Online Issues
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This is the maiden all forlorn that milked the cow with the crumpled horn
art by Helen Hofling
by Becca Klaver
never
in my lucky
& luxurious
erased &
belittled
american life
have I ever
been so relieved
to be uterus-
lessthough
who’s to say
it wasn’t
america
her waters
flush with
estrogen
& fertilizer
that fed the
fibroids
that made
the pain
that etherized me
upon the tablewho’s to say
the house
america built
didn’t cast
my tissue
a-wandering
in the classic
pioneering
hysterical stylelittle slivers
of womb
pricking & -
Medicine
art by JJ Cromer
by AJ Bermudez
But of course I want your teeth in my pussy,
who wouldn’t?what idiot would not want
your papillae / nail beds / germ-junked saliva all over their holey-of-holies?
If an altar falls in the woods
and no one hears it,
[you know the rest].
But, Philosapphy 101:
Can’t a thing be ugly and splendid at once?
a riled-up mess of sex / longing / medicine
the way a brain looks on the ground
If not, -
Self Portrait where lilies are my body and you’re playing me like chess
image curtesy of the MET Museum Archive
by Sophie Jefferies
I am a selfish girl to tell you the truth.
My blood flows inside my own body and nowhere else.
I am an indulgent gash on my left finger.
I am a Victorian maiden, seeping into the walls.My blood flows inside my own body and nowhere else.
I am a chess pawn covered in lily pollen.
I am a Victorian maiden, seeping into the walls.
My white nightgown slips sexily off my shoulder. -
MOONFLOWER
image curtesy of The MET Museum Archives
by Lydia Downey
There was a perpetual
residue on our hands.
Steamed milk stuck like taras my friend and I scrubbed
down each closing shift
and stole our dinnersof half-stale, chipped pastries.
We gave up trying
to leave earlyand walked the long path
to our apartment
somewhereafter ten, when only pheasants
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The Snow, Slant Ghazal for Winter of 2085
image curtesy of The MET Museum Archives
by Linette Marie Allen
The snow, a canvas for branch-sprawl, brittle lines—
a quaking aria breaks them, shivering their bridal lines.
The year grows its teeth, gnashing at our stooped gardens,
gesturing the leaves we swore could defy bridal lines.
Newsprint burns in the hearth, its stories curling to ash,
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Cecilia Gallerani
image courtesy of The National Museum in Kraków
by Martina Clavadetscher, translated from the German by Melody Winkle
Two gifts
Enough! That's enough looking!
Sometimes what I most want to scream into the dimmed hall, across the parquet floor, and straight into their young faces:
It’s too late for you to see me alive!
Even though at their receptions and tours, they’re always eager to agree—yes, yes, how true, indeed:
This woman alone is enough to grasp what nature is,
