Tombstones, Heptonstall Churchyard / Joanna Grant
These grey-green moors—Brontë country,
where they say the harsh groundwater
around the sisters’ parsonage leached
through the interred corpses in their
unraveling shrouds, their splintering coffins.
Death in the water pitcher, the ewer and basin
Death in the middens rippling their stink through
the lace curtains in the formal parlors, in the
blackening soot corroding the old stone, tarring
pink lungs like so much furred lichen on the
toppling monuments inscribed to some old saint
No one really remembers anymore.
Least of all the slick-black rooks who light
for a moment to rest on what for them is just
another stone. Our etched words convey nothing
to them. They thrive on this very water. Their wings
whisper the wind. No fear in them of this cold, this damp.
Slow motion / Judit Hollos
In her kindergarten years, my daughter was often mocked for being too slow, inattentive, out-of-sync with her movements while other kids were dancing in unison.
slow motion
butterfly dust on fingertips
argonauts
In those slowed-down moments, she existed in realms she created, with self-made magic heroes, crispy rainbows and tamed memories.
awake in a dream
the glow of past summers
between branch scars
old thorns (a cento) / Zach Hauptman
a sun that warms but never burns
with eyes that glisten
a roundel refined and
snapped in half
Thank you for your aversion to this membrane!
redefined by your touch
and I am singing in a language
made easy by a singular body;
meaty and rich red, soft and fibrous
where: the waterfall of nasturtiums
bowing like movement of
missing huntsmen
from the open door
but small mammal a great. of a great.
of a great. look. Grok r spons
(slow blink)
sparks and holes,
when galatea looks back;
I swallow
heartburn following
into waiting carnage
yes.
an old man with your own weather
a Lord Byron of
envy is a chokecherry stone
dropping off the continental shelf
she never taught me
school uniforms left to dry
gentle winds cool damp strands of hair
pornographers of our own narratives
nothing but a mermaid tear in my pocket
leave a hole for me to escape
the egg shells are soft beneath your toes
o on X y s rday.
without words growing in my body
old things are rarely sensual
the fire eater’s pneumonia
after a downpour
Like an egg. Like an egg. Like an egg. Like an egg.
she turns to marble
because we’re proof of
something that like mint
the gleaming eyes of an animal
rotate in a two body problem
compass / Brice Maiurro
sometimes i find
myself shuffling my feet
at a cross-section of hallways
or lost down a winding path
manically dancing
as if a bee had landed
on my back
there is no sign here
if there was the sun
would surely blot it out with its shine
there is no white gloved conductor
nor ominous owl
there is no pie in the sky
lending bright light beams
to the right path
all that’s left
is you
in moment like these i know
the only place to go
is elsewhere
Love Poem / Kimberly O’Connor
I was wearing my winter boots because you had brought me west where I learned about winter boats. Here in the west the past felt less like our past because the past of our people was back east. Here it rains cold in late May so I wore my winter boots to the concert. It rained and I’ll say it: it felt like a cleansing. We had just met on the stairs in the library. We knew all the words. I was smug in my boots. I had no past.
Elegy for D / Michael Schad
For about five years you lived down the street
and then you moved to Mechanicsville and then later
to Chesterfield and now you have moved even further.
We miss your random visits and laughter,
and Matthew said he keeps the remote control car
safe, Asa did not get a chance to know you.
Schizophrenia is a terrible disease as you were both here
and someplace else, but when you were present
with me, with us, you shined and brightened our days.
You once said I was a good looking dude
and that sticks with a person who feels ugly.
Thank you, thank you for picking this dude to lift up.
I will tell people you were an inspiring mess,
a fighter who refused to be alone, so much so,
we drove to Fairfax to buy an overpriced Cocker Spaniel
that you held the whole trip back to Richmond.
I sing because you wept – for Kai Coggin and her poetry ambassadorship / Kashiana Singh
The weight of broken altars
dear poetess, goddess, priestess
dear friend of words, wordless, worlds
and other kingdoms
Oh mother of awe, and queen
of stars, you fill us with promise
queen of sorrow made wise, and
awakening of the dead
You are both sand and shore, pain
and perish, you are living poem, an
epitome of curiousity, teacher you
who play errand girl to joy
Praise for the Pups Among Us / Elizabeth Wolf
