Do you hear those crows they are announcing death but the mystery is the death of what? Let’s guess. I’ll say Summer. I’ll say Summer’s body was finally ready to give out & go home & listen to the unnameable birds, birds we will never see nor hear because what are we? I am bones. You are bones too. You are more deliberate than I am here. When you speak I like to listen to you because when you speakit feels like hearing a story about the first time somebody saw the ocean, no matter what you’re saying. Those crows have never seen the ocean & that in itself is its own kind of death, probably. Maybe Summer isn’t dead after all. Maybe Summer has just dug a hole in the dirt somehwere & is ready to lay down for a while & dream of all the things that happen while Summer is gone. Bones turn into trees. We manage to stay warm. Wings disappear.
The Wind in a Corner by Stacey Balkun
after the painting by Kay Sage
I don’t want to lean this far away from you,
but bone-shudder tall and still, you’ve turned
so rigid. Backed into a corner, windblown
cliffs stiff against sunwash—have you angled
away from me, or from us all? Baby,
I call you baby from exasperation. There’s more
to see in this world if we don’t let it dry up
around us. Once, we found love in this
landscape: cholla blooming like my bouquet,
petaled fury. A gust blows up my skirt and I wish
you’d laugh with me. Crouch down. Look at this
slash of blue rock against red dirt. See, a sprout
of some wild something rooted in the hard earth,
reaching for the wind we make with our hands.
Are All the Break-Ups in Your Poems Real? by Aimee Nezhukumatathil
If by real you mean as real as a shark tooth stuck
in your heel, the wetness of a finished lollipop stick,
the surprise of a thumbtack in your purse—
then Yes, every last page is true, every nuance,
bit, and bite. Wait. I have made them up—all of them—
and when I say I am married, it means I married
all of them, a whole neighborhood of past loves.
Can you imagine the number of bouquets, how many
slices of cake? Even now, my husbands plan a great meal
for us—one chops up some parsley, one stirs a bubbling pot
on the stove. One changes the baby, and one sleeps
in a fat chair. One flips through the newspaper, another
whistles while he shaves in the shower, and every single
one of them wonders what time I am coming home.
Sonnet for the Night Shift by Kim Harvey
For the barbacks and the line cooks, this one’s
for you, for the jostle and bustle of
busboys hustling tips, for the aprons
and grease, for the fluorescent light above,
for how her hair falls at the nape of her
neck, for the way memory works, something
I chase, something I can’t control, slow burn
of swoon-jazz on the jukebox, for the sting
of tequila, for the draft beer on tap,
for the ones who come back night after night,
for yesterday’s special wrapped up as scraps
and for those who pass through just for a bite
or some human contact, for busting ass
and for refilling every empty glass.
The Imprint by Jennifer Moxley
We will count on these walls
to whisper
our resumes
to the strangers who take up
the work of these rooms,
forwarding them
past dust.
Our purpose shared,
suspended in trust
to a poem
that told us a long love
is willed.
Believing such
we are bound to exit
flattered
by our design,
unmindful that this thing
has also always
been lying
in wait,
a thing
in itself, bossy and brutish
that has thrived in spite of
sabotage chapters
occasional giddy
neglect.
A volition
apart
that exceeds
dull need
a self-interweaving
imperative be mine
that will whisper
our love
past dust.
I Love You by Jenny George
Her eyes were mostly shut. She didn’t speak.
The sun’s slow exile crossed the wall above the bed.
But once, when I bent to feed her a drop
of morphine from the little plastic beak,
her hand shot up and gripped my arm. She looked right at me.
When she said the words, it sounded like she meant: Don’t leave me.
From the very first, we love like this: our heads turning
toward whatever mothers us, our mouths urgent
for the taste of our name.
Things Said To Be Ineffable by Mark Yakich
A book decorates
A nightstand
And a body
Decorates a bed.
The nightstand
May be made
Of plastic, metal,
Or wood,
And is normally
The same
Height as the bed.
Even if they are
Very married,
Lovers tarry
And aver
And aver and
Tarry. Finally
One of them
Rises
To search
The dictionary
For a word
The other has
Made up.
For What Binds Us by Jane Hirshfield
There are names for what binds us:
strong forces, weak forces.
Look around, you can see them:
the skin that forms in a half-empty cup,
nails rusting into the places they join,
joints dovetailed on their own weight.
The way things stay so solidly
wherever they’ve been set down—
and gravity, scientists say, is weak.
And see how the flesh grows back
across a wound, with a great vehemence,
more strong
than the simple, untested surface before.
There’s a name for it on horses,
when it comes back darker and raised: proud flesh,
as all flesh
is proud of its wounds, wears them
as honors given out after battle,
small triumphs pinned to the chest-
And when two people have loved each other
see how it is like a
scar between their bodies,
stronger, darker, and proud;
how the black cord makes of them a single fabric
that nothing can tear or mend.
love at the beginning by Andrés Montoya
tonight for a moment as the owl sleeps
i’m going to dust this city’s dirt from my clothes
the dry hot deaths that bring the strongest to their knees.
i’m going to run headlong through a rainstorm
dodging lightening blasts and hurdling rivers
as wolves howl on a peak of purple darkness.
with my nose flaring, the sulfur of the fields will not deter me,
i’m going to come through to a background of laughing cars
and screaming
sirens.
my forehead pushing forward to the street
of your house, i’m going to come with the smile of a boy,
my smile,
my hands offering callouses, offering struggle.
tonight as the owl sleeps, i’ll come with the silence of a cricket,
with the intensity of a flower and for an instant, a second,
before i tell you it’s starting and bring the guns,
feathers will flow from my mouth to tell you, mi amor, my soul,
a kiss before we pray. i gather the stars like berries
and bring them to light your face, let me again smell
the skin of your stomach,
let me wash your feet with my lips,
nibble the meat from behind your knees.
My Heart by Kim Addonizio
That Mississippi chicken shack.
That initial-scarred tabletop,
that tiny little dance floor to the left of the band.
That kiosk at the mall selling caramels and kitsch.
That tollbooth with its white-plastic-gloved worker
handing you your change.
That phone booth with the receiver ripped out.
That dressing room in the fetish boutique,
those curtains and mirrors.
That funhouse, that horror, that soundtrack of screams.
That putti-filled heaven raining gilt from the ceiling.
That haven for truckers, that bottomless cup.
That biome. That wilderness preserve.
That landing strip with no runway lights
where you are aiming your plane,
imagining a voice in the tower,
imagining a tower.
Compassion Camp 