William Aarnes
“Having to talk doesn’t make her happy.
She feels put on the spot, doesn’t like
the pitch of her voice, can’t ignore the way
her left hand waves about unless she focuses”
William Aarnes
“Having to talk doesn’t make her happy.
She feels put on the spot, doesn’t like
the pitch of her voice, can’t ignore the way
her left hand waves about unless she focuses”
Philip Jason
“The first thing I want you to know is that I love
the circle you drew in the sand
with your finger. It has one
too many corners, but it is a thing of you”
Jeffrey Kingman
“On Mt. Kilimanjaro
we sat, our first date.
The cat took a bath.
We licked each other’s”
Betsy Martin
“the walls
are heat
and bird calls”
Stella Vinitchi Radulescu
Translated by Domnica Radulescu
“I am printing on paper in golden letters
the flights
the passing of hours
the growing grass and the secret”
Stella Vinitchi Radulescu
Translated by Domnica Radulescu
“whistling at the door — frost
frost
: at other times the seagull
the filth of the gray dawns”
Stella Vinitchi Radulescu
Translated by Domnica Radulescu
“from its shell the golden sand—
what rapacious
dream
troubles my solitary
cold”
Skye Gilkerson
“Back then you were the surface, the floorboards beneath carpets of sage and bluestem, a row of graphite scratches at the bottom of the drawing.”
Adam Day
“They are perfecting
the pillow with which
you are being suffocated;
now it sings to you”
Ariana Den Bleyker
“A new day is forming in the kind
of sky or ocean or plain
where you can see the edge
of a dream in all directions
& it opens to you, & you let it in”
Justin Vicari
“Some people, by mere overlap of luck,
Guessed at parts of your soul by looking
Into your eyes, so you thought and sought
To hand them back a key. “Open me up,”
Justin Vicari
“I gather his drafts to read in bed.
His language is sexy but cannot be
Held like a man.
Lately, his heart, too,”
Rebecca Macijeski
“Let me tell you again. A new day is a new world is a new mind. There are a few constants: cerebral cortex, Irish breakfast tea, the way window light makes wavering star maps across the too-tired skin of my hands.”
Rebecca Macijeski
“Perhaps I’ll eat everything. Perhaps I eat everything and the hunger remains. What then? What more can I put in my body put in my mind put in my heart before next thing I know I’ll want the whole town on a bed of lettuce, my family tree deep fried.”
Rebecca Macijeski
“Why is the sky blue, but the clouds have so many different colors? It’s a signal question. When a child asks why is the sky blue what she means is suddenly I see the bigness of the world all around me like a thicket of knowledge I can’t get to the center of.”
Cletus Crow
“Methuselah died
at nine hundred
and sixty-nine, which
is enough if
only to get to know you.”
Ellis Elliott
“I want to tell you about the flock
of starlings, pinpricks like pixels,
shifting direction against the grid”
Evan Nicholls
“‘Buy the buoy,’ said the salesman.
‘No,’ said the person back.”
Evan Nicholls
“Nobody asked for it, but there it is. In the way of honking cars and bighorn sheep and clementine oranges. People yelling for it to get out of the way, and watch out.”
David Wojciechowski
Not the sound of a real cricket, but an electric one. That’s what I’m hearing. The stone against stone.
David Wojciechowski
“The candlemaker has a secret. He walks it through the darkness. He places it on the ground. Runs away from it.”
Sophie Bebeau
“every woman is a fossiled fern limestone impression
made of threads that backstitch the first moon
and this moon together”
Evan Williams
“I allow that you may carry me upon your back while it is that we walk. I will hold equally onto everything in my life and in yours.”
Cameron Morse
Breath is soft, surf
from a distant island, before day-
break, another day breaks
upon you. Your day sees you
Cameron Morse
That I would remember moving in here
time would bear witness
I am still here, have weathered
and written seasons out-
Eva-Maria Sher
“Let there exist for us
not one further sorrow
Come to me once again
clear-sounding myth weaver”
Rolla Barraqz
Translated by Muntather Alsawad and Jeffrey Clapp
“Hold the camera steady
zoom in
and if you want to go further
choose a different angle.”
David C. Hall
“In this movie God is made of aluminum foil,
computer screens and old cell phones,
beer cans and dead batteries
with eyes of Christmas tree lights”
Réka Nyitrai
“Deadheaded dandelions and your seed flowing. This is oblivion: bliss not yet congealed and my dummy heart pooling bundles of hope to be sold at a reduced price.”
Réka Nyitrai
“It seems that the bull-headed man managed to shoot my bird. I didn’t hear the gunshot but I felt the bird’s fall.”