FOREVER by Adelaide B. Shaw
A Lover’s Song
come to mefor comfort and for warmthcome to me for lovefor friendship and for trustfor understanding and for care
come to me for lovefor sunlit days and star filled nightsfor laughter and for...
SOFT, DEAD LEAF by Winslow MacDonald
I. Soft, Dead Leaf
The night that you killed yourselfI walked down to the clearing whereAs boysWe had built a settlement,As pioneers we cleared the trees,And when the land gasped outWe leaned logs against bouldersAnd...
WHAT IT CAME TO by Peter Cashorali
What It Came To
I never thought it would come to thisWhen I drove across town to get more cocaineOr watched the bulldozer fill in the graveOr played in the waves with my bucket and...
MY FIRST PET by Duane Anderson
The Paper Trail
I am not competing for a place in history.My name was listed in the newspaperafter being born to let everyone know I had arrived,then report cards came along,rating me from a F...
EXPAT by Joe Albanese
Trading Post at the Edge of Known
Empty more mistaken pearlto curl fate
and find oneself
somewhere withno starsand no fear,no knots andno ends
The varied cost not haggled,just peaked and tipped
Traverse naught and koan, andtrust the seed...
TRANSCONTINENTAL by Guiseppe Getto
Transcontinental
How do you take it? She says.Clouds have rolled in, drawn thinend to end like cotton pantieson high-tension wire. Below the seaof non-native grasses is Lincoln,then below alkali flats,the lost golden tablets of Joseph...
NO BONES ABOUT IT by Ken Holland
NO BONES ABOUT IT
Someone told me that my storywas a story that would be told.But I can’t remember who it wasthat spoke when he spoke so.Or who he said the teller would be.Or if...
NAKED IN DREAMS by Michael Eaton
Parting Is Sweet Sorrow
she leftanddidn’t leavemuch of herself—a blond hairdropped without care,frayed golden threadon a worn and stained carpet,a cup of coffee,half-filled, unstirred,and a smell lingeringon the morning sheetslike a winter fog lying lightlyover...
A CHILD LOST by Ray Keifetz
Fool’s Birthday
Not every daydo you pass through a doorwithout opening itand behind the iron boltfind cake.
Not every dayagainst the slow grinding glaciers,evaporating seas,the calcificationof every human heart,do you sing.
Not every day is a birthday.Not...
RAM by Debendra LalTranslated from the Odia by Pitambar Naik
Whether or not Ram was thereI don’t know. Whether or notRam would come one day,that also I don't know. But then,the only thing I know is thatthere’s one Ram Lalthere’s one Ram Prasadthere’s one...