July 2024
In this issue
Contents
Travelers Song
I mind the peak cabin with vistas in all directions need fire humming here and nowhere in particular while you dip a toe into icy time flow finicking a door
ADVANCE LESSONS
Bypassing clenched fists, their conscientious poems get published in conscientious journals.
Between Two Oblivions
When I see the roots of a tree bleed through the ground, now I say they are the veins of my grandmother’s hands, spilling upward. I recall the tender bruises up and down her arms
Old Lady’s Moon
It’s dry,a fragrance tucked away, no longer lavender.
Welcome to Equity Crater
When the hums reach the edge of the crater, they return to the girl, and she replies by raising her voice an octave.
killing something wild
I knew he’d never kill anything and it wasn’t that I thought you wanted that deer to get killed but I had suspicion you did not care either way and that indifference made me more sick but
Firefight
First punch landed at Stonewall, Bleached reef, powder nose, drip-drip-alive, Nightmare waking and post-sleepfuck-stares, You. Bought You,
echoes of Ferlinghetti
skateboards dope and pogo sticks banana bikes and popsicle sticks ten cent candy up from five
footprints
the air thickened with silence. a small robin robs the brush of whatever red berries exude from the death of this place.
Remembering We Are Meant To be Joy
A soul is already carpeted in the divine and who is to say sorrow isn’t God? Who is to say love isn’t prayer? Who is to say time is always on our side?
POET CAESAR
Only when you can delete your Submittable account, and box your poetry books into a carton shipped to a country without birds or borders;
My First Love was Long
At home, he refused to drink his milk. I tried different kinds: organic, fat-free, almond. I studied the pamphlet, which advised against force-feeding, so I made him a milk bath and soaked him for several days.
Between the Woodchips and Me
My sister was supposed to come swing with me. She could push me so high that I would forget there was a world below awaiting my return. She coaxed me to jump every time.