Category: Poetry—Silence & Power

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] Looking Outside Airplane Windows   I expect to see that boy in the clouds, sad faced, barbed wire tattoo ablaze where no one can see it— not a tattoo but a scar wrapped around his belly like a belt cinched… Continue reading Three Poems

W. Todd Kaneko

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] Efes Wrestling with the Poet Who Won’t Look Away   To set fire to warships in the water                                                                                            cast your mirror as parabola. You still won’t quiet these waters.                                                                Finite are bodies to drown. Infinite only the quarks & electrons that you… Continue reading Two Poems

Rosebud Ben-Oni

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] Red Running Into Water   tsi’naajinii nishłí pronounce the ł as water whistling through shadow                on black bark the í as boy wearing only yucca                lake colored tábąąhá báshíshchíín the í is now mouth of narrow stream                inside a pink… Continue reading Two Poems

Jake Skeets

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] Has customs kept us from saying our favorite words as we cross? (madrugada, residiente, dentures,) or has customs left these worlds, sorry words, here in the desert to get picked at by the cultures, (ah! I keep tripping over these… Continue reading The Border Simulator
(Is This Language A Desert Also?)

Gabriel Dozal

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] I Haven’t Masturbated in Five Daysfor Fear of Crying   her eyes closed the way my eyes sometimes close when I reach a hand  between my thighs              pretend they’re someone else’s fingers that slide  the unsexiest pair of panties I own… Continue reading Two Poems

Eloisa Amezcua

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] on Meng Haoran’s “Spring Dawn” for Hong Kong   春曉 春眠不覺曉， 處處聞啼鳥。 夜來風雨聲， 花落知多少。      —孟浩然   0. The seasons have changed with a sudden force and the birds, who know, cannot keep the peace.   1. The peace, we know,… Continue reading Transformations

Theophilus Kwek

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] I Believers stream out the strip mall church: women with flowers in their hands, praising, as they walk toward the paletero. Timing his arrival to maximize sales to girls wearing white fold over socks, boys in ostrich boots and ties.… Continue reading Rio Grande Valley Triptych

Lauren Espinoza

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] How to Make Art   Even when I’m sick, when I feel the thorn of a sore throat prick my right tonsil, and I purr through a stuffed nose while I dream of spilling my coffee because I’m stumbling through… Continue reading Three Poems

Lizzy Fox

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] “The company had pulled its employees from the facility earlier this week out of concern for their safety, and warns that it expects more of the chemical storage containers to rupture as the materials degrade and burn. Residents within a… Continue reading The Arkema Plant—Crosby, TX

Lupe Méndez

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] The first five days read yellow against the window shade. The water                     pressure barely knew its way                                         through the pipes. We accordioned                       the hours on a damp queen with pale green sheets. It was always morning. The dew always… Continue reading Long Dash

John A. Nieves

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] I wake in the middle of the night to whimpers. An angel shivers beside me, translucent as shadow. It vomits a chrysalis into my hand, sticky and green. Its red eyes ripple like pools. Where are the others? But the room contains… Continue reading Crystal Vision, with Chrysalis

Jade Hurter

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] Because you are five, I say airplanes crashed and you say where is our flag and I say look at those roses, breaking open—little mouths on our walk to school. You scuff and work out the equation: if airplanes crashed… Continue reading Morning Walk: September 11, 2018

Amelia Martens

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] It’s a circular night and my blood is itchy. As soon as the now is over, I’m going to disentangle the amnesic kilowatts nestled inside these invisible particles. The house is still as a sleeping animal, and I’ve had it… Continue reading No Tomorrow

Brad Rose

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] My mother fills paper boats with pastel mints, juice glasses with bourbon. The room shimmers with lit cigarettes. We watch the perfumed players sneak peeks at other hands, bet and bluff . Out back my father beats hedges with rusted… Continue reading In the Embassy of Silence

Tina Carlson

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] He forked a cube of tofu and stuck it in his pretty mouth. The sound of him chewing. Clink of metal against the ceramic I later cleaned, have always cleaned, can already see me cleaning, like the good wife I… Continue reading The Real Housewife of Orange County

Paul Tran

[av_hr class=’custom’ height=’50’ shadow=’no-shadow’ position=’center’ custom_border=’av-border-fat’ custom_width=’100%’ custom_border_color=’#8f2f66′ custom_margin_top=’30px’ custom_margin_bottom=’30px’ icon_select=’no’ custom_icon_color=” icon=’ue808′ font=’entypo-fontello’ admin_preview_bg=”] Give me now what scalds and reeks. Give me chilis and garlic raw. Give me dropwort and chrysanthemum greens. Buckwheat and tea. The bite of a well ripened kimchi. Let me wrap my meat in what others mistake for spoil.… Continue reading Benediction as Disdained Cuisine

Jihyun Yun