Category: Issue 28

ISSUE 28

POEMS OF WINTER AND FIRE by Justin Hunt DESIRE PATH by Matthew Carter Gellman THE HISTORIAN’S SHADOW by Malvika Jolly TWO POEMS by Maria Zoccola THREE POEMS by deziree a. brown DOWN IN THE CREVASSE OF LANGUAGE by Henk Rossouw CHAGALL’S “THE POET WITH THE BIRDS” by Jessica Cuello I AM AFRAID TO LOVE YOU…
SONG FOR AMERICA by Jacques Viau Renaud trans. Ariel Francisco

America, sitting atop the night’s shoulderssinging in the faces of the hungrydeciphering the language of sadnessmeasuring the modulation of hatred in our children’s stomachs.America, they’ve stolen your joydestroying the muscles in your facetied your heart to the vigilwhere thousands of beings wanderinhabited by death,a death we drag since men, from beyond,buried his sword, before your…
THE PIER by Judita Vaičiūnaitė trans. Rimas Uzgiris

Your torn white shirt lies drying on the anchor.In the hush of my cheek I feel your gypsy hair, while huskyvoices echo across the water and through night’s rusting gear.Palms timidly touch the still aching…
TWO POEMS by Tomas Venclova trans. Rimas Uzgiris

Variation on the Theme of Awakening What echoes in the dark? Is it the wind of Junein the gardens by the lake? If so, the two of usare in the summer house up high, still young,having fallen asleep just before dawn. A muffled engine? Then we’re in that dive by the harbor, in a country where we’d…
TWO POEMS by Stefano d’Arrigo trans. Joe Gross

WHEN MEEK & THUNDEROUS When meek & thunderousspring makes its mooring& the heart wanes in wax,honeycomb homiliesflit from fin to wingof migrant fish & birdswearing whispers of your name;we imagine you, because it’s true,your destination, too, is mystery. OH IN ITALY A MEMORY Oh in Italy a memory of the womenwho turtledove-strut the windowsillssuddenly thresh…
RADISH FLOWER by Jang Seoknam, trans. Paulette Guerin and Claire Su-Yeon Park

Is a path one travels alone also a road? The radish flower has bloomedalong a hidden pathafter others have been planted. In the swamp, the radish flower has bloomedwithout a flag,without a flagpole,its heart coming alone, late spring arriving with only its body.Woo woo. Like a Molotov Cocktail,I bloomed late, among the radish flowers.Roads ahead and behind are…
TWO POEMS by Beatriz Pérez Pereda trans. Colleen Noland

“Untitled” Lucía nursed her anguish for thirty-six years (she didn’t know sadness is an animal that doesn’t understand flattery). There are no pictures of her: she was afraid of the eye in the camera lens, since it was said it could bewitch a soul and make feet clumsy on cliffs. Everything about her is a…
MOTHER TONGUE by Adil Tuniyaz trans. Munawwar Abdulla

We were born like goldon this sparkling brown land. It fell, ringingfrom the mouth of an Uyghur angel,its music sunk into our ears.Oh, mother tongue,we became wanderers,and have moved far from your horizons. Opium poppiesbring the scent of the seas,thoughts kept moist for a while. I have left the radio on.It speaksin the wind. Cool…
I WILL REMEMBER by Rahile Kamal trans. Munawwar Abdulla

Today I did not comb my hairI didn’t even look in the mirrorMy kitchen greeted me icilyThe walls eyed each other, but didn’t look at meI wasn’t worth it to those four wallsIt’s hilarious that my cat was scared of meIs my appearance uglier than a catIs it so important to dress upHow did I…
ART by Junyi Liu
INTERVIEW WITH Jared Harél by Urvashi Bahuguna

Jared Harel’s poems are quiet records of the layers inside the ordinary days of our lives, exposing the restless forces and memories that power and threaten our most mundane actions. In “Behind The Painted Railguard,” the poet is standing in an amusement park with his mother, watching his young son on a ride. He uses…
ANNIVERSARY by Edward Salem

Kneeling to carve back the grass encroachinglike cuticles on a fingernail, I noticed how close her flat headstone was to the others around hers. Watering the flowers at his wife’s grave, an old man told me they’re placed above the abdomens, not the heads, as you’d expect. I think he meant to explain they were less crowded underground than…