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The Floatin Baby
By Marilyn Nelson
A doll was forgotten in a bedroom
when the old owners of the house moved out
and G-ma and Gramps moved their family in.
There’s an old photograph in an album
of boy Uncle Roy laughing, holding it
in a jumble of moving-in boxes.

It spent...
Calling the dead
By Jennifer Wong
On certain nights they come back,
ghost story fragments lodged in my head
from midnight taxi rides. Almost always
a woman in a red dress, hollow laughter
and a ball bouncing in a playground,
lost souls crossing the misty river where Meng
offers them soup to...
We and the Dead Ride Quick at Night
By L. M. Rivera
When the home is no more

When the mother's negative light goes also

When solitude rips the door from frame

When the transitory moves into the familial

Then: I often think of the drink, the notes, the contented, and badly drawn cartographies

On my bare...
From “Aftering Delmore’s ‘Season in Hell’ [Rimbaud] 3”
By John Kinsella
I have gorged on a glorious dose of poison.—Triple blessings
on the advice that was proffered!—My guts on fire. Future shock
distorts and contorts and hurls me into the dirt. Choking and parched
I can’t call out. This hell, this eternal torment. Watch...
Untitled Poem [“Why feel guilty because the death of a lover causes lust?”]
By Alan Dugan
Why feel guilty because the death of a lover causes lust?
It is only an animal urge to perpetuate the species,
but if I do not inhibit my imagination and dreams
I can see your skull smiling up at me from underground
and your...
Pinocchia takes on the role of the magician’s assistant
By Lo Kwa Mei-En
When the mirror swings open, it calls me obscenely
shapely. A ruby wing slaps the glass. Soft smear. Since,
like the drowning trick in reverse, I learned to float

outside myself from a certain, mostly bearable height,
I watch terror push its anthem into...
Pineola
By Sy Hoahwah
Severed finger of a convicted murderer uncurls like a waking pet.
Demonic compass points toward the most dangerous direction to get home.

Its long yellow fingernail can pick any lock.

On the fishhook, the finger resembles a long, fat mealworm.
Most times, it’s lodged...
Body of Rags, International Bridge Between the US & Mexico
By Ray González
Yes, I am a body of rags lying
here on the bridge waiting for

a hot rain to wash me open,
dissolve me off the bridge

because this border is closed.
I rot on the boundary line

and can’t enter Juarez,
pennies thrown at me

when a drunk...
The Haunted
By John Masefield
Here, in this darkened room of this old house,
     I sit beside the fire.    I hear again,
Within, the scutter where the mice carouse,
     Without, the gutter dropping with the rain.
Opposite, are black shelves of wormy books,
     To left, glazed cases,...
Allegiances
By Emily Berry
In the nighttime house I don’t know where you are
My allegiances could change
How can I stop my allegiances from changing?
Morning is a gown put on at midnight, but no one’s coming
I don’t know what your secrets are
You say you have...
Life Form
By Aase Berg
Translated By Johannes Göransson
Will haul this gelatinous body, will lash forward this non-form, will push this organism of gas through the gray regions.

A sour wind tears through the thin white hair. A wind of vinegar and henbane tears in the rustling, discarded bird-shells...
For the Nefarious
By Mai Der Vang
From a recessed hollow
Rumble, I unearth as a creature

Conceived to be relentless.
Depend on me to hunt you

Until you find yourself
Counting all the uncorked

Nightmares you digested.
I will let you know the burning

Endorsed by the effort of
Matches. And you will claw

Yourself inward,...
Domestic Violence
By Roger Reeves
A Lowcountry marsh trembles with the blood of an African
Who refused to climb out of the salt and mud of the bay
And quite literally lost his head. A hunter named Hunter
Waits for the man’s wounds to close and for him...
Thrashing Seems Crazy
By Juliana Spahr
this is true
a man in an alley grabbed my arm
this is true
someone called me and left the phone dangling at the post office
this is true
a man stalked me

someone tells a story

someone tells a story to another person
another person says I...
The Right Foot of Juan De Oñate
By Martín Espada
On the road to Taos, in the town of Alcalde, the bronze statue
of Juan de Oñate, the conquistador, kept vigil from his horse.
Late one night a chainsaw sliced off his right foot, stuttering
through the ball of his ankle, as Oñate's...
The Raven
By Edgar Allan Poe
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
“’Tis...
Hey, Ma, Something’s under My Bed
By Joan Horton
I hear it at night
when I turn out the light.
It’s that creature who’s under my bed.
He won’t go away.
He’s determined to stay.
But I wish he would beat it, instead.

I told him to go,
but he shook his head no.
He was worse...
End of Days Advice from an Ex-zombie
By Michael Derrick Hudson
To think I used to be so good at going to pieces
gobbling my way through the cops

and spooking what’s left of the girls. How’d I

get so far, sloughing off one knuckle at a time,
jerking my mossy pelt along

ruined...
The Black Cock
By Ishmael Reed
He frightens all the witches and the dragons in their lair
He cues the clear blue daylight and He gives the night its dare
He flaps His wings for warning and He struts atop a mare
for when He crows they quiver and...
Nellie Clark
By Edgar Lee Masters
I was only eight years old;
And before I grew up and knew what it meant
I had no words for it, except
That I was frightened and told my
Mother; And that my Father got a pistol
And would have killed Charlie, who was...

Quick Tags

poetry-magazineThe Floatin Baby

poetry-magazineFrom “Aftering Delmore’s ‘Season in Hell’ [Rimbaud] 3”

poetry-magazinePinocchia takes on the role of the magician’s assistant

poetry-magazinePineola

poetry-magazineBody of Rags, International Bridge Between the US & Mexico

poetry-magazineAllegiances

poetry-magazineFor the Nefarious

poetry-magazineDomestic Violence

poetry-magazineEnd of Days Advice from an Ex-zombie

The Floatin Baby

From “Aftering Delmore’s ‘Season in Hell’ [Rimbaud] 3”

Pinocchia takes on the role of the magician’s assistant

Pineola

Body of Rags, International Bridge Between the US & Mexico

Allegiances

For the Nefarious

Domestic Violence

End of Days Advice from an Ex-zombie