Transition Dreams Cab to train to plane to bus—– Where am I? Where? Here is a house but the rooms keep changing. Here all is familiar—– the school, the mall, the ceremonies, the stadium. What have I missed or is it all the session of mid & I just need rewinding? Traveling, strangers traveling, & all that […]
Read more "Stephen Mead ~ Transition Dreams"Self-Portrait With Writing a Poem I used to know what a poem is. And the scream of peacocks used to know me. And what does that mean? Here’s another bird: the snowy egret stands one-legged and silent in flowing creek water, and neither water nor egret knows the difference. My own sharp beak spears old […]
Read more "R.C. Hoerter ~ Self-Portrait With Writing a Poem"Arrogate There aretwo waysto makeit work swimin goldfrom LAto Dubai swimin bloodin Seattlein New Yorkagain, in LA either waythe end resultis the sameand whetheryou geta headstoneain’t upto you * * * The Emperor The chair is not anythingthe chair has never been—a bitsprung, threadbare, thinnerthan it was. Yet still it is wherehe sits, against the […]
Read more "5 POEMS BY ROBERT BEVERIDGE"Landscape with Tree To be the worst makes someone very special. Imagine the worst crook, the worst drunk and the worst enemy. They’re all special in their own right. And the worst art history student? I looked at every painting like it was a Rorschach test for hysteria or depression. Logic kills imagination. I studied […]
Read more "SARAH HENRY ~ Landscape with Tree"Unfinished Exit I keep thinking about the time in high school when you drew me a map of the city, I still have it somewhere. It was so easy to get lost in a place where all the trees look the same. And now every time I see a missing person’s poster stapled to a […]
Read more "Claudia Wysocky ~ Unfinished Exit"COYOTE TRUTHS Beauty What is it like, I ask Coyote, to wander in fields of lupine and poppies that dot the dry fields, to never walk a straight line and yet brush against glory? All day I starve and all night I roam, Coyote says. Beauty is to wander through an unwoven fence. Fear What […]
Read more "JEFF BURT ~ COYOTE TRUTHS"HONORABLE MENTION – Michael Taylor Utah GirlsI wanna be more disciplined and responsiblePissing off a mountain into a riverYour watermelon can’t believe, approve, or understand your behavior and he is very upsetGrumpy man with with a tan, sitting in a lawn chair in a blizzard, Coca-Cola in hand, upsidedown, drinking his magazineMy teacher told me […]
Read more "WINNING POEMS FROM THE 3rd ANNUAL KAREN TRUJILLO TEEN POETRY CONTEST ~ LAS CRUCES, NM ~2024"bitter coffee so she’s standing there— in vaulted two-storey morning light Bratz Doll Angel engulfed by Redemption coffee shop’s bustling glory ass as tight as a peach the contour of her muscled thighsshowcased by a definite size six boot-cut black yoga pants draped over platform Docs topped with a brightly-colored cap-sleeve and she’s me with […]
Read more "Natasha Deonarain ~ BITTER COFFEE"Cantata some laughed, some wept,most stayed silent.i must hold my posture,face the onlookers with steady eyes.many hide behind their newspapers,a few pull out handkerchiefs.i lock my stance, toes gripping the ground.a boy with a black bag stares, unblinking—i almost dropped the bird.from my chest / a crimson bird emerges / we are told not to […]
Read more "Jennifer Choi ~ Cantata"Old Fiddle Man Old daddy man playing fiddle man in a family youth band. He was the star. Crowds paid & rushed through that door, dancing clapping to hear a few slim notes for just transitory seconds a few brief notes only realizing the ephemeral rhythm man before he died. Dance, dance, dance, fiddle man […]
Read more "Michael Lee Johnson ~ Old Fiddle Man"
