God or a Lottery Ticket in a Black Woman’s Purse
By Angelique PalmerTrying to find faith
in a world that is slowly killing me and blaming me for why they can’t do it right
or why survival might be the only thing in the way of enjoying life
Search Results
Epistle: Disobedience Operates Across Time & Space
By Leslie McIntoshImal, direct action protest visible from satellite is time travel, is binge-watching the future. Your optic nerves can reach where no lung has emptied, and speak back with authority, so what is the meaning of witness? Imal, when I see your lover’s face, I am seeing what it has become, in spite of you, and everyone. And what does he see?
how to make her stay
By Shauna M. Morgantell her the new fragrance is nice but she doesn’t have to bathe in it
assert that sarcasm is a talent
tell her that her salwar or lappa is weird and take her to the mall for khakis
do so until she stops wearing that colorful garb
impermanence
By sam saxsometimes i wonder what happens to people’s hands when they disappear
in their pockets. of course, my rational brain knows they go on being hands
but there’s still the question. i wonder if object permanence isn’t the biggest
trick of them all, a scam, a way to ground the brain in its thin bath of liquid
To the woman I saw today who wept in her car
By Bianca Lynne SpriggsWoman,
I get it.
We are strangers,
but I know the heart is a hive
and someone has knocked yours
from its high branch in your chest
THE NINE
By Tara HardyThey call it dissociation.
I call it THE NINE (children)
who live inside me.
Each of them encased
in amber, frozen in a mosquito-pose
intermittent apnea of unknown causation
By Doritt Carrollthe first time it happened
i thought i was being strangled
four fingers compressing each side of my throat
no air
When I Kiss You, A Casket Opens
By beyza ozerthis is not terrorism
this is toxic masculinity
made in the USA
when my mother hears
about orlando
she doesn't look at me
Talk Ugly
By Joseph GreenThe last time I saw you alive
I wish I would’ve talked ugly to you.
Said, “Put the straw down. No,
I don’t want to take another line,
I should be writing them.
Almost Midnight
By Deborah A. MirandaWife and dogs have gone to bed.
I sit here with the front door open.
Crickets sing patiently, a long lullaby
in lazy harmony. Rain falls