Sophie Cabot Black: Democracy Until
And to set fire before heading on
Is also to say it does not matter
Which part is played
But that it gets played.
Bill Knott: The Closet
I shall find room enough here
By excluding myself; by excluding myself, I’ll grow.
Michael Simms: A Cowboy in the Chapel of Bones
Where I come from
it’s bad manners to speak of death
except in dead metaphors.
Barbara Crooker: Treadmill
We lift weights. We
feel great. We
do yoga. We
eat granola.
Zbigniew Herbert: The Envoy of Mr. Cogito
and do not forgive truly it is not in your power
to forgive in the name of those betrayed at dawn
Chard deNiord: River
lose then find yourself where self begins in emptiness
Valerie Bacharach: Crows
Some days I don’t know what to do with this rage I carry.
Sally Bliumis-Dunn: Week One
She is fine like a ringlet of fiddlehead fern
before it unfurls in the summer forest
Zeina Azzam: Alive in Gaza
Ahmed spends hours each day trying to find potable water, wood to make a fire, anything for his family to eat.
Sophie Cabot Black: As to Why We Will Not Stop (Making the Hats)
We have come to know the truth
As no longer true— the old ways do not work
Against the new.
Mosab Abu Toha: Shrapnel Looking for Laughter
Shrapnel flies in the dark,
looks for the family’s peals of
laughter hiding behind piles of disfigured
walls and bleeding picture frames.
Alfred Corn: Instagram posts of Dr. Ali Tahrawi (second gathering)
We are dying in the longest nightmare in the history of humanity, with the most disgusting and immoral generation in human existence, witnessing the most human abusing and destructive period.
