a beautiful face. It was tired and it was old— Grandmother old. It offered a comfort and a sense of home.
Maybe my Great-Grandmother Maria had a Georgia O’Keeffe persona too. Maybe she was an artist who saw beauty.
This poem is a reflection of what struggles with mental health might look like. A house, a mind, that is rotting away from storms it can’t control.
Rain trickles at the roof
Of an empty house.
Filling the walls that
Held a home once before.
It trickles through the roof
That’s been repaired
A thousand times.
You can’t stop the rain
And its undoing.
A thousand repairs
Can’t stop it from seeing through.
It may be the ruin of the home,
This place.
The Sun don’t shine long enough
To remodel.
This roof
Is rotting.
This house is melting.
These walls are drowning.
And this rain
Is destroying my home.
Presenting a wide range of poetry with a mission to promote a love and understanding of poetry for all. We welcome submissions for compelling poetry and look forward to publishing and supporting your creative endeavors. Submissions may also be considered for the Pushcart Prize.