Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
by Daniel Aristi
In the movie, the scientists wish
They’d be in uniform, and the US Marines actually
Dream of kissing the eggheads, but no one says nothing.
Always,
There’s a nuclear device with blood red numbers that
They all fathered in a Manhattan orgy—and R-Mann would say
‘It’s queer’.(More …)
Honey Ant
by Daniel Aristi
A hopemonger comes he sells
hope, in Spanish
esperanza.
Abuela used to say
They were so poor in Zacatecas they
Ate ant honey—
Miel de hormiga—
Bees, hah, way too expensive, muy caro
mijo, carísimo, ja! (More …)
LatiNo
by Daniel Aristi
Everything the State says is a lie, and everything it has it has stolen.
(Friedrich Nietzsche)
On the map, the capital city black spot
isn’t there, like a hole in a golf course for God, like
an empty plate of frijoles big enough for the nation, like
the victory of some Ulysses campesinos that dared gouge the military government’s Cyclops—
Ecdysis
by Emily Banks
Before a snake sheds skin, she goes half blind
for just a week or two. The fluid she excretes,
a grey-white lubricant to ease the slide,
pools under the scale of each eye
like warm milk filling up a metal spoon.
When the world blurs,
she searches out a rough surface
to rub against, loosening first
the old skin from her head, where it will split,
then working down. If done correctly,
the skin should come off in one easy piece,
a hollow tube of flimsy wax paper, a shroud of self
like the seat of jeans you’ve worn all week,
that absence so distinct.(More …)
The Cowhouse
by Raisa Imogen
The sky impossibly
dark above us, pin-
pricks of stars like
exit lights as we
walk the field
of fireflies,
She Had a Name, It Was Saint Catherine of Siena
by Raisa Imogen
Once I did not eat
I grew a fine coat of hair. loved my bright collarbone
more than I loved any boy—
hip bones, knives, apple seeds, dust,
I left a trail of paper behind me
personal confetti of tallied calories
oh, reader, you’ve heard this story before?
have you heard the sound a body makes as it absorbs itself?
like clocks ticking backwards.(More …)
I’m About As Sorry For Killing Myself As You Are For Telling Me To
by Khalypso
come to my wake
dressed sharp as a lemon rind
the trimmings of a hollow season’s harvest
scattered on the floorboards and
crackling like the heartbeat
you’re wailing to hear,
cauterizing your tear ducts and setting
whatever dance-crazed soul upon you
that will bend your toes in the way of
the light. praise my coffin. praise your
gilded sorrow. praise the burn i swallowed
and offered you, generous, like the good
blood brother and spook i am. those who
merely pretended to know me will say
do not weep.(More …)
The Moon Is A Black Girl & You Don’t Deserve Her
by Khalypso
the moon
is a black girl with an arm
that knows the twist and give
of an indian burn from boys
she doesn’t know.
of course,
she is so sick with love
for the evading sun, she
has made an athleticism out
of her endurance.(More …)
You Really Seem To Think I’ll Miss You
by Khalypso
and that’s true, kind of.
but never more than
the sound of my own voice.
never more than giving
all the things i love
about myself to a
more deserving husk.
once
i shouted down
an entire battalion of
carnivorous orchids.(More …)
An Altar in the World
by Stacy Boe Miller
I pick up a stone and name it
Every time you’ve hurt me. I keep it
in my mouth, let it click
against my teeth. (More …)
Church
by Stacy Boe Miller
Muzzles gone white on old dogs church,
quadriceps screaming uphill
on gravel bike church, garbanzos dancing
in their dry rattles church, his finger finally
finding your clitoris church, alone
on the toilet birthing
a dead baby church, church of the first time
you kissed a girl, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
fiddled poorly in a park at
night church, tomatoes
ripe in a garden you planted
with your mother church, jukebox
that still takes quarters church,(More …)
In the Tree Fort
by Stacy Boe Miller
My sister gives me a cigarette,
says I don’t even have to
inhale. I blow out a cloud of
another world, take it
back into my mouth. She doesn’t
know she’ll soon tear up
her knee, marry a man
it will be smart to fear,
doesn’t see herself calling
our father from a gas station
with only her purse and pajamas.(More …)
There are Cholas
by Veronica Sandoval
There are Cholas feathering their hair
and only the smell of hairspray remains in the empty rooms
of Saturday night con las homegirls.
There are Cholas finely edging the tips of their razor sharp eyes—
the more perfect the upward swish,
the more fierce the stare.(More …)
Bells
by Lynne Thompson
Give in to your inner goat. Do not say I am not a goat.
Do not say I have only two legs. You give milk, run with
herds, graze. Remove the latch on your mind. Baaa
in moonlight even though you will be shorn or stuffed
at a time you have not chosen. (More …)
Notes on a Day Job, or, How to Be an Adjunct Professor
by Sayantani Dasgupta
1. When I was eighteen, the most boring professor in the world taught me American history. She was a scholar, yes, laden with more degrees than the earth has tectonic plates, but an inspiring teacher, that she was not. At the designated hour every day, she entered our classroom, sheathed in yet another handwoven sari, in colors as vibrant as fire and cinnamon. She glanced around the room giving us all the benefit of her gaze, and I suspect, the time to admire her exquisite taste in wardrobe and hand-forged silver jewelry. She set down her purse, seated herself and took attendance. And then she opened her notebook and began to read. For fifty minutes, thrice a week, our classroom saturated with the sing-song quality of her voice, interspersed with the furious scratching from pens that truly cared and those that only pretended. Our hands got a reprieve when one of the front benchers asked her a question. But the moment she delivered the answer, she returned to her notebook—drawn by some umbilical attachment that only she understood—and the space between our ears plugged up again with the droning static of her voice. I glanced at my watch, at the clock above her head, at the pages of my own notebook, where lived the newest doodle of her face with a foghorn for a mouth. The window next to my seat shimmered the pristine lawn outside and whispered enticing words such as “freedom” and “independence,” and I vowed, for the millionth time, to never become a college professor.(More …)
Last Time in Bangkok
by Grace Loh Prasad
The immediate family members were invited into the small, doorless room, covered floor-to-ceiling in bright blue tiles. The only decoration was a high, small alcove displaying a crucifix and a simple bouquet. This was not how I expected to see my brother, lying on a platform covered up to his chest in a white sheet, wearing a dark blue suit. His arms were straight by his side and his hands looked dark and unnaturally big. Makeup disguised his yellowed skin, and he was clean-shaven. He was still wearing his glasses, and his eyes were shut in peaceful repose. His face had been gaunt in the photos my uncle took in the hospital the previous week, and my husband had commented on how handsome Ted looked with more chiseled features. But today his cheeks were plumped up again, and I wondered if that was the embalmer’s craft, trying to make the deceased look as much as possible like his portrait, like the stocky, muscular man everyone remembered.
Bela Karolyi
by Anne Rasmussen
It was, we told ourselves, a matter of being in the right place at the right time. Nadia hadn’t even noticed the man watching through the schoolyard fence as she turned cartwheels with her kindergarten pals. She hadn’t known he would go from class to class afterward looking for her, take her away to train with him, to change her life forever. We knew it was only a matter of time before one of us would be discovered by someone in the know. Bela Karolyi lived in America now, which seemed auspicious. Readiness was all.
We knew all about stranger danger, of course—creeps and weird guys who offered candy, coaxed children into cars or knocked on doors posing as salesmen or Jehovah’s Witnesses. Men like Bela Karolyi took little girls and made them stars; other men made them disappear like volunteers in a half-finished magic trick. At the supermarket, under the harsh fluorescence of the dairy aisle, rows upon rows of missing children peered at us from the sides of milk cartons. At the breakfast table those milk carton kids provided a doleful, grainy counterpoint to Mary Lou Retton’s triumphant, hi-res, Wheaties-box grin. We knew there were certain risks involved in seeking glory. You couldn’t flinch. You had to be able to hurtle your body through space and nail the dismount. You had to know which magician to trust so you didn’t end up sawn in half. We were pretty sure we’d be able to tell the difference. The real challenge was getting noticed.
Rebel Airplanes
by Renee Simms
I.
Joyce swatted at the pine dust settling in her hair. She was sanding The Etta, a remote-controlled aircraft that would fly fifty miles above sea level. Once there, it would glide to the edges of outer space to record a clear view of the earth. Steve had shown Joyce a YouTube video of a plane with a similar mission that had failed to keep its video connection. “Shoot,” Joyce told Steve when she watched the video. “That’s my next project. I want one of my planes to travel to outer space and back.”