by Matthew E. Henry

perhaps Chesterton was right and there does come a time when the act,
the game, the art of pretending becomes tiresome. when playing cops and

by Jeannine Marie Pitas

J in Panama talks dirty to me. We’re both single over forty and could use a little consolation.

by Sean Cho A.

the microwave counts down but never up. this feels important. my therapist says you’re always thinking

by Stephen Haven

Of course, the branch does break, and the sun,
No drunk Hungarian, stabs the rooftops,

by Stephen Haven

Wind-softened in bas relief, the slate bone markers
Were skeletons we traced with calloused fingers,

by Aaron Brown

We’re good at them, in Texas, these artificial lakes—
unearthing farmland, razing pines, laying a bed of rock

by Hilary Sallick

all we wanted / ALL WE WANTED
I copy these lines 
from Gary Snyder’s poem Oysters

by Hilary Sallick

in August    the whole world
through these windows
draped by mulberry   blessed

by Richard Chess

To get here, forget the prayers you’ve learned.
Abandon the story of heaven.

by En Lin Koh

plastic covers
open
with pops

by Christina Ellison

My mother points this out like it's something lighthearted
and now it’s all I can see

by Frank Paino

Midnight. Mid-winter.
In this frozen northeastern
meadow, switchgrass

by Sharlee Mullins Glenn

Grandma called it owl light
that in-between time
when day leans into dark

by Barry Casey

As through a window I am seeing my life
And the days and nights of it already spent.

by Isabel Chenot

Dank straw. It needles
at a rusted plow –
bedded with excrement and larval beetles.

by Louis Bourgeois

1.

There were these bones I played with alongside a barren ditch. They were armadillo bones and these bones gave me much pleasure in an abstract way that I cannot fully explain because I am incapable of saying what I mean when I want to.

by Alison Lock

It's early, that time before first light but after the deep dark of night. I open the door of the caravan, step out onto the grass, tuck my heels into my canvas shoes, lift my bicycle by the handlebars, and quietly wheel it away.