Emma Bolden Girls' Life In eighth grade Algebra I sat between two doll-eyed girls who were always moving, feet tapping, knees dancing, shoulders rolling. They’d read in a magazine that [...]

Lana Hechtman Ayers Prayer Is a Painted Lavender Field I remember van Gogh’s Lavender Field II not with my eyes but a sense closest to proprioception how my body held [...]

Margaret F. Browne To build a wasp's nest 1. A wasp builds her nest from paper—builds paper from wood in the mouth, wood from the world she gathers upon her [...]

Samuel Burt Empire Is Frail and flint-toothed, like rusted ice picks, we stumble from the monotone wreck of the city into yawning silence, into alarm— two pheasants, a stillness, and [...]

Joseph Chaney Wrong-Footed For Blake Burr When my friend’s daughter refused to wear shoes on the right feet (they felt good turned against the arches), my friend let her choose [...]

Ian Hall Love in the Time of Company Towns Nothing worth nothing ever happens after midnight. Coroners & dairy farmers alike have told me this, & you should believe every [...]

Dennis Hinrichsen Pedal Steel Death Song At 32,000 feet the fields resemble a wreckage of abandoned quilts. Patterns: welts and dying moons. Wallace County, Kansas 38° 54' 29” N 101° [...]

Mistee St. Clair And What Are We Now Because I don't understand titles. What to call a thing. Like us—what do we call ourselves? If I were to name us [...]

Mikal Wix Red Observatory I have listened to car horns clash like rams, offered to feed the orphan dogs of Pompeii, slept under summer skies to escape him, spoken to [...]