Inside the trap, I spend weeks remodeling the haven you’ll haunt. Not for the joy of it, but for the wonder that keeps snapping my neck. Come December, there’s a … Continue reading Love Letter from Inside Fatherhood by Fritz Ward
The whiskey stink of rot has settled in the garden, and a burst of fruit flies rises when I touch the dying tomato plants. Still, the claws of tiny yellow … Continue reading September Tomatoes by karina Borowicz
It gets messy underneath the veilwhen the strength it takes to becan zap the moisture from your skin,and all you want is to be held to thebreast of a beautiful … Continue reading Lord Knows by Kwame Oposu-Duku
By Walt Whitman Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles! blow!Through the windows—through doors—burst like a ruthless force,Into the solemn church, and scatter the congregation,Into the school where the scholar is studying,Leave not … Continue reading Beat! Beat! Drum!
By Lisa Low Every June I think I might stop shavingmy armpits. Every summer’shalf-assed attempt involves partieswith my arms clamped shutlike when I was in middle school, afraidmy deodorant wasn’t … Continue reading Ode to Armpit Air
By Maya Angelou FOR BAILEYWe were entwined in red rings Of blood and loneliness before The first snows fellBefore muddy rivers seeded clouds Above a virgin forest, and Men ran naked, blue and black Skinned … Continue reading Kin
By Gwendolyn Brooks People who have no children can be hard:Attain a mail of ice and insolence:Need not pause in the fire, and in no senseHesitate in the hurricane to … Continue reading The Children of The Poor
By Lawrence Ferlinghetti Retired ballerinas on winter afternoons walking their dogs in Central Park West (or their cats on leashes— the cats themselves old highwire artists) The ballerinas leap and … Continue reading Retired Ballerinas, Central Park West
By Lauren Whitehead OkayTell that to the palm of this Black man’s handever so slightly cupped and carrying in its bendthe finger tips of another Black man, both of themarms … Continue reading Not Everything is Sex
By Charles Bernstein I ruin my hats and all the mat slides glad I hop my girls and all is skip again I jump I run you up inside my … Continue reading Sad Boy’s Sad Boy
By Ted Greenwald For Ed. Baynard buildings blendinto the sky the workgoes onfrom where we left offand consciousness, by rights,is doors and windowsa spritz of colorin this lifeis what we … Continue reading Miami
By Bob Kaufman Believe in this. Young apple seeds,In blue skies, radiating young breast,Not in blue-suited insects,Infesting society’s garments. Believe in the swinging sounds of jazz,Tearing the night into intricate … Continue reading Believe, Believe
By Richard Brautigan O beautiful was the werewolf in his evil forest. We took him to the carnival and he started crying when he saw the Ferris wheel. Electric green … Continue reading A Boat
By Walt Whitman I sing the body electric, The armies of those I love engirth me and I engirth them, They will not let me off till I go with them, respond … Continue reading I Sing the Body Electric
By James Baldwin If the hope of givingis to love the living,the giver risks madnessin the act of giving. Some such lesson I seemed to seein the faces that surrounded … Continue reading The Giver (for Berdis)
