Songs of the Perimenopause: The Selkie Hears the Call of the Sea / Joanna Grant
It was the salt in the broth
Calling, calling long after
I first licked the spoon, testing
The garlic, the butter, the cream,
Tasting the mineral tang
Of the mussels in the old stewpot
I’d dirtied and scrubbed,
Dirtied and scrubbed, all those
Long years since I first left
The brine, the white foam, the wine-deep
For life on two legs, on land, with that man
Who was a boy once, with lashes
Like a girl’s, all long and sweet.
Nothing hard in my heart for him
Now, no hard feelings at all,
Just the boom-call of wave-crash
On gravel beach, salt-wind in
The twisted pines by the shoreline,
The taste of home. And then down
To the surf, the table left set for
Just one. He knew this day would come.
Between the sand and the sea
I am, ever-estranging animal,
Lungs relearning to hold onto air
As I duck and dive under the
Grey-green waves, whirls of silt,
Curls of kelp. Every day less of a woman.
Every day more of myself.
My ears shrink, my hands, my feet
Flare, cupping the cold seawater
In their fleshy webs. Once my full fur,
My fat comes in, I’ll no longer
Fear the cold, feel the wet,
Every flick of my tail another
Great swirl, a spiral abreast the great
Mother current, ever and ever
Onwards into the open sea.
I have forgotten my name.
Ringató / Judit Hollos
Over continents of unsung names
in languages etched in wiggling syllabaries
I wade through codes of filtered time
to find the shelter cradled by a moorland
surrounded by beasts that guarded the end of the world
a cottage filled with babies and toddlers
who look exactly like an earlier version of you
wide dark eyes veiled by thick chestnut hair
your vulnerable face gets lost in the crowd
of abandoned babies I was gently rocking years ago
at a countryside hospital near the train tracks
but unlike in that volunteer program
time passes through liquid mirrors in my dream
you are now blossoming in zigzaged syllables
storming in unknown computer scrips
passing by like a rivulet of expired words
and fail to recognize me anymore.
untitled (renga, sebastopol) / Zach Hauptman
at languid dusk
crickets call their audience
beneath green shadows
and the next door neighbor plays
korean pop at volume
sliding into the
bubbling tub we smell
chlorine and petrichor
gentle winds cool damp strands of hair
and bring the call of night birds
ducks tuck up their legs
and huddle together
around the night-lit pond
barely move sleepy bodies
away from my evening stroll
this life / Brice Maiurro
wherein the poet refers to themselves only in the third person.
wherein the lights turn off. wherein the poet observes a cloak across the room.
wherein the poet places the cloak over his shoulder & becomes death.
wherein the poet removes the cloak from his shoulders & vows to never be death again.
wherein the bluebird nests into the black cloak of death.
wherein the sky sees the new blue of death & mirrors its majesty.
wherein the clouds slowly distance themselves from their old friend.
wherein the mirror breaks to reveal behind it only another mirror.
wherein the mirror cries for never being able to see its own reflection untainted.
wherein the tears of the mirror become the mercury within a volcano.
wherein the volcano cries for not being able to produce tears.
wherein the volcano spends an age questioning if it is not just a mountain.
wherein the glacier absolves itself as the doomsday clock.
wherein the glacier has flashbacks of once having been water
wherein the bones of the mastodon rattle in the old earth.
wherein the ancient medicine manifests only to those with their tongues out.
wherein the devil himself has resolved to no more deals.
wherein the birds flee as the first sign that you too should turn around.
wherein the poet is disoriented in examining where to turn around to.
wherein the birds return to heal the broken-winged among them.
wherein the flag flies half mast on every day because every day is half mast.
wherein the sun becomes the flag & too flies half mast until it tires
wherein the flag relieves itself from duty & becomes just fabric in the wind.
wherein the wind asks if it is the dancer or the choreographer.
wherein the wind asks what happens behind windows.
wherein the stained glass windows hold perennials that never die.
wherein the church tells the old story of revolution of resistance.
wherein the church cannot find its tongue beneath too many rows of teeth.
wherein the marquee has been stripped of words & we’ve been left to speak.
wherein the clapper of the bell bangs against the sound bow & it doesn’t toll.
wherein the mice retire from science. wherein the earth picks up its dust.
wherein the molecules congregate in perfect succession & abandon the task.
wherein the motor of humanity runs down. wherein the runner stops at the red light.
wherein the poet grows jealous of the green light & sets themselves on fire.
wherein the poet blushes their cheeks & bruises their eyes mascara.
wherein the stage awaits the poet like a conductor at a train station.
wherein the train never returns home. wherein the ball never drops.
wherein the mannequin breathes better with no lungs within it.
wherein the hummingbird floats above the translucent lake of fate.
wherein the three fates make sweet garments from the threads of life.
wherein the books open themselves read themselves unname themselves in the night.
wherein the moon has tides & the water holds the sunlight.
wherein the sunlight destroys what it loves the most. wherein the movie plays wrong.
wherein the stomach swings across the trees. wherein the rib cage rises.
wherein the elevator doors won’t open. wherein the organ won’t play.
wherein the stairs return triumphant. wherein the hands return as drums.
wherein the martyr unmartyr. wherein the beast has no business with any of us.
wherein the maths break down at infinity. wherein the end refuses to leave the house.
wherein the holly king throws down his crown. wherein the oak king resigns his post.
wherein the wolves were raised by wolves. wherein the pigs were left alone.
wherein the old words of the ancient texts are returned to the river of poetics.
wherein the individual paints a new archetype upon their skeleton & smiles.
wherein the reader wonders where this bus is going & why they are on it.
wherein the reader looks out the window & sees the trees move through them.
wherein the reader closes their eyes to nidra & sleeps without sleep dreams of nothing.
wherein the poet sets down the staged gun & covers themselves in black soil.
wherein the migrations are guided by joy. wherein the urn is set upon the fireplace.
wherein the bed is turned down. wherein the mint is placed upon the pillow.
wherein the room was not born immaculate but made that way by the silent hand of a human.
May Thunderstorm / Kimberly O’Connor
We were saying how much we loved it because the rain fell onto the gardens as if everything was fine. We had just eaten salmon slices anointed in sesame oil and the irises were purple outlined in pink, a child’s coloring page. “And they sauntered down the uneven sidewalk laughing. The flowers were salmon and lavender. Everything was fine.” The sky flashed, a white crayon gash. We gasped, laughed again.
The Stars Look so Different Tonight / Michael Schad
Tonight my son and I tried to draw
Cheetahs, we watched a video on how
to draw Cheetahs on my phone.
Cheetahs are fast, so my drawing is a blur,
and looks like a kangaroo with dots.
My son became tired of trying
to draw Cheetahs,
so we draw a racecar,
or he draws a racecar
while I fall asleep listening
to the faint ticking of time.
The Sarcasm of Submission / Kashiana Singh
[Verse 1]
I kneel not because they told me to
But because the earth knows more than I do
This spine once proud, now folded low
Where old truths rise, the ego goes
[Verse 2]
The dust remembers what I’ve lost
And every silence counts the cost
So I bow not in defeat
But where the soul and ground can meet
[Chorus]
I say Amen
Like a whisper, like a dare
Like I’m speaking to the air
And hoping something’s there
God or whatever wears that name—
I still come, I still remain
[Verse 3]
The thunder doesn’t always roll
Sometimes it’s hush that fills the soul
No angels, fire, or parted sea
Just the ache of being seen
[Chorus]
I say Amen
Like a whisper, like a dare
Like I’m speaking to the air
And hoping something’s there
God or whatever wears that name—
I still come, I still remain
[Bridge]
I am nothing but the asking
I am flame and I am ash
I am kneeling for the breaking
So something better
might come back
[Final Chorus]
I say Amen
Not for answers, not for proof
But for the burning of what’s true
In the silence that you choose
God or whatever wears that name—
I still kneel, I still remain
Maintain A Positive Balance / Elizabeth Wolf
Maintain A Positive Balance
The whole world is run
from an invisible favor bank.
Keep making deposits.
Not only because it is
the right thing to do,
but so when you stumble,
stuck in a dry gulch,
the reservoir is ready.
give give give
give take give
take take give
give give take
Give, child, full of grace
so that maybe, a month after
your husband leaves, when
the Christmas tree drops needles,
dries out, and dies standing up
the friend who you covered for
when her baby was sick, who
you found alone at twilight in a
parking lot, mumbling over jumper cables,
so that she may turn up at your door
bearing cookies, and spend an entire
afternoon taking down ornaments,
unhooking their twisty wire hangers,
unwinding unplugged strands of lights,
help carry the bins back down cellar
and restore the furniture
to its rightful place. Later that night
while you sip tea and your daughter
sits in clean pajamas doing homework
that windblown arid space
that used to hold your heart
will feel replenished, fed, full;
your tail, untucked;
your jaw, unclenched.
See how that works?
