by Caroline Maun If I was showing you the house,I’d be sure to mention the century cactus,no longer there, that sent up its flagpole-sized stamenbefore collapsing under its own weight. I’d point outthe royal palm that started to fruit in 1973, and howwe had to axe open the hulls on…
by Abby Caplin A doctor only pretends to understandthe soul’s transmissions through the stethoscope,the placement of bell and drum on bare chest, simple human breath comingling with clicksof worry, raspings of self-reproach, the unpredictablebeat of chronic confusion. The details don’t matter when loneliness is undone,and the siren I hear through…
by Jennifer Schallehn I am 22 and I have just given birth to my first child,a daughter. I run across a photo in a drawer.In it, I am 14. I have just fished the runof a musical, which I have danced in and choreographed.My arms are around two of my…
by Fathiya Alalawi She wanted her husbandto forever be a lionand so, created mythsabout his might.He’s in his seventies,and she misses the dayswhen he was roaring.Now, he barelystretches and yawnsin front of the TV–his favorite den–and she roars at himout of frustration.She misses the dayswhen he was troublingthe whole town.Now,…
by Jennifer Schallehn (This poem contains domestic abuse.) Your homeboy asked what you liked best about me,and you answered,“She does what I say do.”I’ve got news for you.I did what every boy said to do.I was born to it,laid out for my first baby picturesa welcome mat in rosebuds and…
by Cynthia Good Then it sparked into flame, Christmas in the fire pit, a burst three times the size when it stood in the den festooned in bows, the Fraser Fir— a shooting spiral of tangerine light. What should we burn next? you ask. Let’s burn…
by Cynthia Good So long cell tower dish sneaking inthe bedroom window, so longto saying thank you to taxi doorsheld open to slide across sticky seats.So long to dragging our bodies into roomswhere we don’t want to go, into argumentsthat aren’t our own. So long to tryingnot to wake the…
by Michelle Askin The building at night. My hand tracing the greyish-white veining of the brown marble. The door left ajarso that I inhale the cigarette ash, chlorine,and the soaked rum from the forgotten cakeon the chained metal mailboxes. Palm treesrowed to the elevator as if to say that within…
by Jeffrey Kingman after Kerouac’s “On the Road” she went out in the mud to find a head between his knees the two foggy bundles wandered there together from the steps of the motel court alone mixing up their boys a prowl car came by possessions moved along self-propelled hunchbacks…
by Brian Reickert On an August afternoon, on the fringe of a riotous wildflower garden, I crouched to observe the mortal struggle of a tiny green spider and a yellow/black hornet on the chest of Saint Francis draped in plaster robes, arms outstretched as if to embrace the world in…