Songs of the Perimenopause: Look What the Cat Dragged In / Joanna Grant
How many times have I been here—
So many times tired of waiting,
Of staying up late, of hoping.
Girl, you’ve got a foot and half a heart
Out my front door—you know it,
I know it, my happy little welcome mat
Not really doing it for you anymore.
Even when you’re here, you’re not
Really here, just a lick and a promise,
A little red speck, a spot. Half-heart,
But still not quite ready to quit.
Just when I’ve made up my mind
To stuff all your old things in a sack
And dump them out back, here you are,
Resplendent. Unrepentant. Wheedling.
Soaking. Just plain insistent.
Spurt after spurt every time I recross
My legs, I sneeze, I cough. Silky-sweet,
No-good, sweet little voice in my ear—
How could you think I was through?
Baby, you know I’m all in on you.
Your childhood sweetheart at nine,
At fifty-two, you and me, still intertwined.
Come, on girl, put it on for me, just one
More time—the hot gush, the blood-skirts.
One last flowering, the end of this hot summer.
The trail back home / Judit Hollos
Was it a difficult decision for the woodcutter’s wife and the father to leave two young siblings in the woods? As a four-year-old, there were neither shiny pebbles nor tiny pieces of bread to help me follow the trail back home, or at least to a monstrous hotel room, when my parents lost sight of me at a summer vacation in a faraway land while they were embroiled in a friendly chat with their fellow guests at an outdoor restaurant.
losing my parents
the white pebbles turn
into bread crumbs
Trudging the ill-lit streets at the resort, a tall lady with curly brown hair wearing a long yellow skirt emerged in the distance. The two older children who were accompanying me during my journey to find my parents asked if that kind-looking woman was my mom. At first, I felt relieved at the thought I finally found her, but as she got closer and closer, I soon realized she only looked similar to my mother but could never replace her. And this lady did not even have a lush candy cottage to lure kids inside, she just walked past us with a sligthly astonished smirk.
fears shape-shifting
the sour taste of
broken glass candy
At last, to everyone’s surprise, I showed up in a colorful Bulgarian folk dance group in the middle of the night, so this parenthetical tale turned out to have a rather happy ending. Or is it likely that my vanishing act was left unnoticed by the gaping crowd? Interestingly, I was never able to remember the happy outcome, only crumbs of a traumatic memory, searching for my mom and dad for a smaller version of eternity.
paint your statues / Zach Hauptman
write a poem about a beautiful woman
here she is; she is naked
she holds a mirror; she looks at herself
name her “vanity”; the object is to be looked at
try not to blame her for her beauty
when galatea looks back; she turns to marble
sculpt her down; chisel out the parts that want
desire is a hollowness; it makes the object brittle
write a poem about a beautiful woman
behold a woman; a bipedal hairless human chicken
pink and pale like a luminous pearl; folds and curves in titanic motion
she is; an interruption to the symposium
try not to blame her for her beauty
when she chisels herself; hatshepsut takes power
smooths one side of the chest then another; belly round with good food
taking herself out of your gaze; and into history
pattern & sequence / Brice Maiurro
pattern-sequence
Cento / Kimberly O’Connor
from Tom Andrews’ The Hemophiliac’s Motorcycle
We’re always looking for some good advice.
After the sudden hush and cool,
the dead are articulate, and know what to say.
Damp smell of the cornfield at night.
We try to talk. Their eyes the color of my eyes.
The Wolf Moon / Michael Schad
At 7 pm we ask, where is the moon?
The moon is stuck in the crown of an Oak.
I look at the fire, then back to the moon
wondering what tonight’s moon ride will invoke.
Every year in January we ride our bikes in January
to remember the winter is here, but it will not always
be here, we ride down Jefferson to Cannon Creek Greenway
up to Brookland park to Boulevard, we ride on Monument Ave,
Patterson, all through the night and then stop for tacos and a beer.
Finally, we go down to the river to see the moon at its peak
hovering over the James, just reflecting all that light into the night,
All five of us just wondering why on a cold January night
we were riding bikes, laughing and being in awe.
SLOUGH / Kashiana Singh
You loosen—
scale by scale—
your name,
your mirror,
your son’s face.
Memory molts,
not all at once
but in soft spirals,
like a snake curling
out of its former self.
Your hands,
twisted shells,
grip at air—
familiar only
by texture, not name.
The candle sputters.
Musk fades.
Words become roots
you no longer chew.
And still,
you are here—
mid-molt,
quietly brilliant
in your forgetting.
Prayer for Memorial Day / Elizabeth Wolf
after watching the movie The Six Triple Eight
Praise to those who died
in service to their country.
Praise to those who organize
who march, protest, call and holler,
to stop the wars that take them.
Praise to the wondrous women
who delivered the backlog of mail,
in the hardest days of the biggest war,
so those who later met with bullets
or flak, fell into the sea or flames,
knew that they were still loved
and remembered. Praise to those
who treasure all those yellowed
fragile letters still, and tell us
all the stories that they hold.
Praise to those who share
bread and chocolate with
the children of the dead,
and teach them how to dance.
