by Reyna Espinoza What will you tell your children when they are grown and ask who you were? Will you tell them the truth? Will you tell them you were cruel? Will you tell them you enforced the rules? “I did my duty,” you’ll say, as if duty were blameless, as if obedience absolved you, as if a…
by Reyna Espinoza What will you tell your children when they are grown and ask who you were? Will you tell them the truth? Will you tell them you were cruel? Will you tell them you enforced the rules? “I did my duty,” you’ll say, as if duty were blameless, as if obedience absolved you, as if a…
by Reyna Espinoza I was born of sunrise and pesticides,of strawberries and struggles.I was raised with sunburnsand church on Sunday,where my knees memorizedthe wood of the prie-dieu,where prayers were counted, not answered,and hope stayed lowered,like a head that forgot how to rise. I was cared for by hands in the…
by Ed Schad Tony the Tiger began to groan free of his box, pacing, padding, rushing down to disrupt the morning table. Great though he was, his flakes also great, he increased, deepened, outstretched his cartoon lines out of the world of toys to stride into blood and hair and skin, leaving the cardboard a scratch-and-sniff of musk and urine, a…
by Kenneth Pobo I turn off the computer and watch the moon through a half-closed venetian blind— then head to bed. Sometimes I can’t sleep because I fear dreaming. Last night I dreamed I was teaching again. Sex interrupted my words like a stoplight on a highway. What will I dream tonight? The quiet comforts. No crickets. Maybe I’ll dream of my mother, a…
by Kenneth Pobo My favorite is a list of my top songs. Almost 3000 titles. The shortest are by the DC5. The longest is “MacArthur Park.” The grocery list bores me. We discuss at martini time what I should pick up—the list, a firm jaw. At the store I forget three items. The list has holes. I don’t make a list of chores. That would be a…
by Kenneth Pobo our white sweet pea curls up and above the top. We don’t let the gate swing open for fear of breaking it, no longer use the back door until frost fells the vine. My cousin says we’re foolish—why cater to a vine? Oh well, we never did much like her anyway. A vine offers no opinions, makes no demands. Climb. That’s what it does— and so well….
by Jacqueline Hyatt He likes the smell of my perfume, How it sticks to the pillowcase Hours after I go. He likes the smell of my perfume; He craves reminders that He is not alone. He likes the smell of my perfume; He has no clue that It is discontinued.
by Jacqueline Hyatt Five minutes in line And a credit card swipe Of $9.99, my salad was Easily earned. Kale and spinach, Cherry tomatoes, And dried cranberries In a capped paper cup Took a tumble when I tripped In my too-big sandals And planted a vegetable garden On cement stairs.
by Dalia Davis Flames cooled by blue tones. Rushing foam faces burst into song groovesswinging past stones. A jazz band of water nymphsquell fire arrows aimed for my heart bones.
by Martin FitzPatrick I turned on the car radio in time to hear the last minute or so of “Sweet Emotion”; then the DJ came on and said, “Some Aerosmith here this morning . . . one of my favorite teachable moments of this year— I learned a few months ago that there’s an Aerosmith cover band in Europe called . . . wait for it . . . Eurosmith.” Now,…