Christine Rhein: Miscarriage
I want to talk to you—Alito, Barrett,
Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Roberts, Thomas
Carmel Mawle: The Calisia
When Mama and Baba pulled us from under their bed, we stood where our wall had been and looked over the smoking city.
Barbara Crooker: Pentimento
In the lost rooms of my childhood,
cinnamon and nutmeg float in the air
Desne A. Crossley: O Rosie Girl
it was one thing for a white man to bed a black woman, but unthinkable that he would marry her. And it was commonplace for a black woman to be forced to open her legs to her employer or his sons. But Martha married white and returned home with the man!
James Laughlin: Easter in Pittsburgh
the telephone rang it
was Mr. Shupstead at the
mill they had had to use
tear gas father made a
special prayer right a-
way for God’s protection
Michael Simms: House
You want to lie down in the lost field
of your courage and sleep
beside the blurred road of snow
Tony Gloeggler: New House
I try
not to think of all the time I spent
going over what went wrong
between us, how badly I missed
who I wanted her to be
Michael Simms: Sometimes I Wake Early
Last night we took a friend for a walk along the edge
of our mountain. She looked out
over the city, the rivers, the sultry slopes
crowded with sumac and maple
and said So you know where you live
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.
Sandy Solomon: Casual Labor
The man at the front door wants work,
any job. Hand on the knob, I start
to turn him down, to swing the door’s weight
to, but then I consider my mother’s mother.
Rachel Hadas: Rainbow Parfait
…to be the archaeologist of one’s own past,
as if the sleeper, wakened now, alert,
was perched at the top of a trench
peering at something shining down below
Video: Alua Arthur | Why thinking about death helps you live a better life
What must I do to be at peace with myself so that I may live presently and die gracefully?
Laura McCullough: Hero With Only One Face
He tells me in his diminishing days, death not yet active,
but clearly begun, about his siblings, family shufflings,
foster homes, the orphanage. Who said they would
but then could not, who promised this & forgot that
Barbara Crooker: Star of Wonder, Star of Light
It’s Christmas, the year before the accident, when the earth
still seemed fixed. My husband and children are hanging
lights on the big pine tree
