from THE BLACK MARIA
By Aracelis GirmayBeloved, to
day you eat,
today you bathe, today
you laugh
Search Results
For Brown Girls
By Katy Richeymust be tight
spiral wound
corset of rope
be body and
undertaker be
things that shine in the night
By Rigoberto GonzálezFulgencio's silver crown--when he snores
the moon, coin of Judas, glaring
at the smaller metals we call stars
my buckle
what else
By Tanya OlsonWhat else should I want. But to
be a boy. A boy. At his mother’s hip.
A boy between. His father
and the plow. A boy to remain.
What else.
Race/Race
By Martha Collinsstock strain family line
breed blood skin shape
of the head of the pack
A Car, A Man, A Maraca
By Charlie BondhusAt the mirror I heft
elbows, belly, cock,
say hematocrit—44.3; hemoglobin—15.2;
neutrophils—62; monocytes—5.
Ego-Tripp(ed)
By Mahogany L. Browne& then the poet became G_D/like
just’a rolling his tongue everywhere
like G O D must’ve
when the earth got birth(ed) & even
Kitchen, Donetsk
By Susanna LangShe had planned to offer peaches with the tea.
August was warm; the fruit had ripened to perfection.
She’d placed two paring knives on the cutting board,
set out the teapot with nasturtiums painted on the side.
The Newer Colossus
By Karen FinneyfrockMy feet have been wilting in this salt-crusted cement
since the French sent me over on a steamer in pieces.
I am the new Colossus, wonder of the modern world,
a woman standing watch at the gate of power.
Nonstop from Fruitvale to Ursa Major: Threnody for Los Desaparecidos* of The United States
By Vincent ToroA lung lit like diesel
is not fable or fodder.
Is not sewage siphoned from stern
and starboard. Cuffs, not slapdash plums
plunge from your garden