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7/30/2023 Poetry by Naomi Thiers Warren LeMay CC
In But Not Of The acrid taste of emotion held in, flattened. I remember hot afternoons in our house in Pittsburgh, my mother’s depression, how it walled her off. It’s like a kind of sea, she told me. I have felt the sucking. Some feel depression as an endless falling: When your life is sliding down a mountain, you can’t always find a way to stop or climb, though you yearn to go back to the start. You close your eyes and try to accept, to just feel it, but this motion is not a dance. Yet I can be in the sea but not pulled under. I can swim. I was taught. Listen to the hiss and crashing of the waves, their song. Can’t Help It I can’t help it: tonight, random grim fears flood my head. My son and I have been travelers, through years of eking out, stacking pennies, movers in my old heap to cousins’ couches. A streaky dawn, from a Greyhound chugging down Rt. 96, skies chopped by smokestacks, dark halls in apartments they never tend–these things we’ve seen, but always had clothes, Christmas, PO box for the checks. Tyler finds clovers, bugs—small beauties. This year checked all the boxes. August makes three family dead and one car. We’ll stay in Lansing, forget them (I almost hope). My fears will dry up, and his nightcries. I’ll pretend I’m going on a long ride--but in my head. Inside. Note: This poem is a Golden Shovel, using these lines from the Bruce Cockburn song “Grim Travelers”: Grim travelers in dawn skies. They see the beauty, makes them cry inside. Naomi Thiers grew up in California and Pittsburgh, but her chosen home is Washington-DC/Northern Virginia. She is author of four poetry collections: Only The Raw Hands Are Heaven (WWPH), In Yolo County, and She Was a Cathedral (Finishing Line Press) and Made of Air (Kelsay Books). Her poems, book reviews, and essays have been published in Virginia Quarterly Review, Poet Lore, Colorado Review, Grist, Sojourners, and many other magazines and anthologies. Former editor of Phoebe, she works as an editor and lives on the banks of Four Mile Run in Arlington, Virginia. 7/30/2023 Poetry by Karen Poppy Doug Snider CC
Morning Routine Rumble from bed. Eat recklessly. Rub belly, hold other Hand to heart. Stick out tongue In mirror. Refuse too much Self-reflection. Except as to Integrity. Remind yourself Of what it means. As you get naked. As you get dressed. Stay vulnerable within. Walk outside. Greet everyone With kindness. Karen Poppy (she/her; non-binary) has work published in numerous literary journals, magazines, and anthologies. Her debut poetry collection, Diving At The Lip Of The Water, is published by Beltway Editions (2023). An attorney licensed in California and Texas, Karen Poppy lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. More at karenpoppy.com. 7/30/2023 Poetry by Jacob Schepers Carl Wycoff CC
It’s Like I Feel Your Lips on My Lips I want my language to be difficult in the same sense as some adults describe children to be I want my language to be troubled as I am troubled / I want my language to be touched I want the words on each page to bleed to blur to gather together in a fairyring ritual I want each of my tongue’s spores to cast spells to move so much each mushroom borne out thinks it is its own little miracle its own little gift and then thank its mamastork / that’s me / for babybird feeding those lucky starspores but from the roots up Jacob Schepers is the author of A Bundle of Careful Compromises (Outriders Poetry Project 2014). His poems and reviews have appeared in such places as Verse, Tupelo Quarterly, The Fanzine, Entropy, PANK, Burning House Press, The Destroyer, and elsewhere. With Sara Judy he edits the journal ballast, and he teaches at the University of Notre Dame. 7/30/2023 Poetry by Mary Maxfield Wildlife Terry CC
Goddamned Sacred The first lesbian I ever knew I knew taught me to transform the curse from “fuck you” you to “may no one ever fuck you.” By eighteen, she knew there’s more than one way to get screwed, and some of them are blessings best never bestowed on those hellbent on proving we’re hellbound. Since then, I’ve learned we’re titans of the turnaround. We’ve never found a phrase we can’t reframe. We turn slurs into nicknames into t-shirt slogans, remix epithets as anthems we sing in six-part harmony. We’re experts of alchemy, apothecaries who brew medicine from poison, transmute Dyke to Dykon Flamer to Phoenix Beaver Eater to Hot Dam(n). I’ve never met a lesbian who wasn’t a deft hand at turning a middle finger into a goddamned gift. (Behold the many uses of a well-formed fist.) So it’s like this? Lez go, show us your worst. We’re an artillery of Tim Gunns: we make it work. Transform the curse. My first lesson in lesbian. You and I transform their every curse into a blessing but lately I have less and less energy to make mosaics from the brokenness they’ve left behind I’d trade my cleverest comeback for a story I can self-define a blessing that ends as it begins in benediction. That requires no revision Here, now, if only for a minute let’s hold each other—start to finish-- dear wholly and holy queer: May your body be a pride parade that’s only met with cheers. May love play a never ending music festival inside your chest. May you rest in your belonging. May you rest like every day’s an afternoon in June that you’ve spent slurping rainbow sno-cones in the sun. May no one ever fuck you (unless you so choose). May no one ever fuck you over but if they do, may you find yourself back in this room, drinking in the medicine of a community that calls you only the name you’ve chosen only our most precious blessing only the miraculous answer to our every fucking prayer. Mary Maxfield (she/ they) uses poetry, research, fiction, and nonfiction to explore queerness, illness, trauma, and community. Their past publications include Catapult, Strange Horizons, and Sweeter Voices Still: An LGBTQ Anthology from Middle America. In 2021, Mary was chosen as a Lambda Literary Fellow in Young Adult Fiction. Find her online at marymaxfield.com. 7/30/2023 Poetry by Sarah Morris Shux Carl Wycoff CC
The House Attempts To Tear Itself Down After the first attempt, the police were called And the woman was told to buy a gun, Store it under the bed beside the boxes full of photographs And the thick dust trails from The sliding and pushing During the second and the third The gun lay forgotten Because these things happen so quickly And the cop said, “dead or alive” but at this point They preferred dead It makes things easier for everyone The man was skinny but he was strong They say these kinds of patients have almost Superhuman strength Which explains the five nurses that were required To strap him down And the three story window That he jumped out of And the wooden door that he busted down so easily A hammer through drywall In order to get to the woman again For the third time Doors will not keep him out Til death do us part Til death do us part A lost ring will not keep him out Recently I asked my mother what happened to it She says that she does not know And she does not look for it Sarah Morris Shux (she/her) is a poet, screenwriter and short story writer currently living in Los Angeles with her very loud Siamese cat, King Tut and her sweet black lab, Sami. She enjoys obsessing over ghost stories, roller skating, stress baking and spending too much money on vinyl records and weird, antique tchotchkes. Find her words published in Sledgehammer Lit, Not Deer Magazine, Superfroot amongst others and on Medium. Find her on social media: @awwshux on Instagram and @MsShux on Twitter. 7/30/2023 Poetry by Janelle Elyse Kihlstrom Carl Wycoff CC
Siren I threw my life away, but it swam back, circled like a shark, stuck like a salmon, persevered, and though I seared it in its skin, it kept its vigil, haunting from each night within its stream, sang strong its tender anthem, held until at last I sank with it, then pulled us up – beneath the moonlit jellies, danced its lonely dance with it, and sang a- long; Memento Vitae A little yellow bloom of something wild, folded loose in my jacket, found years later not quite crisp – the slenderest of miracles it kept some small belief, its certain shape, unbrittled. Was it love? I have no memory of touch but only words for it, and rhizomatic roots that sought a way around, a path back down. My father knew, I know. My father didn’t doubt, though no one prayed. Even as air burned and parting words were ocean water, he kept faith with me, each in its time, and then at last, one day, perhaps – Janelle Elyse Kihlstrom's poems have appeared in journals such as Gargoyle, Arsenic Lobster, and most recently Ghost City Review, and her book reviews have appeared in Lines+Stars and the Iowa Review. She has published two chapbooks, Blue Trajectory from Dancing Girl Press and Minor Theodicies from Finishing Line Press. She holds an M.A. in Writing from Johns Hopkins University and in 2009 founded the online journal Melusine, which she edited until 2016. She lives in Maryland with her partner and their two fantastic kids, works as a copyeditor, and is a graduate certificate candidate in Disability Studies. She tweets sometimes @jekihlstrom. 7/30/2023 Poetry by Chloe Adams Carl Wycoff CC
Advice for girls alone in their bedrooms at 1 am with too many candles lit and chip crumbs in the sheets Buy the journal. If you think it is pretty, then adorn it with chicken-scratched and bloody drafts that have yet to scab over. You’ll need it eventually or maybe you won’t. But some things get to exist just for loveliness, don’t they? Write about your depression. How joylessness once tied you up, with all its tentacles, left you glued to dirty laundry and the bottom of cracker boxes. Mom and dad know anyway. People who claim to love you should hear it anyway. The ones who matter will love you anyway, right? Tell them all how you came back from it too. How the ring came back to your laughter, Joy tolling in your throat. How you didn’t even notice until you heard it, clattering in your own ears. Delightful shock. And meds in orange bottles cast sunshine light through the windows of your ribs so warmth hit your heart again. And you can harvest a little extra warmth for the overcast days, can’t you, with this help? Write about love. Even if you say you aren’t, you are and everyone can tell. You might as well be honest about it. Don’t you crave honesty, even, mostly, from yourself? When you have a thought, in the shower or the hallway at work, jot it down. I can assure you, you will not remember the good idea later. Only that you had a good idea. And you don’t want to wonder about lost things, do you? Use the unkind men you once hooked up with as metaphors. They’ve already used you as one and fair is fair. Sometimes, I don’t believe in forgiveness. Sometimes, I think anger feels better, we can admit that, right? Write about how Big Daddy’s secret moonshine runs through your blood and mixes with the juice of Pappa’s pickled green tomatoes. How you’re allowed to love it all. And how it turns your blood holy water. Haven’t you always been sacred vessel? Send your words as texts, Instagram captions, perfumed letters, submissions, and books. You can. You can do it scared. After all, you’ve done it all scared. Haven’t you? Chloe Adams (she/her) is a poet and educator residing in the Bay Area of California. She writes creative nonfiction about mental health, navigating romance, and exploring familial identity. Chloe has been previously published in Free Verse Revolution, Querencia Press, Driplitmag, and Inherspacejournal. You can connect with her further at @chloes1amwrites on Instagram. 7/30/2023 Poetry by Jo Angela Edwins Carl Wycoff CC
Sundown after Jericho Brown You cannot catch the daylight, and you will not let me help you. We have fought this fight before, hands flying through the air. We have fought this fight before, hands flying through the air until our bodies tire. This mad circuit must burn out soon. Before our bodies tire, this mad circuit must burn out soon. I have better things to do than force your eyes to see past darkness. You have better things to do. Please. Force your eyes to see past darkness. Look there—the morning doves build their nests outside your window. Oh, look at the mourning doves, two and two, outside your window! You loved them, named them once. You would talk of them for hours. You loved me, named me, once. You would talk of us for hours. Now you’re blind to love. You scream like an innocent in jail. You’re blind to my love. I scream, Innocent! In your jail, you cannot catch the daylight. You are too proud to let me help you. Jo Angela Edwins has published poems in over 100 journals, including recently or forthcoming in Door Is A Jar Magazine, Shō Poetry Journal, The Hollins Critic, and Words & Sports. Her chapbook Play was published in 2016, and her collection A Dangerous Heaven is forthcoming this year from Gnashing Teeth Publishing. She lives in Florence, SC, where she serves as poet laureate of the Pee Dee region of South Carolina. 7/30/2023 Poetry by Amy Cook Carl Wycoff CC
Oh, the letter begins I am doing well in this moment, the ebb of light only cumbersome when I circle again to self-sorrow and a cover-less pillow, actively bracing against the homesick, with my toes. Unincorporated Tacoma is a breathing place to grieve what isn’t yours yet. You made decisions this time that rot over days like uncorked wine. I said no (help) in many ways, mostly by the unlooking, but also by taletelling and running as quickly as I could from the water. The Water - was it even warm? I paid for our meal, And then I said no help, again And again. When I am later swept away and dusted by the twister of missing, I will see places everywhere where I abandoned people for words. Amy Cook is an MFA candidate at Pacific Lutheran University (Rainier Writing Workshop), and participated in the 2021 Kenyon Review Writers Workshop in Creative Nonfiction. Her work has been featured in more than two dozen literary journals, magazines and anthologies, including Santa Fe Writers Project Quarterly, great weather for MEDIA, The Other Journal and Apricity Press. She was a finalist for the 2023 ProForma competition (Grist: A Journal of the Literary Arts), a finalist for the Disruptors Contest (TulipTree Publishing, 2021), a semi-finalist for the 2022 Brooklyn Non-Fiction Prize, and received an Honorable Mention from the New Millennium Writing Awards (2022). She is a reader for the literary magazine CRAFT. 7/30/2023 Poetry by James King Carl Wycoff CC
Ode to Danville The oaks and maples step close like a crowd pressing in on famous people. The old red schoolhouse and cooperage, their doors shut like mouths of the dead. In the old days the cooper took half-formed barrels to the hooper to bind in hot iron, to fill with what? Burnished apples, or the liquor you need to flush yourself through a New England winter. I used to run through the woods where they tapped maples for syrup, the trunks scaly like burn victims’ arms-- drained, linked through rubber tubes like a pale blue IV. Everyone in town was on some life support or another, and there were many benches bearing plaques of children’s names, but you never heard screaming unless in glee for backyard fireworks, first launched a week before the Fourth and continuing until the kids went back to school-- a little sheltered, a little shy, much like Danville herself, who, like me, I think, is wont to sleep in the middle of the afternoon, slowly rolling and rolling, like hills. Like the hills especially in the part of town where the streets take the names of precious stones-- Diamond Drive, Emerald Lane, Opal and Ruby Street. We knew no riches other than these. James King is a poet from New Hampshire and an MFA Candidate at the University of North Carolina Wilmington. His work has appeared in Exposition Review, Chautauqua, Humana Obscura and High Shelf. He lives in Wilmington, NC, where he works as a coordinator for the UNCW Young Writers Workshop. He luckily cannot be found on Twitter, but is on Instagram at @jamn_king. |
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