Swirling waters
embrace the cliff
with ardor… with
the passion of a lover.
Sparkling diamonds
reach for the skies,
then they crash
with the sound and fury
of clashing cymbals.
The moon dances
a silver waltz…
romancing with the waves,
as the world sleeps.
From the simmering summer
to the icy snows of winter
the show goes on…
Gleeful torrents spread
their whipped cream
of joy into the foaming waters.
Showing off nature’s landmark
of unbridled freedom;
endlessly it flaunts
its tranquil liberty
at the world, a place
where only chaos reigns.
Sheila Thadani is a writer and a poet; she has a M.A. and has written a column for Hi-Rise Magazine, her articles have appeared in Substack. Her poetry has been published in The Wave-Kelp Journal, Tiny Seed Journal, The Dissident Voice, Literary Veganism, W.P.D.Congress and others; and Anthologies, “Emerging Earth” and “From Here to There.” She has won prizes for “The Moral Abyss, Quest for Peace, Woven Fabric, Weeping Earth, Lost Spring of Love, and others.
Aerial View of Niagara Falls on a Hazy Day Niagara Falls, Ontario in foreground, Niagara Falls, New York in background Photo by Andrew Porteus, June 2004
Before the roar,
there is accord,
a quiet gathering
of tributaries,
gentle streams,
forgotten springs,
consenting
to become one.
The current remembers
every stone it has polished,
nations that stood upon its banks,
every canoe,
and whispered promise
passed downstream.
Then comes the edge
as water does not resist
its becoming,
but gives fully
to gravity,
to mist,
to thunder,
to light.
Tour boats,
slight as drifting leaves,
venture into the white cathedral,
where millions of gallons
collapse without hesitation,
the vast curtain
hurling its breath
into the sky.
Mist surrounds them,
soft as cloud,
fierce as weather,
until passengers vanish
inside the river’s exhalation,
laughter and astonishment
wrapped in living vapour.
The air blooms
with broken rainbows,
each colour stitched
from droplets
that refuse
to disappear.
On each shore
a city wakes
to the pulse of visitors,
their skylines
sharing the same breath,
their nights
trading reflections
across restless water.
The river belongs
to neither,
yet blesses both.
The oldest lesson
never spoken.
It rises
from the endless plunge:
that strength
may wear the face
of yielding,
that beauty
is often loud enough
to shake the earth,
that the water
does not repeat itself,
yet never ceases
to be the river,
and those who leave
carry its thunder
long after
the mist
has dried.
Mike Keenan has been published in multiple anthologies such as the Canadian Authors Association Saving Bannister, Niagara-on-the-Lake’s Writing Circle and Ottawa’s Independent Writers Association. He won the Canadian Simone Weil Foundation award for Solstice Thirst. The Canadian Authors Association of Niagara’s poetry judge Dr. A. F. Moritz selected Solstice thirst to be published in the 19th volume of The Saving Bannister.
He currently writes a column for Torstar’s three Niagara daily newspapers, The St. Catharines Standard, Niagara Falls Review, Welland Tribune and Southwestern Ontario’s The Club Magazine. For three years, Mike was published in The Lake Report Newspaper (Niagara on the Lake). He has been published in every major Canadian newspaper including The Toronto Star and The Globe and Mail.
Mike has been published in multiple magazines including Pulse Niagara Magazine, Anchor Magazine, Niagara Life Magazine, Buffalo Spree Magazine, and West of the City Magazine.
Mike Keenan served as an Alderman for the Town of Fort Erie (four terms)
Louise Waldie is the retired head of the IT project management office of a major national insurance company, and wife of Andrew Porteus (curator of the Niagara Falls Poetry Project). She has been active for many years on the executive of the Niagara-on-the-Lake Social Club, and as a volunteer personal shopper for people in Northern Canada who do not have access to retail outlets. In their multigenerational complex blended family , Louise and Andrew have 5 children and 11 grandchildren with assorted spouses, and a great-grandchild.
Arvida Juni Svenske is a poet, a folk high-school teacher, writer and journalist born in a place called Stockholm, Sweden. She is a history buff, fantasy nerd and a huge fan of hiphop and reggae, who in 2025 just published her first poetry collection in English, Caribbean Wind, Polynesian Storm published by She Rises , in which she explores colonial crimes committed and knowledge lost, especially other views on gender than the two-gender-norm. Oh, and she’s currently writing a follow-up book that details her journey into womanhood, Estrogen speech – and oh, she has a podcast: Cohenpodden.
Beside a stand of reeds, I stand
on the shore of the Niagara,
dawn shedding its dim light
through morning fog.
On a rock amid those cattails,
a black-crowned night heron
turns its red eye towards me,
and the bird’s shape transforms
until I’m faced by a maiden
in a simple gown of gray and white
that shifts like the wings
of the bird that first greeted me.
Lelawala, Maid of the Mist, speaks.
Long was I troubled by the return
of the serpent that sought to poison
my people through these waters.
Only by the will of the Thunder God
was it defeated, its great body
forming the rim of the mighty falls.
But your serpent is not mine. It is industry.
While your neighbors to the north
have long sought to maintain their shore
as a parkway, it took long decades
for your people to recognize the toll
imposed by industry. The renewed state
of that shore must be a reminder
to never again let that serpent raise its head.
I realize that the fog has thinned
in the morning light, and once again
I stare into the eyes of that heron,
which turns from me to take flight.
I wake and I’m left with a fading memory,
an early morning mist that dissipates
in a warm October sunrise as the air loses
its grasp on the river, lets it slip back
into its already cooling depths,
that air now filled with sunlight.
Ken Gierke was born and raised in Western New York and, since moving to Missouri in 2012, has missed Niagara Falls the most. He was twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize and has been featured online and in numerous print anthologies. His four poetry collections from Spartan Press, Glass Awash (1922), Heron Spirit (2024), Random Riffs (2025), and The Long Haul (2026), are available on Amazon. More of his poetry can be found at https://rivrvlogr.com/.
