by Barrie Brewer The river has kept many things—bones that did not sink as they should,secrets that refused to erode,and once, a man who tried to take me. I have no name—not in the way people use names, not in the way names pin things to memory and maps. Names…
by Barrie Brewer The river has kept many things—bones that did not sink as they should,secrets that refused to erode,and once, a man who tried to take me. I have no name—not in the way people use names, not in the way names pin things to memory and maps. Names…
by Louis Faber I have often thoughtthat it would be most interestingto be a postmodernistfor after today there willbe yesterday yet again,Blake will still be consumedby his visions but it willbe so much quickerwith CorelDRAWand Sibelius can finallyput the CD player on repeatuntil he finally understandsthe meaningof his Fourth Symphony.Once…
by Doug Van Hooser Lighten up! You’re not a funeral director. Don’t beas serious as a doctor visit, a 4 A M phone call.Quit writing poems that resonate like an obit. Tryto pull a rabbit out of a hat and smile when it’s a ferret.Be a public-address announcer, let everyone…
by Phillip Knyphausen My cousin Toto texted me at the start of February. It was all in German and he spelled my name wrong. I had only met him once before, at my uncle’s funeral in Mainz. In a tall black tailcoat, he approached me by the chapel. We talked…
by Paul Hostovsky My thumb is pushing the thin metal thumb-lockof the screen door up and down, up and down,locking it and unlocking it—click, click, click, click—while I gaze out past our tiny poor excusefor a backyard, just big enough for a tetherball pole.My mother is sitting at the kitchen…
by Paul Hostovsky “Have a blessed day,” she said.And it sounded new, different, positive-ly numinous. So I said,“You have a blessed day, too,” and I floated out of therewith my coffee and corn muffinand beatific smile. But nowevery time she rings me up she says it. Every time.No variation. No…
by Paul Hostovsky They’re talking about tying teacher payto teacher performance,and tying teacher performanceto student outcomes. They like to use words likeoutcomes. They probably don’t readmuch poetry, whoever they are,and wouldn’t know a good lineif they wrote one. I remember Mr. Westrich though,my seventh-grade English teacher, who diedin a boating…
by Nick Stonaker Ned grew up in church. He and his family rarely missed Sunday, and never for silly reasons like rain, sleep, car problems, or sickness. If Ned missed a service, it meant there was no feasible way to attend. His family even played hooky for his grandmother’s funeral…
by Zachary Jones Living in the shadowsI became a prophet.Learning everythingThat no one can teach Here alone nowI’m in perfect companyThe waters around me are my fortress walls. I see the future,In seashells and ripples.They tell me of heat waves,They speak of great wars. In hot fever dream state,I saw your god running.A…
by Sam Barbee Silence, our first lie. We perch pacified, feastingwhen fed. Ignore plagues and storms outsidefavorite outlet stores. Mediocre menaces inside.Nothing allowed to interrupt our next shopping spree. We grasp self-assured bounty. Seed by seed yieldsuncherished. Flourishing timber now blunt-cut boughs.We shell-out admission to Joni’s Tree Museum. Pilgrimage there in…