Poetry

God Is Burning

By Li-Young Lee

January 2018
Li-Young Lee

God Is Burning Through an open wound in God’s left side,springtime enters into the world,sticky, green, with a taste of iron.That’s not the wound I hurt from. There’s a dull pain...
Three Poems

By Anna Maria Carpi

January 2018
Anna Maria Carpi

[untitled] Dear Lombard fog maternal densesix in the morning, winter,espresso machines are steamingin the first bars to open in the square.The city of gravestones is quiet, each has a name:under the...
Three Poems in Mapuzungun, Spanish, and English

By Liliana Ancalao

January 2018
Liliana Ancalao

[1] feichi lali mülen ñi nontual katrütuleufün feichi lali mülen ñi nontual katrütuleufünchem trewa ngiyulaenew, nielan trewatrongli trewa nümüalu...
The Square

By Iossif Ventura

January 2018
Iossif Ventura

Who are these people marching at noontide?Why do we hear these beating drums?What are the pigeons looking for on fluttering banners?What are the scattered words that stain the air? Sweat soaks the sq...
Three Poems

By Elisa Biagini

November 2017
Elisa Biagini

Photo: Daniel Simon [1] this ours that it be a unionof scissors: cutthe hair, the hems, the cord thatfeeds me worry withevery bite, my secret familyline. Cut itas i...
Shhh

By Lee van Laer

November 2017
Lee van Laer

From Yousef Khanfar’s project Humanity at Large, in cooperation with the United Nations. Khanfar writes, “These photos are impressionistic images that show human beings as islands within the...
The Village

By J. V. Foix

November 2017
J. V. Foix

Giorgio de Chirico (1888–1978), Mystery and Melancholy of a Street, 1914, oil on canvas, 69 x 85 cm, private collection My village sits on a circular platform. The gate of every house faces...
After the Funeral

By Robert Bly

November 2017
Robert Bly

There’ll be no more mother. We’ll have to live nowWith the looks on the faces of our friends,And half-open windows, and lamps that go onBy themselves, and an egg standing on a plate. Last night I dr...
Barefoot

By Kevin Hart

November 2017
Kevin Hart

Sam Roxas-Chua 姚, Pilgrim, 27 x 51 in., sumi-e and squid ink. www.samroxaschua.com Still of our world, dear father, in your graveOr at my winter window, looking hardInto a life you never kne...
Two Poems

By Nicholas Samaras

November 2017
Nicholas Samaras

The 200,000 lights in the Mémorial des Martyrs de la Déportation in Paris represent the number of deportees sent from France to Nazi concentration camps. Photo by Zak / Flickr Martyrs of the Deport...
Two Ghazals

By Rumi

November 2017
Rumi

Photo by C.P. Ewing / Flickr "The sky has never seen such a moon” The sky has never seen such a moon, not even in its dreams,No water could ever extinguish the fire of its light, Look at my body,...
Two Poems from Korea

By Yoo An-Jin, Kim Seung Hee

November 2017
Yoo An-Jin, Kim Seung Hee

Valery's "cemetery by the sea," Sète, France / Photo by Mathieu / Flickr An Encouragement by Yoo An-Jin “The wind is rising!We must try to live!”So said Paul Valéry.How shall I adopt that Frenchman’s...
Two Poems

By Ted Kooser

November 2017
Ted Kooser

For more, read Daniel Simon’s interview with Ted Kooser, “Starving for Order.” The Constellation I was on my way home from a party,ten-thirty, a dark winter night, no stars,a few snowflakes drifting...
Pianist

By Admiel Kosman

November 2017
Admiel Kosman

Photo: Ath-Har Saeed / Flickr I play on the water. It’s not completely necessary or required, but things flow under the treeslike a gentle melody. Day unto dayuttereth more lo...
Three Poems from the Alphabet of Empire

By Mona Nicole Sfeir

November 2017
Mona Nicole Sfeir

Mona Nicole Sfeir, The Maps of Our Making (detail), 2015, acrylic, chalk, collage on canvas. Political maps are human constructs that have continuously changed since the first maps were scratched ont...
Two Poems

By Eli Eliahu

September 2017
Eli Eliahu

Photo: Daniel Ebneter/Flickr Crossroads All winter I didn’t write a poem, and I didn’t remembereven one dream that I dreamt. I left a houseand a wife, rented an apartment, and everything I neededI fo...
Two Poems

By Sasenarine Persaud

September 2017
Sasenarine Persaud

Photo: Daniel Simon Egret The bird was just searchingfor food not metaphors –or taking rest from a day’s flight It was dusk after all and its ancestorswho might have crossed the MiddlePassage, crosse...
Four Poems

By Maxim Amelin

September 2017
Maxim Amelin

Satiro della Valle, Capitoline Museums, Rome Эти бездонные ночи в июле Эти бездонные ночи в июле, О!Ты вопрошаешь: — Меня обманули? — Да, — отвечаю, — но как! Лучше не спрашива...
Captivity

By Kimberly Blaeser

May 2017
Kimberly Blaeser

Photo courtesy of the authorI.A mark across the body. The morning I watched my beloved uncle disappear down the alley. His car left sitting in our yard for thirty days. This tattoo we...
Resurrection

By Jennifer Elise Foerster

May 2017
Jennifer Elise Foerster

Norman Akers (Osage), The Gathering (2012), lithograph, 22 3/4 x 16 3/8 in / Courtesy of the artist (normanakers.com) Summers we lie out on the hot porchpalms splayed— raising flames from ra...
Grandma’s Zydeco Stomp Dance: A Patchwork Poem*

By Rain Prud’homme-Cranford, Carolyn M. Dunn

May 2017
Rain Prud’homme-Cranford, Carolyn M. Dunn

Tony Tiger (Sac & Fox / Muscogee),Intertribal / Courtesy of the artist(facebook.com/tony.tiger.5268) I Mix cultures of homeWest Africa West Indies disrupted along slave tradeFrench and...
Sitting in the Car Waiting

By Linda Rodriguez

May 2017
Linda Rodriguez

Photo: Ruth Ellison/Flickr for someone who’s been delayedon a cold, gray, rainy daytakes me backto that little girl waiting in the cold car with the littler onesas the night took over the skywhile he...
like any good indian woman

By Tanaya Winder

May 2017
Tanaya Winder

Photo: David Hepworth/Flickr i pull my brothers from words, stupid injun, shot like bullets. when people ask why my brothers hated school i say: the spirit remembers what it’s like to be lef...
Ode (Ending with a Confession) to the First Mango I Ate on Guam After Decades Away

By Craig Santos Perez

May 2017
Craig Santos Perez

Photo: Jin Choi/Flickr All the mangoes I’ve tastedin California were imported and lost their true flavors in transit. And, even though all the mangoes I’ve enjoyed in Hawai’i were homegrown and ripen...
Skins, Forms, Flows, Tones

By Heid E. Erdrich

May 2017
Heid E. Erdrich

Photo: Jake Bellucci/Flickr What holds water in a droptension that holds humans in between their sweet skins water holds usher arms baystide of bloodbeat so close just our skins betweenhome and oce...