a flor de piel (blooming on my skin) by María José Giménez blooming on my skinbloodied fieldsof unbloomed childrenblooming on my skinwilted traintracksof weeping eldersblooming on my skintu país, mi paísblooming on my skina nation builtby blistered handsblooming on my...
When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? As a Haitian-born writer, storytelling is something ingrained in my Caribbean DNA and as such I was always interested in telling stories. However, as most Caribbean children can...
Rereading Tranströmer in a Pandemic by Steven Cramer I’ve seen next to no one.My street, which I’ve namedThe Busiest in the Known Cosmos,I could lay my body down on. Nobody’s sick, goes the newsfrom Antarctica, where snowpetrels, to repel predators, spewstomach oils...
Interview with Doug Holder, organizer for Newton Free Library Reading Series
Chloe says the earth wants to grow things by Claudia Wilson We spend somuch timestanding on theground,but we nevertouch it She says thiswhile giving meseeds and atomato plant We pick a spotmy fingerstouch the earth. It’s drylike my belief...
A lot of this book is written using language/formatting tied to computer programming, with even the title being formatted in a way that is reminiscent of HTML. Do you have a background in that sort of area, and how did you come to start writing in this mode? The...
Poetry by Jennifer Jean Sometimes a poem says it first. Says: “The Pacific Coast boardwalk cyclists will pedal, churn, chargemobile carbon collectors! Stuck above a back tire!Will vacuum & compress breathable particulates! Till, each cycler has...
If I must wear a mask by Deborah Leipziger Let it be a mask of flowersViolets and magnoliaPansies, buds of allkinds, wrapped around my earscovering my lipsLet me smile in irisFlower the first syllable Previously published in Amethyst Review (June 2020)....
When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? Growing up in a small New Hampshire town, I found solace in many places- the woods, the estuary, the railroad tracks- but always seemed to find myself returning to the same spot:...
Imagine the Angels of Bread by Martín Espada This is the year that squatters evict landlords, gazing like admirals from the rail of the roofdeck or levitating hands in praise of steam in the shower; this is the year that shawled refugees deport judges, who stare at...
Taking Stock by Jennifer Garfield We’ve stocked the pantry with tomato sauce,broth, chickpea pasta for protein. The fridge casts her blue halo upon crowns of broccoli,cottage cheese, a dozen lemons. Toilet paper soldiered in the basement. Clean underweartucked into...
Reading series interview: Everyone Has a Voice at the Brockton Public Librarya conversation between Frances Donovan and Paul Engle, Director of the Brockton Public Library Does your series happen on a regular schedule, such as the second Tuesday of the month? If so,...
Reading series interview: The New England Poetry ClubInterview with Wendy Drexler and Mary Buchinger of the New England Poetry Club. Does your series happen on a regular schedule, such as the second Tuesday of the month? If so, what is it?We have three reading series,...
When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems? I was a latecomer to poetry really, outside of the limited exposure in grade school and high school. I remember one Old English Poetry class in college in 1979. But really it...
Attention is Prayer, Curative by Jenny Grassl burn cinnamon your remorse I will attend your systole and flu favor speckle for heart take foxglove burden in its tonic please don’t die I do beseech you beloved and strange bowed with soft shoulders of penitence charcoal...
Ledger of Doubts, Unmasked by Amanda Grace Shu At CVS, a woman toes the tape linemarking a safe six feet from where I stand.She stares at me slantwise, suspicious,and turns away when I meet her gaze. Mom chats with the grocery checkout girl,thanking her for her...
When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover you wanted to write poems? It began with Bob Dylan’s lyrics at the age of thirteen and then Charles Bukowski was the first poet I read—no, no— I could “relate to” somehow. From there, my whole high...
Bref Double Written for Central Park During the Pandemic by Jenna Le Magnolias, long-fingered like a thief,their knuckles purple fading to pale pinktoward their fingertips, reach out to stirthe robin’s-egg-blue basin of the sky, to swirl their fingers lazily...
Love in the Time of Corona by Charles Coe (with apologies to Gabriel García Márquez) In ancient Greece, men shook handsas a demonstration of good faithto show they weren’t armed. In these days of fever and fearwe keep our distance, resistthe timeless call of flesh to...
a conversation between Lip Manegio and Bradley Trumpfheller It seems fitting to begin an interview with the beginning of your book, so I wanted to ask about your epigraph, which is half critical text quote and half song lyric. That kind of mixing of the “high” with...
torrin a. greathouse’s “Abecedarian Requiring Further Examination Before a Diagnosis Can be Determined” May 27, 2020 Abecedarian Requiring Further Examination Before a Diagnosis Can be Determinedby torrin a. greathouse after Natalie Diaz Antonym for me a medicalbook....