Sean Sexton: Not
Not the listless woods these days,
their ongoing summer song
same as the year-round sound in my head.
Barbara Hamby: Trigger Tries To Explain
Aw, Dale, he didn’t mean it when he said I was the
best thing that ever happened to him. If he even said it,
chalk it up to the RKO publicity machine.
Michael Simms: The Cove
I loved those mornings
of timeless simplicity.
I learned patience
is not something you work for
but something you wait for
Cesare Pavese: Ancestors
I found out I had lived, before I was born,
in hard, sturdy, independent men, their own masters.
None of them knew what to say, so they just kept quiet.
Kim Stafford: Four Poems
Her text says the bombing is getting
closer. She dozes, there’s a blast, a rattle
of debris falling somewhere near. She says
every bomb makes an earthquake. Her heart
stops. She says the forces are getting closer.
Alice Friman: The Nick Poems
Do you know what you’re doing?
and she said yes
though deep in her virginity
she knew nothing
but what she wanted
Emilie Lygren: With and Without
Hunger ––
I can’t hear the word
without my mind swinging to Gaza.
Kahlil Gibran: War
One night a feast was held in the palace, and there came a man and prostrated himself before the prince, and all the feasters looked upon him; and they saw that one of his eyes was out and that the empty socket bled.
Robert Cording: An Unasked for Inauguration Prayer, 2025
Lord of the light that reveals
how we have failed and failed again
the one requirement asked of us—
to love one another.
Sandy Solomon: Widow
Now the mockingbird at the mulberry
and its mate on the fence pretend they’re crows
and their caws contend with the noise in my bones
Majid Naficy: A Song for Peace
Let me compose a song for peace
Beyond your phony epics.
Richard Levine: Solstice
We approached the solstice from a Ferris wheel,crowned and paused between day and night. We held onto each other and each spoke-like hour, immersedin beach-tide sounds, briny scents and banking … Continue reading
Jessie Redmon Fauset: Nostalgia
Lonely log cabin
On the road to Notasulga,
Sighing and sagging and quaking;
Let me breathe to the heart of your walls
A secret—
