Poetry

  • This view of Saturn’s rings from the “ringscape finale” series was among the last images Cassini sent back to Earth (September 13, 2017) / Courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
    September 20, 2017 | Lauren Camp
    This view of Saturn’s rings from the “ringscape finale” series was among the last images Cassini sent back to Earth (September 13, 2017) / Courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institut...
  • Gillie Rhodes, “Log pile,” November 7, 2009
    September 13, 2017 | Fred Dings
    Gillie Rhodes, “Log pile,” November 7, 2009 Late Autumn  A butterfly searches our garden plants for blossoms  I don’t see. Flitting, almost lurching, it lands    at last on a barren branch as if exha...
  • Grave at the US/Mexico border taken at a cemetery near Anthony, New Mexico, July 19, 2015 / Photo by Lanie Elizabeth
    September 7, 2017 | Ilan Stavans
    Grave at the US/Mexico border taken at a cemetery near Anthony, New Mexico, July 19, 2015 / Photo by Lanie Elizabeth The following is an excerpt from part 2 of a four-part poem called “T...
  • Liu Xiaobo, 1991 / Courtesy of Wang Ya
    September 6, 2017 | Liu Xia
    Liu Xiaobo, 1991 / Courtesy of Wang Ya Translator’s note: This photo of Liu Xiaobo swimming surfaced on the Internet after the sea burial in Dalian, China. Those of us who were hear...
  • Photo print in a living room
    August 30, 2017 | Victoria McArtor
    Bury Me tell me            wet limestone            flinching coral reefs  what’s it like to alwaysbe night                                      tell me  what is it to be rooted in shadow           ...
  • John, “Fallen Angel,” August 29, 2010
    August 23, 2017 | Shamshad Abdullaev
    John, “Fallen Angel,” August 29, 2010   Here and Now Here he is sitting across from the balcony door;the wind will blow – a wound. The rustling lightblushes and fades in the rectangular mirror – th...
  • moomin goat, “Goat Bells,” April 9, 2007
    August 15, 2017 | Brian Sneeden
    moomin goat, “Goat Bells,” April 9, 2007 Click here to read Sneeden’s translations of four of Giannisi’s poems.  Phoebe Giannisi is one of Greece’s foremost contemporary poets and i...
  • Lorenzo Gaudenzi, “Agria,” September 15, 2016
    August 15, 2017 | Phoebe Giannisi
    Lorenzo Gaudenzi, “Agria,” September 15, 2016 For more, read Brian Sneeden’s translator’s note on Giannisi’s work.   (Nostos I)                                                 f...
  • Tail light. Photo: Sarah-Rose/Flickr
    August 7, 2017 | Perrin Langda
    Tail light. Photo: Sarah-Rose/Flickr   Pistoning seas rise andmountains flow a river spreadsin the bed of an undulatingvalley forestswither and entire citiesblossom people copulate thereon certain nig...
  • coniferconifer, “water ablution pavilion,” November 30, 2013
    August 2, 2017 | B. B. P. Hosmillo
    coniferconifer, “water ablution pavilion,” November 30, 2013   Sparrows, Sparrows She is a man in her late forties and nobody knows when she was born or when she built a silvery house at the notorio...
  • Chañaral is a small coastal city in the Atacama region of Chile. Devastating flash floods in 2015 caused an estimated $1.5 billion in damage to the region. Photo by jipe7.
    July 31, 2017 | Laurence O’Dwyer
    Chañaral is a small coastal city in the Atacama region of Chile. Devastating flash floods in 2015 caused an estimated $1.5 billion in damage to the region. Photo by jipe7. Chañaral A desert town of...
  • Nadia Murad speaking with a group of Yazidi women / Courtesy of Nadia’s Initiative
    July 26, 2017 | Manash Firaq Bhattacharjee 
    Editorial note: This Sunday, July 30, marks the World Day against Trafficking in Persons, established in 2013 by the UN General Assembly. Nadia Murad—nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize and c...
  • Mike Prince, “Black Drongo at Sunrise,” October 7, 2015
    July 24, 2017 | Kedarnath Singh
    Mike Prince, “Black Drongo at Sunrise,” October 7, 2015 Where Would I Go Where would I goI shall only stay here, like a handprinton a doorjust to be there, I’ll be hidden inthe smell of a suitcases...
  • Maryam Mirzakhani
    July 20, 2017 | Manash Firaq Bhattacharjee 
    Iranian mathematician Maryam Mirzakhani died of breast cancer on July 15 at the age of 40. A professor at Stanford University, Mirzakhani became the first woman to win the prestigious Fields Meda...
  • A H T, “Goreme – Pasabag,” December 5, 2014
    July 19, 2017 | A. G. Pettet
    A H T, “Goreme – Pasabag,” December 5, 2014 Göreme A ripple of flicking eyelids,a rooster’s cryand the call to prayerbreak through this dustyIslamic morning. I have been in this room before.The ten...
  • Usha Akella
    July 17, 2017 | Jhilam Chattaraj
    Usha Akella’s poetry is known for an undertone of spirituality within a contemporary voice. Here she discusses the impact of travel on her work, poetry as a verb, and the distance betwee...
  • Gary Burke, “Remembering 9/11,” September 11, 2014
    July 4, 2017 | Puneet Dutt
    Gary Burke, “Remembering 9/11,” September 11, 2014 i’m from where the towers fell i’m from where the towers felljaws where we mourned Tupacarmpit of a state bruised byhad-it-too-hard dollar ferries...
  • Eros Bendato (Eros bound), bronze, 1999, by Igor Mitoraj, Kraków, Poland / Photo by Val Kerry
    June 19, 2017 | Nausheen Eusuf
    Eros Bendato (Eros bound), bronze, 1999, by Igor Mitoraj, Kraków, Poland / Photo by Val Kerry Not Elegy, But Eros             for Xulhaz Mannan, LGBT activist murdered i...
  • Rich, “On a Saturday Afternoon” (on the road from Royal, Nebraska, to the Ashfall Fossil Beds), May 25, 2013
    June 14, 2017 | Matt Mason
    Rich, “On a Saturday Afternoon” (on the road from Royal, Nebraska, to the Ashfall Fossil Beds), May 25, 2013 Creation Stories My favorite creation story right nowis the Babylonian one,where Apsu and...
  • Incognito by Biljana Obradovic
    June 7, 2017 | Angus Woodward
    Biljana Obradović captures the immigrant’s distrust of the permanent in Incognito. Serbian American poet Biljana Obradović has lived in Yugoslavia, Greece, India, and in the US, whe...
  • Tanure Ojaide / Urhobo Historical Society
    May 31, 2017 | Lami C. Adama
    Tanure Ojaide / Urhobo Historical Society Tanure Ojaide seamlessly blends the personal with the political in this volume of verse to paint a compelling portrait of a Nigeria always in transition....
  • Drawing by Lea Goldberg / Courtesy of Tuvia Ruebner
    May 30, 2017 | Rachel Tzvia Back
    Drawing by Lea Goldberg / Courtesy of Tuvia Ruebner Lea Goldberg (1911–1970), preeminent, versatile, and prolific writer of modern Hebrew letters, produced in her lifetime poetry that was characteriz...
  • Geoff Whalan, “Mistletoe Bird (Diaceum hirundinaceum),” Fogg Dam Conservation Reserve, Middle Point, Northern Territory, Australia, November 8, 2015
    May 24, 2017 | John Kinsella
    Geoff Whalan, “Mistletoe Bird (Diaceum hirundinaceum),” Fogg Dam Conservation Reserve, Middle Point, Northern Territory, Australia, November 8, 2015 Graphology Endgame 55: Adjustment We ha...
  • Firebreaks
    May 24, 2017 | Diane Glancy
    Poet John Kinsella inhabits and lends voice to the landscapes around him in Firebreaks. In Firebreaks (Norton, 2016), the title John Kinsella chooses for his twenty-third...
  • Marcel Duchamp, Nude Descending a Staircase (1912), oil on canvas, 147 × 89.2 cm, Philadelphia Museum of Art / The Louise and Walter Arensberg Collection, 1950
    May 22, 2017 | Óscar Hahn
    Marcel Duchamp, Nude Descending a Staircase (1912), oil on canvas, 147 × 89.2 cm, Philadelphia Museum of Art / The Louise and Walter Arensberg Collection, 1950 Desnudo bajando una escalera...
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