FRAN MASAT

After years as a professor in the Midwest and New Jersey, Fran writes now in Key West. His poetry has appeared in Amaze, Artistry in Poetry, Avant, Bottle Rockets, Frog Pond, Heron's Nest, Lynx, Mayfly, Modern Haiku, Muse Apprentice Guild, Paper Wasp, Poetry Midwest, Prairie Poetry, Short Stuff, Simply Haiku, and many other edited print and online journals.

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SENTINEL

fireplace
standing alone
guarding blackened debris
the remains of a burnt-out house -
my hearth

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ONE WAY

With scorn
we pass the sign
"One Way, Do Not Enter."
But we think again - as the hearse
departs.

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WAR CLIPS (3 cinquains in sequence)

again
click live click die
again - click live click due
the evening news keeps rerunning
war clips

soldiers
dying silent
in black and white and red
not knowing they'll live and die each day
on film

watching
with reluctance -
shooting, clutching, falling
each time the news scene reappears
I flinch

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SMALL FRIENDS

Evening --
my walls become
the meeting/feeding place
for little cat-eyed dinosaurs ...
geckoes.

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ART

Look here!
Famous art works!
All that remains after
The patrons and collectors fade
Like light