CITADEL by Keith Carver
CITADELby Keith Carver
CITADEL
You teeter on the wall, that thatthat keeps the ancient world
ancient, and talkas though to rid yourself of helium,
Your voice is a rumor in the smog the semi-circleof tourists dangle their feet into.
The...
SUNDAY COMING DOWN by Jamel Hall
SUNDAY COMING DOWNby Jamel Hall
Sunday Coming Down
The slight shudder of newspaperadds accents to the commercial break.My mother in her meekest vestmentspaces the house singing songs of jesus,of better days, and inheritance.
His name pressed to...
MANOR by Ann Pedone
MANORby Ann Pedone
Manor
Particles of lightStrain to the seenIn the shadows of his heart.
He knows her faceTaqstes her lips—Sun wrenched in the sky of her longing forThe sightHimInside—the inside of herGrowing upon t he sight...
ART by Aditya Shankar
ARTby Aditya Shankar
Art
A birdwove its nesttirelessly
withbeak and wing,twig and grass,tweet and silence,
deepinside the forest.
A nest, demolishedand rebuilt,
till it becamewhat the bird desired.
It did not matter
that the nestwas never titledor signed,
spoken aboutor adulated.
It hung there,
a...
BUDDY by Jonathan Andrew Perez
BUDDYby Jonathan Andrew Perez
Burn, Barn, Burn
What remained couldn’t be salvaged from the shipwreck of my immobility.Climate change. Father warned me don’t dive deep:Wake before you go to sleep, migrate in the afternoonRead Borges, Neruda,...
I BARELY ESCAPED WITH MY LIFE by Louis Gallo
I BARELY ESCAPED WITH MY LIFEby Louis Gallo
“I BARELY ESCAPED WITH MY LIFE”
The lacquered reporters declare another miracleas we now deem the merest rosy swerve from dooma glittering token of divine twitch.Minicams pan the...
OUT OF BED by Penney Knightly
OUT OF BEDby Penney Knightly
Out of Bed
Slow to serenade, wispy, extendingarms and legs, a jungle heap.Moss-fern overgrowth.Dew on cheeks and inner limbs,I blush in dark placeshiding against sky light, and crunch of air.
I slither...
I DO NOT LIE IN ’T, YET IT IS MINE by Dane Myers
I DO NOT LIE IN’T, YET IT IS MINEby Dane Myers
If my dead grandpa, a kindly and devoted Republican farmer, were to visit the living he’d first ask about black angus and alfalfa… then the weather… and...
WHAT XERO OFFERS by Mark Young
WHAT XERO OFFERSby Mark Young
What Xero offers
The leading online storage &file delivery service is enviedfor her use of the tropes she keeps in a secret gulag of unique art forms. Her young adult ministry is a global provider...
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS by Emily Brummett
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTSby Emily Brummett
Boston, Massachusetts:
she steps off a twelve-hour ridenext to a stranger-whose shuffled music playlistand snoresdidn’t know personal space.
Footfalls and fast food stopsfill the train stationas she barrels through the massessuitcases dragging behindto...