POETRY
Ghost’s town
Illustration | Jennifer Fong Li Mornings I drive through a lesion in memory from County Road Five until Bedford. The shadow of a history only half forgotten slips between bricks and sidewalk cracks. I could be window shopping for realities both lost in time and still waiting in my rear-view ...
Beast
Illustration | Jennifer Fong Li Your body is going to be alright, because the Witch in the woods says so. The world is going to end. We all know that. Gonna get stabbed in the heart by the Three of Swords. Gonna get the hell out when the conversation goes ...
The Intersection
Illustration | Jennifer Fong Li It’s there, Right around the corner. Darting eyes. Perked ears. Scampering feet. Sweat is wiped from foreheads. The drops of dew Are flicked from wrists And sizzle on the summer’s pavement. Steps, Through beams of sunlight. Don’t step on the crack. The scars of ...
A question for T.S. Eliot
Illustration | Jennifer Fong Li Mr. Eliot, sir, you who taught me about men, and death, and growing old, About cold comings, balding Magi, and trousers rolled, Time has demanded of me to wonder, having lost the innocence of a kid, Time to ask you, ‘Why do dads die, like ...
A Limp Hand Extending from the Body on the Couch
Illustration | Seavey van Walsum I can’t reach the Sediments settling in The lining between my Daydreams and responsibilities, Every gap a yawning canyon, Repetitions of “Tomorrow, I’ll–” And it’s still today in spite of Night and the Glue leaking from my dirty pores, For every unclean, slow dream sticks ...
Spell Jars
Illustration | Seavey van Walsum “Put it in a jar and it’s a spell,” the saying goes. Withered flowers for resurrecting memories that outlive the bouquet. Pebbles for conjuring a granola sunburn on rainy days in the city. I put everything in jars. This room that holds all my joy, ...
On poetry, pandemics, and path-finding
Editor’s note
Quarter note rest
Gap yearsignifyinga slippery head,the lost chip in bedsheets’ seams,the honest grip of academic burden—with ego death, its loss, a dream! This odd twist;leaving a chippy mind to dampen,leavings of proteins unfolded,heaving from kin’s guilt, this damned sinblistered, known as the “son” who folded. Yet, there’s glister inuncombed, uncoiffed, and voided ...
Disclarity
I feel like —I don’t really know how to explain it, but —I feel likeThat glossy layer of condensation On a cheap scoop of ice cream.Strawberry or chocolate or something,The sheen, its weak shell coats the dessertJust before it melts I also feel likeOne of those unrecognizably smattered and batteredBits of ...
Untitled
Untitled Words and Photo by Max Lees The hunting party sets out Into the mudsucking swamp stumbling through thick fog and shooting at answers to a question they’re still looking for Carrying black-and-white binoculars, chanting to a two- beat stomp chasing ghosts and waving excitedly at some object in the ...