The Age of Unlimited Possibility, by Kate Gleason (1956-) My sister and I, being girls, wasted the better part of our childhoods practicing to be women. Every fall, our lawn swelled with the colors of singed orange, crayon yellow, maroon, the brilliant ruin we raked into the floor plans of leaf houses, elaborate ranches […]
Day Time Sequence/November, by Dalene Stowe (1946-) The wind has no voice, really. The obstacles have voices. Going up hill This crow time of year The cartilage cracks, The wind announces: November is the month of cartilage. Small bones All over your body applaud. But the wind has no voice, really. It is the […]
A Storm, by Amroziy Metlinsky (1814-1870) The savage tempest howls and whines; In clouds the livid lightning flashes; A mighty uproar rends the pines As once again the thunder crashes; But now, coal-black the midnight stood, And now it reddens, fierce as blood. The Dnieper wails amid these shocks And shakes its mane, a mass of grey; […]
Fishermen, by Basil Bunting (1900-1985) Mesh cast for mackerel by guess and the sheen’s tremor — imperceptible if you haven’t the knack — a difficult job; hazardous and seasonal: many shoals all of a sudden, it would tax the Apostles to take the lot; then drowse for months, nets on the shingle, a […]
St. Paul Street Seasonal, by Kathy Mangan (1950-) Not the crocuses, sporadic purple and yellow stars in row house yards, not the ice-cream wrappers stuck to the sidewalks, but the syringe — someone’s discarded joy — nestled in the green new shoots of our ivy trumpets the Baltimore spring. Dusks, the halfway house spills its […]
Bedtime Story, by Wanda Coleman (1946-) bed calls. i sit in the dark in the living room trying to ignore them in the morning, especially Sunday mornings it will not let me up. you must sleep longer, it says facing south the bed makes me lay heavenward on my back while i prefer a westerly […]
Notes For My Son, by Alex Comfort (1920-2000) Remember when you hear them beginning to say Freedom Look carefully see who it is that they want you to butcher. Remember, when you say that the old trick would not have fooled you for a moment That every time it is the trick which seems new. […]
The Redbreast, by Charlotte Richardson (1775-1825) Cold blew the freezing northern blast, And winter sternly frowned; The flaky snow fell thick and fast, And clad the fields around. Forced by the storm’s relentless power, Emboldened by despair, A shivering redbreast sought my door, Some friendly warmth to share. ‘Welcome, sweet bird!’ I fondly cried, ‘No […]
Self-Portrait at Eighty with Twelve-String, by Kate Sontag (1952-) Out of the corner of her good eye she recognizes it tonight on television: there it is, she’s sure of it, her old Martin dazzling as a dozen wild yellow lilies opening on stage in a younger woman’s arms — this guitar home […]
Day Lilies, by Susanna Warren (1953-) For six days, full-throated, they praised the light with speckled tongues and blare of silence by the porch stair: honor guard with blazons and trumpets raised still heralding the steps of those who have not for years walked here but who once, pausing, chose this slope for a throng […]