Poetry

Because of their format, several poems that appear in the current issue are included only in pdf. To read them, click on their titles on the right side of this page.

The Marvel of It Is
Henry Walters

Not two inches tall, a conquistador’s horse,
stepping as high through his terrarium
as any life-size bronze in monument.

Crime Scene
Henry Walters

Ephemera the wind forms out of snow

Night Swimming
George Witte

Midsummer, wind across the lake
the humid morning breath of thunderheads.
Too small for awkward jutting oars
I rowed in futile circles, out of synch.

Three Sonnets
Robert Thomas

Sonnet with Swan and Long Tall Sally

What if we’re the crux, the diamond lynchpin?
What if creatures in other galaxies

Something You Left to Me
Owen McLeod

This box of apothecary vials with black rubber stops.
A strip of masking tape runs the length of each vial.

Breakup at the Starfish Brasserie
Owen McLeod

You imagine yourself the simplified figure
in this future person’s false romantic idea
of the present moment.  You’ve even stopped
believing you know where the sculptures end
and the furniture begins.  Well, bully for you
is all I can say—that, and have a good one.

On Being Told: You Must Learn to Love the Violence
John Sibley Williams

Like a man who sets himself on fire
on purpose every night without quite
achieving ash. This is something like
saying every stain, every scar makes

On Being Told: You Must Learn to Pray
John Sibley Williams

For the occasional carcass
dragged skyward by crows.

All those little mouths hungering
inside our mouths. The silence

Roundabout
Chad Davidson

As Odysseus finds his portal
to the underworld,

delivers his libations, I kill time
just down the shore,

For a Dog
Ryan Wilson

You’d wake us up—that shrill, insistent bark
Driving away whatever dreams had fogged
Our vision—and we’d rise in the true dark,