Earth’s bell rings into naked autumn; the meadowlarks forage the bedtime of berries. They curl their tongues in birthplaces of insect dynasties under a starless canopy of peace— or that is what the night suggests until one explores closer to see the blackbirds making a new sky, tearing each other apart.
Nicole Scott is a West Virginia native with an M.F.A in Creative Writing from Lindenwood University. She loves exploring wordplay, mythology, and sexuality in her work, while simultaneously debating if she should have another double shot of espresso. Her poetry and other published work can be found on her website nicolescottpoetry.com.
The mountain fell. Ice. No resistance. Canyon floor far below. What would the wives know? Crampon, piton, stance. The cloud bellowed. Rope Grew tight. Afternoon faded Into night. The coombe, The scarp, the fall. Three thousand years pass. A pouch. Something other than a dream. Tattoos on frozen skin. Flint point beneath a shoulder blade. Descending into shade. Mushrooms no avail. Nor copper ax. The scree, scruff, muscle. No thought. Death. Enough.
The Last Diagnosis
Its back, she says, as if it is a single thing returning like a boomerang and she can beseech power across the table, an unruffled pool her hands rest upon. Her words drop in it like stones. It. Back. Again. As if it were alone, and not one but three. Each entering in turn. Like a menu. Each courses paired. Each with its own prescription, utensil. Kidney. Brain. Now lung, she says. He can’t swallow. It is only a matter of time. A single reservation has been made. The place-card has been engraved. She says, you should have known him then, like the spool of time could be rewound and propped like a bolt of cloth in a corner, seen at last for what it really was instead of only guessed.
Later, she remembers words, a favorite meditation, a grace to introduce a service for the dead.
Michael C. Davis is a poet, classical guitarist, tanguero, teacher, traveler, reader, photographer. Retired copy editor. Resident of Falls Church, VA. His work has appeared in Gargoyle, Innisfree, Lip Service, Minimus, Poet Lore, and the anthologies Cabin Fever, Winners, and Written in Arlington. He has published a chapbook, Upon Waking (Mica Press), and a collection, Prodigal (New Academia Publishing).
Image: Kogo, GFDL <http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html>, via Wikimedia Commons
POEM ENDING WITH A NESTLING CRADLED IN MY HUSBAND’S LARGE HAND
Because of the time difference I wake to a text from my husband, sent the night before. Perched on the edge of his hand is a tiny bird, a nestling—already feathered but not yet able to maintain flight. The dogs went nuts, I read, I think it flew into the front door. I imagine my dogs, 100 pounds of fur and teeth, unaware of their strength, beholden to their prey drive. I felt like a Disney princess, he said, it just sat in my hand, fluttering its wings. He carried it to a tree at the edge of our property, gentled it onto a branch, the dogs’ barking escalating to a frenzied pitch. The next morning another text awaits me: it didn’t make it. Instead of imagining it broken between my dogs’ strong jaws, I think of it in my husband’s hand, its small body protected, its feathered frame safe.
BLESSING FOR THE GIRLS WITH EATING DISORDERS
because I know what it’s like to make lists of food you’ll never allow yourself to eat, to let your fingers trip through a cookbook, using Post-Its to mark recipes you’ll never make. Bless the girls who see a buffet as the most deliciously terrifying thing, whose friends marvel at her getting seconds and thirds, without knowing she’ll kneel before the toilet and without a sound, bring everything back up—the eating reversed until the very first thing she swallowed brushes past her teeth and kisses her lips as it leaves. Bless the girls who log every morsel they eat, who know the calorie count of every meal, who track their workouts and calories and go to sleep with the dull ache of hunger in their bellies. Bless the ones who break the cycle and the ones who don’t. Bless the girls who see themselves in this poem. Bless the girl writing it, for the words reflecting in her eyes and feeling like home.
WOULD YOU EVER GET YOUR SPOUSE’S NAME TATTOOED? ~a question posted on Twitter
We’d been separated six months and you’d been dating someone for two months when you called to tell me my name now graced your bicep. I looked at the kitchen that was now only mine: the fridge with the broken handle, the stove with only three working burners. We’re not getting back together, I finally said. It’s a testament, you corrected, to the years we spent together. I was wife #2 and you tell me your first wife’s name was inked onto your other bicep. But where will you put your third wife’s name? I quipped. I’ll never marry again, you insisted. Years later I will spend hours getting my entire left arm tattooed, a delicate sleeve that my second husband does not like—he cannot comprehend how they make me feel beautiful. I waited seven years to remarry, uncertain I wanted to do it again, uncertain I could. You remarried seven months after our divorce was finalized. I don’t know where her name resides.
Courtney LeBlanc is the author of the full-length collections Her Whole Bright Life (winner of the Jack McCarthy Book Prize, Write Bloody, 2023), Exquisite Bloody, Beating Heart (Riot in Your Throat, 2021) and Beautiful & Full of Monsters (Vegetarian Alcoholic Press, 2020). She is a Virginia Center for Creative Arts fellow (2022) and the founder and editor-in-chief of Riot in Your Throat, an independent poetry press. She loves nail polish, tattoos, and a soy latte each morning. Read her publications on her blog: www.wordperv.com. Follow her on twitter: @wordperv, and IG: @wordperv79.
darkness fell, and we knew what we were in for; wind howled and we sheltered from the storm, and crawling from beneath the fallen branches, the shadows that poured down from above, we counted ourselves lucky.
we saw the aftermath as we drove, the restless capitalist machine resting for no man, woman, child or otherwise, resting for no inclement weather, no disaster of nature or man great enough, but we count ourselves lucky,
and now as the sun regains its foothold in the sky, we realize how right we are; we all are safe, all are whole, all together and extol not the human resilience, but the mercy of the storm; we count ourselves lucky.
Ellie Cameron (they/she/he) (Twitter: @ellie_cameron1) is an emerging nonbinary, genderfluid writer and writing teacher. They hold a BA in Writing Arts with a concentration in Creative Writing from Rowan University. Their published work can be found at elliecameronwriting.wordpress.com.
Image: Ochir Kikeev, CC by 4.0. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Storm_in_Voradero.jpg, via Wikimedia Commons.
The sweetness of summer, falling from trees / ripe / soft / luscious dreams of forever. We were the ones who begged at street corners, never bowing our heads. Church baskets on back porches / filled with tomorrow’s hope. Steaming blacktop and tar / strong odors of everyday life. Mama worked 2 jobs / we lived by latchkey. Freedom / a timeless concept, it wafted above the gray steam. Ice Cream Truck songs calling to youthful joy / with never a dime for a cone. Bookmobiles carrying wonderous worlds of fantasy / we lived for Saturday afternoons. Looking back – to be poor was to be rich. We needed so little / we wanted so much. Hand-me-down lives that reached for the stars. Summer will never be the same.
Anna
The ocean bore her seven times, upon its rolling spine. Storms could not unfold her / a sister to the angry waves. She lived ninety-seven years among the clouds, not knowing how to rain. Decades carried buckets, waiting for a tear. She was too stubborn to cry. I remember furrowed brow / deep valleys east to west. Determined, she would not cleave. Three children lost, two survived. Yet, one would take his life. She was stone & iron. She could not be broken / refused to rust. There was a time when she was soft, before I held her hand. Her stories nourished my need. She gave what she could not receive. I watched her brow soften as she knelt to say goodbye. A lifetime of tears flooded out to wash away the pain.
Ann Christine Tabaka was nominated for the 2017 Pushcart Prize in Poetry. She is the winner of Spillwords Press 2020 Publication of the Year, her bio is featured in the Who’s Who of Emerging Writers 2020 and 2021, published by Sweetycat Press. She is the author of 15 poetry books, and 1 short story book. She lives in Delaware, USA. She loves gardening and cooking. Chris lives with her husband and four cats. Her most recent credits are: Eclipse Lit, Carolina Muse, Sparks of Calliope; The Closed Eye Open, North Dakota Quarterly, Tangled Locks Journal, Wild Roof Journal, The American Writers Review, Burningword Literary Journal, Muddy River Poetry Review, The Silver Blade, Pomona Valley Review, West Texas Literary Review, The Hungry Chimera, Sheila-Na-Gig, Fourth & Sycamore.
*(a complete list of publications is available upon request)
Image: Svln4821, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
