by Rowan Ricardo Phillips We’d cut school like knives through butter, the three Of us—Peter, Stephen and I—to play Just about all the music we knew, Which meant that from nine in the morning till Steve’s parents, the ever-patient Murtaughs, Would get home from work, I played guitar, Peter played bass, and Steve (who’d end […]
by Juan Felipe Herrera Mimi — can I call you that this is a song for you — with candles we stand & we kneel this is how it is now we well all of us we send you these flowers across time this time here which we cannot explain
by Dunya Mikhail 23 We cross borders lightly like clouds. Nothing carries us, but as we move on we carry rain, and an accent, and a memory of another place.
by Terrance Hayes I can imitate the spheres of the model’s body, her head, Her mouth, the chin she rests at the bend of her elbow But nothing tells me how to make the pupils spiral From her gaze. Everything the eye sees enters a circle, The world is connected to a circle: breath spools […]
by Jericho Brown Aster. Nasturtium. Delphinium. We thought Fingers in dirt meant it was our dirt, learning Names in heat, in elements classical Philosophers said could change us. Star Gazer. Foxglove. Summer seemed to bloom against the will Of the sun, which news reports claimed flamed hotter On this planet than when our dead fathers […]
by Simon Armitage Five pounds fifty in change, exactly, a library card on its date of expiry. A postcard stamped, unwritten, but franked, a pocket size diary slashed with a pencil from March twenty-fourth to the first of April. A brace of keys for a mortise lock, an analogue watch, self winding, stopped. A final […]
by Juan Felipe Herrera Before you go further, let me tell you what a poem brings, first, you must know the secret, there is no poem to speak of, it is a way to attain a life without boundaries, yes, it is that easy, a poem, imagine me telling you this, instead of going day […]
by Carol Ann Duffy Some days, although we cannot pray, a prayer utters itself. So, a woman will lift her head from the sieve of her hands and stare at the minims sung by a tree, a sudden gift. Some nights, although we are faithless, the truth enters our hearts, that small familiar pain; then […]
by Major Jackson This downpour of bad reasoning, this age-old swarm, this buzzing about town, this kick and stomp through gardens, this snag on the way to the mall, this heap and toss of fabric and strewn shoes, this tangled beauty, this I came here not knowing, here to be torched, this fumbling ecstasy, this […]
by Anis Mojgani a heart made of marbles a pocket filled with crumbs of colored paper a train tunnel painted pink swallowing a paintbrush filling the pillowcases with sand breaking eggs just for the sound our anvils become flocks of tiny geese bending ourselves over them we become water all the light sits on us
