There is a perfection to the mockingbird’s song dropped from a black wire, to the white slashes of his spread tail feathers against this deep, clean blue. The choral repertoire of his hopes is chanted ,,,,over and over .,,,,and over and over and over ,,…..,,and over through the night ,on and on, a desperation ,,,,…sharp edges finely stropped ,,…..,,to rip open ,…….,,,even the loveliest sigh. Carol Hamilton’s poetry appears in Louisiana Literature, Southwest American Literature, San Pedro River Review, Dryland, Pinyon, Adirondack Review, Commonweal, Broad River Review, Fire Poetry Review, Gingerbread House, Main Street Rag, … Continue reading A Turn by Carol Hamilton →

Revolution He watches the tail lights of her car disappear down the rutted driveway, throws a hammer after her yells don’t come back He turns towards his trailer weeds pushing through the metal steps propped up on cinder blocks a hole punched in a cupboard door a cracked cell phone screen testimony to long nights with her back turned to him and anger that seeped into his dreams In a few hours the first birds will start to sing before it’s even light the snow will keep melting in the mountains on its way down … Continue reading Revolution and Persephone’s Abduction, 2 poems by Cindy Yarberry →

Alone, timeworn—but still standing, even if its paint-scuffed radiators give no heat and its window frames leak and its doors don’t shut tight, everything foundering since its elder keepers died, the next generation, though paying the property taxes, too dispersed to steward or even sell it, the farmstead’s absent presence like a stark stare from the back end of old age, from a hardened place that sees our younger, ongoing lives— no matter how well built— as false fronts set for collapse; sees our blossoming memories forming, like the farmstead’s (love in the bedroom, children … Continue reading Farmstead by Mark Belair →

  From a distance I saw a frog, standing like a soldier in a field of summer grass. Up close, the creature looked alive. My curious dog sniffed its warty behind. I, too, touched its stiff and tailless end with the blunt unfeeling tip of my white summer sneaker. Later, we found another: the stretched-out skin of its helmeted head, arched above its shoulders round; its fore and hind legs spread, poised like a soldier for action. Closer inspection showed death: a flat black disc of missing eye and fat, red tongue in locked jaw … Continue reading Blunt Force by Lisa Low →