Poetry Summer 2021 fiction all issues
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Cover
Diana Akhmetianova
Monique Jonath
Viscosity
& other poems
Alix Christofides Lowenthal
Before and After
& other poems
Rebbekah Vega-Romero
La Persona Que Quiero Ser
& other poems
Oak Morse
Incandescent Light That Peeks Through Secrets
& other poems
George Kramer
The Last Aspen Stand
& other poems
Elizabeth Sutterlin
Meditations on Mars
& other poems
Holly Marie Roland
Clearfelling
& other poems
Devon Bohm
A Bouquet of Cherry Blossoms
& other poems
Ana Reisens
In praise of an everyday object
& other poems
Maxi Wardcantori
The Understory
& other poems
William A. Greenfield
Sometimes
& other poems
Karen L Kilcup
The Sky Is Just About to Fall
& other poems
Pamela Wax
He dreams of birds
& other poems
Mary Jane Panke
Apophasis
& other poems
a mykl herdklotz
Mouettes et Mastodontes
& other poems
Claudia Maurino
Good Pilgrim
& other poems
Mary Pacifico Curtis
One Mystical Day
& other poems
Tess Cooper
Airport Poem
& other poems
Peter Kent
Congress of Ravens
& other poems
Kimberly Sailor
White Women Running
& other poems
Bill Cushing
Creating a Corpse
& other poems
Everett Roberts
Hagar
& other poems
Susan Marie Powers
Canada Geese
& other poems
Tess Cooper
Strawberry Roses
Blind stripes of morning sun; coral roses in my bedroom are the sweetest domestication—
Though red and white columbine grows at my windowsill and this is my heart’s bitter favorite.
It is naked-on-the-beach weather and my popsicle and lips are mango flavored, glossed with sugar.
Bright orange matches my ocean hair and reminds me of juice bursting from flesh with a sweet spice from the islands
Where I am not allowed to visit abuelita
Tillamook
I awake and my mouth tastes like the sea
I remember a little cabin by the water
Where pheasants come in the spring and we eat them in the summer
Where there are reeds by the bank and the river runs red and yellow with speckled bellies
We wore plaid and denim, sandals and bare feet
Met the cows who gave us our ice cream-
Invasive blackberry just as I am
Thorny and thick, but sweet under the august sun
You are saltwater taffy, sticking to my teeth long after I’ve had you
Filling my mouth with that ocean sweetness I haven’t had since I was a teenager
I awake and my mouth tastes like the sea.
My Own Name is Bitter in my Mouth
The first thing I am aware of in the morning is the long growl of my stomach, and yet;
I will not feed it until evening.
I hunger for flesh in the reddest sense;
Sex and roasted chicken are my safe foods
Nicotine and caffeine do me one better
I carve away five pounds of myself every week,
As if less of my body means more of me
This is not the most beautiful I will ever be
I am cheekbones and jawline, lips and eyes
My collarbones are the thin branched perches of sparrows
And for this I eat once a day
For dainty white cotton dresses and slender braceleted wrists,
I dream of bread that will never pass my lips
Airport Poem
You are the owner of all my organs and I am gutted
Crying again in the airport as we part because I am allowed less than persephone’s lot;
We part and I again I am penelope, my patience no virtue but a forced hand
I fold this turn into my airplane seat, knees to chest and eyes fevered and wet.
There is a layer of wool over Dallas,
a weeping blanket of cloud and I wish dearly for gin,
Though I cannot afford the hangover, for—
As my flight takes off I am already heart sick.
What walks
Brother, do you believe?
I stand at the pulpit and preach— Oh Lord above
Do you believe in what lives in the cornfield
And why we don’t go there after dark?
Brother do you believe?
I stand in the waters and preach
Dark waters where alligator turtles live
And catfish mermaids lurk
They get bigger than you think.
Oh brother, I say, do you believe?
Do you know why we say not to leave the safety of the porch light
when you hear your name from the dark?
Brother I tell you that church has been abandoned for good reason
No souls can be saved there anymore
No joyous shouts can be heard in the rafters, only birds
Kudzu now owns the doorway and half the pews
And the devil walks with his white hat, asking
Brother, oh Brother, do you believe?
Tess Cooper
is a writer, artist, and sometimes bear currently living in the woods in Alabama. She has lived in six different states and has been eager to get into fist fights since age seven.