in the beginning, everything shape-shifts into grace, into harmony. all the prayers made on my bodybecame roses sprouting on my fingertips, on my palms. you see, my twin told this story first. before everythingtransformed into doom—but in this poem, there is no grief at all, just an illusion of grievances. sometimes, i wonder what …
June 22 Evelyn didn’t agree with having a gun in the apartment. She’d discovered my father’s revolver in the closet and become violently angry. This was the last argument, the one that truly severed our engagement. “Michael, if you can’t get rid of it—if you can’t decide between me and a fucking gun,” she said, …
After the killing of cows and herdsman in Enugu Prelude: [In the storm / the brief branches of lightning / stretch like the jagged edges / of a torn map / over a country / the storm thickens into night / the night fizzles into day / the day blossoms into tomorrow.] Somewhere, sprawled on …
In the Storm, a Country, by Omodero David Oghenekaro Keep Reading »
In the bitter of November, the inside of the house waited.A knock: a visitor, leather jacket hung with motor oil and amber. —how’s my favorite brother —you just missed him An embrace, tears. A huge bag swallows the father, its zipper like his brother’s leather jacket,if the track were drawn out for seven feet, plus …
Eight Synonyms for Shroud, by Laura McPherson Keep Reading »
After the Flesh Teddy asks: Can you talk a little bit about the history of charnel houses? I feel like I always hear this word as a literary cliché, particularly in depictions of war, but know less about the practices behind it. I’d love to hear more about how components of this are reflected in …
You’re sure you’ve been here before. You’ve met this perfumed man who watches you through glass organs below the wax mask. Before this, you searched for a mirror in this house without mirrors, and when you couldn’t find one, you found a sink. Thinking now at last you’ll locate your true likeness in water, you …
L’Homme de Houbigant, by Jonathan Louis Duckworth and Joe Koch Keep Reading »
the same way I hold wounded things,the bird with the clipped wing,the dazed moth,scalded in search of light—I run my hands on fraying walls,curled fingers like a handle to clasp;ghosts, I findare always feeling through the darkthey fold into embraces,all deadweight and dragging,like they’ve forgotten how to be held. Catheryne Gagnon lives in Tiohtià ke/Montreal …
I Hold Ghosts in My Hands, by Catheryne Gagnon Keep Reading »
Celebrating the dead begins with a song. An organist, pianist, or keyboardist—sometimes all three at once—pluck notes into the air. Tambourines rattle, their brass jingles sending shivers down the spines of the congregation. Then a sharp soprano croons, “If you wanna know, where I’m going, where I’m going, soon….” After a few lyrics, a chorus …
The third time I see the bones is on the day all is lost. We sit around the big oak table, the other women and I, unsure of ourselves. We lost the war. That’s what the young soldier tells us. He looks miserable and emaciated. There is dirt under his nails and on his ragged …
In fields corn is blooming, embers burning, gilded sea of spun glass. My father points out the car windowto rattle off a folktale or maybe urban legend about haunted crops, vengeful farmers, and our own relativeswho came over to find nothing after leaving nothing. The radio cuts out. The Midwest sits between transmission zones,memory and …
Driving in Lake County, Illinois, by Morgan L. Ventura Keep Reading »
