Poetry
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Five Haikus by Antonio Guzman Gomez
photo by Giovanni Apruzzese
Translated from the Maya Tseltal by Kiran Bhat
You open your eyes
and wake up the sun so that
a new day can start.
Wik’a asit
ya xojobaj talel k’aal,
ya sakub k’inal.
Abres tus ojos
y se levanta el sol,
despierta el d
Every morning
at the back of a mountain
the sun yawns awake.
Ta jujun sab,
ta yach’ te’tikil,
ya sjach’ ye te k’aale. -
Hallucinyx
"As All Can Be" art by Edward Lee
by Dana Curtis
“The literary equivalent of a hallucinogen; or:qualities of a hallucinogen reduced to literary essence”
-Steve Erickson, American StutterI look for the opium den or
the library because I need
the sweet addled sleep of
the damned, the endlessly
levitated and furious, fearless
on the collapsed couch, words
leaking out the corners
of my mouth. It’s the only way
to look at a sunset, -
Bildungsroman
"Ecumenical" painting by Michael Moreth
by Seth Hagen
I was a cabinetmaker commissioned
To construct the King’s sex chair.
I was a maypole flag wet with June dew
I was half-mouse, half-toad.
Like a dog now paraplegic
I wore a bright coat.
Like a dog now paraplegic
I wheeled on.
A room. A braided rug. Two doors.
One half-open, the other half-closed.
Like a spoonbill splayed
And two owls in a mangled oak.
-
It’s a tender gap, a handclap
"Golden Orb Weaver" collage by Tiffany Dugan
by Ashleigh A. Allen
Starting next week, we pray loud
in the direction of memory.
Face forest like a flag, mount the lions.
Your insides hairy and damp as concrete.
Sundays full of worry and worms, socks
hour the clocks full of snow, the doorway
is deliberate. In the garden, flattening
the lawn. Your song comes to me eyes
first, lands on warm lashes, saliva
across a naked face, you look up, ask for sky
but all you get is god, -
Waiting for Leonora Carrington at Cafe Alma Negra
"Storm Brewing Over the City" painting by Nuala McEvoy
by Laurel Benjamin
wouldn’t order for you because I don’t know your coffee tastes,
but this place has a steel reputation. I heard rumors
about your cloistered ways, how you’ve grabbed a sack and thrown it
dripping on the threshold, creature with fangs and octopus eyes
birthed. Frankly, all I could imagine,
dark roast, though the art photos
plastered on the walls don’t jive with your paintings,
especially the mohawk woman. I expected
your small flames to fan at the table
on time, -
The Mountains Comes Down the Mountains
Art by Andy Mister
By Patrick Whitfill
Maybe there’s some great end game
I’m missing out on with this last
century’s revision to the nursery rhymeabout the baby stashed in a tree, but I
always thought, with kids, it’s best to lie
only a little. Point to the window,say outside, because there’s nothing
about transparency they need to know
When my son noticed his shadowthe first time, we had a choice to make:
confess to what we don’t know,
