Chelene Knight: from Braided Skin
UGANDA 1972 A once promising land—evaporating. The people abolished, divided and shaken by the expulsion, the elimination. The threat of an ethnic cleansing of the Indian minority hovered over Asian carpenters, mechanics, shoemakers and tailors—the middlemen flail in the political winds. Minority eyes must speak: Identify yourself; breakthrough for Uganda. Kampala—tombs of kabakas have woven...
Wanda Praamsma: from a thin line between
EXCERPTS FROM A THIN LINE BETWEEN it wasn’t intended for me to see but I did (in the subject of an email) the invisible mom on a hill in a suburb in serbia jon went back julie followed there were two weddings one in serbia one in canada two services two families two dresses...
Chelsea Rooney: from Pedal
I twisted a cap off a bottle and threw it into the fire. We watched the sparks. The beer went down like water. The firelight pumped like a red heart in the night. I said, “Let’s bring Sally to the beach tomorrow.” Smirks didn’t respond, didn’t move, didn’t look at me. I could imagine them...
Tanis MacDonald: Two Poems
CHERISH: A CENTO Dear friend, you have excited crowds with your example.1 I speak to judge crimes of filiation.2 Consider that the thing died before we ever proved it lived,3 the boatman’s ferry creaking with its legions of incurables.4 This landfall happened at your exact flooding and5 now you are sitting doubled up in pain,6 your...
Kelly Shepherd: Self Portrait in Fur
SELF PORTRAIT IN FUR The bear says to the gathered performance artists who are attempting a sound poem that emulates the sounds of a bear I never know when it’s actually sound poetry or when it’s someone making fun of sound poetry The performance artists adjust their bear masks, wipe sweat from the backs of...
Ali Znaidi: The Doxa of the Wind
THE DOXA OF THE WIND The dust is biting the leaves. A chrysanthemum is blooming in a salty dry swamp. Sécheresse is everywhere. I’m searching for a mystery amidst the sandy gravel, forgetting about the wind & about doxa, a common belief as its name implies. My lemonade becomes mixed w/ yellow pollen. The desert...
Concetta Principe: from Perversions
THIS DON JUAN FISHBOWL to reach and stop. to want and keep going. to want to reach the limit. to want to take and justify the taking. to reach the limit and steal transgressing. this shapes all that is cypher. sealed with a kiss. so many they cannot be counted. so many thrown, juggled, dropped...
Taryn Hubbard: Two Poems
ON ROLLING THE DICE I tried to explain non-sequitur username perfect punch line a secret combination what’s the point of baited wish down at the avatar hall? tight cued lemon juice, raspberry, reboot, a diagnosis for coconut oil nature’s web forum crowd verified recommendations for correcting personal experiences, or what happened to my friend, or...
Annick MacAskill: Woman as Riot
WOMAN AS RIOT “Then come curtain-lectures in the live-long night.” –St Jerome Our best shot was to ignore it—like a group of dignified mute let gravity herd our cries, take them into the earth. We could have stayed silent: a supple garrulous throat you like to jam things into; the pretty fatras for your soirées....
Sanjeev Sethi: Rigmarole
RIGMAROLE After the drill of social punctilios, when curtains are drawn, the blah blah of bovarism lies peeled in hearts willing to eavesdrop on themselves. The therapy of truth unveils its secrets: we know our lies better than all the light there is. After a mortise level on laminate of life, it is meaningless to...
C. Kubasta: The Prurient I
THE PRURIENT I i much of the language of this section lifted from Gray’s Anatomy ii language lifted from Gray’s Anatomy iii language lifted from The Malleus Malificarum _____ C. Kubasta attended Wells College and received an MFA in poetry from The University of Notre Dame. Her work experiments with hybrid forms, excerpted text, and shifting voices. A...
Erín Moure: Кaпycтa / Kapusta
КAПYCТA / KAPUSTA _____ Erín Moure writes in English and Galician and translates poetry from French, Galician, Spanish and Portuguese into English by, among others, Nicole Brossard, Chus Pato and Fernando Pessoa. Her work has also appeared in short films, theatre, and musical compositions. In 2014, her Insecession, a translational echo to Chus Pato’s biopoetics,...
