Poems from The Orbit of Known Objects by Lisa Erin Robertson
The Mineral Kingdom ~ Lisa Erin Robertson Just an hour outside of Las Vegas, the sky chilled Baker through winter nights, my cheek against the Ford glass, black and cold like that desert, nothing between December-dead creosote and a sky that glittered like druze, mineral black gleam of coal or diamonds that shone in defiance…Read More
Poems from The Long Night of Flying by Sharon Olson
Remembering in Part The Church is auctioning off its precious artifacts. My mother’s hands press into the floured dough. In lot three, a set of praying hands, nineteenth century, Alsace-Lorraine. With her hands behind my head like a benediction, my mother pushes me off to school. I am searching for a body, terra-cotta, to go…Read More
Ito Naga’s Pensees from I Know (Je sais)
Translated from the French by the author and Sixteen Rivers poet Lynne Knight, I Know (Je sais) is a collection of 469 observations on life and the universe by a scientist whose eye for detail is keen and whose sense of humor is refreshing. The book is profound without being ponderous, instructive without being pedantic,…Read More
Poems from After Cocteau by Carolyn Miller
After Cocteau: Beauty’s Father in the Castle of the Beast for Lee Hildreth When the thorny hedge opened for him, he was astonished; when it closed behind him, the leaves and twigs knitting themselves seamlessly together in the darkness, fear flooded his body, and went with him on the path through the wild garden,…Read More
Poems from Light, Moving by Carolyn Miller
Childhood Rivers You must approach them slowly, for they are rimmed with green fur and slippery stones. The smell of them rises up and you walk through it, like velvet curtains parting. The pebbles clank beneath your feet, and dragonflies sail by, purple- blue and iridescent, and the fur stirs in the green water, and…Read More
Poems from What I Stole by Diane Sher Lutovich
What I Stole I stole endlessly as if the center of the universe were all mine. I stole brazenly, stripped off my clothes to steal gazes, entire pages from the encyclopedia, attention and time from teachers, glances from mirrors. I stole others’ ideas, my father’s succulence, Snickers bars from the five-and-dime, a seat in the…Read More
Poems from In the Right Season by Diane Sher Lutovich
It’s About Time Today I want to invite the dead in, show them to a well-padded chair, offer a cup of chamomile tea, finally ready to listen to them talk about pain, narrowing of the spirit. When they were dying, each of my joints was a well-lubed machine part, stomach ready for chocolate malts, stuffed…Read More
Poems from Again by Lynne Knight
Prologue While we slept, such heavy rain swept past it shook the last roses loose. They lay smashed on the deck this morning, their petals scattered like big white tears. I shouldn’t say a thing so sentimental. But there they were. And you, my father, so long dead, why should I not expect you to…Read More