Poem
-
Two Poems by Rikki Santer
No, butwhat’s floating inside these couplets and what you know the cold wantsstart with a sign unknownghost in the machine moving through the long perse of doubt andwhat’s clicking between your earswhat could be the lone one linerand what the dream thinksthe din of crackers in your mouthcod liver oil laced with laughing gaslive oak Continue reading
-
Telling the Bees
by Grace Massey In Celtic tradition, families tell their bees everything—births, marriages, deaths. Bees are also messengers between worlds.Three weddings this summergoth princesses, groomsmen in kilts, bride swollen out to here.The voles consumed the lily bulbs, tulips were shipwrecked. But you know this.Over lunch Doris let slip that her dogs will outlive her, they’re oldbut Continue reading
-
Moment in American Nectarine
by Michael Dwayne Smith Thus radiant, therefore unlasting, this poemthat is Cactus Wren with its jar-jar-jar, nesthatching messages from a spirit world humanshave long forgotten. Sublimity, as if it weresky. Minimalism, as if it were happiness. Yourtumor, your PTSD, your children vapingurns full of disenchantment, the slurry speechof your ancient gods, jubilant all. The past Continue reading
-
My Fourth of July Grocery List Reveals What America Means to Me
by Joan Leotta From my grocery listyou might suspectmy heritage is Italian:eggplantred bell pepperfinocchioartichokesgarlicDe Cecco pastaWhen the checkout clerkasks about the finocchioI tell her it is called anise in her computerChicken wings, hot dogs and burgers,will also have a place at our barbeque.She smiles as she rings them up.She and I often exchange recipes.Eggplant will Continue reading
-
Two Poems by Lisa Delan
Poet and how will you feelknees on the groundeye level to the void whereyou must clamp coerce cut compress coax the fat resin of each phraseholding its howl swallowing its oncevoluptuous breath words braided into tight-plait wire straining against cylindric steel whose friction-singed sidesblister syntax scathed flesh of sentencesforming slim scarsas you blow ash across Continue reading
-
Honey
by Jean-Paul Thuot I am not one who praysthe way bees to and fromthe field of golden flowersdo not pray After the sun has passed beyondthe far trees, and dewbegins collecting in thepregnant air Moon rising on her coursesilent as a sail on unshippedseas, velvet brocadeof her passing In all of this — the bees, Continue reading
-
Two Poems by Julie Allyn Johnson
ArcticPolar bear reclines on the ground beneath me,stretches out white and still on his long & lovely spine,in need of touch,in want of connection.Head tilted to the side, eyes closed,he reaches out his paw; perches it looselyon my upper arm, holds it there—holds it.And I rub his white fur,his jolly belly. My soothing ministrationsundo him Continue reading
-
Ode to Resistance
by Ellen Gerneaux Woods Wisteria curls in delicate bloomsheads bowed in surrender long flexible stem known to wanderand twine in unpredictable patternsclimbs the lattice he builtto control her meandering waysthe poetry of her mind the plant outlasts the lattice now copious lavender expressionsedge her home wander near windowsdrop long blossomed branchesover the face of the Continue reading
-
Three Poems by Richard Jordan
Herring Run No one will convince me the sky was ever cloudy over South River those late April afternoons when Grandpa and I went to the stone bridge to witness herring battle swift currents, the run so dense I imagined I could walk upstream on a trail of blue-black backs. Grandpa would hold my legs as I Continue reading
-
Three Poems by Nancy Cherry
A Bottle of Summer There were summers bright with sunlight glancing off chrome truck bumpers where we’d beg a dime for a cold Fanta Orange, or a Coke in green glass.Already rusty on the rim, the cold box held the bottles in a web of metal, and a crate forthe returns, and we returned them, Continue reading
January House Literary Journal 