Liza Katz Duncan: The Uncles
I’m forgetting others, I know.
One had a scar near his eye in the shape of a bird.
One, a firefighter, had tattooed the word
mercy, and fed the feral cats.
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
Margo Berdeshevsky: For Autumn, 2023
yet awake to the fallen
leaves—their many many
tiny burning
hands—
John Clare: Autumn
Burning hot is the ground, liquid gold is the air;
Whoever looks round sees Eternity there.
Tim Peeler: Two Poems
When you’re close enough,
Even chaos looks like order:
The falling star, the overturned
Cattle car, the psychotic mother’s
Meandering explanation.
Keith Flynn: The Hyena Men
The spotted hyenas of Ethiopia
know nothing of man’s machinations,
only the sweet smell of their cast off
meat once the sun has slipped behind
the mountain
Video: Imelda May Sings “Johnny Got a Boom Boom”
Pulling me down
Like a rumble in the ground
Crawls up from the depths
With a deep down sound
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
Video: Walt Whitman — “Song of Myself”
Produced by Harvard University, this series of animations looks to poetry to explain what science renders dry and academic.
Judith R. Robinson: Black Scar
oh Danny boy
who is no more
he whom I loved
Sandy Solomon: Diary of Amelia Stewart Knight
Commenced the ascent of the Blue Mountains.
A lovely morning; all hands delighted
