Poetry - Year II - Number 7 - Volume II - June 2017

POEMSBy Osip Mandelstam / translated by Don Mager Untitled Accept as gladness from my palmsA little sun and a little honeyAs the bees of Persephone directed. Not to be untied is an unmoored boat,Not to be heard...

MIDWAYBy Michael Carr Midway A student asks me why Dantewandered off the straight path,and I tell him that midwaythrough his life he might findthe answer. Now, it would just be esoteric. I wake at three to the soundof...

FEED FLOWERSBy Mark Taksa  Feed FlowersWind, if it woke, might scrape a leafagainst the planks. Flowers wilt in the pot.A departed wind pushed the watering can, dry,to its side. Dry wood shows through porch paint.Long...

TABLE-SCARFBy Mary Jane White ENVOI Having returned from beyond black bordersOver sundry riversI come to our final parting & bring at last that kiss the departed are freely granted& call out  wailing  above your absence Since separation forbids...

MY FATHER’S DOG TAGSBy Billy Malanga My Father’s Dog Tags The name on my father’s brass dog tagsdoesn’t match his driver’s license.The gunfire caves filled with burning fleshand bloodshot south Pacific surfhad taken its toll. He...

AFTERWORD: OR, THE AMATEUR POETBy Michael T. Smith Afterword: Or, the Amateur Poet                 You thought you gripped the futureWhen you only brushed the dust from your handsand pinched earth's prurient cheekLike that of a chubby,...

POETRY TRANSLATIONSBy Len Krisak EUGENIO MONTALE:. . . BUT LET IT BE. THE BUZZ OF A CORNET . . . but let it be. The buzz of a cornet                  Converses with the bees that swarm the oaks.Inside...

NAMELESS MOMENTSBy Harold Barnes   NAMELESS MOMENTSThis poemIs s proxyA placeholderFor every lapseIn my memoryIt representsThe fullness ofMy lifeA sum of allThe nameless momentsThat shaped meThe undersideOf the coinThe greater ofTwo evils    PARANOIDI fear these wordsHave already...

IN LIMINEBy Eugenio Montale / translated by Mary Jane White IN LIMINE Delight, then—if the wind re-enter our conservatorybringing back to it, and to you, the surge of our life:here—where a deadtangle of memories subsides,—no garden...

A POEM IN WHICH THE MOON REJECTS YOUBy Danielle Hanson  Instructions on Stripping Take the rotten unused light of the moon,Add what the mirror sees when it is dark—Forgetting is lovely at night. Throw away all that...