Brendan Walsh
Pronouns: He/His
1 Poem
nine2five
Barely getting by, it's all taking and no giving
They just use your mind and you never get the credit
It's enough to drive you crazy if you let it
dolly parton wrote “9 to 5” on the set of the film
9 to 5; she used her long acrylic fingernails
to tap out a beat and the song became canon
for weddings and working class happy hours,
for drunk uncles and overserved aunts
to unloosen their ties and shout into the ceiling.
two years i sat nine2five in an office.
i had a desk and two monitors. people
called me on my office phone. i had
a four-digit extension. winter mornings
i wore a peacoat over a blue button down.
i entered equations in spreadsheets,
brought piles of checks and cash to the bursar.
at nine, i stared into an inbox void
so cavernous and sinister i swore
it perched deep in my unconscious,
the dark place no one knows about.
at noon, i’d refuse to eat, but coffee
counts as food if you disregard calories
and chewing, which are both symptoms
of laziness. at two, i’d sit with my friend
and search the salaries of our higher-ups.
public information. every time, shocking.
where did they put all that money?
too much for a wallet, really. maybe
a wheelbarrow? maybe they converted it to gold coins,
filled their basements like Scrooge McDuck.
i released back into the night, the sanddirtsnow
parking lot, too sullen and screendead to holler
towards the sky which just then opened up to hear me.
Brendan Walsh (he/his) has lived and taught in South Korea, Laos, and South Florida. His work appears in Rattle, Glass Poetry, Indianapolis Review, American Literary Review, and other journals. He is the winner of America Magazine's 2020 Foley Poetry Prize, and the author of five books, including Go (Aldrich Press), Buddha vs. Bonobo (Sutra Press), and fort lauderdale (Grey Book Press).
Brent Calderwood
Pronouns: He/His
1 Poem
Evening Commute
All over town people are meeting cute
The tangled leashes the spilled coffee
They are stranded on islands waiting
for the light they are reaching for the same
waxy apple and queuing at the movies
Tippi and Rod in the bird shop
Harold and Maude among the tombstones
Or you and me at the same concert
Dolly singing “Those Were the Days”
back when I lived in your city
They are returning from work they are sharing
a handrail their thumbs almost touch
they are tall like you the doors slide open
and they are collected by their people
The kiss the quick linking of fingers
the stack of mail the bunch of violets
they are going home to their lives
Brent Calderwood (he/him) is the author of The God of Longing (Sibling Rivalry Press), an American Library Association LGBT poetry selection for 2014. His essays on film, music, and culture have appeared in Rolling Stone, Out, the Chicago Sun-Times, and elsewhere. His poems have appeared in journals and anthologies including The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide and Why to These Rocks: 50 Years of Poem from the Community of Writers.
Denise Duhamel
Pronouns: She/Her
3 Poems
THREE VILLANELLES ON MY SIXTIETH BIRTHDAY
Swan Song
How lucky am I to have lived this long,
to have made it all the way to sixty.
This villanelle isn’t quite my swan song
though I can only do so much to prolong
my ability to tap my Mac keys.
How lucky am I to have lived this long—
eating Pink Lady apples, playing ping pong
and Scrabble, reading Nikki Giovani.
This villanelle isn’t quite my swan song.
I’ve read Sylvia Plath, Ocean Vuong,
Frank O’Hara, and Agatha Christie.
How lucky am I to have lived this long—
When I was eight I watched Neil Armstrong
walk on the moon. I thought he looked tipsy!
This villanelle isn’t quite my swan song,
or is it? I’ve been right and I’ve been wrong
before. Future predictions transfixed me.
How lucky am I to have lived this long—
I hope this villanelle isn’t my swan song.
***
About Birthdays
If I am sixty then Boy George is too.
He’s casting for an upcoming biopic—
No trailer yet, no big hullabaloo.
About birthdays, he says, As long as you
stay present, life stays kaleidoscopic.
If I am sixty then Boy George is too.
I have no movie, only poems to debut.
Friends ask if I’ll fly to the tropics,
leave a trail, make a big hullabaloo.
But I stay home to shimmy and boogaloo,
rage at those Proud Boys, their violent upticks.
If I am sixty then Boy George is too.
Like me, George feels freedom bidding adieu
to youth. Huge problems seem microscopic
in hindsight, no big hullabaloo.
Once I wanted fame. Now I want to pass through
days of good karma, avoid the chaotic.
If I am sixty then Boy George is too.
No Sweet Sixty party, no hullabaloo.
***
Sweet Sixty
Sweet Sixty and of course I’ve been kissed
by humans and pets, the breeze and the sun.
Keep It Simple, Stupid when you reminisce,
I tell myself. Not everything was bliss,
nor was everything a grief-megaton.
Sweet sixty and of course I’ve been kissed
then left. Kissed by disaster. Kissed then dismissed.
The illness, the divorce, the hit-and-run.
Keep It Simple, Stupid when you reminisce—
never, when looking back, look in the abyss.
(Shrinks say guilt is a useless emotion.)
Sweet sixty and of course I’ve been kissed
by toddlers with sticky lips. A bee’s hiss—
then I was in the ER where my life had begun.
Keep It Simple, Stupid when you reminisce
about childhood, first loves, that awful Christ-
mas. Tragedy didn’t outweigh the fun.
Sweet sixty and of course I’ve been kissed.
I can be stupid when I reminisce.
Denise Duhamel’s most recent book of poetry is Second Story (Pittsburgh, 2021). Her other titles include Scald; Blowout; Ka-Ching!; Two and Two; Queen for a Day: Selected and New Poems; The Star-Spangled Banner; and Kinky.She and Maureen Seaton have co-authored, most recently, CAPRICE (Collaborations: Collected, Uncollected, and New). She and Julie Marie Wade co-authored The Unrhymables: Collaborations in Prose. She is a Distinguished University Professor in the MFA program at Florida International University in Miami.
Donna Vorreyer
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
The Sky is a Promise
An airplane arcs a white contrail across the blue,
a linea alba darkening on the belly of the sky,
sign of a world about to be born. That’s not true–
it’s just a machine, venting its exhaust, the dew
of its hot air hitting the atmosphere. I cannot fly
like an airplane’s arching white tail, but blue
is the color that paints my isolation, the view
from every window, the calmest color, a sigh,
a sign from the world. Born of something true,
I make up stories, search the clouds for clues
for how to travel through this trial, my mind
on its own plane –white boats, cotton sails, blue
water. Now a needle pierces my arm, leaves a bruise,
some soreness, the ache a reemergence of the divine,
a sign. A world about to be reborn. That’s not true–
it has all been here, just knocked askew,
spinning wild on its axis. I believe we will be fine,
airplanes arcing white contrails across the blue,
signs of the burdens we have borne, of what is true.
Donna Vorreyer (she/her) is the author of To Everything There Is (2020), Every Love Story is an Apocalypse Story (2016) and A House of Many Windows (2013), all from Sundress Publications. Her work has appeared in Baltimore Review, Tinderbox Poetry, Poet Lore, Sugar House Review, Waxwing, and other journals, and she serves as an associate editor for Rhino Poetry. Recently retired from 36 years in public education, she looks forward to new adventures.
Douglas K Currier
Pronouns: He/His
1 Poem
Turn the page
We come to think of this as age,
this measured movement into night.
Go check the mirror, turn the page.
We check out faces at this stage
for signs of wearing, signs of blight,
we come to think of this as age.
We move our muscles, try to gauge
the looseness there of what was tight.
Go check the mirror, turn the page.
The worst of us try to assuage
the damage and avoid harsh light.
We come to think of this as age.
The best of us try to engage
the mind to hold the memories right.
Go check the mirror, turn the page.
But this is only time’s outrage,
cover-to-cover, a book so slight,
we come to think of this as age,
so check the mirror, turn the page.
Douglas K Currier (he/his) has published work in a number of anthologies: Onion River: Six Vermont Poets, Getting Old, and Welcome to the Neighborhood and journals: The Café Review, Main Street Rag, The Comstock Review and many others, both in the United States and in South America. He lives with his wife in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
George Franklin
Pronouns: He/His
1 Poem
When Water Was Enough
I used to wake up early with the light,
Swing feet to floor, ignore my tightening spine,
Throw water on my face to slough off night.
I’d check the mirror surprised back then by white
Hair and wrinkles unmistakably mine.
I used to wake up early with the light.
Uncomfortable asleep, I’d roll left, right,
Barely aware of shadows and design,
But water on my face would slough off night.
Lying in bed, now conscious, just not quite
Awake, tongue swollen, still tasting last night’s wine—
I used to wake up early with the light.
The alarm, ringing loud, persists despite
Blunt hand and brain’s best effort to decline,
Like water on my face to slough off night.
Face it, I’m old. Sleep rheums and blurs my sight.
The stiffness in my back’s just one more sign.
I used to wake up early with the light
When water was enough to slough off night.
George Franklin (he/his) is the author of four books of poetry, Noise of the World (Sheila-Na-Gig Editions), Traveling for No Good Reason (Sheila-Na-Gig Editions), Among the Ruins / Entre las ruinas (Katakana Editores), and Travels of the Angel of Sorrow (Blue Cedar Press). Magazine publications include: Into the Void, Pedestal Magazine, The Threepenny Review, Salamander, and Cagibi. He is the co-translator, along with the author, of Ximena Gómez's Último día/Last Day (Katakana Editores).
James Davis
Pronouns: He/His
2 Poems
An Accident
The day he slammed the tailgate on my finger,
we’d just unloaded the last of the firewood.
It was an accident. I wasn’t in danger.
He said he was sorry, twice. “A real humdinger,”
my father called his handiwork, my hand
the day he slammed the tailgate on my finger.
I was thirteen, a back-tier church-choir singer.
I’d prayed for a straightening all that I could.
It was an accident. I wasn’t in danger
as long as I sang my part. I felt no anger
beyond the usual, mortifying need
the day he slammed the tailgate on my finger.
He shuffled cards. I split the deck. A king or
queen, a flush or straight, I understood
it was an accident. I wasn’t in danger.
The nail turned plum, then black, a harbinger
of night, a little sunset in my blood
the day he slammed the tailgate on my finger.
It was no accident. I was a danger.
Senior Quotes
“Stay in drugs. Say no to school.”
“Why fall in love when you can fall asleep?”
“Veni vidi vici.” – Ja Rule
“Money can’t buy happiness. It can buy Taco Bell.”
“Some days are just a total waste of makeup.”
“I went to school high. You went to high school.”
“I like my women like my coffee: not at all.”
“No, you cannot try on my hijab.”
“Veni vidi vici.” – Tool
“I may be a ginger, but I do have a soul.”
“You’ve got to be bottomless to get to the top.”
“Yo, make up a quote for me. I’m not at school.”
“I was Beyoncé in a school full of Michelles.”
“Yes, the carpet matches the drapes.”
“Veni vidi vici.” – Jewel
“Our parents all had sex the same year. That’s cool.”
“A walk of shame begins with a single step.”
“Veni vidi vici.” – Deadpool
“Bruh, we graduated just to go back to school.”
James Davis (he/his) is the author of Club Q (Waywiser, 2020), which Edward Hirsch selected for the Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in American Literary Review, Bennington Review, Best New Poets, Copper Nickel, The Gay & Lesbian Review, and elsewhere. He is an Associate Poetry Editor for Narrative Magazine and a Voertman-Ardoin Fellow at the University of North Texas. Originally from Colorado Springs, he now lives in Denton, Texas, where he is pursuing a PhD.
Jen Currin
Pronouns: She/They
1 Poem
The Chill
On the verge of so many symptoms.
Her father a neurotic academic.
The chill of countless opinions.
She thinks she'll make another gold album
after she dumps the ginny alcoholic
on the verge of so many symptoms.
Hungry for Venice, Tokyo--but she has no income,
camps in her father's attic,
chilly, writing songs of countless opinions.
She harmonizes into her phone; computer's broken.
Replayed, her voice sounds anemic,
on the verge of so many symptoms.
She lights a candle, knowing it's superstition.
There are too many rituals for her to mimic,
in the thrall of countless opinions.
A hundred new photos wink for her consideration.
The sight sends her into a panic.
On the verge of so many symptoms,
in the chill of countless opinions.
Jen Currin (she/they) is the author of five books, including Hider/Seeker: Stories, a 2018 Globe and Mail Best Book, and The Inquisition Yours, winner of the 2011 Audre Lorde Award for Lesbian Poetry and a finalist for a LAMBDA. Jen lives on the unceded territories of the Qayqayt, Musqueam, and Kwantlen Nations (New Westminster, BC, Canada, a suburb of Vancouver), and teaches writing at Kwantlen Polytechnic University.
Jen Karetnick
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
Evaporating Villanelle for Algae Bloom
We all have secrets we would like to keep
to ourselves. Sure, the sea is no different.
The whole grave mass of it could cover up
oil spills, plastics. But they spike into shape,
those hourglass whorls to see in the distance.
We all have secrets we would like to keep
but still resuscitate. Regret’s lewd,
a sour bite that shows up for tea;
the whole grave mass of it could
foul the interstitial brood
with its vast swirl, its Milky Way.
We all have secrets we would
label scarlet tide or sea snot—
endless whirl of dishonor—
the whole grave mass of it
we fail to save
with mere skimmers,
this whole grave
we all have.
Jen Karetnick's (she/her) fourth full-length book is The Burning Where Breath Used to Be (David Robert Books, September 2020), an Eric Hoffer Poetry Category Finalist, an IPPY EVVY winner, and a Kops-Fetherling Honorable Mention. Co-founder and managing editor of SWWIM Every Day, she has work appearing recently or forthcoming in Barrow Street, The Comstock Review, december, Matter, Michigan Quarterly Review, Terrain.org, and elsewhere.
Jennifer Wheelock
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
Something Simple as a Sock Can Break You
You are carrying a heavy load
of laundry up the stairs, drop a sock,
bend to pick it up, another goes,
and then some boxers. Again, you’re bowed.
You feel this day was made to mock
you, carrying a heavy load.
All scooped up, and now it’s time to fold,
match. Where is your son? Why is he not back?
Bend to rub the dog, another goes.
Then you hear the frig groan. It’s so old.
The vet calls – you bounced another check.
You are carrying a heavy load.
Something simple as a sock, and you implode.
A tremor shakes the house. L.A. No shock.
Bend to grab a sock, another goes.
Ringing. Can’t find your phone. Your patience erodes.
The clothes cling with static. Don’t take stock.
You are carrying a heavy load.
Bend to pick it up, or let it go.
Jennifer Wheelock (she/her) is a poet and painter living in Los Angeles. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in many journals and anthologies, including Chattahoochee Review, Muse/A Journal, Cortland Review, Los Angeles Review, Post Road, Valparaiso Review, Lake Effect, Flycatcher, Diagram, River Styx, Atlanta Review, and The Inflectionist Review. She works at the University of Southern California.
Jessica Melilli-Hand
Pronouns: She/Her
3 Poems
Fool Me Twice: A Manifesto by the ADA’s Able-Bodied Self-Appointed Guards
Of course we should be kind – if it’s real – but
a squeak of wheels does not always sound true!
I watched him stand and walk! He’s faking it.
“My pain!” she cried from Helen’s lips – that slut –
too pretty—agony cannot be truth.
Of course we should be kind if it’s real, but
the other day a well-dressed man saw fit
to ease his Jag into the only blue.
I smelled the Franklins, and I knew: he’s faking it.
And bratty kids you can tell just need to get hit,
not given IEP’s for poor me boo-boo’s.
Of course, we should be kind – I’m just saying – but
I heard his rumbling laugh, and then – no shit –
he said he was depressed. Yeah, right. Boo-hoo.
I’m sick, too. Sick of all this faking it.
Can’t lift! Can’t sit! Can’t work! Can’t eat nuts!
It’s too convenient, I say. Who pays? You.
Of course we should be kind – if it’s real – but
what if what if what if they’re faking it?
The Spokesperson for the Perpetually Broken Elevator Beside the Stairway to Heaven Responds to Pesky Activists
It’s inconvenient (you’ll say “Who pays? All do…”):
the elevator’s out until next year.
A squeak of wheels may not always roll through,
so don’t expect the world to spin ‘round you.
Stop screaming “Access is a Right!” – Dumb cheer.
It’s inconvenient, we know. Who pays you
to harass hard-working hard-hat folk, who
just need some time – the finish line is near!
The squeaky wheel will not get greased or through
to anyone who gives a damn if you
refuse to be polite. Listen, Sweet Dears,
you’re inconvenient, I say. Who pays? We do
when you chain your chairs and chant – and look at you,
not even in a chair! Lazy! Climb the stairs!
Don’t squeak your feels; just wait until we’re through.
It won’t take long – this time we promise you,
so wheel to the side and keep the walkway clear.
Don’t inconvenience those who say they’ll pay you
to squeak your wheels out of the way. Let them through.
Elevator Complaint Refrain: A Tour of America
Please wheel to the side and keep the walkway clear.
In Washington, the freedom blossoms fall;
the elevator’s out until next year.
New York, New York, where Liberty looms near
but not for those stuck in stations far from all.
Please wheel to the side and keep the walkway clear.
When Kansas twisters roar the sound of fear,
we run down stairs in ground beneath the hall –
the elevator’s out until next year.
We thought Berkeley would be the place where we’re
welcomed, but like elevators, progress stalls.
Please wheel to the side and keep the walkway clear.
In Coastal Georgia, tourists cradle beers
up Savannah’s steep stairways until they fall.
The elevator’s out until next year.
From sea to sea, we hold this value dear:
freedom to climb the rungs for (almost) all.
Please wheel to the side and keep the walkway clear.
The elevator’s out until next year.
Jessica Melilli-Hand’s (she/her) work appears in the Carolina Quarterly, CALYX, Redactions: Poetry & Poetics, Hunger Mountain, Painted Bride Quarterly, Barrow Street, and the minnesota review, among others. She won first place in the Agnes Scott Poetry Competition three times: when judged by Terrance Hayes, when judged by Arda Collins, and when judged by Martín Espada. She is an assistant professor of English at the College of Coastal Georgia.
Julie E. Bloemeke
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
Stay at Home
I am in the days I dreamed I would live,
baby at my breast, child by my side,
and yet, I wonder, how much can I give?
Because to feel the arc, to be alive,
I must have the poem of every word wide.
I am in the days I dreamed I would live.
My yearn refrain, time to write, time to live,
no tears or swaying, the mother aside.
And yet, even then, how much can I give?
Why is it always we must wait to live,
the pull of hunger tide rising inside?
I am in the days I dreamed I would live.
I wish through hours, I do this to live,
not wanting to break, not wanting to hide.
And yet, I wonder, how much can I give?
Today, both board the bus, wired, alive,
and I return to only me inside.
I am in the days I dreamed I would live,
and yet, I wonder, how much I can give.
Julie E. Bloemeke (she/her) is the 2021 Georgia Author of the Year Finalist for Poetry. Her debut full-length collection Slide to Unlock (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2020) was also chosen as a 2021 Book All Georgians Should Read. An associate editor for South Carolina Review, she was a finalist for the 2020 Fischer Prize. Her poems, essays, and interviews have appeared in numerous publications including Writer’s Chronicle, Prairie Schooner, Cortland Review, Gulf Coast, EcoTheo Review, and others.
Karen Paul Holmes
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
Music Camp, 1968
I don’t know exactly where his hand was—
hanging over my shoulder, but how far down?
Did I tell you he never kissed me?
We sat on a bench behind the lakeside stage,
the All-State band rehearsing Sousa.
I don’t know exactly where his hand was—
Did his arm cross the back of my camp shirt,
damp palm stretching past damp pit… to breast?
Is it odd to you that we never kissed?
My face sunburn-hot with shame or thrill
I stared ahead, could not move. How long did we sit?
I must’ve known exactly where his hand was.
I don’t know why we weren’t missed
from wherever eighth graders were meant to be.
Can you tell me why he never kissed me?
All I knew was the heat, the wet. Garbled
music in buzzing ears. He was a trumpet player.
I know exactly his eyes, his mouth. But his hand?
Did I ever tell you he said he’d write me?
Karen Paul Holmes (she/her) has two poetry collections, No Such Thing as Distance (Terrapin, 2018) and Untying the Knot (Aldrich, 2014). Her poems have been featured on Garrison Keillor’s The Writer's Almanac and Tracy K. Smith’s The Slowdown. Publications include Diode, Valparaiso Review, Verse Daily, Prairie Schooner, and many more.
Kate Falvey
Pronouns: She/Her
2 Poems
Lakeside Villanelle
Each month the moon breaks over Windermere.
The stars, unaltered, tremble, streak and, and spill.
Our brash ghosts flung from memory’s mists appear.
Fir-flakes and pebbles, forest-stalks adhere.
Our backs, incautious, press against that hill.
Each month the moon breaks over Windermere.
Our bodies young, our promises sincere.
Lapped by darkness, we lightly take our fill.
Our brash ghosts flung from memory’s mists appear.
An ocean and the years can’t interfere.
Our small sounds break the lakeside silence still.
Each month the moon breaks over Windermere.
Not fabulous enough for balladeer,
Our legend charms our ages, leaves us chill.
Our brash ghosts flung from memory’s mists appear.
We join again, each from a separate sphere,
Recast our moonlit images at will.
Each month the moon breaks over Windermere
Our brash ghosts flung from memory’s mists appear.
Mad Crone Villanelle
No one wanted me but I can’t seem to care.
This life is hard enough without regrets.
I don’t need pity, sorry eyes, or prayer.
I loved once or twice but each banal affair
ended raggedly with savage tears and threats.
No one wanted me but I can’t seem to care.
I pot my herbs and potter ‘round my lair,
accumulating tales, discharging debts.
I don’t need pity, sorry eyes, or prayer.
The children often dance away and stare.
I know the rumors say I’ve lost my wits.
No one wanted me but I can’t seem to care.
They want acquittals, fixes, spells, a share
of what they think a canny ancient gets.
I don’t need pity, sorry eyes, or prayer.
I stride with unbowed back and feral hair,
give myself to none, write brash, unread vignettes.
No one wanted me but I can’t seem to care.
I don’t need pity, sorry eyes, or prayer.
Kate Falvey's (she/her) work has been published in an eclectic array of journals and anthologies; in a full-length collection, The Language of Little Girls (David Robert Books); and in two chapbooks, What the Sea Washes Up (Dancing Girl Press) and Morning Constitutional in Sunhat and Bolero (Green Fuse Poetic Arts). Kate edits the 2 Bridges Review, published through City Tech/CUNY, where she teaches, and is an associate editor for the Bellevue Literary Review.
Kelly McQuain
Pronouns: He/His
1 Poem
Vampirella
It wasn’t her boobs that appealed to this gay fellow
or the fact that she wore a red bikini thong.
She was a superhero with fangs, my gal Vampirella
—no tangled-up Rapunzel, no ashen Cinderella.
An ass-kicker in knee boots ready to get it on
with any handsome, hot-blooded earthly fellow.
I fell under her spell too, I have to tell you,
though her curves didn’t appeal to my ten-year-old dong.
Still I was bewitched and bedeviled by Vampirella
and her pulp-mag adventures, their pages long yellowed
along with old comics left in boxes too long.
In back of the Book Mart, past the fat owner fella,
is where I found her, a slick cover by Frazetta
peeking out past Creepy and Eerie, one shelf-rung
below forbidden Playboy: my wild bitch, Vampirella!
She fought werewolves, demons, witches, night terrors;
she seduced handsome men with her succubus song.
Though I followed her stories, I never could tell
a soul that I wanted what every straight fellow shouldn’t:
to be a hot vampire chick and super-strong—
my high-heeled, raven-haired, bikini-clad Vampirella.
At ten, I was a good kid, no holy terror,
though I suspect my parents feared I was turning out wrong.
Maybe that’s why they let their queer little fellow
spend his allowance on soft-core mags that might quell
a desire already starting to steer him along.
Blame me. Don’t you dare blame double-D Vampirella.
*"Vampirella" was originally published in the anthology Drawn to Marvel: Poems from the Comic Books (Minor Arcana Press).
Kelly McQuain's (he/his) poetry has appeared in American Poetry Review, Best New Poets 2020, The Pinch, Painted Bride Quarterly, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Rogue Agent, Spunk, and Cleaver, as well as such anthologies as The Queer South and Rabbit Ears: TV Poems. He is the author of Velvet Rodeo, which won the Bloom chapbook poetry prize. His poem, “Ruby on Fire” won the inaugural Glitter Bomb Award from Limp Wrist.
Kerry Trautman
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
Glitter in the Air II
There have never been flowers in my hair.
I’ve never watched sunlight stream
through a fistful of glitter in the air.
It’s not as if I don’t care
to wallow, to while away time and dream,
but there have never been flowers in my hair.
I let sensibleness shadow. I beware
the foolishness clearly seen
in a fistful of glitter in the air.
There must be music somewhere
or love or poetry to mellow me like cream.
There have never been flowers in my hair
but I know it’s possible to weave them there—
petals like stained-glass in sunlight’s gleam—
like a fistful of glitter in the air.
Someday I will dare
to not be who I seem.
There have never been flowers in my hair.
No fistful of glitter in the air.
Kerry Trautman (she/her) is a poetry editor for Red Fez, and her work has appeared in various anthologies and journals such as Midwestern Gothic, Rat's Ass Review, Alimentum, Slippery Elm, Paper & Ink, and Free State Review. Her poetry books are Things That Come in Boxes (King Craft Press 2012,) To Have Hoped (Finishing Line Press 2015,) Artifacts (NightBallet Press 2017,) and To be Nonchalantly Alive (Kelsay Books 2020.)
KJ Cerankowski
Pronouns: He/His
1 Poem
Villanelle for the Geology Next Time
After Kathryn Yusoff, after James Baldwin
Because the world is always already turning
to face the storm writing its weather,
I have begun this poem and torn it up too many times
Because I keep seeing the face of my father in mine
torment of knowing whence I came and where I’m headed
in the midst of this world’s burning—
How to quilt and fasten lyric from semblance of jawline into spine
apologue of ore and jewel, ossified endurance of elements sutured together
huddled against a fictitious linearity of cascade and brim of time
Mistake of first/then, before/after, of nucleic acid for bloodline
forgotten enfolding of amoeba and algae, of laurel and heather
of grey wolf and whale—chorus of creatures pacing the planet’s turning
Bodying vine into vertebrae sentimental sediment we intertwine
metamorphic stone of lime, quartzite eye, of flock, of a feather
committed to act, to be in danger, to endanger far too long in time
If we cannot love each other when we are soft, down of pine
crest of palisade, break of tide, none of us will survive whether
or not the world is always already burning, still turning
away from or into what we have invented and torn up too many times
KJ Cerankowski (he/his) is a queer writer based in Cleveland, OH. His poetry and prose have appeared in Paper Darts; DASH; Short, Fast, & Deadly; The Account: A Journal of Poetry, Prose, and Thought, and Home is Where You Queer Your Heart (Foglifter). His collection of hybrid essays, Suture, is forthcoming with punctum books.
Liz Ahl
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
Watching the Blood Moon
Tonight the moon burns white, the moon burns red,
and then, unshadowed, shifts and sifts the light
and floats a grand finale overhead.
Though we were tired, and might have gone to bed
and dreamt the dreams we’d meant to dream tonight,
we watch the white moon’s slow burn down to red
the way a coal might seethe before it’s dead.
But this moon oozes back to life and light
and floats its grand finale overhead.
Driving, we pursued the moon. It led
us to this lakeside where the breeze is slight
but seems to push the moon from white to red,
and back again. The stars blink, sewn by threads
of constellations to the sky. Moonlight
washes them out, returning overhead.
It’s dust. It’s blood. It’s harvest. Then, to bed
where lesser dreams will be eclipsed tonight
by a shadowed moon that dims from white to red,
and floats a grand finale overhead.
Liz Ahl (she/her) is the author of Beating the Bounds (Hobblebush Books, 2017), as well as several poetry chapbooks from Slapering Hol Press, Seven Kitchens Press, and Pecan Grove Press. Individual poems have appeared in Lavender Review, Mezzo Cammin, Nimrod, Atticus Review, Sinister Wisdom, Prairie Schooner, Crab Orchard Review, and in other literary journals and anthologies. She lives in Holderness, New Hampshire.
M.M. De Voe
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
After the Audition
I paced. Behind the plate glass door, I heard
the telephone’s abrasive voice dissect
a hollow silence. “Say the fucking word,”
I hissed. The leaden pencils’ scratch conferred
no details of the one they would select.
I paced. Behind the plate glass door, I heard
a hesitating mutter and absurd
exaggerated laughter intersect
in hollow silence. “Say the fucking word,”
I pleaded, but the sentry walls deterred
all knowledge which was more than indirect.
I paced. Behind the plate glass door, I heard
a fist crash on a desk. My ears inferred
disorder, and I felt a voice project
through hollow silence, “Say the fucking word!”
With sudden clarity, a phrase (no longer blurred)
complied: there is just one we must reject…
I paced. Behind the plate glass door, I heard
a hollow silence speak the final word.
M. M. DeVoe (she/her) is a female person but a nonbinary writer. Instead, she writes across genres, frequently blending them, and champions the cause of every form of writing. Most recent accomplishments are a 2020 Pushcart nomination, two inclusions in 2020 anthologies and in 2021, her first full-length publication, a guide for parents who are hoping to stay on creative track in their writing: BOOK & BABY (Brooklyn Writers Press), which won first prize at the 2021 Indie Awards.
Marc Frazier
Pronouns: He/His
1 Poem
While Birds Sing: A Villanelle
You arrive full of need every day.
Sometimes I wish a season will end.
I want to say I’ll never go away.
We both try to keep fear at bay.
Our words break but never seem to bend.
You arrive full of need every day.
When dawn comes I’ll know what to say.
Imagine a letter I don’t intend to send.
I want to say I’ll never go away.
While lilacs last I ask you to stay.
Shorter days tame my impulse to tend.
You arrive full of need every day.
At times the moon’s waxing prompts me to pray.
Strong joints can untie like a fisherman’s bend.
I want to say I’ll never go away.
We can’t predict how much our grief will weigh.
Or why our choices cause a wall to ascend.
You arrive full of need every day.
I want to say I’ll never go away.
Neil de la Flor &
Maureen Seaton
Neil's Pronouns: He/His
Maureen's Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
A Box of Boys
Marc Frazier (he/his) is a Chicago-area LGBTQ writer who has published in journals including The Gay and Lesbian Review, Slant, Permafrost, Plainsongs, Poet Lore, Ascent, Gargoyle, Into the Void, RHINO, The Tampa Review, et al. A recipient of an Illinois Arts Council Award for poetry, he has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. His three books, including his latest, Willingly, are available at online booksellers.
Matthew Hittinger
Pronouns: He/His
1 Poem
Manhattins
Don't rush, hour,
parade in cologne
the yet-to-sour
cloud of perfume and powder
the soap halo
of fresh-from-the-shower, hour
of the possible, of trouser
crease and run-free hose
blouse and ironed shirt, sour
breath scoured,
the fully charged phone,
unread text, hour
of no regrets, power
in the bone and stone
of last night's whiskey sour
the hour we devour our
lone poses and supposes.
Don't rush, hour;
too soon will it all sour.
Matthew Hittinger (he/his) is the author of The Masque of Marilyn (GOSS183, 2017), The Erotic Postulate (2014) and Skin Shift (2012) both from Sibling Rivalry Press, and three chapbooks. His work has appeared in many journals and anthologies, has been adapted into art songs, and in 2012 Poets & Writers Magazine named him a Debut Poet on their 8th annual list. Matthew lives and works in New York City.
Maureen Seaton
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
Things to Do in Denver When You’re Dead
—Warren Zevon, 1991
’Cause I got some weird ideas in my head
regarding things I’d like to do in Denver
(or Miami or Manhattan) when I’m dead,
or, for that matter, when I’m almost ready
to be dead—so I’d best be fast and clever.
Cause I got some weird ideas in my head
about things I bet you thought I never said
or ever dreamed I said out loud whenever
I found myself dead in Denver or half-dead
in Dallas or Santa Fe where I once fled
a ranch of ghosts, all unearthly-gendered
’cause I got some weird idea in my head
that maybe I could meet you in bed instead
of waiting to rendezvous in Denver
(or Manhattan or Miami) when I’m dead.
That’s my end of life proposal, old friend.
What have we got to lose except forever?
’Cause I got some weird ideas in my head.
Can’t wait to go to Denver when I’m dead.
*Listen to Warren Zevon's "Things to do in Denver When You're Dead."
Maureen Seaton (she/her) has authored numerous poetry collections, both solo and collaborative, most recently, Undersea (JackLeg, 2021) and Zero-Zero (Anhinga, 2021, with Kristine Snodgrass). Her honors include the Florida Book Award, Lambda Literary Award, Audre Lorde Award, NEA, and Pushcart. Her memoir, Sex Talks to Girls (University of Wisconsin, 2008, 2018), also garnered a “Lammy”. She was voted Best Poet 2020 by the Miami New Times and is Professor Emerita of Creative Writing at the University of Miami.
Raina K. Puels
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
Alien Queen
So you want me to be your Alien Queen forever?
Worship my green cunts—remember—I’m the one in power.
Prove our orbits should always sync together
by coming aboard me for a deep space adventure.
If you probe my dark matter at all unearthly hours
& eclipse my expectations, I’ll queen your dungeon forever.
See that purple pregnant dragon guarding treasure?
Genuflect. Tickle her scowl. I promise she won’t devour.
Very good, my subject! May we always wear these jewels together.
I’ll tether your wrists in ethically sourced unicorn leather
& ride your face while we cruise through meteor showers.
Could you handle my gravity if I was your queen forever?
Dick me hard, dick me deep, dick me tender—
my moans sonic boom-boom-booming even louder.
Hubble named us Triple Lindy for how we writhe together.
Because you proved my pleasure is your pleasure,
I invite you—My Consort—to move into my tower.
I’m your Alien Queen always & forever;
one day, I’ll allow you to cum while we’re together.
Raina K. Puels (she/they) is a queer/poly Boston-based writer, educator, and kinkster. She holds an MFA from Emerson College and reads poems for Split Lip Mag. You can find their writing in The Rumpus, Hobart After Dark, PANK, and many other places listed on their website
Rebekah Wolman
Pronouns: She/Her
2 Poems
Taking You Out To The Ballgame
You’re sure you have no interest in baseball
but I’m telling you to give it just a chance.
I have the tickets anyway—this one’s my call.
You’re outraged and disgusted by the gall
of MLB to charge so much to watch a dance
of overpaid, outgrown boys on a field with a ball.
I promise, though, when you see a home run clear the wall
you’ll become a fan, swept up in the game’s romance.
You’ll lean forward in your seat to catch the umpire’s call;
you’ll recognize the difference, however small,
between a forkball and a splitter; you’ll take a stance
when the umpire calls a blatant strike a ball.
And then there’s looking at the players, whether tall
or short, whether wearing the knickers or the pants.
If nothing else, on points of fashion you can make a call.
A few more games and you’ll be subject to the pall
a loss casts over the field. You’ll succumb to the trance
of watching the arc and the curve of the ball.
You’ll know why when a game is on I don’t take your call.
Hubris And Humbling
What’s all this about writing a perfect poem
like landing a fish with a well-aimed spear
when every line I launch out on its own
drifts moping, limp, bedraggled, home?
They ring their tinny bells against my ear,
taunting my pursuit of the perfect poem.
The next words I set free to roam
seem sure to bring me somewhere near
but all these lines I launch out on their own
lose their substance, dissolve into foam,
and I rein them desperately back in fear
that I’m losing sight of my perfect poem.
I could fill a foot-thick tome
with words I’ve scrawled and then watched veer
off course, charting paths of their own
toward islands where they land, alone.
Maybe it’s enough — what I have right here —
not trying to write some perfect, imagined poem
out of lines perfectly happy on their own.
Rebekah Wolman (she/her) is a recently retired educator living in San Francisco and returning to poetry after a long detour. Her poems have appeared in decades past in the Berkeley Poetry Review and Essential Love, an anthology of poems about parents and children, and more recently in The New Verse News.
Roberto Christiano
Pronouns: He/His
1 Poem
Telenovelas are Hell
after the YouTube videos
This much I know—telenovelas are hell.
The storylines repeat until you’re sick
just like the crazy lines of a villanelle.
How often can Maria fall under a spell?
First her pimp then that sorry gringo Rick.
This much I know—telenovelas are hell.
Her house burns down, she’s thrown in a well.
Her bad ass father pulls her out with a stick
and chants the crazy lines of a villanelle,
which of course turns her into a gazelle.
(He’s a warlock and he’s pretty damn slick.)
This much I know—telenovelas are hell.
Her godmother Lucia rings a mystic bell,
incants a rhyme of scary loco magic—
only this will nix the lines of a villanelle.
Human once more, Maria’s perfectly swell
till her father returns and bites her like a tick.
This much I know—telenovelas are hell
just like the crazy curse of a villanelle.
Roberto Christiano (he/his) won the 2010 Fiction Award from The Northern Virginia Review for his story, “The Care of Roses.” His poems have appeared in Prairie Schooner (Pushcart Nominated), Poetry Quarterly, The Washington Post, New Verse News, Beltway Quarterly, Hiram Poetry Review, and The Sow’s Ear. He has won two consecutive prizes from Writer.org for seasonal poetry. He is anthologized in The Gavea-Brown Book of Portuguese-American Poetry. His book, Port of Leaving, published by Finishing Line Press, is forthcoming next year.
Rupert Fike
Pronouns: He/His
1 Poem
Readers' Advice to Writers
- after Robert Graves
We can always imagine a better story
than the truthful account of what you've seen,
a stretcher or two might well bring you glory.
Like with Ahab's quest, his Memento Mori -
whole chapters given to whale-blubber scenes -
we wanted to scream, "Get back to the story!"
Our love of books has made us your quarry,
yet we do grow bored same as screen-obsessed teens -
try a stretcher or two, they might bring you glory.
Plus some blood never hurts, like Richard Corey's
bullet in his head - so shocking, obscene,
we couldn't have imagined a better story.
Homer's shameless whoppers left little worry
that those rhymes would remain a joy to sing -
epics with stretchers truly bring lasting glory.
If you stick to the truth you'll end up sorry.
Listen up. Don't pout. You know what we mean.
We can always imagine a better story.
A stretcher or two might well bring you glory.
Rupert Fike's (he/his) second collection of poems, Hello the House, was named one of the "Books All Georgians Should Read, 2018" by The Georgia Center for the Book. It also won the Haas Poetry Prize from Snake Nation Press. His poems and stories have appeared in The Southern Poetry Review, Scalawag Magazine, The Georgetown Review, A&U America's AIDS Magazine, The Flannery O'Connor Review, The Buddhist Poetry Review, Natural Bridge, and others. He has a poem inscribed in a downtown Atlanta plaza.
Shelly Rodrigue
Pronouns: She/Her
1 Poem
That Should Have Been a Boy
That should have been a boy, my grandpa said,
his eldest son a failure in his eyes
when I was born a girl. He shook his head
to clear the hopes I’d dashed when I was bred.
With me, the family name would not survive.
That should have been a boy, my grandpa said,
his embarrassment staining my cheeks red.
This chorus was repeated from the time
when I was born. A girl, he shook his head,
and laughed at rifles I refilled with lead
and begged him once to let me have a try.
That should have been a boy, my grandpa said,
but never took me hunting, though I pled.
He said someday I’d make a decent wife.
When I was born a girl, he shook. His head
decided then it was my job to wed,
imagining a groom, but not my bride.
That should have been a boy, my grandpa said.
When I was born a girl, he shook his head.
Shelly Rodrigue (she/her) is a lesbian poet who was born and raised in Louisiana. She currently resides in Texas with her partner of 12 years. Rodrigue has an M.F.A. from the University of New Orleans. She teaches English at the University of Holy Cross in addition to teaching ESL to children online.