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…
by Kerri Vasilakos Words turn diamonds in these volcanic bones. I wait for the eruption. My throat has been hollow for so long, that my blood began carving letters in my veins, bruising voice into my flesh. My body rebelled against my fear, took matters into its own hands, seduced…
by Kerri Vasilakos I felt the oceans rhythms and listened to the waves crash against the shore like a heartbeat, you didn’t know my body was part of the sand. I would hear your footsteps approaching and pray that you’d walk all over me. I was there for all your…
by Brian Reickert When I was thirty-one I learned the difference between casket dead and hospital dead. There was no composure, only a profusion of absence and that which accompanies it. My father’s eyes were wide and yellow, his face whiskered and sallow, lips cracked, swollen tongue, mouth agape. The…
by Kristal Peace What is the length ofHeartbreak? The colour ofDespair? I will tell you:The length of heartbreak is The story of the dayYou left me. The colour ofDespair is the pool of tearsDancing in my bewildered hands. And The sound of guilt,Does anyone knowHow decisive and sureThe sound of…
by Gwenn A. Nusbaum Bobbing, in the language of hunger, they hover over what isn’t given.
by James Croal Jackson My excuse for a poor score:the frisbee has teeth. And a mind.It chose to rebel inside the wind– I agree, of course, when you sayour food delivery job is temporary.We have hours before we need to clock in– an ordinary morningstraddling the Olentangy river.Any way to…
by Daria Smith Giraud You See, this trauma is branded, #BlackLivesMatter— co-opted, a corporation with corporate donations. Ablack girl like me, will never spend or touch.You do, however see and feel its binding residue its Black Magic Matter surging the well of tears frommy mothers’ mothers’ mothers’ injustice. Blood-borne lipsof little white…
By Scott Christopher Beebee how does one know theirheightened sexual proclivitiesin kindergarten?it is what happened tome but good luck gettinga straight answerfrom this bent,detoured, rattled& deveined source not only had i knownof my homosexualitybut the more importantpiece is my beinga transgender person before you go offthe rails by sayingthere’s no…