{"id":2794,"date":"2017-12-10T11:45:36","date_gmt":"2017-12-10T16:45:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ratsassreview.net\/?page_id=2794"},"modified":"2026-02-04T17:12:14","modified_gmt":"2026-02-04T22:12:14","slug":"winter-2017-issue","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/ratsassreview.net\/?page_id=2794","title":{"rendered":"

Winter 2017 Issue<\/p><\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\n\"\"<\/a>
\n 
\n Misunderstood Children<\/strong> by Jennifer Nichole Wells
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nMike Alexander<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nSHINTAKE
\n 
\nfor Craig Arnold<\/i>
\n 
\nThe night he read at Brazos, we pulled up
\nto see a wild man with a coffee cup
\nin one hand, leather jacketed, & bald,
\nwho ranted at the sky, like it had called
\nhis name. We gave this lunatic a wide
\nberth, as we walked, like saner folk, inside
\nto get a better seat. We didn’t know it
\nbut that word-ridden nutcase was the poet
\nwe’d come to see. He had his lines by heart,
\nhis patter passionate, his similes smart.
\nThis was salvation after cataclysm,
\nworthy of the name Romanticism.
\nI imagine Percy Bysshe would not have cared,
\neither, who gawked at him as he prepared
\nto launch himself the length of Adonais,
\nwith preternatural nature as his dais.
\nImagine Byron with his fiery limb
\nout-pacing verse on a volcano’s rim.
\nImagine Keats turning to Craig, to bow
\n& welcome him where he is igneous now.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nAnastasia Andersen<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nSELECTIONS FROM
\nTHE BOOK OF FASHION, VIRTUE
\nAND ETIQUETTE FOR STEPDAUGHTERS<\/i>
\n 
\n1. Raise your frock consciousness<\/i>
\nbut avoid grotto postures,
\nremember your every gesture
\nis as blood to the flea.
\n 
\nThough the rude yob may reckon your curves
\nbrimming or shy,
\nremember also straight lines
\nare too reminiscent of hardship.
\n 
\nSleep well and return often to the kitchen
\nto braid your tarts.
\n 
\n2. Gentle your static<\/i>
\nand parcel pious tassels in the wardrobe.
\nBe Sunday in your grays and always
\nbucket your ash
\ncheerfully.  Be Tuesday with mutton and ugly
\nshoes, for the humble
\n 
\nmay yet disconcert a prince.
\nAvoid the road to smut or limerick\u2014
\ndeny such bawdy knits
\nor nomadic fringe.
\n 
\n3. Neither over-blossom nor weep<\/i>
\nwhen sized in a mirror.
\nRemember, every blemish warrants a scarf.
\nBe Saturday, dear, and missionary
\nin your fractions of skirt,
\nalways princess
\n 
\nin hoop, frame or girdle. Never pose
\nyour grand theories of cleavage
\nnor extrapolate for a stranger
\n 
\nor you may find yourself wretched
\nin puffed sleeves and glass slippers,
\nas the huntsman next door pulls you aside\u2014
\ntells you to assume the fairytale position.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nRaymond Philip Asaph<\/strong>
\n 
\n \u2028NATURE SHOWS
\n 
\nOn a sidewalk a block north of a Burger King,
\nthe wrapper of a Whopper brings back to mind
\nthe wing of a certain South American butterfly
\n 
\nI witnessed once on one of those nature shows
\nwhich redeemed a day of despair when I realized,
\nright there, in the box of my own living room,
\n 
\nthat I was not a prisoner of the limited horizons
\nof suburbia or bound by the boundaries of my nation,
\nbut something more weightless and twice as free
\n 
\nas that butterfly working a field of wildflowers
\nor this litter rising at my feet in a gust of truck-wind
\nand fluttering over the traffic in the breezy fumes.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nJudy Shepps Battle<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nIN MEMORIAM: APRIL 15, 1967
\n 
\nI’m not standing here with my draft-card ablaze
\nbecause I enjoy the heat or the spotlight
\nor because those of a foreign ideology have
\nseduced me.
\n  
\nI don’t hold my aching arms aloft for all to see
\n \u2003 \u2003 because I am convinced the war will end today
\n \u2003 \u2003 or even in the next one or two years (though I
\nhope so).
\n  
\nI don’t revel in the smell of my own searing flesh
\nas the card burns or even enjoy the stares
\nof audience \u2013 be they cops, feds or fellow
\npatriots.
\n  
\nI really am scared of 5 years in jail (with or
\nwithout a ten thousand dollar fine) for I am
\n \u2003 \u2003 young and freedom is especially precious to
\n \u2003 \u2003 me.
\n  
\nI stand here, sunbeams dancing on charred remains
\n \u2003 \u2003 of the card so I can tell my children as well as
\n \u2003 \u2003 generations yet to be born that
\n  
\nI did not sit silent and ignore this war.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nClayre Benzadon<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nON END
\n 
\nYou are vertical,
\nmetal-clank right
\nunder jeans’ seam
\n 
\nzipper jingle
\ntwinge morning
\ncrow call
\n 
\nblack dress left
\non the bedpost
\nhook
\n 
\nfasten as in idleness
\nas in long day’s
\nbeginning full
\n 
\nof nothing I know
\nwill become of them
\nand in bed I miss
\n 
\nthe backwards touch,
\nthe trailing,
\nnow only my fingers
\n 
\ntrack dampened
\nabandonment.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nTiffany Lee Brown<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nBUNNIES
\n 
\nJoe met Hef in Chicago, after Mr. King was
\nshot. I want to ask, Were there bunnies?
\nBut the conversation crumbles in on itself
\nas poems begin to puff up in every nearby
\noven, and poets \u2014 some with mitts on, some
\nwithout \u2014 fling themselves willy-nilly at oven
\ndoors, wailing at the souffl\u00e9s swelling inside,
\nforgetting every time how to unlatch the
\ndoor.
\n 
\nI met Hef in LA, at the Mansion,
\nafter the Interactive Media Festival.
\nThere were bunnies, mostly furry, roaming
\nthe sweet green lawns, dodging peacocks.
\nSome were humans, the kind with boobs.
\nMy friend Paul stole a fluffy white bathrobe
\nfrom the famed faux-cave hot tub grotto, and
\nI felt a thrill (the kind an older feminist does
\nnot know how to hold for her former, younger
\nself, but cannot seem to discard) as the man
\nhimself, the pajama-bedecked pipe smoker who\u2019d
\nbrought me my first porn same as my brother,
\nwho ruled the vintage airwaves in the awe-
\ninspiring Playboy After Dark, who published my
\nfavorite writers, who reduced women to tits and
\nrabbit outfits, who infantilized and objectified
\nwomen, women, women, but at least saw
\nthem, saw us<\/i>, women, women, women…
\n 
\nHef checked me out. He found quickly the
\nwoman beneath the funny hairdo and Doc Marten
\nboots, inclined his head in an approving way, not
\nlechy or leering, and I was glad she was still in there,
\nthe regular girl old rich white men might want to
\nfuck, even though I’d spent my half my twenties
\nwrapping her in prickly overcoats like a horse
\nchestnut swallowed by its own sharp green shell,
\nfalling to the sidewalk encased in spikes. I was
\nglad.
\n 
\nA white woman may think these thoughts
\nat her leisure, over and over, wondering
\nWhat This? and What That?, drawing
\nblood in the master bath mirror. Anything
\nto avoid the dead, noble Black man. Anything
\nto avoid the white men with their
\nguns.
\n 
\n <\/p>\n

MAKING IT STOP
\n 
\n“Oh, honey, I’m so sorry. Life is
\nhorrible and the Universe is
\npainful and humans are
\ncruel and our habitats shouldn’t
\noverlap so much and\u2014”
\n  
\n\u2014 Me, wielding a cast-iron pan,
\n    to the mouse in the inadequate
\n    trap<\/p>\n

 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nHelen Burke<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nTHAT OLD FRONTIER SPIRIT
\n 
\nYeah.  I reckon that’s how the West was won.
\n 
\nBecause Bob says \u2014 there ain’t nothing much
\ndoing over where he is.
\n 
\nApart from a couple of hundred hostages being
\nheld up at the school by terrorists . . . and his
\nneighbour two doors down just shot his parents
\n 
\nAnd last night a bear broke into the local
\ndrugstore and killed Old man Geraghty’s dogs.
\n 
\nOne was just a puppy.
\n 
\nBut other than that,  nothing much has been
\nhappening, in fact he’s never known it to be
\n 
\nSo damned quiet.  he wishes it was a bit
\nlivelier.
\n 
\nEspecially for our sakes, so he could at least
\ntell us about it. So . . . what’s happening with you?
\n 
\nAnd we say – well Ken next door just bought
\nsome new slippers . . . and the students
\nupstairs discovered how to eat biscuits late at
\nnight REALLY LOUD you- know what I’m saying.
\n 
\nAnd us, well we had scones at just gone four
\no’clock AND got a new stair carpet.
\n 
\nOMG . . . Bob says.
\n 
\nYou Brits with your crazy accent and hysterical
\npast . . . you can really show US how to do drama,
\nain’t that a fact.
\n 
\nAnd the crazy, wild historical thing is
\n 
\nHe  really means it.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nNicole Byrnside<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nSPIDER-MAN
\n 
\nHe kissed me
\nupside down
\nhalf-masked
\nlike Spider-Man
\nand Mary Jane
\nin the movie.
\n 
\nI surrendered
\nto the mystery
\nthe unknown
\nas the arms
\nthat held me
\nsqueezed tighter
\npulled closer
\nheld firm.
\n 
\nNow he returns
\nto feed
\nto drain me
\nbit by bit
\nand I remain
\nwound and bound
\ndangling
\nfrom a fire escape
\nhobbled by his touch
\nand wonder
\nhow long
\nI will sustain him.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nWendy Taylor Carlisle<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nA LITTLE SONG ABOUT LEAVING
\n 
\nThis is a poem about leaving but aren’t they all?
\nIt begins early, somebody you know dies
\n 
\nin high school \u2014 in those years when all life
\nseems to be alive at once and the future
\n 
\nis a cotyledon in the chest, about to unfurl.
\nThen Frank dies on his motorcycle.
\n 
\nAnd the list continues\u2014
\ncancer, leukemia, heart attacks, lungs wasting
\n 
\nuntil a person’s arms are only big around
\nas a five year old’s. Each morning
\n 
\nI am surprised awake by my breath, an accident
\nhappening again at sunrise
\n 
\nbut by night I’m officially bored with imagining death,
\nweary with all these songs about absence.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nHeather Chandler<\/strong>
\n 
\nPARKING LOT TANGO
\n 
\nShe met him in the parking lot.
\nPassions accelerating too fast
\nto drive off.
\nTinted windows shielding her
\nshoving down her inhibitions,
\ntil they wrapped around her ankles.
\nKissing him with both timidity and
\nboldness, hands shifting and clutching.
\nTwo natures crashing–
\nRegretting the indulgence,
\nand regretting the restraint.
\nBent over in small quarters,
\nHer head in his lap, his hands in her hair.
\nKnees brushing against the shaft,
\nUrgently tasting both freedom
\nand chains.
\nResignation and sweat gripping
\nthe leather seats,
\nWashing over them with ecstatic
\nmoans of shame and pleasure.
\nHe’s off.
\nClosing the door behind him.
\nShe’s facing the rearview mirror,
\nFlushed, empty, and spinning. \u2028 \u2028 
\nTHAT SAME OLE SONG
\n 
\nShe watched him pluck the strings.
\nHis fingers running up and down the frets
\nof her spine,
\npulling out notes and moans
\nfrom deep within the cavity
\nof her hollowed out chest.
\nApollo’s golden lyre lulling the muses
\nbeyond their sensibilities.
\nNotes of passion causing a riff
\nand changing his tune.
\nNeeding space like air.
\nThe Pied Piper’s pitch filling
\nthe acoustics in the room.
\nThe arpeggio escalating and bending
\nburning the bridge and lacing
\nthe capo around her neck,
\ncausing her to fall flat.
\nThe vibrato measured
\nin octaves, picked over, and re-tuned.
\nDissonance clashing with the metronome
\nof their progression,
\nuntil the blue notes scaled her back
\ninto a solo improvisation.
\n 
\n 
\nHARD TALES
\n 
\nThe smell of leather and whiskey mingled
\nwith the citrus of her fancy margarita.
\nHer mouth closed around shame and pain,
\nfelt old skeletons wash up against the salt-rimmed edge,
\nand swallowed.
\nA silver tongue relaxed by Jose Cuervo.
\n 
\nHe traced his finger around his third round of Jameson,
\nthe fragility of the highball glass reminding her
\nof the danger of throwing stones in a house ready to shatter.
\nHe swirled whiskey into his beer,
\ngathering strength in numbers.
\n 
\nShe ordered another round,
\nundressing the swirls of truth–
\nnothing left to hide.
\nSo she finished her drink,
\ntasted the bitter backwash
\nof every broken and painful
\ndraft and washed it down.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nJoe Cottonwood<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nTHE FIRST (ONLY) TIME I MET HUGH HEFNER
\n 
\nI hitched a midwestern circle
\n(in 1968 I did these things)
\nfrom St. Louis to KC to Des Moines to Chicago
\nto an alley behind Walton Street
\nwhere I found food in garbage cans.
\nUgly smoke stank up the air everywhere
\nwhile angry voices chopped through the exhaust fan
\nof a big restaurant kitchen
\nwhen I passed out.
\n 
\nCradled in female arms, female scent, I heard
\na voice say “He’s just a kid and he’s sorta dead.”
\nOpening my eyes I saw bunny ears and the top half
\nof bulging brown breasts. A name tag said JUDIT.
\nI mumbled \u201cI’m almost twenty-one.\u201d
\nJudit said “He ain’t dead yet.” She stood up
\ndropping me to the bricks
\nwhere my head went BAM.
\n 
\nI came to seated on a bucket in the alley
\nwhere a man in a smartly tailored trench coat
\nwas standing over me lipping a pipe
\nlike a smug asshole except for
\nteardrops brimming I thought from the smoke.
\nHe asked what did I think I was doing.
\nSo I told him I’d hitched for two days
\nwherever the truckers were going and whatever
\nthey’d feed me which wasn’t much.
\nHe seemed to like that answer.
\nHe dabbed his cheeks and eyes with a hanky,
\nsnapped his fingers at a cook
\nwho brought me a sirloin on a big plate while
\nhe kept asking questions and nibbling on the pipe stem as
\nI told him I was an English major on Spring Break
\nwith a crappy job driving a school bus, no career plans
\nexcept I was a writer, and he said
\n“You mean you want to be an author?”
\n 
\nI said “No, I mean I can’t stop writing
\neven if I wanted to.”
\nHe seemed to like that answer, too.
\n“Send me stories that change this shitty world,\u201d
\nhe said, and I asked who he was.
\nHe introduced himself just as Judit with bouncy brown
\nbreasts came out and said he was needed inside,
\nthe police wanted to close the place down.
\nHe gave her butt a squeeze and hurried away.
\nI asked Judit what was happening and she said
\nMartin Luther King had been assassinated,
\nthe city was on fire and seeing as how I was white
\nand kind of naive I’d best get the hell out of town.
\n“You mean he’s DEAD?” I said.
\n“Yeah,” she said, “and everybody’s pissed.”
\nI was still staring at the breasts and she said
\n“Don’t believe everything you see.”
\n 
\nJudit handed me green money, a few twenties,
\n“From Hef,” she said.
\nI said I wanted to stay and talk to her.
\nShe laughed and said “I’m almost thirty-one.”
\nTo get rid of me she wrote a phone number
\non an order slip and left me in the alley.
\nFrom a Greyhound bus window on the Skyway
\npaid with Hef’s money I could look back
\nat flames and smoke like a photo of Berlin
\nat the end of the war.
\n 
\nHef didn’t create the ‘Sixties,
\nhe simply ran with it until left behind.
\nHe became a caricature, icky. Fame
\ncan do that. Nobody needed to kill him.
\nNext time I hitchhiked, I headed west,
\nSan Fran. And stayed.
\nOnce, I called Judit’s number.
\nA man answered.
\n\u201cDon’t ever call here again,” he said.
\n \u2028 <\/p>\n

ACKNOWLEDGING MY DOUCHINESS
\n 
\n“Oh my god. I killed you for a
\n poem.”
\n 
\n\u2014Me to the mouse, just now,
\n   retrieving the skillet<\/p>\n

 \u2028 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nKen Cumberlidge<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nGAZE
\n 
\nI caught your gaze —
\n 
\nput it in a jam jar with
\nthe labels slithered off,
\nwrote ‘GAZE’ in felt-tip on the lid
\nand snuck it somewhere safe, high on a shelf.
\n 
\nA silly thing to do, I know.  Forgive me.
\nI was young, in love
\nand \u2014 being in love \u2014 afraid:
\n 
\ntrying to make provision,
\ninsurance of a kind,
\nagainst a time when you might look
\nand there’d be nothing in your eyes but sight.
\n 
\nThen I’d reach me down the jar,
\nwash the dust off, hold it up,
\nlet it catch the light:
\nyour image, filtered through the glass.  Pretend.
\n 
\nBut now?
\nThe two of us have come so far,
\nknown many changes of address,
\nlost key after key
\nand, unsurprisingly
\nwith all the packing and unpacking,
\nI’ve no idea where it’s ended up
\n\u2014 forgotten maybe, or mislaid?
\n\u2014 in the wrong box?
\n  anyway…  Astray.
\n 
\nI don’t even know if it still exists.
\n 
\nThat is what you were asking, wasn’t it?
\n\u2014 why, nowadays, I spend so much time tidying the attic?
\n 
\n 
\nNO PARTICULAR PLACE TO GO
\n 
\nFar beyond the point of no return,
\npast all reach of aid or intervention,
\nhaving hauled the same ragged sledfull
\nof that-stuff-you-thought-you-needed
\nfor considerably longer and further
\nthan could ever be called sensible,
\n 
\near buds embedded and player set to
\n‘shuffle’ in the hope of taking the edge
\noff the sheer bloody tedium of the exercise,
\nand \u2014 notwithstanding a lifelong commitment
\nto vegetarianism \u2014 having long since eaten
\nthe last of the Huskies, you find you’ve arrived.
\n 
\nWelcome to the magnetic North Pole of your
\nlife: the place beyond which all further
\njourneying, regardless of apparent direction,
\ncan only be, at best, a managed retreat.
\n 
\nYour compass needle knows it, too. Hitherto
\nan unswerving monotheist, impressively certain
\nof purpose \u2014 absolutism’s biggest fan \u2014 now it
\ndawdles sheepish, shocked at its own indecision
\nand, frankly, embarrassed by the whole thing.
\n 
\nAnd it is here and now that, in an act of
\nserendipity so sweet that if your lips weren’t
\nfrozen solid shut you’d laugh out loud, it happens.
\nFor once (indeed, for the only time so far in the
\nentirety of your journey) the shuffle pixie gets
\nit right: drops the virtual needle on Chuck Berry
\nand his trademark Gibson chime.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nMaureen Daniels<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\n\"\"<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nStephen M. Dickey<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nYour Dying Breath
\n 
\nYou’ve been holding your
\ndying breath
\nin one of my alveoli:
\nthat mole of oxygen
\nslipped through
\nmy blood knot
\nhardening into
\na shard of us,
\nour old days, cutting
\nboth ways.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nCat Dixon<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nWALKING MY HUSBAND
\n  
\nWe leave the trees and I release
\nthe leash. He wags too closely
\nto the street, so I call his name.
\nHis head lowers to sniff the grass,
\nthe gravel, the smashed soda can.
\nNo matter where we walk, litter makes
\nan appearance. It’s pointless
\nto collect for it multiplies
\nlike the silent days, the mounds
\nof bills, the lies we tell.
\nOnce I did share the truth,
\n“I fall in love every few months.”
\n  
\nHe didn’t understand that a man
\nis a discarded fast food sack
\non the side of the road. A man
\nis a broken beer bottle in the street.
\nWhen I shove items in a black trash bag,
\nthey bust out and scatter.
\n  
\nEach day my husband and I go for a walk.
\nEach day when I yank the leash taut,
\nI’m disappointed that he doesn’t pull away,
\nthat he doesn’t growl in protest,
\nthat he never breaks free.
\n 
\n 
\nTHE EX-BOYFRIEND RETURNS TO AMERICA
\n 
\nHis arm hair curls up his wrist
\nto crooked knuckles. As he
\nslips my panties to my knees,
\nhis thumb and index finger
\npress against my sweaty clit,
\na bloated pineapple slice.
\n 
\nThe Honduran maid, who kept
\nhis house and ironed his shirts
\nfor three years, then stole his watch,
\ntasted like caramel and sweet
\nonion. Why did you go in
\nsearch of plums and peaches
\nin foreign countries?<\/i> I ask.
\n 
\nDarting his eyes to mine, he
\ninches his mouth from my thighs
\nand says with wet lips, I ate
\nstar fruit every morning. At
\nnight, I wrote verbose emails
\nto you that I couldn’t send
\ndue to spotty internet.<\/i>
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nThomas J. Erickson<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nDISCOVERY
\n 
\nIn criminal law: Process by which defendant’s attorney is given information by prosecution regarding evidence supporting the charges against his client.<\/i>
\n 
\nI.
\n 
\nHis wife and kids barricaded the backdoor with
\na plastic picnic table, a garbage can,
\nand a grocery cart found off the street
\nbut he busted through and poured
\ngasoline around the kitchen and
\nliving room and lit a match.
\n 
\nHe stopped at a gas station to call 911
\nbut there was no pay phone. The guy
\nwho loaned him his cell phone recognized
\nhim from when they were in jail.
\n 
\nTwo of the kids didn’t make it out
\nof the upstairs bedroom.
\n 
\nThe boy was found draped over his little sister.
\n 
\nII.
\n 
\nSometime after midnight, they dragged
\nthe rapper to the basement and choked
\nhim to death with a chain because
\nhe stole some weed.  They burned
\nthe body in a dumpster.  A garbage
\ntruck dumped the body in a landfill
\noff Highway 45.
\n 
\nThe rapper’s blood was found in
\nin the basement.  His DNA came
\nback as female.
\n 
\nNo one knew but his parents.
\n 
\nIII.
\n 
\nCuz brought the two little boys up
\nfrom Mississippi. Mom was supposed
\nto come once they got settled
\nbut she stopped answering their calls.
\n 
\nAfter Cuz’s boyfriend was arrested,
\nthey moved in with Solei.
\n 
\nCuz tied up the boys so they wouldn\u2019t
\nrun away.  Solei burned them with cigarettes
\nand beat them with a belt.  No one fed them.
\nCuz heard voices and loved to sing them to sleep.
\nThe younger boy stopped breathing.
\nCuz took them to the hospital.
\n 
\nThe one who lived told the police he loved Cuz.
\n 
\n 
\nSANDPAPERING THE WITNESS
\n 
\nMaurice told the detectives that he didn’t have
\nsex with his girlfriend that night and she was
\nlying about the assault.
\n 
\nA week before the trial, I got a report that his
\nDNA was in her so…we had a problem.
\n 
\nHis first reaction was that there was no way that could
\nbe true because he knew she took a shower.  I told him
\nhe wasn’t OJ and I wasn’t Johnny Cochran and there
\nwas no way the jury wasn’t going to believe they had sex.
\nFine, he said, we did have sex but she consented
\nand we have sex all the time.  Okay, but why did you
\nlie to the police about it?  I don’t know.   You knew
\nshe took a shower, right?  Yes.  So that’s why you lied?
\nYes.  How were you feeling when the detectives told
\nyou she said you raped her?  I was scared.  Why were
\nyou so scared?  Because last year she lied to the police
\nabout me beating her up and they believed her.
\n 
\nSo, you’re going to testify that you lied because you
\nknew she took a shower.  If she hadn’t taken a shower
\nyou would have told the truth but you were scared
\nbecause she’s a good liar.  And you would have no
\nreason to assault her because she was your girlfriend.
\n 
\nYes, that’s right.
\n 
\nAnd now we’re ready for trial.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nFrederick Foote<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nBORN BLACK
\n 
\nI was cursed before I was even born.
\n 
\nMy grandmother told my mother, “Don’t be bringing no black babies up in here.”
\n 
\nWhen I was born my mother said, “He’s dark, but at least he ain’t black.”
\n 
\nMy father said, “He a good-looking boy except for them flapping coffee coolers.”
\n 
\nMy sister said, “He too black to be my brother. The hospital must have given us the wrong baby.”
\n 
\nI heard my teacher say, “He sure looks different from his siblings. Mama’s baby daddy’s Maybe.”
\n 
\nMy aunt said, “Pinch his nose, so the baby wouldn’t have no Negro nose.\u201d
\n 
\nMy best friend said, “Your Mama must have reached back to Africa to get your black ass.”
\n 
\nThe girl I like said, “You dark and got bad hair. I could deal with one or the other but not both.”
\n 
\n“My boss told his boss, “I hired him, in part, because he looks like a Negro should. Those others could have been Mexicans or anything.”
\n 
\nMy wife said, “You the lightest and brightest one in our family. You know they gonna call me color struck.”
\n 
\nOur daughter, at age twelve, said, “Shit, I’m too dark for the black boys and too light for the white boys. You two really fucked up my life.”
\n 
\nAt sixteen she was on the cover of Vogue. She said, “I’m fortunate to be the color du jour. But what about tomorrow?”
\n 
\nShe named her daughter, “Tomorrow.”
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nKathy Gee<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nSUBSTANCE
\n 
\nUsually I’m peach or plum.
\nDissect this fragrant flesh
\nand you’ll find stone,
\nunbreakable, authentic me.
\n 
\nToday I’m onion, not fruit,
\nwith paper skin that wrinkles
\nwaiting in the basket.
\nPeel away the rings:
\nsweet songs of summer
\ndie like unconfirmed belief.
\n 
\nAs circles fall apart
\nprotective layers shrivel.
\nChop that tiny heart-bud,
\nI may disappear …
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nT. L. Hayes<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nI’M NOT FEMME AS FUCK
\n  
\nI’m not femme as fuck; \u2028I don’t have long hair or nails\u2028and a dress feels like drag.
\nI’m not femme as fuck;\u2028make-up makes me itch\u2028and I flunked Fashion 101.
\nI’m not femme as fuck;\u2028the only heels I wear are on the bottom of my Doc\u2019s\u2028and nothing I own has lace.
\n\u2026
\nI’m not even butch as hell,\u2028though you think I am.\u2028What are you afraid of?
\nWhat do you think of when I say I’m butch?\u2028Flannel? I own a couple. Grease under my nails and\u2028a misogynist swagger? Not even close.
\nAre you afraid I’d fight you for dominance,\u2028want to lead while you figured out \u2028what to do with your hands?
\n\u2026
\nI am somewhere in between;\u2028jeans and tee-shirts are my thing.\u2028Tennis shoes or loafers\u2014I’m all about comfort.
\nI am somewhere in between;\u2028buzzed hair and men’s cologne,\u2028boxers, if I’m being honest.
\nI’m somewhere in between;\u2028masculine of center, that’s what\u2028the kids are calling it these days.
\n\u2026
\nI’m not femme as fuck,\u2028butch as hell,\u2028I’m somewhere in between.
\nYou don’t know what to do with me,\u2028and you don’t want to date me.\u2028Trust me, I’m no threat to your masculinity.
\nBut, you do you and I’ll do me;\u2028I’m not femme as fuck\u2028and I’m not who you want me to be.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nRobin Helweg-Larsen<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nA BOY SMELLS IRON
\n 
\nTo a boy new-come from some warm elsewhere
\nwith neither frost nor fall in memory,
\nthis new cold night air
\nsmells of salt-grimy metal on ships, of iron railings in the street,
\nmeans metal window bars of dorms in which he grieves.
\n 
\nYears later, when that cold night air
\nreminds him of his childhood,
\nhe will smell it as it is and as his life became,
\nno longer iron, but
\nfrost on fall leaves.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nSabrina Hicks<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nCONTEMPLATING GRAVITY ON 180 GREENWICH STREET
\n 
\nSeptember sits like concrete,
\nstreet carnival peppered into ash,
\nnursery rhymes ringing into memory,
\nthe one where they all fall down.
\n 
\nHow many of us were counting leaves
\ninto folds of day? While gravity held,
\ncradled, smothered, descended,
\nliquefying steel.
\n 
\nThe man in the moon leapt into a
\nflawless blue, sailing against the Hudson
\nmid-flight while I waited to hear if
\nfamily was alive, and towns purged
\n 
\nfathers, brothers, mothers and sisters.
\nI picked up dry cleaning from a
\nhusk of a woman, bought eggs from
\na grocer with no teeth, listened
\n 
\nto degrees of separation while I dreamt
\nabout Icarus without the fall.
\nI sit at this wound of earth
\nshaded under a canopy of trees,
\n 
\ninching out sun and snowfall,
\ndrywall and debris, listening to
\nfountains recycle seasons.
\nA man asks for change, laced in anger,
\n 
\na small girl brushes her hand along
\nthe names, tourists grin like fools into
\nselfie sticks next to the dead.
\nI catch the warped city in a mirrored sky
\n 
\nnoting distortion, flooded with
\ndiaphanous day, thinking of
\nladybug wings, secret under a shell of red,
\ngifting flight, when the roar of a plane
\n 
\noverhead shudders.
\nHeads lift with muscle memory.
\nIt was a clear blue day after all
\nwhen suits began to stain the sky gray.
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nElisabeth Horan<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nWEEKDAY ERRANDS
\n 
\nI need to try and be more attentive, more invested;
\nmore . . of everything which human society values \u2014
\n 
\nYou’ll miss me when I go to town. I’ll miss you too \u2014
\njust not as much as I used to or I’d collapse like
\n 
\nThe hollow side of my cheek in profile like a
\npumpkin face, hacked open –
\n 
\nI’m afraid.
\nI need to go to the store. Bananas, cookies, whatever.
\n 
\nI so want to get rid of my stomach. Black hole pit of flab,
\nit’s disgusting. I want a lap band. I had a C-Section, 2 actually –
\n 
\nI should take a walk today.
\nIt\u2019s just a little windy, and no bugs.
\n 
\nBut then there’s Soda Crush and sweatpants. Coffee too.
\nGives me heart palpitations.
\n 
\nMy goats are asking me about raspberry leaves
\nand I wonder what it would take to harden my tongue for prickers.
\n 
\nI am too sensitive for all the good things. My tongue was raspier, more
\nbarbed, when I used to smoke Marlboro Lights.
\n 
\nI have to go pick up my Zoloft at CVS now. I was hoping to taper off of
\nit but I have a headache and I also had bad dreams all night long . . . my
\n 
\nBlood\/Brain barrier overflowed, levee broke open
\nI was missing that NDRI –
\n 
\nI was being pressured into buying
\nanother horse for four hours straight, (felt like it anyway)
\n 
\nAnd then I followed you around hoping
\nyou would give in and want to have
\n 
\nSex with me (for what felt like the next three).
\nYou weren’t into it.
\n 
\nThen I realized I overslept and I felt like giving up –
\nso I figured I better go get my meds, if I am
\n 
\nNot going to spend the day
\nfrolicking with my goats and eating raspberry leaves.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nRobert Hunter<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nALARM
\n 
\nThe crow’s hoarse caw,
\naggressive and threatening,
\ntoo close to the open window,
\nis echoed by another
\nsomewhere
\nin the gray morning mist,
\nand then another
\nunseen,
\nfollowed by their conversation
\nof throaty rattles
\nand indecipherable clicks.
\n 
\nThese are the thieves that murder
\nand devour the naked
\nnewly hatched chicks
\nfrom other birds’ nests.
\n 
\nMy discomfort isn’t
\ntheir robbing and killing,
\nor that they are fattened
\nby the fresh, flattened carrion
\nof some unlucky opossum or skunk,
\npecked off the road
\nby veinless beaks,
\n 
\nbut their comfort in the indistinct
\nhalf-light of the morning,
\ntheir confidence in what is to come.
\nTheir raw-voiced prophesies.
\n 
\n 
\nINSTEAD
\n 
\nSome summer mornings
\ninstead of the musical kaleidoscope
\nand early morning leaf-streaking
\nof the songbirds
\nfeathering my yard’s trees
\nand hanging feeders
\n 
\nI’ll wake to several crows yelling obscenities
\nat each other out on the lawn,
\na pack of miscreants
\nwho’ve been out all night drinking:
\ntheir arguing
\na chainsaw in the dawn.
\n 
\nBut right now
\na single crow
\nflaps its big wings once, twice,
\nslips sideways in flight
\nthrough a hail of slanting snow,
\nthis stark beautiful bird
\nthe daring first stroke
\nof black on a fresh
\nwhite canvas.
\n 
\n 
\nTHE SILVER BOWL
\nFor Brian Gawlik<\/i>
\n 
\nThere are four inches of snow
\non the green hedge outside of your window
\nthat look as perfect as a birthday cake,
\nbehind it
\na leafless winter crabapple
\nholding white line branches.
\n 
\nIt’s the first legitimate snow this year–
\ninevitable in December.
\n 
\nWe’ve been waiting
\nfor the onslaught of real winter:
\nblueblack morning’s cold house
\nthe somber afternoons melding too quickly into night,
\nthe silencing snow.
\nAnd somehow, we’re relieved that it has finally begun in earnest.
\n 
\nI know that you’ve been waiting, too,
\ncarrying that secret inevitability in your blood,
\nthe same way Nature promises the return of a season.
\nAnd somehow, you must be relieved that it has finally begun —
\nif only to know that it will end,
\nthe dreadful anticipation over at last.
\n 
\nWhen you were ready to leave us,
\nI dreamed that I handed you a silver bowl,
\nlarge enough to carry the new infant of yourself into spring.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nClarissa Jakobsons<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nSILENT CEILING FANS
\n  
\nThe gypsy left for Paris,
\nmy daughter, Marielle, flew to Oakland.
\n  
\nI do not watch DSL or cable.
\nMy cousin, Bill, wears a black Fedora
\nnothing else.
\n  
\nMy father’s blood is in my veins,
\nhis flame burns my hands.
\n  
\nThere’s a hole in the wall where I used to live.
\nPass the jar.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nKristine Jepsen<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nS.O.S.
\n 
\nIt’s 11:32 pm, and as I write, my dad lies in the next room, dying.
\n 
\nHe moans in his sleep, loudly,\u2028pacing his breathing.
\nAn oxygen concentrator cycles in the hallway between us,
\na great, deliberate whale, spouting.
\n 
\nThe voice moaning is familiar,
\nas he might punctuate a sentence, or
\nlet out a grunt of surprise.
\n 
\nBut his dying is not.
\nAfter 14 months embattled by treatment,
\nhe and the preserver of lymphoma round his middle organs have come home,
\nwhere we hope his 63-year-old body, strong otherwise, might fail peaceably,
\nslipping through, \u2028through into darkness.
\n 
\nHe weighs a scant 120 soaking wet.
\nWhen he lifts his arm off the bed, conducting a few bars of Wagner, say, the tip of his right thumb kisses tip of
\nforefinger. I know the release is coming; I watched for it myself, over the rim of my stand in junior high,
\nwhere he taught me to align my reed and move air: steady, steady, to the end.
\nEspecially then.
\n 
\nI watch him, and it is my arm waving: and so we compare, side-by-side.
\nTapered fingers. Hair just below each knuckle. Downy blonde on freckled sand, over bony landmarks,
\nas far as the eye can travel, back to my shoulder, his almost-bones, beached.
\nOur arms drop, back to our sides, and we gaze at what does not compare.
\nHis belly-button is swollen taut across the largest swell of tumor,
\nthe closed mouth of a manta ray. A whole note.
\n 
\nOne week ago he walked into a hospital for IV fluids.
\nToday, he has given up the distance to the bathroom next door
\nand instead heaves heavily onto a commode beside his bed,
\nhanging from the neck of whomever comes to his rescue.
\nHe lies splayed on his bed on his back, after, for a minute or more, breathing.
\nSuch is the effort to lurch from sitting to prone,
\nto kick his legs out, and bring his hands back from odd angles.
\n 
\nThe bitch of this is that his brain, already practiced at floating, fires unscathed,
\nthough his morbid sarcasm is losing its edge.
\n“If it’s there, it’s winning,” he says of the cancer, and
\n“I love you.” There aren’t many more words for the endgame.
\n 
\nLiquid morphine, that pools briefly in the cheek, without need to swallow, we hope,
\nis sufficient for him to sail away. “Are you scared?” I asked him, before the slurring started.
\nHis response lapped so gently against anything substantial that I can’t even remember.
\nNow he can’t say.
\n 
\nThe waters circulating beneath his skin, seem burst from their channels
\nand are beginning to eddy on the lee side, where he lies.
\nHis knee starboard, rises, wavers, falls,
\nrises, wavers, falls, for reasons lost to the deep.
\n 
\nIt seems important to write this, as he is, right now, alive but dying, nearly gone.
\nI go back to watch, hardly able to keep a hand from shielding my eyes.
\nOne moment, very soon, this small circumstance will vanish forever.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nJacqueline Jules<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nWHAT MOTHERS DO
\n 
\nA female rabbit rips
\nthe fur from her own belly
\nto make a nest for her babies.
\nBut once they are born,
\nblind and naked,
\nshe only visits briefly,
\nto nurse standing up.
\n 
\nNo lying down, no snuggling.
\n 
\nHer kits are better off alone,
\nhidden from hawks and foxes,
\nthan with a mother who hovers.
\n 
\nSurvival is only luck
\nfor those who are hunted.
\n 
\nStill, she rips the fur
\nfrom her own belly
\nto line a nest
\nshe has no power
\nto protect.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nTim Kahl<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nTHE ORIGIN OF SMUT
\n 
\nWe rode our bikes on the frontage road
\nto the truck stop, so we could discover
\none trucker’s purge, his libido dumped
\nin a trash barrel. We picked through Playboy,
\nPenthouse, and an assortment of rubbers in
\nanimal shapes, 8mm films that we held up to
\nthe day’s dying sun. The ten of hearts on
\nthe deck of cards was occupied by Garden
\nof Eden rejects: the woman a Botticelli type,
\nthe man, graying, a stout block like newscaster
\nFahey Flynn. We divvied up the loot,
\nthis the greatest treasure of porn ever
\nto turn up along the Tri-State.
\nOne guy stashed his under the floorboards
\nin his room. Another hid his in boxes
\nin his garage underneath some old paint.
\nI kept the cards suspended over my heart
\nin the chest pocket of my little Sunday suit,
\ntempting me whenever we sang
\n“Hosanna in the Highest”. I wasn’t sure
\nwhat Hosanna meant, but I was pretty certain
\nthat blasphemy was bringing those cards
\nto church, that if I were found out, the whole
\nFlynn-Daly-Coleman-and-Frinks Eyewitness
\nNews Team would descend on me and report —
\nBoy Sings Praise at Worship While Cards in
\nPocket Depict Missionary Position. Details at Ten.
\nI would have to tell all, forced to rat out all my
\nfriends’ hidden caches. Their parents would
\nwhisper to friends, and their friends would chatter
\ninto the distant social circles of the neighborhoods
\nup north. The origin of the smut would be
\ndisclosed, the story of its migration up the Tri-State
\ninto the suburban flesh analyzed and discussed,
\nconfirming once and for all what
\nmy parents had always thought —
\nyes, oh yes, this was the city that Daley built.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nMiriam Kramer<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nVAGABOND
\n 
\nOn a first date, a stranger
\nlooks me in the eyes
\nand tells me he needs a home base.
\nSomewhere he can always return to.
\nAs my pulse races
\nand synapses rapidly misfire,
\nall I can manage is
\n“part of me envies that.”
\nI already told him
\nabout my tendency to overpack,
\nI neglected to mention that I live
\nmore comfortably
\nout of suitcases than drawers,
\nthat having had the same
\nmailing address for over five years now
\ncontinues to be a new concept.
\n 
\nI tell men that I never intend to know
\nthat train tracks make me feel at home,
\nonly to be asked
\n“wouldn’t that be noisy?”
\nSo I do not tell them
\nI have sought out
\nthis false connection,
\nwill lay next to them feeling lonesome.
\nAll I have is my inner vagabond
\nlonging for the Doppler Effect
\nof a train horn.
\nOn nights when I need
\nthe noise outside my mind
\nto be louder than the noise inside,
\nall I hear is my heartbeat screaming out rhythms of
\n“Run, and don’t ever come back.”
\n 
\nI read each “Do not stop on tracks”
\nsign with reverence, balance beam the steel
\nwith all the significance my tiptoes can muster,
\nand I do not stop.
\n 
\nI think back to North Carolina,
\nto the makeshift home,
\nthe tent not quite hidden
\nin the bushes by the tracks
\nwhere I used to go to take photographs.
\nMy accidental trespass
\ninto the entirety of someone’s life.
\nOn a pile of clothes,
\npictures of a girl,
\nof a daughter,
\ncorners torn from nights
\nspent holding on to her smile.
\nI could hear her laughter,
\nI could feel his heartbeat.
\nTook a crumpled $5 bill from my pocket,
\nSharpie scrawled
\n“You are loved,”
\nplaced it carefully beside his photographs.
\nThe tent was gone a week later
\nwhen I went back.
\n 
\nAnd I think back to Oregon,
\nnights spent climbing painted boxcars,
\nhands growing filthy
\nstudying each tag,
\nunsure of their origin,
\nfalling in love with each artist
\nthrough my fingertips.
\n 
\n“I miss you all the time,
\nI will be home soon”
\nThis message was spray painted
\non a wall in Skid Row
\nby a shaking hand
\nthat would never touch its destination.
\n 
\nOf all the confessions
\nI’ve traced on men’s backs,
\nI never dared to spell four letters.
\nI replaced the H with L,
\nthe M with V.
\n 
\n <\/p>\n

<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nAndrew Kuck<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nAT A LOSS
\n  
\nWe have no word for the piece of land
\nthat an island chief blesses with his ancient hand.
\nAnd we cannot name in our English tongue
\nall the flowers that he scatters on the graves of the young.
\nOr the boat that he carved, or the house that he built,
\nor the feeling we no longer have but used to call guilt.
\n  
\nAnd he has no word for an Air Force plane,
\nor for battleship or gun or bomb or nuclear rain.
\nOr leukemia or birth defect or vaporizing heat,
\nor communist or arms-race-war or monumental feat.
\nAnd he wants to say his land was raped by smiling bureaucrats,
\nbut he doesn’t even speak, because he has no word for that.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nIsabelle Lang<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nHOUSE CLEANING
\n 
\nI thought the smudges on my palms came
\nfrom ink pens, half-formed thoughts, or a Kerouac-
\nfueled nightmare. I’d been writing again.
\n 
\nThe smudges stood out on my pale flesh. Some
\nas small as freckles, others big like palmetto bugs
\ncrawling across the backs of my hands.
\n 
\nThe bloodspecks had dried to brown, tricking my eyes,
\nsmelling of dust and wood. We’d been drinking
\nagain. Jim Beam shards from days ago still
\n 
\nstuck around in the kitchen grout lines. I can see
\nthe finger spasm, the cool glass slipping.
\nI only noticed these blood spots when
\n 
\nthe broom handle stung me when I grabbed it,
\nglass slivers from the bottle still stuck in my hand
\npushing further into my skin. I’d been losing time again.
\n 
\nI swept anyway. Swept those damn rolly caterpillars
\nright out the back door. There’d been rain again
\nand they keep squirming in through the cracks, like
\n 
\nthe memory of tripping over my graduation gown.
\nThe musty aluminum smell of the stains
\nstuck around even after I’d washed
\n 
\nmy hands, so I gave a citrus scent to the disposal.
\nSunk my nail into the soft skin of an orange
\nto grind it into the air and I could breathe again.
\n 
\n 
\nARIADNE SPEAKS TO THE MINOTAUR
\n 
\nI offered him my thread. I knew he would
\nhurt you. I knew he would slaughter you
\nto become the hero everyone wanted<\/s>
\nneeded. Your hallways now lined with
\nbones and blood, now lined with bits
\nof string. My fault. His fault. Your fault.
\nI did what I had to do to get out of my
\nfather’s house to save myself <\/s>to save us all.
\nBut he left me behind. And now I don’t
\neven have you. I hate him. I hate you.
\nI hate this place. I will burn this island
\nand everyone with it. I will chop up the
\nmemory of you and him. I will choke him
\nwith the pieces and my leftover lengths of twine.<\/s>
\nHe will come back for me.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a><\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nMare Leonard<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nAN OLD NEW YORKER COMES TO THE AID OF THE LOS ALTOS RICH
\n  
\nAt Starbucks in Cupertino I order an Iced Coconut Cold Brew<\/i>.
\nThe blonde woman ahead of me  orders one, Grande<\/i>.
\n  
\nThe young folks all order the same from their mobile apps.
\nAt the pickup station it’s a sea of cold brews.
\n  
\n The blonde woman turns to ask about post office hours.
\n\u201cI don’t live around here but I’d guess 8.”
\n  
\n“Do you live in Calif?”
\n Yes, in the Hills.<\/i>
\n  
\nI know that’s code for uber rich,
\nlike I know Tall<\/i> means medium, Grande<\/i> huge.
\n  
\nBut of course I don’t say “Oh The Los Alto Hills,
\nyou must be uber rich.” I only comment
\n  
\nabout it being cool up in the hills
\nsince the beastly heat wave circles
\n Silicon Valley. 96 today.
\n  
\nThe blond woman says, We have critters, all over<\/i>.
\nCritters? I imagine coyotes, mountain lions.
\n  
\nShe says, “Rats, tons of rats eating
\nour car wires. We leave our car hoods open.”<\/i>
\n  
\nI decide to drive to The Los Altos Hills
\nwith hundreds of Grande Iced Coconut Cold Brews<\/i>.
\n  
\nPlace them around the locked gates
\nto satisfy the rats, and to congratulate
\n  
\n myself for calling ahead on my new Starbucks App.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nNancy Lind<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nWRECK
\n 
\nA cruise ship, the Mohawk, was lost off our shores during an unexpected storm. The Coast Guard heroically rescued all aboard minutes before the disaster. Each person had to jump from the ship to the cutter below in high winds and heaving waves, to be caught in the arms of the sailors.  Incredibly, they all landed safely.  Many of the passengers were Swedish immigrants.<\/i>
\n\u2014 THE MIAMI HERALD, Sept. 15, 1935
\n 
\nit sank. it sank.
\nthey saw it sink, lights drowning one by one.
\njust-about alive, they shivered on the cutter deck,
\nclutched the railing.  No one looked away.
\non the beach burning flashbulbs, questions.
\nthrough chattering teeth, they tried to tell \u2013
\ntheir tongues stuck.
\n 
\ndripping, without a comb or a nickel,
\nthey felt a need beyond money \u2013
\nto plant permanence in this New Land.
\ntwo of us would rise from the wreck,
\nmy brother the Olympic swimmer
\nand me, the Ishmael, left alone to tell.
\n 
\nmy legacy is the stateroom key,
\njammed in my father’s pocket
\nwhen he jumped.
\nhow heavy it lies in my hand
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nPaul Lymanson<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nTO THE THUG WHO RAPED MY WIFE<\/p>\n

You got lucky
\nor maybe shrewd
\nto knock on our door the morning
\nI have an early class.
\nWhen I return, two cops.
\nCara runs to me crying “I was raped and robbed,”
\nlip swollen, bleeding, eye purple.
\n 
\nThe lady above us, Kreptowitz
\nwho is always calling the cops
\nbecause our music is too loud
\ncomes down the staircase and says
\n“I heard the whole thing.”
\nI ask, “Why didn’t you phone the police?”
\nKrep says “I couldn’t move with my arthritis”
\nas she climbs back up the stairs.
\n 
\nYou lucky bastard
\nor maybe shrewd
\nsince with a less evil neighbor you’d be dead.
\nThe cop says, “We want this guy to hang.”
\nI say, “I don’t.”
\nThe cop glares. Stupid hippies, he’s thinking.
\n“Just lock him up,” Cara says. “And beat him to shit.”
\nThe cop asks for a description.
\nCara says, “BIG.”
\nBest she can do.
\nLater the kid from across the hall asks,
\n“Was he black?”
\nCara says, “Does it matter?”
\n 
\nA crime never solved, but resolved for us.
\nFor you? If you’re alive, which I doubt,
\nafter 49 years your hair is gray or gone.
\nThat oversize body would be your enemy as it aged
\nand more so your hatred of women
\nwould lead you to chances
\nbest not taken.
\nShe is happy, healthy, a grandmother.
\nHow you doing, big fella?
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nTim Mayo<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nPREPPING THE PIG (1966)
\n 
\nI took my little Ruger Bearcat: a
\nsingle-action, 22 caliber, six-shooter,
\nwhich left me little time for missing.
\n 
\nThe pig was waiting \u2014 patiently, I’d say \u2014
\nin the passenger seat of an abandoned Bug
\nfor his future resting place in the pigdom
\n 
\nof heaven.
\n 
\nI opened the driver’s door \u2014 I aimed for the head,
\nbelow the ear, where the brain above
\nand behind the snout masters both body
\nand soul \u2014 in not just pigs but all beings \u2014
\nand contains in its skull-cup that fluid
\n 
\nand electric potion called fear.
\n 
\nPoint blank! My first shot missed
\npassing low through the fleshy part
\nof the neck, and the passenger window
\n 
\nshattered
\n 
\nas if the high squeals of fear had reached
\nthat note where everything brittle breaks.
\n 
\nBlood spurt
\n 
\nall over the pearly gray of the vinyl cover,
\nand the pig leapt out the window
\nnow free from its death row seat.
\n 
\nI ran around the car \u2014 just in time \u2014 as it
\nmanaged to scramble to its little pig feet,
\n 
\nand then, I didn’t miss the back of its brain,
\nwhere the body and all its possibilities
\nhung by a thin thread of nerve waiting
\nfor the final message to be received.
\n 
\nAnd each of its pig legs curled
\nunder in a fetal pose, and I left.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nJane Miller<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nAFTERWARD
\n 
\nThe dock is almost under again, its uprights
\nlike faces upturned before vanishing.
\n 
\nSince you died, days press their throttling tide
\nand each night, darkness pours its panic marbles
\nunderfoot and I walk the house, let myself out
\n 
\nto prowl the sleeping cove and come back
\nto stand at the refrigerator, searching
\nin the alien light of its kitchen moon
\nfor solace, but there is only water.
\n  
\nFrom the icebox, small coffins chill my glass
\nand a carafe, lipped like my body, dies
\nof thirst as it drains. I drink and drink,
\nbut there is never enough swallowing
\nto save me from air.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nDevon Miller-Duggan<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nALONG A DARK SHORE, SIGNAL FIRES
\n 
\nWater from the Styx.
\nToday black in the jar,
\nyesterday green.
\nCerberus fans flames along the shore,
\nwaits for meat to come to him, jaws dripping.
\n 
\nThe color of the water tells him
\nwho is meat,
\nwho should pass.
\nI do not dream.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nSuchoon Mo<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nDESPERATE LOVE
\n 
\nthe sound of jack hammer
\nthe sound of Adam making love to Eve
\n 
\nshe has become a cement block
\nhe does not understand why or how
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nFrank Modica<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nCROSS STITCH
\n 
\nDuring the day she positioned children
\nin wheelchairs, changed diapers,
\n 
\ntube-fed kids in a public school
\nspecial education classroom.
\n 
\nDuring the night she worked
\nas a stripper at a local club
\n 
\ndown the street from the school.
\nThe buses passed it every day.
\n 
\nOne afternoon she told
\nthe other teacher aides
\n 
\nthat she used to slash her arms
\nwith a razor blade,
\n 
\nwatch them bleed,
\nthough she didn’t do it anymore.
\n 
\nShe wore long sleeves
\nnever talked to the teacher
\n 
\nabout the scars that glared under
\nthe shadows of her shirts.
\n 
\n 
\nRIMBAUD
\n 
\nthe white page holds
\npoems in the absence
\n 
\nyour life resides
\nin an empty pen
\n 
\nlook outside
\nthe sharpened quill
\n 
\ncarve haiku on your
\nwrists with a sea shell
\n 
\nerase the ink stains
\nwith your bare feet
\n 
\n 
\nGOOD MORNING, BLUES
\n 
\nGood morning blues
\nand how are you today?
\n 
\nYou aren’t nothing
\nlike you used to be.
\n 
\nYou mess with me
\nand I’ll mess with you.
\n 
\nI’m torn down and
\nit hurts me too.
\n 
\nLook how you got me
\nstanding around.
\n 
\nI won’t go riding around
\nin your automobile.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nAlice Morris<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nSTOPPED AT THE RED LIGHT
\n 
\nI see two dozers by the oak \u2014 one extending a path,
\nthe other digging away dirt at the tree’s base,
\nthen the bucket is raised and slammed against the largest limb,
\nwith a booming crack it falls
\nsnapping off branches on its way down
\n 
\nand from the car I’m getting weepy over this tree \u2014 attacked,
\nand the light turns green and my mind starts seeing rafts \u2014 sinking,
\nand a child washed ashore, children working on trash heaps,
\ngirls used as sex slaves, then the face of the smiling father
\nholding his dead twins, unaware they did not survive the chemical attack
\n 
\nand I pull into the dental lot dazed, recline my seat, try to compose,
\nthen hear a child screaming \u2014 a boy, maybe six, headed my way,
\nrunning full blast, arms thrown back, chest thrust forward\u2013
\nscreaming as though no one else in this world exists,
\nhis mother falling behind, carrying a baby, telling her son \u2014 Stop<\/i>
\n 
\nand just then I want to be that boy, want to run screaming
\nall my sad-angry-primal-self out \u2014 want to run a wild line across this parking lot \u2014
\nbut I’m not allowed, can’t, I’m an adult \u2014 and so silently I feel \u2014 the breaking
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nEuphrates Moss<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nI sit down to write
\nBut there is nothing to say
\nI sit down to drink
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nJohn Muth<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nUNCONSCIOUS IN WYOMING
\n  
\n Gasping and panting
\nsoaked in sheets of sweat
\nI climb a mountain trail.
\nEveryone in my hiking group
\nis already at the summit
\nexcept for me and a trail guide
\nwho clicks the hammer of his Colt Revolver
\ntrying to scare me onwards.
\n  
\nI thought a trip to the West would be fun
\nget away from traffic and noise
\ndemanding nineteen-year-old students
\nwho think an academic advisor is a private butler.
\nEvening walks in the park
\nfailed to prepare me.
\n  
\nMy hiking pole bends in half and I fall
\nhit my head on a rock.
\nVisions begin to appear:
\nA Crow Medicine Man officiates at my funeral,
\nrefers to me by my Indian name,
\nIdiot Who Chose The Wrong Vacation.
\nStudents gather around my open casket
\nask if they can switch their major
\nappeal their dismissal
\ndeclare a leave of absence.
\nSome hold out phones
\ntell me their parents want to complain
\nmy death has been a terrible inconvenience.
\nThey want to speak to my supervisor.
\n 
\nThe guide kicks my boot
\nspits a mouthful of water on my forehead
\nsays his ninety-year-old grandmother
\ncan hike up this trail.
\nStaggering to my feet
\nI admit to myself
\nthis is still better than being at work.
\n 
\n 
\nGOTH GIRL AND A GLASS HOUSE
\n  
\nShe has spider webs tattooed
\non the inside of her thighs.
\nIf she likes a guy enough
\nshe might show him
\nwhere the black widow lives.
\n  
\nRaven hair dyed red
\npurple death lips
\nCleopatra-eyed
\ndark magic acolyte
\nformerly suburban.
\nShe’s a coffee barista
\nin the artsy part of town
\nwants to be an artist
\nshare her pain with the world.
\n  
\nHer mother thinks about
\nthe vampire she made
\nas she plants mums along the driveway.
\nHow did the girl get to be so wild?
\nMom was president of the PTA
\nhas lunch every month
\nwith the girls from her church group
\nalways votes for the family values candidate.
\n  
\nXanax glides through her bloodstream like koi
\nas she tries to suppress
\na memory of New Year’s Eve
\nher senior year in college:
\nthe bar crawl with her girlfriends
\nthe garage band guitarist
\nwith the same crooked smile as her daughter.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nRobert Nisbet<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nHEARTS AND DIAMONDS
\n 
\nAfter his bereavement (he was young, so young)
\nthey tried to counsel, shore up a consolation,
\na family earnestness struggling with his hurt.
\n 
\nOne uncle (not the brightest, to be honest)
\nshowed the boy card tricks, as one aunt snapped,
\nOh God, how crass, the stupid man.
\n 
\nBut Uncle flourished bright celebrities,
\nthe queens, the knaves, the halberds, double heads
\n(the joker for the moment kept at bay).
\n 
\nThe boy’s attention pondered numbly,
\ngazed at the multi-coloured spread.
\nLater, in a day or so, he thought about odd puzzles.
\n 
\nHe started to muse, still apathetically,
\non the tricks and tweaks of cut and deal,
\nthe making magic with the hearts and diamonds.
\n 
\nAnd all the while, the slow kind uncle.
\nAbove the deck, the warmth of meaning well.
\nGrowing, the peace of the boy’s absorption.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nSierra Ortega<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nFUTURE NOSTALGIA
\n 
\nLiving in the post-alt wave.
\nGlitter nails already chipped,
\ncracks in my LCD,
\nsubway delays.
\nA pocket full of molly and nowhere to eat it.
\nIKEA meatballs,
\nhairy man balls,
\nseven half boxes of tampons.
\nTrapped in Brooklyn
\nbetween the whole foods and $800 vintage Louboutins.
\nNo butler but Butler, J.
\nQuoting lines across the bar.
\nBumming vodka sodas with lime
\n(the unpaid intern way)
\nfrom the butch in faded skinnies
\nwho let me taste her.
\n 
\n 
\nPERSPECTIVES
\n 
\nI.
\n 
\nI had dreams of you being inside me.
\nFilling me up,
\nwith rocks and sand.
\nMaking me heavy with your body.
\nMaking me solid with your body.
\n 
\nII.
\n 
\nNp bby
\nLicking my lips
\n*wink**wink**kiss*
\nAnother photo of my tits
\n 
\nUr a fucking angel
\nSo sweet
\n[you saccharine bitch, he thinks,
\nred tipped, red faced, and needing me]
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nSergio Ortiz<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nTHE EYE, the eye, the eye
\n\u2014 a gift from God \u2014
\nI wander about
\nhis onyx castle like a ghost,
\nall ears for assailants
\n 
\n 
\nHEY, SKINNY!
\n 
\nyou are
\nthe most powerful
\noven on earth
\n 
\nyou live in Paris
\n\u2014 almost
\n7 thousand Km
\naway
\n 
\nand yet
\nyou keep me
\nheated
\n 
\n 
\nTHE GRIFFON’S IMPULSE
\n 
\nI was not born to lose
\nor win.
\nMy life is in nostalgia gone out of style.
\n 
\nLike a friend said
\nwhen he got beaten by the police:
\nThis is fucked up.
\nThe world ain’t worth shit.
\nBetter I stay stoned.<\/i>
\nThe least I could do
\nis blame it on the energy shortage
\nthe speed of time
\nor the objective eye of the world
\nbut I know
\nit is my negligence
\nthat opens and closes the doors
\nuntil I surrender
\nto every
\nhollow
\nafternoon.
\n 
\n***
\n 
\nI get tired
\nof the idiotic pride in being a man.
\n 
\nWolves can tell the most
\nmagnificent stories about perverse lambs.
\n 
\nLizards do not know
\nthey live in the Third World,
\n 
\nand pigs
\ncan’t invent bombs.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nBasilike Pappa<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nMELINDA’S LONG SCARF SYNDROME
\n 
\nMelinda stores memories inside chickens — uncaring birds.
\nBuys groceries.
\nEats. Cleans. Makes a cup of tea.
\nSitting by her window she knits long scarves. Hobbies are a good thing.
\nIt all feels like calling home and speaking in a foreign accent, or like a strange cat sitting on her armchair.
\n 
\nMelinda used to have her rooms full of nightingales. Sometimes she flashed them at people.
\nWell, she is only human.
\n 
\nBut counting nightingales before they sing all their songs is a cheater.
\n 
\nIt comes as a missed train, as rain inside the brain; as unequal exchange, torn page, minimum wage. It comes as derealization, depersonalization, as minding the gap but still getting your foot stuck in it; as varicose vein, chest pain, not so sweet martha lorraine. It comes as blue, to paint blue the heart; as human factor, x-factor, max factor. It comes as grabbing hands, twisted arms, naked light bulbs; as consumable products, consumable contacts; as dropping leaves, dropping hints, dropping names (even her name has gone out of fashion). It comes as untied love knots, as mispronouncing your deepest thoughts. It comes as leaving, it comes as staying; it comes as anything, as everything.
\n 
\nSome call it fate, say it spreads like butter on a staircase.
\nOthers the biggest joke there is.
\n 
\nOne day Melinda didn’t feed her oven.
\nShe took no nonsense from dishes who claim the road to feelings is perplexed.
\nShe gulped down all tendencies to be nice to herself.
\nFirst she had a tall drink.
\nThe world was off somewhere, grinning at caged giraffes, taking pictures of quaint cottages or bloodsucking.
\nMillions of fibers clinging to each other, loop chains growing longer and longer.
\n 
\nFate was Melinda knitting scarves, pushing the needle with a bruised thumb.
\nMaking a big bad loop, she turned herself into a hanging ornament
\nwhile a ladybird was passing outside her window.
\n 
\n 
\nMARRIAGE A LA MODE
\n 
\nNobody here makes love like this:
\nwith curtains shut against a screaming sun,
\nminds undone,
\nfingers fierce or delicate of instance,
\nhearts unleashed.
\n 
\nHere the sink shines like the surface of virtue
\nand water boils at a hundred degrees Celcius.
\nOrganic courtesies,
\nhand-picked apologies,
\nso much to say on the freshness of a lettuce.
\n 
\nNobody here makes loves like this:
\nwith skin and soul,
\nthorns and teeth.
\nNobody speaks like a piece of fiction
\nor in a way that encourages addiction.
\n 
\n“Isn’t it time we had kids?
\nThey’ll modify our traits to perfection.
\nWe’ll put their pictures on the mantelpiece
\nas proof of our legitimate completion.
\nAll lovely people should have a couple of these.”
\n 
\nPassion is a moment televised,
\nthen dismissed \u2014 another neutered wish.
\nIt’s a liaison of legal nature,
\na garden of suburban bliss.
\nQuelle surprise!<\/i> Nobody here makes love like this.
\n \u2028 
\nULULA
\n 
\nBecause into the woods I’ve been
\nsticky needs
\nsteaming sins
\npracticing damage
\nhammering trouble.
\nInto the woods I’ve been
\nveined madnesses
\nchauvinist letters
\nejaculated whimpers
\nspurting devices
\nshots of lubricant
\nsenses left to hang as paintings
\nantidote beds
\npillow folklore.
\nLegs were fuckers \u2014 steadfast.
\nVoice was sucker \u2014 saccharine.
\nInto the woods, can’t say I lied about the wolves; can’t say I told the truth about them either.
\nPerhaps one day I’ll cry wolf when the wolf is here.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nDarrell Petska<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nDEVIL ON THIRD
\n 
\nDevil enjoys my cushy bed,
\nthe excess of my table,
\nmy porch swing’s lofty vantage
\ninto neighbor’s tell-all windows
\n 
\nspawning carpool gossip,
\nsmoking on the sly,
\nplaying casino poker while
\nthe boss sits on the john\u2014
\nDevil on third, none out.
\n 
\nMy heavy artillery,
\nJesus Mary Joseph,
\nhasn’t knocked him down.
\nI’ve sought out hiding places
\nbut always find him waiting
\nwith mischiefs on his lips.
\n 
\nWe’ve talked of truces\u2014
\na few minutes of rest every hour
\nmy beleaguered mind could stand\u2014
\neach time he feints toward home
\nbefore our pact takes hold.
\n 
\nI’ve given up, he gets to stay.
\nI mollify his lusts with black
\nlicorice and a modicum of malice
\nspread about with Twitter.
\n 
\nDevil jigging like he owns me\u2014
\nhe never streaks toward home,
\nonly laughs and taunts, daring me
\nto throw the goddamn ball.
\n 
\n 
\nCOMING OF AGE
\n 
\nNothing seemed possible:
\nI wrote b when the problem required a,
\nblocked 6 and 9 from my mind
\nbecause I’d heard they were the devil’s,
\nand tried to improve my lot by praying
\nto Grandma Lu’s St. Euphrosyne,
\na cross-dresser demoted by the Church.
\nOne summer I dated a girl I planned to marry
\nuntil I realized I didn’t like girls.
\nThen the music died, my lottery number in the draft
\ncame up 69, jail sucked, the Fitzgerald sank,
\nbits and pieces of sky kept falling until I volunteered to take
\na potential wonder drug that proved to be a placebo\u2014
\neverything turned shit in a basket
\nso I bought a gun to end it all but as I pulled the trigger
\nI closed my eyes and the bullet merely grazed my scalp.
\nCatatonia commenced until just last month when
\nGrandma Lu’s saint appeared and said get up, you dumb fuck,
\nyou poor excuse for a human. Save the world or something.
\nSo I got up to find that nothing’s changed, nothing
\nstill seems possible, though a and b and 69 now seem
\nto work for me and Grandma Lu’s saint might be on my side.
\nCan 70 be the new 30? Can I hold up the sky?
\nDoesn’t seem possible I’m still around,
\nbut here I am, world. Maybe you should tremble about now.
\n 
\n <\/p>\n

<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nLee Ann Pingel<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nFALLOW
\n 
\nThe horse dead now some years,
\nthe fences have come down.
\nDeer coalesce from the morning mist,
\ntrace their ambling paths as they choose.
\n 
\nFat nuts in the trees again
\nshame my fruitlessness.
\nI watch old men who know a day’s work
\nsnap thick vines from the trees.
\n 
\nGenerations made this cropland. Now it rests.
\nEvery week the tractor mows the forest back.
\nThe engine grinds and rumbles in my chest;
\nI wake thrashing from dreams of turning blades.
\n 
\nBut the animal shriek of Now!<\/i> and Here!<\/i>
\nthat rose from the woods at dusk
\nreverberates still in my spine.
\nA wildness pads into the orchard.
\n 
\nThis ground begins to know its mind again.
\n 
\n 
\nHOW THE VULTURE PRAYS
\n 
\nConvening committees of death
\ntrusting the sure provision
\n 
\nFeasting head-deep in a meal
\ngorging on the gift
\n 
\nWaking the freshly departed
\nwearing the purifier’s tonsure
\n 
\nKettling upward on clouds of warm air
\nbreezily approaching heaven
\n 
\nSpiraling over lakes and fields
\ncackling over the earth-bound
\n 
\nSettling to roost in the highest place
\nfacing east, the direction of dawn
\n 
\nGreeting the light with wings outstretched
\npreening in the new sun
\n 
\nRemembering when its feathers were white
\nlong ago, before the fire
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nCharley Reay<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nCIRCLES
\n  
\nAre best cast under a full moon
\nno headlights, no torches.
\nStalk silently through swathes
\nwashed the silver of matinees
\ncareful not to leave tell-tale trails
\nof broken stalks.
\n  
\nPlant your stakes, and unwind
\nplastic sheathed bundles of cable wire.
\nWork in from the end of your line,
\nshuffle your boots to flatten,
\noverlap circle edges to baffle.
\nBe gone by dawn.
\n 
\n \u2028<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nHeather Lee Rogers<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nFORSAKEN
\n 
\nMy angels
\nlounge on rooftops
\ndrinking blood
\nfrom beer steins
\nlazy drunks with
\nred-stained teeth
\ntrading lewd caresses
\nwith their soft
\nand dingy wings.
\nThey give me no thought
\ndancing helplessly
\nin my red heels
\nspinning to nausea
\nthrowing myself again against
\nthe unrelenting beat.
\n 
\nWhere are their prayers
\nto lift and fold me
\nsafe into my bed,
\nwhere their sweet songs
\nto quiet the frenzy
\nof my wanting?
\nNo, my angels carouse,
\npass out after dawn
\nin a useless pile
\nof feathers and stale sweat.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nKerenza Ryan<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nHADES
\n 
\nI wish I saw the dead
\n(not and the living)
\ninstead of the living.
\nI wish I saw wisps of leftover lives
\nlike last night’s clam chowder
\nwith no microwave to heat it in.
\nMaybe then you wouldn’t feel so real
\nand I wouldn’t be warm blooded.
\n 
\n 
\nCHAPPED
\n 
\nI practice the taste of your lips
\nlate at night
\nwhen the stars are too still;
\nI can’t even wish for a wish.
\nIt doesn’t quench my thirst
\nbut I can’t help licking chapped lips.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nM. S.<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nTHE END OF A GARBLED WEEK
\n <\/p>\n

My sanity was bedridden with a raging headache and a raven’s throat. I was in pieces, pacing the floor with questions I already knew the answers to. I felt as responsible as a teenage pregnancy and was fighting the urge to abort the day. The coughing hacked its way through MTV so I took the couch with me to the bathroom and squeezed tubes of paste, waiting for pop lyrics that never came. The second time I called the support group, I asked for their newest pizza toppings. I remembered reading about tea being the latest cure-all and the doctor slash writer made it seem that he was brewing weed. So I served a cup and avoided the eyes of the reclined form. The room was feverish and threatened to puke me out. I reevaluated my decision of having a funeral – if people didn’t have anything nice to say, they wouldn’t say anything at all. I wanted to be buried in a crate so that they could laugh at me being a square even in death. My mom’s call cut off her eulogy. She asked why I wasn’t at work and I told her I was on sick leave. She started using her indoor voice so I left the phone on the table and let her spells fill the air. I entered the musty bedroom and lay upon my sanity; forehead against forehead, interlocking spread-eagled limbs, ignoring the rave of murmurs against my cheek about green tea (not just any tea) being the new miracle drug.<\/p>\n

 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nEmily Schiavone<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nLIGHTS
\n 
\nLike the groundhog fears her shadow
\nI run from green pickup trucks
\n–not even the right make or model.
\nI’ve lost count of how many months of winter.
\n 
\nRed lights, blue lights,
\na body on my front porch
\nalive this time.
\n 
\nI walk a bit faster,
\nmake sure to lock the new bolt on my door
\nto protect against the threat never spoken
\nthat often passes by my front porch.
\n 
\nRed lights, blue lights
\nknock on the shadow’s door
\nand find no body inside.
\n 
\nGrowing quite tired of the light
\nand the sound the bathroom door still makes
\nscraping past the glue, splinters, and nails
\nlong after I conceded that my gut screamed stop.
\n 
\nRed lights, blue lights
\na body parked in a truck outside
\nwatching my front porch.
\n 
\n \u2028<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nClaire Scott<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nTERESA PARTY OF ONE
\n 
\nmy cheeks burn as she leads me to a table. I bury my face in the menu.
\nthis experiment is definitely
\nNot Working.
\n 
\nStep One: dolled up   perfume lipstick eyeliner    dinner
\nat Chez Panisse says Louise Douglas
\nbest selling author of Healing in Three Simple Steps.<\/i>
\nI sneak out without ordering. Uber home. put on flannel pajamas.
\n 
\nnext day I open the book.
\nStep Two: allow yourself a good cry. fifteen minutes a day.
\nno problem. I sob & sob & sob. look at the clock. two hours have passed.
\nStep Two: Total Failure.
\n 
\nI move on to Step Three: read inspirational verse.
\nI google: most popular grief quotes.
\nCome back. Even as a shadow, even as a dream.<\/i>
\nEuripides
\nDon’t grieve. Anything you lose comes round in another form.<\/i>
\nRumi
\nI don’t want a Shadow \u2003 a Dream \u2003 a Cat \u2003 a Tree.
\nctrl + alt + delete.
\n 
\nwhat does Louise Douglas know anyway? I google OkCupid.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nMarsha Segerberg<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nHETEROSEXUAL PRIVILEGE-LITE
\n 
\nThere’s a Strauss waltz on the radio
\nas I rush to type these words.
\nThe waltz goes with the dream –
\nabout a floating sofa in blue sky.
\n 
\nI\u2019m waiting in traffic and next to me
\non a grassy knoll, sitting on a plush
\nred sofa is a woman in a frilly
\nfrock, hair in ringlets gathered
\n 
\nby a kerchief, man angled next to her
\ntakes up most of the space, one skinny leg
\nfolded upward on the cushion, the other
\ndangled languidly over the side.  He taps
\n 
\non his phone, she smokes a long thin cigarette.
\nThe traffic begins to move.  I look away.
\nWe trundle slowly down the crowded road
\njust getting up to speed when a red
\n 
\n’50’s T-bird rolls by, top down,
\nthe couple sitting in the front seat.
\nThe car lifts off, gently, silently rises
\ngets smaller, higher, with the waltz.
\n 
\nIt floats peacefully, crystalline sky, puffy
\ncloud wings on either side. But they are
\non their red sofa again, woman smokes
\nman plays his phone game. The sofa begins
\n 
\nto twirl slowly on its axis, dumps them out.
\nI think: They are committing suicide —
\nlike Thelma & Louise.<\/i>  But they are not
\ncrashing, just bubbles floating downward
\n 
\nwith the waltz.  He looks up from his game
\nshe tosses her cigarette.  I watch breathless.
\nNear the treetops they tumble
\ninto the waiting arms of a leafless tree,
\n 
\nits willowy branches break their fall,
\ncradle them.  They are saved.
\nThey walk away holding hands, smile
\nto each other, say nothing.
\n 
\nJust a straight couple joyriding
\nwhile the world hums along.
\n 
\n 
\nNOT VERY AFFECTIONATE
\n 
\nOne time I sat in my mother’s lap
\nbecause she asked me to.
\n 
\nIt felt funny.  Then she said
\nyou’re not very affectionate.<\/i>
\n 
\nI wondered what that meant
\nas I tried
\n 
\nnot to lean back into her chest.
\nand some opera singer
\n 
\nchatted with Ed Sullivan
\nbefore singing
\n 
\nbut I remembered
\nthat time the other day
\n 
\nshe threatened to take me
\nto the orphanage.
\n 
\nI couldn’t hear the aria.
\nI only heard my eardrums
\n 
\nringing and worried about
\nbeing too heavy on her lap.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nLacie Semenovich<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nHE WAS POET FAMOUS, NOT REAL PERSON FAMOUS
\n <\/p>\n

Dewey Decimal sits outside the Apple store with a sign: Will catalog for hardbound books and paper cuts.<\/i> Today, the definitions dissolve like snowflakes. We watch the words return to the fabric and cement of objects; analyze chair’s identity crisis of wood, oak, spindles, back, square, seat, legs. Orange is a poem. Hippopotamus is a poem. Bucket sashays his poemness all over the place. Only English majors check out library books. Drugged with dust and dying paper they imagine the audacity of cockroach porn, a chopped and screwed soundtrack of bug lust. Music we do not know still exists despite our ignorance. And the termites tango in the trees, between pages of libraries, chewing through the leaves, but leaving behind the grass growing green.<\/p>\n

 
\n 
\nTHE SIZE OF A LEMON. A PEAR-SHAPED MASS.
\n <\/p>\n

Dear Brother, you are not a tree. Please, stop growing fruit beneath your skin, crushing your spine’s nerves. Stop cradling pears between your heart and lung. Where will the next fruit appear? Your throat? Your knee? Will you find it when it is still a grape? A strawberry? Next time, will you try to be a vine?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The lemon, not cancer. Not cancer pressing your spine. Perhaps you thought your brain had grown too big for your skull. Perhaps an alien invasion, a failed fact-finding mission from alpha centauri. But the pear. The pear ages us more than any year. Brings death closer than any survived car accident skidding to the roadside.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You fight the remnants of the pearflesh pulled from your chest. Against your Marine instinct, your body weakens to fight. Instead of muscle and bullets, you kneel, hands clasped, head pillowed on cool porcelain. Chemicals run and crawl through the obstacle course of your body. There are no machine guns, no long range grenade launchers, nothing bigger than a needle and ten ounce bags labeled with names long enough to fill missiles.<\/p>\n

 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nJohn Short<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nBURGER QUEEN
\n 
\nAn old photo snapped
\nin front of that plastic bubble sign,
\n 
\nour first date being the last time
\nI ate flesh: no more traumatic gristle
\n 
\nand though you were perfection
\nin heels, a pale silver dress
\n 
\nmy carnivorous girlfriend
\nyou persisted with the meat habit
\n 
\nso years later, still together
\nyou criticised me for courgettes,
\n 
\nsaid at the station I’ve become
\ntoo weak to carry your case.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nPaul Smith<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nKEN GRAHAM EXPLAINS NATURALS
\n 
\n“Have a natural”
\nKen Graham explained
\n“In case all your back sights
\nare wiped out
\nset up the transit
\nand get a shot on it”
\nit should be something fixed
\nsomething manmade
\nthat won’t budge
\nlike a chimney
\nthe edge of a building
\na bridge abutment
\nsomething useful
\nit was my first week
\nhe also drew on his hand
\nhow we should grade
\nthe slag center of the dike
\nfairly steep on the back side
\nless so on the front
\non our last week
\nhe yelled at me
\nwhen the dike we built reached the
\nCorps of Engineers lock
\nin a December blizzard
\nyelling because my fingers
\nwere frozen and couldn’t
\nturn the levelling screws
\nhis yelling
\ndid the trick, though
\nand we resumed placing slag, then cover stone
\nand he went back in the trailer
\nboth of us sat there
\nstaring at a smokestack a mile away
\nthat stared back at us
\nin flurries that came down the river
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nAlec Solomita<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nCRUCIFIXION
\n 
\nWhen she bends over, I want to cross her like a bridge,
\nlinger as I pass over her curled feet, over her flattened calves,
\nfreckled manna, nibble the flake-like, honeyed flesh.
\nAscend solemnly the call and response of her thighs,
\nrunning my hand between like the strains of an organ,
\nthen heavenward toward her buttocks, a psalm of David
\ncleft by his sorrow over Absalom. And there I rest
\nin their lament and beauty, and my body responds.
\nA sigh long and lovely as the Song of Solomon escapes
\nher mouth. She turns to me, eyes green as infidelity,
\nlips thick swollen lies until they lift in a smile
\nsimple and sunny as a proverb. I inch up her back
\nentering her like a rich man through a needle’s narrow eye.
\nHer arms spread out like crossbars, where I rest my own.
\n 
\n 
\nFREE AT LAST
\n 
\n“Heat’s off, stove’s off, got my wallet,
\nkeys, and watch.” Decades passed without
\na change. Then came someone named
\nGates, then came someone named Jobs,
\n 
\nand latching on them a fat slice of millennial
\nlemmings. At first, I stood firmly in the
\nrighteous remnant: “I don’t want all that
\nshite and I don’t need it.” Time passed
\n 
\nas it always does, not a lot of it, just a
\nfew years. Now I’m wedded to my desktop,
\nshackled to my laptop, bound to my Kindle,
\nbut most of all, I’m a phone-carrying fellow
\n 
\ntraveler, addicted to rings and dings and
\na surfeit of other sad and useless things.
\n“But all the stuff you can do!” cry my friends.
\n“All the apps! You can bank while you drive!”
\n 
\nBANK WHILE YOU DRIVE?
\nI’m motoring across the Charles from
\nCambridge to Boston when my pants
\njangle. I cross lanes as I delve
\n 
\ninto my pocket for my cell, almost
\neliminating a pair of pedestrians
\nwalking together and texting like
\ndreamers. I pull over on the bridge,
\n 
\nleave the car running, dig out the phone,
\nand just as Siri says, “What can I do for you?”
\nI let it sail, a Hail Mary pass if ever there was one.
\nThe phone floats for a moment on the storied
\n 
\nriver then disappears under a skim of sculls.
\n“App this!” I shout into a suddenly chill
\nbreeze, “You son of a bitch! App this!”
\nA few seconds pass before I dive in after it.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nDavid Spicer<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nNOT A RUMOR
\nHugh Hefner, 1926-2017<\/i>
\n 
\nIt’s true. Old lecher Hugh Hefner is dead:
\nthe stud who got laid more than Picasso
\nhas met his maker and Her name is God.
\nHe’ll mansplain his high life as Romeo
\nto the arch broad in charge of true blue heaven
\nwhere the angels have wings shaped like round dongs,
\nand when he talks it won’t be confession –
\nhe’ll compliment God’s golden-glitter thongs.
\n 
\nNo. He’ll recite his articles about
\nmusic, plus politics – and interviews
\nwith great, beautiful minds that celebrate
\nthe world of randy men loving corkscrews,
\nand God will welcome him with open wings
\nslapping him on his mouth until it sings.
\n 
\n <\/p>\n

BURYING THE DEAD
\n  
\n“I am unable to look at your
\n face, much less extract your
\n whole
\n self
\n from the broken trap.
\n  
\n Look,
\nI’ve made you a shroud, for in death
\n you will be tasteful and solemn,
\n appropriate, mourned. Let us pretend
\n it is not a paper towel slung over a
\n half bit of cardboard
\n from Amazon Prime.\u201d
\n  
\n  –Me to the mouse, en route to the
\n \u2003 \u2003 garbage can
\n  
\nMOUSE TRILOGY by Tiffany Lee Brown<\/strong><\/p>\n

 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nM. Stone<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nBAD BLOOD
\n 
\nThe phone rings just before midnight.
\nOur eyes meet, lead lining our bellies
\nas you answer and listen to a doctor
\nwith an Appalachian drawl say,
\n“Your brother is dying.”
\n  
\nThis stranger on the line cannot know
\nhow you and your brother almost came
\nto blows at your father’s funeral.
\n  
\nHe cannot fathom that his ailing patient
\nused to park in front of the family home,
\nrevving his engine and flashing the lights,
\nunspoken threats to your widowed mother.
\n  
\nYou tell the doctor, “Don’t call here again.”
\nI see relief, a stark sheet, pass over your face.
\nYou will rest well tonight, no longer dreading
\na rabid stray at the door.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nFrankie Suzo<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nOF PEOPLE
\n 
\nI couldn’t have known,
\nhearing the drawer of your dresser slide out,
\nthat you had a short-barrel pistol
\nstuffed in a tube sock with
\ntwo red stripes around the top,
\nthe upper thicker than the lower.
\n 
\nAnd it was beyond me to think
\nthe man in the lot outside my office window
\nhad somebody’s body in the blue tarp
\nhe was folding; stepping down its edges
\nthe way you have to do
\nwith that thick blue material.
\n 
\nWho would imagine the mother
\nsmoking a cigarette on the bench by the wooden slides
\non the south-side of the park gently
\nrubbed the pussy of her six-year-old daughter at night in their townhouse,
\ndownstairs, on the green faux-suede sofa in front of the television,
\nwhile they waited for her husband, the girl’s father, to make it home.
\n 
\nWhat the fuck do I know
\nabout a thing?
\nI knew I was being left
\nwhen Corey said she was thinking
\nof buying a condo.
\n 
\nThere was a case;
\nlet’s say instance or incident:
\n 
\nA man killed his six children
\nand Pretzel, the family dog.
\nThat was in 1978; the man died in 2017.
\n 
\nIn Seattle, a woman
\nmassacred six family members from three generations.
\nIt was Christmas Eve.
\n 
\nIn a hospital,
\nsix people died.
\nThey had reported nausea, abdominal pain, and shortness of breath 45 minutes into dialysis.
\n 
\nThe dialysis machines were sealed off.
\nTheir families received $660 (USD).
\n 
\nIn my 20s
\nI finally started trying to own the
\nfact my families and closest communities
\nhad at the least neglected me.
\nA man taught me that neglect
\nwas at least abuse
\nwhen I was near forty.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nDavid M. Taylor<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nMARVIN GAYE
\n 
\nWe sat in the lingering silence
\nof our high school parking lot,
\nso you could stop the earth from spinning,
\nforce the universe from collapsing
\ninto itself for one more night.
\n 
\nI tried to sober you up
\nwith cold coffee and stale bread,
\nbut you puked up my efforts, creating
\na splatter painting on the sidewalk.
\n 
\nYou needed to be home before curfew,
\nbefore your father got back from the bar
\nwhere he visits for salvation
\nafter the graveyard shift at the auto plant.
\n 
\nIf you weren’t home before him,
\nyou’d feel his belt in the morning,
\ncome limping to school
\nlike the wounded dog we once saw
\nin the field by your house.
\n 
\nI knew I’d be blamed for your defiance,
\nbut I was trying to save you
\nfrom drowning in your mother’s memory.
\n 
\nHow she’d dance in the living room
\nwith a glass of wine and sing Marvin Gaye
\nwhile waiting for your father to come home.
\n 
\nAnd he never got the irony it was a drunk driver
\nwho crushed the steel of her car,
\nturned it into a tomb that kept her broken body intact
\nafter being suffocated in her own blood.
\n 
\nI wasn’t brave enough to see her at the funeral,
\nto have my last memory of her cold and still,
\nor watch your eyes question a benevolent god.
\n 
\nBut now I watch you become consumed,
\nlike your father, with brake pads and beer,
\ntry to spit out the grease and hate
\nin the blurred hours of morning.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nP. C. Vandall<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nTHE DILEMMA
\n 
\nIt was never about
\nwhether or not
\nto eat the grapes
\nbut whether to eat
\neach one slowly,
\nletting sweet innards spill
\nagainst my lively pink
\ntongue or take in mouthfuls,
\nand split skins with my teeth
\nlike sharpened pick-axes.
\nYou did not enter
\nthe equation, till long
\nafter they were gone
\nand only then
\ndid  I surmise
\nyour indignation,
\nthe furrow of your brows
\nfrowning from your forehead
\nwhen fingers reached deep
\ninto the bowl and felt
\nbrown skeletal branches.
\nI would blame the goblins.
\nThe goblins did it!
\nThe goblins gobbled the grapes.
\nThey also took the cash
\nfrom the bedside table,
\nthe car keys, and the wedding
\nring you slipped in your pocket.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nPaul Waring<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nA CONFERENCE OF CROWS
\n 
\nThey paint a black coat
\non top of fence poles
\nclose to the waterfront
\nperched, arms behind backs,
\nstern as schoolmasters
\nin gowns at assembly
\n 
\nand stare, fearless
\nin the face of wind
\nthat rages from the Irish Sea
\ntaking turns
\nto caw strategy
\nabout death in corvid code.
\n 
\nA morning conference
\nof murderous intent
\nto find feeding grounds
\nand share intelligence
\nabout comings and goings
\nfrom nearby nests
\n 
\nand the timing of raids
\nwith family and friends
\nwho watch and await
\nnews of opportunities
\nbroken like fresh-baked bread
\nto feed the agenda of the day.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nMatt Whitfield<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nRAINDROPS
\n 
\na friend of mine told me
\nthat musicians in paris
\nused to piss out the window during church
\nbecause the cathedral bathrooms were
\nso
\nfar
\naway
\n 
\nand that passersby would be treated
\nto a surprise sun shower
\non beautiful french spring mornings
\n 
\nwhen i was a child i used to
\nstick out my tongue and
\ntaste the rain as it fell
\nfrom the sky
\n 
\nnow i do not
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nCatherine G. Wolf<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nI DIDN’T KNOW
\n 
\nIt’s May 25, my birthday!
\nMy family surprised me by taking me to
\nthe running trail around the lake in Pocantico Hills.
\n 
\nThe afternoon sun is glancing off the lake
\nlike a ring of fire. I never knew I loved lakes,
\nso placid and calm like a Buddhist master.
\nWhether small, like this one or large as Lake Sunapee,
\nproviding shelter for fuzzy goslings and their parents.
\nI swam with my father out in Lake Sunapee floating
\non our backs as he sung \u201cI’m forever blowing bubbles.\u201d
\n 
\nI didn’t know how much I loved hills, running up them,
\nme at the end of the pack, we could see the distant town
\nfrom the highest cliff, or the glorious rush of adrenaline
\ncross country skiing downhill.
\n 
\nI didn’t know that I loved snow, sliding down
\nCollege Hill on trays purloined from the cafeteria,
\nthe full moon creating diamonds of each snowflake.
\nHard to believe each snowflake is unique.
\n 
\nI never knew I loved leaves, crunching brown
\nbeneath my feet like tiny drums, or discarded beer cans.
\nI don’t like comparing leaves to beer cans.
\nOr green above me forming a glorious canopy.
\n 
\nI didn’t know how much I loved shadows, long at sunset,
\ntiny at noon, the length of the shadow proportional
\nto the cotangent of the sun’s elevation angle from the horizon.
\nI have a picture of my pregnant daughter’s shadow
\ntilting towards the shadow of her husband.
\n 
\nI never knew how much I liked meadows, the running trail
\nbisecting fields of yellow and purple wildflowers.
\nI sometimes picked a yellow to put in curly red hair.
\n 
\nI didn’t know how I liked fog, smudging edges of
\nbuildings like a Monet painting, making oncoming
\nheadlights into soft glow. I don’t miss driving in fog.
\n 
\nI never knew how many things I loved until I
\nwas in my wheelchair on the trail where I used to run.
\n 
\n 
\nPANDORA CHANNELS THE SIXTIES (AND A FEW OTHER YEARS)
\n 
\nA hard rain’s a-gonna fall.
\nAdmit that the waters
\naround you have grown,
\nthere’s a battle outside
\nand it’s ragin’.
\nThe times they are a-changin’.
\nYou won’t have a name
\nwhen you ride the big airplane.
\nAll they will call you is
\nDeportee.
\nThere’s a bad moon
\non the rise.
\n 
\nI won’t back down.
\nI’ll stand my ground.
\nSmile on your brother.
\nEverybody get together,
\ntry to love one another.
\nThis land is my land.
\nThis land is your land.
\nWell I’ve got a hammer
\nand I’ve got a bell.
\nIt’s the hammer of justice.
\nIt’s the bell of freedom.
\nIt’s the song about love
\nbetween my brothers and my sisters.
\nI walk with friends of every nation
\non freedom’s highway.
\nHallelujah!
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nStella Wulf<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nLETTER FROM A DEAD KING IN LIMBO
\n <\/p>\n

My dear boy, I have been patient, I have not harried or haunted beyond the necessary manifestation to shake you from procrastination, but I have of late a need to know if you are wont to front this show. Are you, or are you not, resolved to execute the plot? Why suffer still, those arrows and slings, come, spread those swift avenging wings, be strong my son, just get a grip, don’t bow to the oppressor’s whip. I know not where, I know not why but resolution’s turned awry, and conscience doth a coward make, why don’t you act for goodness sake? I’m sorry if you think me piqued but frankly I’m a little freaked by what grim forfeit they did earn, poor Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. You blindly slayed Polonius with thrust in haste erroneous, and poor Ophelia’s drown\u00e9d – dead. My son, I think you’ve lost your head! You’ve dithered long beyond the joke, it isn’t funny roiling folk, alas, poor Yorick can attest that in the grave there is no jest. All I ask’s a little vengeance, a mere ghost of firm intention, won’t you find the name of action, end this grim dissatisfaction? Save me from this purgatory, give up this damned soliloquy, Is it to be or not to be? That is the question — R.S.V.P<\/p>\n

 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nMark Young<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nTHE YIN & YANG OF CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS
\n 
\nThe macaques’ rabid
\ncaroling kept him
\n 
\nawake on his return
\nto Europe. He dreamt
\n 
\nof the Americas & the
\ncapuchins’ plainsong.
\n 
\n 
\nTHANKSGIVING DAY, 1976
\n 
\nI have never
\nliked the last
\n 
\nwaltz of The
\nLast Waltz<\/i>, but
\n 
\nthe rest of the
\nmovie is magic.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\nGo to the Poets’ Bios<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nSally Zakariya<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nAFTER THE ECLIPSE
\n 
\nAnd then it’s over \u2014 the midday darkness lifts,
\nthe moon loses its fiery crown, the sun returns full force.
\n 
\nThe same yet different \u2014 something has changed.
\nA few minutes’ suspension of the day’s discord
\n 
\nand we are put in our place, mere spectators for once,
\nrelinquishing our audacious sense of agency and control.
\n 
\nA slim thumbnail of light and millions stand amazed,
\nhumbled, no longer masters of the universe.
\n 
\nA two-minute reprieve, a chance for contemplation,
\nfor reflection, before the world turns on its wounded way.
\n 
\n 
\nTHE END OF CORN SEASON
\n 
\nThe ears are smaller, stunted kernels clustered at the tips.
\nAnd no more ten for a dollar – the price has gone way up.
\n 
\nCan you live on corn? Lord knows we’ve tried – on the cob,
\nsuccotash, relish, fritters – crisp gold worth all the husking.
\n 
\nButter and salt the taste of sunshine – nibble row on row
\nplaying the corn cob harmonica, music in your mouth.
\n 
\nBut as the season thinks about changing, as tomatoes and berries
\nbegin to play hard to find, now we have to think about good-byes.
\n 
\nGood-bye to the dark-tipped silk that ought to be good for something
\nbut isn’t. Good-bye to the sharp crack of the stalk when you snap it.
\n 
\nGood-bye to the sun-hot farmers’ market, to burgers on the grill,
\nto the daft daydream of summer without end. The calendar says
\n 
\nit’s not fall yet, but the corn says otherwise. The corn says
\ncooler days are coming, longer nights. Get ready for the end.
\n 
\n 
\n<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nA Little About The Poets
\n 
\n 
\nMike Alexander<\/a><\/strong> is the author of one full-length poetry collection \u2014 Retrograde (2013), & several chapbooks. His work has appeared in Rattle, Measure, Raintown Review, River Styx,<\/i> & elsewhere. Mike devotes his spare time to Houston Public Poetry, Poetry FIX, an acoustic-electric six-string, & his private hallucinations.
\n 
\n 
\nAnastasia Andersen<\/a><\/strong> is a Pushcart nominee whose work has appeared in Puerto del Sol,  Southwestern American Literature, and  Poet Lore.  She received her MFA in creative writing from the University of New Mexico (UNM) and teaches poetry workshops through UNM Continuing Education.
\n 
\n 
\nRaymond Philip Asaph<\/a><\/strong>‘s poems and fiction have appeared in Poetry, Glimmer Train, Tampa Review, Mississippi Review, The Humanist<\/i>, and elsewhere. Good fortunes have included a Vogelstein grant for poetry, a Stadler undergraduate fellowship to Bucknell University, and a graduate fellowship to NYU. Asaph’s first book, Four Short Stories and Ten Love Poems<\/i> was published in October of 2017. Off the page, the author goes by “Philip” and can be reached at philasaph@gmail.com.
\n 
\n 
\nJudy Shepps Battle<\/a><\/strong> has been writing essays and poems long before retiring from being a psychotherapist and sociology professor. She is a New Jersey resident, addictions specialist, consultant and freelance writer. Her poems have been accepted in a variety of publications including Ascent Aspirations; Barnwood Press; Battered Suitcase; Caper Literary Journal; Epiphany Magazine; Joyful; Message in a Bottle Poetry Magazine; Raleigh Review; Rusty Truck; Short, Fast and Deadly; and the Tishman Review.
\n 
\n 
\nClayre Benzadon<\/a><\/strong> is a recent graduate of Brandeis University with a B.A in Psychology and Creative Writing. She has been the editor-in-chief for the school’s oldest literary magazine (Laurel Moon) for a year and has also been published by the The Acentos Review, the Merrimack Review, and Triadae Magazine. Additionally, she attended The Ashbery Home School, a week-long writing workshop and conference in Miami, which she attended last year.
\n 
\n 
\nTiffany Lee Brown<\/a><\/strong> is a writer & artist living in Sisters, Ore. Her poetry has appeared in Slow Trains, Art Access, and The Human Growth Experiment (Water Line Press), among others. The prose poems of her book A Compendium of Miniatures (Tiger Food Press, 2007) also appeared in the installation “Against the Wall” in the group show Re\/Construct, in various multidisciplinary performances, and on a window made by a stained glass artist. She is an editor at Plazm magazine.
\n 
\n 
\nHelen Burke<\/a><\/strong> is a poet turned artist; her work has exhibited in the UK and France; she currently has an exhibition in Leeds, England. Her art can be seen on krazyphils.com<\/a> and origamipoems.com<\/a>; she designs greeting cards and fabric and likes to work in acrylic, mixed-media, collagraph, and water colour. Helen’s new book, Roman Holiday, is just out this week and is available now from www.krazyphils.com<\/a>. You can check out Helen’s poem When I Was at Woodstock<\/i> here<\/a>.
\n 
\n 
\nNicole Byrnside<\/a><\/strong> has been a Champaign, IL resident for 21 years, and for about the same amount of time, has worked in an auto salvage\/metal recycling facility.  She is a mother of four children ages 5, 8,10 and 16, and am a member of CU Poetry, a writing group that has been an endless source of inspiration and encouragement.  Her fellow Cuppers have assisted in reviving her, pulling her out of a creative coma, and rekindling her desire to write again.
\n 
\n 
\nWendy Taylor Carlisle<\/a><\/strong> lives in the Arkansas Ozarks. She is the author of two books and five chapbooks, most recently They Went to the Woods to Play<\/strong> (LoCoFo Chaps, 2017).  See more about her and her work at www.wendytaylorcarlisle.com<\/a>.
\n 
\n 
\nHeather Chandler<\/a><\/strong> lives in Central Texas where she teaches English and writes poetry and short stories. Her work has appeared in The Avalon Literary Review, Down in the Dirt Magazine<\/i>, and The Lookout<\/i>. In her spare time, you can find her in the kitchen making coconut cream pies and drinking coffee.
\n 
\n 
\nJoe Cottonwood<\/a><\/strong> still works as a carpenter, plumber, and electrician (whatever pays) when knees and shoulder allow. Nights, he writes. He lives in La Honda, California, where he built a house and raised a family under (and at mercy of) giant redwood trees. More at www.joecottonwood.com<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nBirkenhead-born recovering actor Ken Cumberlidge<\/a><\/strong> has been writing and performing poetry, songs and stories on and off for 40+ years, during which his work has popped up sporadically in print (SMOKE, Bogg, Ludd’s Mill) and, more recently, online (Algebra of Owls \/ Allegro \/ Ink, Sweat & Tears \/ The Open Mouse \/ Picaroon \/ Spilling Cocoa . . . \/ Strange Poetry \/ Snakeskin).  Since 2011 he’s been based in Norwich, where he can be seen muttering and gesticulating in the company of an embarrassed-looking dog.  Don’t worry – the dog’s fine.
\n 
\n 
\nMaureen Daniels<\/a><\/strong> teaches English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, where she is also a doctoral fellow in creative writing. She is an editorial assistant for Prairie Schooner and Western American Literature. Her work has recently been published in Sinister Wisdom, Wilde Magazine, Gertrude Press, Third Wednesday<\/i> and the South Florida Poetry Review<\/i>.
\n 
\n 
\nStephen M. Dickey<\/a><\/strong> has recently published poetry in Asses of Parnassus, The Lyric, The Rotary Dial, Quarterday Review<\/i>, and Indefinite Space<\/i>, and a a short story in Word Riot. He has published numerous translations of Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian fiction and poetry including Me\u0161a Selimovi\u0107’s “Death and the Dervish” and Miljenko Jergovi\u0107’s “The Walnut Mansion.”
\n 
\n 
\nCat Dixon<\/a><\/strong> is the author of Eva<\/i> and Too Heavy to Carry<\/i> (Stephen F. Austin University Press, 2016, 2014) and The Book of Levinson<\/i> and Our End Has Brought the Spring<\/i> (Finishing Line Press, 2017, 2015). She is the Managing Editor of The Backwaters Press. Her website is catdix.com<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nThomas J. Erickson<\/a><\/strong>‘s poems have appeared  in numerous publications. His award-winning chapbook, “The Lawyer Who Died in the Courthouse Bathroom,” was published by Parallel Press of the University of Wisconsin Libraries in 2013.  His full length poetry book, “The Biology of Consciousness,” was published this year by Pebblebrook Press.  He was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2016.   He is an attorney in Milwaukee.
\n 
\n 
\nSince 2014 Frederick Foote<\/a><\/strong> has published over a hundred-fifty stories and poems including literary, science fiction, fables, and horror genres. Frederick has published two short story collections, For the Sake of Soul, (2015) and Crossroads Encounters, (2016).
\n 
\n 
\nKathy Gee<\/a><\/strong> lives in Worcestershire, UK. She works in museums and heritage. Widely published online and on paper, in 2016 her first collection – Book of Bones – was published by V. Press<\/a> and she wrote the spoken word elements for a contemporary choral piece – suiteforthefallensoldier.com<\/a>.
\n 
\n 
\nT. L. Hayes<\/a><\/strong> has two novels published through Bold Strokes Books, A Class Act<\/i> and Sweet Boy and Wild One<\/i>, and her third will be out next fall. You can also find her short stories published through Sapphire Books. She resides in Springfield, Illinois. Find her on Facebook or at TLHayesweb.com<\/a>.
\n 
\n 
\nRobin Helweg-Larsen<\/a><\/strong>‘s poetry has mostly been published in the UK (Ambit, Snakeskin, etc), but also in The Lyric, The Hypertexts, The Rotary Dial, the Phoenix Rising sonnet anthology, etc. British-born but Bahamas-raised, he lives in his home town of Governor’s Harbour on Eleuthera. For more of Robin’s work in Rat’s Ass Review, check out the Spring\/Summer 2016 and 2017 issues, the Love & Ensuing Madness collection, and the Such an Ugly Time collection.
\n 
\n 
\nSabrina Hicks<\/a><\/strong> lives in the Southwest. She was the Grand Prize winner of the Writer’s Digest 85th Annual Writing Competition for her fiction. Her work has appeared in Gyroscope Review, Spelk Fiction, Panoply, and Poetry Breakfast.
\n 
\n 
\nElisabeth Horan<\/a><\/strong> is a poet mother and teacher living in Vermont. Her work has recently been featured at Dying Dahlia Review and Quail Bell Magazine. She has work upcoming at Algebra of Owls and Midnight Lane Boutique. She spends time with her three beautiful horses, Deuce, Flynn and Copper for therapy. Follow @ehoranpoet and ejfhoran@weebly.com.
\n 
\n 
\nRob Hunter<\/a><\/strong>‘s collection of poems, September Swim<\/i>, was published by Spoon River Poetry Press. His poems have appeared in Poet Lore, The Oddville Press, Timberline Review, Sleet, Wild Violet, Straight Forward Poetry, The Blueline Anthology, and others. In 2013 he was a featured writer at Hartwick College’s New American Writers Festival. In 2012 he was an editor of Birchsong, an Anthology of Vermont Poetry<\/i>. He has been teaching high school English since 1991.
\n 
\n 
\nA former art professor remarked that Clarissa Jakobsons<\/a><\/strong>‘ sketchbooks look more like poetry than paintings. Who would have guessed this observation accurately predicted her current direction? Artist, poet, and instructor, Clarissa weaves one-of-a kind artist books exhibited internationally. Don’t be surprised to see her inner artist kicking sandcastles, climbing Mount Diablo, painting Provincetown dunes, or writing poems under an Ohio crescent moon.
\n 
\n 
\nKristine Jepsen<\/a><\/strong> is a writer and farm business owner in Northeast Iowa whose work appears in the Driftless Region’s Inspire(d) Magazine<\/i>. She’s writing a memoir about founding a Midwestern grass-fed beef company, a project that earned a spot in the AWP Writer-to-Writer mentorship program. She is also a 2017 finalist in the Personal Essay competition at Proximity Magazine<\/i> and the winner of the Diana Woods Memorial Award in Creative Nonfiction, with the journal Lunch Ticket<\/i>.
\n 
\n 
\nJacqueline Jules<\/a><\/strong> is the author of three chapbooks,  Field Trip to the Museum<\/i>, (Finishing Line Press), Stronger Than Cleopatra<\/i> (ELJ Publications), and Itzhak Perlman’s Broken String<\/i>, winner of the 2016 Helen Kay Chapbook Prize from Evening Street Press.  Her poetry has appeared in over 100 publications including Rat’s Ass Review, Glass,  Beltway Poetry, Innisfree Poetry Journal, Gargoyle<\/i>,  and Connecticut River Review<\/i>. She is also the author of forty books for young readers. Visit her online at jacquelinejules.com<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nTim Kahl<\/a><\/strong> (www.timkahl.com)<\/a> is the author of Possessing Yourself (CW Books, 2009), The Century of Travel (CW Books, 2012) and The String of Islands (Dink, 2015). His work has been published in Prairie Schooner, Drunken Boat, Mad Hatters’ Review, Indiana Review, Metazen, Ninth Letter, Sein und Werden, Notre Dame Review, The Really System, Konundrum Engine Literary Magazine, The Journal, The Volta, Parthenon West Review, Caliban and many other journals in the U.S. He is also editor of Clade Song (www.cladesong.com)<\/a>. He is the vice president and events coordinator of The Sacramento Poetry Center. He also has a public installation in Sacramento {In Scarcity We Bare The Teeth}. He plays flutes, guitars, ukuleles, charangos and cavaquinhos. He currently teaches at California State University, Sacramento, where he sings lieder while walking on campus between classes.
\n <\/p>\n

 
\nMiriam Kramer<\/a><\/strong> studied Creative Writing at Pacific University, and works at a local bookstore. Her work has been published in The Rising Phoenix Review. She lives in Bound Brook, NJ, with her faucet obsessed cat, Ernie. Miriam has recited her poetry to friends and strangers in parking lots and coffee shops all over the country. She is overly sentimental, regularly rescuing items from other peoples’ garbage.
\n 
\n 
\nAndrew Kuck<\/a><\/strong> was born in Ypsilanti, Michigan. After graduating from college, he spent a year teaching science in the Marshall Islands. He now teaches high school mathematics in the United States, but his poetry and prose continue to be influenced by the time he spent on that small collection of coral atolls in the Pacific Ocean.
\n 
\n 
\nIsabelle Lang<\/a><\/strong> recently received a Masters degree in English Literature from Mississippi State University, and is currently an MFA candidate in poetry at the University of Nevada-Reno where she also teaches Composition. Her work has recently appeared in The Pittsburgh Poetry Review.<\/i>
\n 
\n 
\nMare Leonard<\/a><\/strong> has published chapbooks at 2River, Pudding House, Antrim House Press and RedOchreLit. Her poetry has appeared in The Naugatuck Review, Hubbub, Cloudbank, The Chronogram, Earth’s Daughter, Ilya’s Honey and most recently in A Rat’s Ass Review, Perfume River, The Courtship of Wind, New Verse News,  Bindweed, Forage and the New Independents. In 2017, she won First Finalist in  the NY State Di Biase Poetry Contest. She lives in an old school house overlooking the Rondout Creek in Kingston, NY. Away from her own personal blackboard, she teaches writing workshops for all ages through the Institute for Writing and Thinking and the MAT program at Bard College.
\n 
\n 
\nA recent transplant from New York, Nancy Lind<\/a><\/strong> is a retired professor of English literature and a lifetime Dickensian.  Nancy currently resides in Pasadena, CA where she has been active in regional poetry groups and events. She has been nominated for the Pushcart  prize. Most recently Nancy’s poems have been published in Impulse, Ibis Head, Three Quarters Journal, the Journal of Modern Poetry’s 2016 Protest<\/i> edition and both the 2015 and 2016 editions of the Altadena Poetry Review<\/i>.
\n 
\n 
\nPaul Lymanson<\/a><\/strong> lives quietly in a forest. He has no academic credentials.
\n 
\n 
\nTim Mayo<\/a><\/strong>‘s second collection, Thesaurus of Separation<\/i> (Phoenicia Publishing, 2016), was a finalist for the 2017 Montaigne Medal and a 2017 poetry category finalist for the Eric Hoffer Book Award. Among the many places his poems and reviews have appeared are Avatar Review, Barrow Street, Narrative Magazine, Poetry International, Poet Lore, Salamander, Web Del Sol Review of Books, Verse Daily<\/i>, and The Writer’s Almanac<\/i>. He is a six time Pushcart Prize Nominee.
\n 
\n 
\nJane Miller<\/a><\/strong>‘s poetry has appeared in the Iron Horse Literary Review, Summerset Review, cahoodaloodaling, Watershed Review, Mojave River Review, Pittsburgh Poetry Review, and Broadkill Review among others. She has been nominated for Best News Poets, Best of the Net and was a finalist in the 2017 Red Wheelbarrow Poetry Contest. She received a 2014 Individual Artist Fellowship in poetry from the Delaware Division of the Arts and lives in Wilmington, DE.
\n 
\n 
\nDevon Miller-Duggan<\/a><\/strong> has published poems in Rattle, Shenandoah, Margie, Christianity and Literature, Gargoyle. She teaches Creative Writing at the University of Delaware. Her books include Pinning the Bird to the Wall (2008), Neither Prayer, Nor Bird (2013), Alphabet Year, (2017).
\n 
\n 
\nSuchoon Mo<\/a><\/strong> is a retired academic living in the semiarid part of Colorado. He composes music and writes poems. Some of them appear in literary and cultural publications.
\n 
\n 
\nFrank C. Modica<\/a><\/strong> is a retired public school special education teacher living in Urbana, Illinois. He taught special education for 34 years. Since his retirement from teaching he volunteers with several arts and social service organizations in his community. He writes poetry, short stories, and creative non-fiction. His work has appeared in Black Heart Magazine, The Tishman Review, Crab Fat Literary Magazine, Pegasus and FewerThan500.
\n 
\n 
\nAlice Morris<\/a><\/strong> comes to writing with a background in art – published in a West Virginia textbook and The New York Art Review<\/i>. Her poems appear in The Broadkill Review, Delaware Beach Life, Silver Birch Press, The Avocet, The Weekly Avocet, The White Space – Selected Poems<\/i>. Poems are also published in collections, anthologized in Ice Cream Poems, The Way to My Heart, Rehoboth Reimagined<\/i>, and Bared<\/i>. She lives in Delaware with her husband and Sammy, their cat.
\n 
\n 
\nEuphrates Moss<\/a><\/strong> has been writing since age 3. He has published various sketches in the Jibsheet, a weekly newspaper published at Bellevue Community College. He graduated from Bellevue Community College with an A.A. Degree in Spring 2007 and from Seattle University with a B.A. in English\/Creative Writing in 2011. Don’t hold that against him, though. His current book of poems is titled Telos and Other Psychographs.
\n 
\n 
\nJohn David Muth<\/a><\/strong> was born and raised in central New Jersey. For the last seventeen years, he have been an academic advisor for Rutgers University. The main focus of his poetry is satire, particularly romantic relationships and modern values. Some of his poems have appeared in San Pedro River Review, Verse-Virtual<\/i>, and US 1 Worksheets<\/i>. His second collection, Inevitable Carbon<\/i> (Aldrich Press), was published this year and can be found on Amazon.com.
\n 
\n 
\nRobert Nisbet<\/a><\/strong> is a Welsh poet who taught English in high schools for over 30 years, and creative writing at college level for a further 12. His poems have been published widely in Britain and the USA, including San Pedro River Review, Constellations and Verse-Virtual.
\n 
\n 
\n Sierra Ortega<\/a><\/strong> is an emerging multi-disciplinary performance artist\/poet living and working in Brooklyn, NY. They received an MA in performance studies from New York University in 2016 and an MA in rhetorical studies from Hofstra University in 2015. Their poetry has been published in Alphanumeric and their self-published chapbook anxious erotic is forthcoming. Follow them on Instagram @sierra_o.
\n 
\n 
\nSergio A. Ortiz<\/a><\/strong> is the founding editor of Undertow Tanka Review. He is a two-time Pushcart nominee, a four-time Best of the Web nominee, and 2016 Best of the Net nominee. 2nd place in the 2016 Ram\u00f3n Ataz annual poetry competition, sponsored by Alaire Publishing House. He is currently working on his first full-length collection of poems, Elephant Graveyard.
\n 
\n 
\nBasilike Pappa<\/a><\/strong> lives in Greece, where she teaches English and smokes a cigarette after the lessons. Her flash fiction has appeared in Life & Art Magazine<\/i> and Intrinsick<\/i>, and her poetry in Rat’s Ass Review, Surreal Poetics<\/i> and Bones – Journal for Contemporary Haiku<\/i>. Places she can be found are: office, living-room, kitchen, garden, down by the river, up on the hills. Her work can be seen on basilikepappablog.wordpress.com<\/a>.
\n 
\n 
\nDarrell Petska<\/a><\/strong>‘s writing has appeared in Red Paint Hill, Mobius: The Journal of Social Change, Chiron Review, Rat’s Ass Review: Such an Ugly Time, Bird’s Thumb and elsewhere (see conservancies.wordpress,com<\/a>). Darrell worked for many years as communications editor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, leaving finally to focus on his own writing and his family. He lives in Middleton, Wisconsin.
\n 
\n 
\nLee Ann Pingel<\/a><\/strong> lives in Athens, Georgia, where she owns Expert Eye Editing. Previously she served as editor for the University of Georgia’s Department of Independent and Distance Learning. She holds degrees in creative writing, political science, and religion. Her work has been published in Motif 2: Come What May<\/i> from Motes Books and Crossing Lines<\/i> from Main Street Rag, as well as in Rascal, Pink Panther Magazine, Hobo Camp Review, The Fib Review, Plainsongs<\/i>, and other journals.
\n 
\n 
\nCharley Reay<\/a><\/strong> is a Newcastle based writer from the Lincolnshire Fens.  Their poems are published by Obsessed With Pipework, Ink, Sweat & Tears, and Three Drops press among others.  Charley also performs on the North East spoken word scene.
\n 
\n 
\nHeather Lee Rogers<\/a><\/strong> compulsively tells stories as a writer and an actor in NYC.  In addition to proudly appearing here in Rat’s Ass’s Love and Ensuing Madness section, her poems have also been read in the following printed and online publications: Harbinger Asylum, Here Comes Everyone (UK), Leopardskin & Limes, El Portal  S\/Tick, Waterways, Adanna Literary Journal, Jersey Devil Press and the Kaaterskill Basin Lit Journal. More of her work can be read at heatherleerogerspoetry.weebly.com<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nKerenza Ryan<\/a><\/strong> is a student at Cairn University studying English. Her work has been published in Corvus Review, Peeking Cat Poetry, Poetry Quarterly, and other literary journals. She can be found writing about writing on twitter @KerenzaRyan, or working her way through college in Bristol, PA.
\n 
\n 
\nM. S.<\/a><\/strong> writes like she almost means it. She lives in Mumbai, India.
\n 
\n 
\nEmily Schiavone<\/a><\/strong> grew up in the suburbs of Chicago and is currently an assistant professor of Physics and Engineering at Viterbo University. She has published poetry in The Naga.
\n 
\n 
\nClaire Scott<\/a><\/strong> is an award winning poet who has been nominated twice for the  Pushcart Prize. Her work has been accepted by the Atlanta Review, Bellevue Literary Review, Enizagam and Healing Muse among others. Claire is the author of Waiting to be Called and the co-author of Unfolding in Light: A Sisters’ Journey in Photography and Poetry.
\n 
\n 
\nMarsha Segerberg<\/a><\/strong> is a newly retired scientist and educator, doctorate in neuroscience, whose dogs have all passed away and has adopted poetry instead of getting new pets.  She attends weekly and monthly writing groups, the weekly one called COW (Collective of Writers) and we have t-shirts.
\n 
\n 
\nBorn in the Appalachian foothills of southern Ohio, Lacie Semenovich<\/a><\/strong> now lives and writes in the greater Cleveland area. She enjoys hiking with her husband and dog. Her poetry has appeared in Barrelhouse,
\nZygote in My Coffee, MOBIUS, Kansas City Voices, Eunoia Review, Quail Bell Magazine, and other journals. She is the author of a chapbook, Legacies (Finishing Line Press, 2012).
\n 
\n 
\nJohn Short<\/a><\/strong> was born in Liverpool, studied at Leeds University and then spent some years in Europe doing a number of jobs. His stories and poems have been published in Britain, Spain, France and the USA, most recently in Prole, Ink Sweat and Tears, Frogmore Papers and The French Literary Review. He reads on Vintage Radio, Birkenhead and at The Dead Good Poets and The Liver Bards in Liverpool.
\n 
\n 
\nPaul Smith<\/a><\/strong> lives near Chicago, writes fiction & poetry. He is a civil engineer who has worked many years in the construction racket, and sometimes likes to write about that. Other times he writes about the people he has met. And at other times he just waits for something to happen. he has been published in Gravel, Clementine, OYEZ, Rat’s Ass Review, and other publications.
\n 
\n 
\nAlec Solomita<\/a><\/strong>‘s fiction has appeared in, among other publications, The Mississippi Review, Southwest Review and The Adirondack Review. He’s published poetry in Literary Orphans, MockingHeart Review, Rat’s Ass Review, and elsewhere. His poetry chapbook, DO NOT FORSAKE ME, was published by Finishing Line Press in October. He lives in Massachusetts.
\n 
\n 
\nDavid Spicer<\/a><\/strong> has had poems in Chiron Review, The New Verse News, Alcatraz, Gargoyle, Easy Street, Third Wednesday, Reed Magazine, Santa Clara Review, Rat’s Ass Review, Midnight Lane Boutique, Ploughshares, The American Poetry Review<\/i>, and elsewhere. The author of Everybody Has a Story<\/i> and five chapbooks, he’s the former editor of raccoon, Outlaw<\/i>, and Ion Books. His latest chapbook is From the Limbs of a Pear Tree<\/i>, available from Flutter Press.
\n 
\n 
\nM. Stone<\/a><\/strong> is a bookworm, birdwatcher, and stargazer who writes poetry while living in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Bop Dead City, SOFTBLOW, Calamus Journal, and numerous other print and online journals. She can be reached at writermstone.wordpress.com<\/a> 
\n 
\nFrankie Suzo<\/a><\/strong> is the nom de guerre of a writer who wishes the war didn’t exist.
\n 
\n 
\nDavid M. Taylor<\/a><\/strong> teaches at a community college in St. Louis, MO. His work has appeared in various magazines including Rising Phoenix Review, Trailer Park Quarterly, and Anthology, as well as upcoming in Misfit Magazine and Burnt Pine Magazine. He also has three poetry chapbooks – M&Ms and Other Insignificant Poems, Two Cobras in a Ritual Dance, and Life’s Ramblings.
\n 
\n 
\nP. C. Vandall<\/a><\/strong> is the author of three collections of poetry: “Something from Nothing,” (Writing Knights Press) “Woodwinds” (Lipstick Press) and “Matrimonial Cake” (Red Dashboard). Her next book of poetry is forthcoming from Oolichan Books.
\n 
\n 
\nPaul Waring<\/a><\/strong> is a retired clinical psychologist who once designed menswear and was a singer\/songwriter in several Liverpool bands. His poems have been published in various poetry journals and sites including Clear Poetry, The Open Mouse, Amaryllis, The Lampeter Review, Reach Poetry, Foxglove Journal, Scrittura Magazine<\/i> and Eunoia Review<\/i>. His blog is https:\/\/waringwords.wordpress.com<\/a>
\n 
\n 
\nAn introspective, introverted empath, bursting with anxiety and 90s kid nostalgia, Cover Artist Jennifer Nichole Wells<\/a><\/strong> creates images full of desolation, malcontent and longing by transforming her hand-built miniature tableaus through her camera lens. Her images draw influence from her midwestern roots and Florida youth. Jennifer graduated from the University of North Florida in the Spring of 2013 with a Bachelors of Fine Art, concentration in Photography, and minors in Art History and Professional Education. She resides in Jacksonville, FL with her boyfriend and cat.
\n 
\n 
\nMatt Whitfield<\/a><\/strong> lives in Toronto, Canada, where he is a professional musician and sometimes writer. He specializes in avant-garde musical presentations and otherwise unusual performance art. Visit or contact him at orguenouveau.com<\/a> or at mwhitfi3@gmail.com
\n 
\n 
\nIn 1996, when Catherine G. Wolf<\/a><\/strong> was stricken with Lou Gehrig’s disease, her ability to speak was taken away by the disease. She found poetry had a special capability to express her innermost feelings. By losing her physical voice, she found her poetic voice. She has published poems in Bellevue Literary Review, Rat’s Ass Review, Love & Ensuing Madness and Front Porch Review. She writes with assistive technology, and types by raising her right eyebrow.
\n 
\n 
\nStella Wulf<\/a><\/strong> lives in South West France. Her work has been widely published both in print and online. Publications include, Obsessed With Pipework, The High Window, Raum, Prole, Ink Sweat & Tears, and many others. Her poems have also appeared in several anthologies including, The Very Best of 52, three drops from a cauldron, and the Clear Poetry Anthology. She has an MA in Creative Writing, from Lancaster University.
\n 
\n 
\nMark Young<\/a><\/strong> lives in North Queensland, Australia, & has been publishing poetry for almost sixty years. His work has been widely anthologized, & his essays & poetry translated into a number of languages. He is the author of over forty books, primarily text poetry but also including speculative fiction, vispo, & art history. A limited edition chapbook, A Few Geographies, was recently released by One Sentence Poems as the initial offering in their new range.
\n 
\n 
\nSally Zakariya<\/a><\/strong>‘s poems have appeared in more than 60 print and online journals and won prizes from Poetry Virginia and the Virginia Writers Club. She is the author, most recently, of When You Escape (Five Oaks Press, 2016), as well as Insectomania (2013) and Arithmetic and other verses (2011), and the editor of a poetry anthology, Joys of the Table (2015). Zakariya blogs at butdoesitrhyme.com<\/a>.
\n 
\n <\/p>\n

\n

Edited by Roderick Bates<\/p>\n<\/h5>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

RAT’S ASS REVIEW FALL-WINTER ISSUE 2017 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED<\/p>\n<\/h4>\n

 
\n 
\n 
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      Misunderstood Children by Jennifer Nichole Wells       Go to the Poets’ Bios     Mike Alexander     SHINTAKE   for Craig Arnold   The night he read at Brazos, we pulled up to see a wild man with a coffee cup in one hand, leather jacketed, & bald, who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":23,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2794","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nWinter 2017 Issue -<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/ratsassreview.net\/?page_id=2794\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Winter 2017 Issue -\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"      Misunderstood Children by Jennifer 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