Tony Gloeggler: Goodbye
no one seemed to accept
or understand I love Jesse,
that the way he will never fit
in the world reminds me of me
Naomi Shihab Nye: Jerusalem
He’s painting a bird with wings
wide enough to cover two roofs at once.
Laure-Anne Bosselaar: The Rat Trinity
I loved the rats
of Bruges I watched from the dorm window,
how they slunk out
the courtyard sewer grill, slid along walls,
slipped down the cellar steps like whispers,
and vanished into gray.
Donna Hilbert: Credo
I believe in the Tuesdays
and Wednesdays of life,
the tuna sandwich lunches
and TV after dinner.
Michael Simms: Ishmael
I’m not prepared to measure grief
like grains of darkness
Mosab Abu Toha, et al: Ceasefire Cento
Each morning
I wake
in the shape
of an ancient
song
Chard deNiord: The Silence
an elegy for a child or parent or sibling
or friend who’s died at the hand
of the enemy whose God is the same
monotheistic deity with a different name
D.W. Fenza: Why the Department of English Needs a Drastic Renovation
The English department had fashioned itself after the kind of revelation the English Department could no longer provide. —from the poem “Berkley Hills Living” by Jessica Laser ~ The English … Continue reading
Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer: Tonight, When I Turn Right on Ogden
By the time I turn onto the highway toward home
it is fifteen years ago
and my father is sitting in his favorite chair
Zeina Azzam, Andy Young, David Adès: Three poems about Gaza
Only the children, terrified, wide-eyed,
have no complicity as we lead them, again,
sacrificial lambs to the slaughter.
Naomi Shihab Nye, Debra Winger: Zero
I can’t stop thinking about classrooms
bedrooms pets toys strawberry patches
altars bent skillets spatulas. The skirts
of little girls. The pink. I can’t stop thinking.
Corrine Clegg Hales: Her Husband Wants Her Back
Marge has run again, hiding out
at one neon motel after another
with her three small children.
Barbara Hamby: Mambo Cadillac
I’m talking to you, Mr. Magoo. Sit up, check
out that blonde with the leopard print tattoo. O she’ll lick
the sugar right off your doughnut and bill you, too, speak
French while she do the do.
Ellen McGrath Smith: Woman Standing for an Hour in Target Reading Greeting Cards to Herself
Rejecting some
for sounding nothing
like her, others for
sounding too much
like the way she feels
