Grace Before Meals

By Lauren K. Alleyne As a child, I'd refuse to eat my veggies,
pushing them round and round my plate
until my mother's glare unclamped my jaw

‘N’em

By Jericho Brown They said to say goodnight
And not goodbye, unplugged
The TV when it rained. They hid

By Emily K. Bright It is nearly midnight and I'm
scrubbing at the grout.
The dishes, washed,

By Lauryn Nesbitt As long as you wake up everyday you should have
no reason to complain, right
i guess if i'm still breathing then i'm not really

By Tarfia Faizullah In Grandmother's house,
we are each a room that
must remain locked. Inside

By Antoinette Brim Let the moon untangle itself
from the clothesline, as coming daylight
diminishes its lamp to memory.

By Penelope Scambly Schott Back when I used to march
in the noon of the green world,
I sang like a crow.

By Joseph O. Legaspi slides down into my body, soft
lambs wool, what everybody
in school is wearing, and for me

By Alison Roh Park If it were not so scarred from your accidental
rages—uptown, upstate—I would have rested
on the cinder block of your chest.

By Lenelle Moïse the children of haiti
are not mythological
we are starving