Jennifer L. Freed: Even in Unkind Times
I just saw her last summer, sat two rows behind her
on a folding chair. Stared at the knobs of spine
protruding from beneath her tied-back hair
Derrick Z. Jackson | Trump EPA to Americans: Drop Dead
The Trump EPA recently announced it will no longer consider the benefits of regulating soot, which will lead to more premature deaths.
Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer: Like a Friend
I didn’t land. I fell and I fell and I fell.
At first as I plummeted, I feared the landing,
imagining an imminent crash. Then,
I fell through nights and middays. Fell through
kitchen floors and highways.
Alfred Corn: Blue Roses
When Edgar said, “Yes, us too,” I was surprised that he and Miriam were calling it quits; but even more by his “too,” which linked their separation to Renée’s and mine….
Thomas Lux: Ode to the Unbroken World, Which Is Coming
It must be coming, mustn’t it? Churches
and saloons are filled with decent humans.
A mother wants to feed her daughter,
fathers to buy their children things that break.
Sydney Lea: Remorse
Do you ever recall some minor misdemeanor or even one you committed only in mind, and –however absurdly– half believe it contributed to a disaster?
Ellen Foos: Letting Assisted Living Have a Say
We are both losing something.
I am losing him,
he is losing himself.
Abby Zimet: Here We Go Again, War By Cartoon Sociopaths
Almost as grotesque as the witless carnage itself is the “slopaganda” issuing almost daily from a White House evidently run by 14-year-old gamers who splice real combat footage with Call of Duty-esque video games.
Mattea Kramer: After Loneliness
Left for Dead in Donald Trump’s America, Communal Life Stirs
James Crews: After Receiving Bad News from a Friend
To offer what we can,
even when a friend lives far away,
to say: I will hold you inside myself
as you pass through this new gate.
Sean Howard: Envisioning a Post-Nuclear, Post-Digital Future
If we appear to seek the unattainable, as it has been said, then let it be known that we do so to avoid the unimaginable. — Students for a Democratic … Continue reading
Alison Hurwitz: V.A.S.T
An acronym for Variable Attention Sensory Trait
Ma Yongbo: Responding to My Deceased Father’s Order at Night (English & Chinese)
At last, we arrive at the small town of Sifangtai,
only my father stands there,
at the crossroads shrouded in thin mist
Helen Pletts: In the Presence of Things Flying Slower in a Grey Dusk (4 Poems in English and Chinese)
Rain from the Tang dynasty has re-surged,
all feelings gather in a fine mist, and lighter still is the joy of rain as a witness
to the landscape of fear fleeing like mist up the mountainside
