Send up to three poems on the subject of or at least mentioning the words hell and/or heaven, totaling up to 150 lines in length including stanza breaks, in the body of an email message or attached in a Word file to donkingfishercampbell@gmail.com by 11:59 PM PDT on September 22nd. No PDF's please. Color and B&W artwork are also desired. Please send in JPG form. No late submissions accepted. Poets and artists published in Four Feathers Press Online Edition: Hell or Heaven will be published online and invited to read at the Saturday Afternoon Poetry Zoom meeting on Saturday, September 23rd between 3 and 5 pm PST.

Wednesday, September 20, 2023

Henry Olivas

THE ELEVATOR TO HEAVEN 


was out of order

so I took the stairs 

gripped the banister 

wet with plague 

began to climb 

that corkscrew path 

sure bet vertigo 

but who cares?

it was the trip of a lifetime!

a ten-minute ascent opened up

a clear view of the asylum 

“what’s that word mean?”

I once asked Pop

(pronouncing it wrong: ah-SEE-lum)

“it’s a place for crazy people”

so I climb and climb 

miles into the sky 

shedding crumbs of reason 

what if heaven’s just an asylum?

you’d need to be crazy 

to want to live forever 

the final step left me 

suspended in air 

clouds below and above 

quick drop or slow ascent

which choice 

would a sane man make?




(NOTE: This was the last poem I showed to Johnny Bender, aka Brutus Chieftain, a couple of months before his untimely demise. He had me remove a line and suggested a word change or two. So I’m dedicating it his memory)

 — Brother Jude 


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