Month: August 2017

a morning prayer By Ashley Miranda

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a morning prayer

6am sun pressing down on my hand

we gather around the flag because the bible was blue red white

boys & girls separated to segregate sin                            some of us are sin chasms

we pray at the flag to the flag we pledge to the flag to the bible

i’m wearing a knee length skirt because legs are sinful              dew on the grass is sinning
dew on the grass is innocent

i look up at the flag i look up at the prayers

exhalations of how we writhe for god

for red for blue for white, only for white

this is the last time i recite the pledge of allegiance

By Ashley Miranda

Biography:

Ashley Miranda is a latinx poet from Chicago. Her work has been previously featured by the Denver Quarterly, Yes, Poetry, Ghost City Review, Lockjaw Magazine, and Glass Poetry Press. She tweets impulsive poetry and other musings @dustwhispers.

Nobody Lives Here Anymore By Joseph S. Pete

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Nobody_Lives_Here_Anymore.JPG

Biography:

Joseph S. Pete is a photographer, an award-winning journalist, an Iraq War veteran, an Indiana University graduate, a book reviewer, and a frequent guest on Lakeshore Public Radio in Merrillville. He was named the poet laureate of Chicago BaconFest 2016, a feat that Geoffrey Chaucer chump never accomplished. His work has appeared in The Five-Two, Chicago Literati, Dogzplot, shufPoetry, The Roaring Muse, Blue Collar Review, Lumpen, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Pulp Modern, Zero Dark Thirty and elsewhere. He once Googled the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. True story, believe it or not.

False Spring By Nandita Naik

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False Spring

This is the way we play at love:
gin pinwheeling our bodies together,
curves pinked with April want.

By play I mean this is not a game.
When we were eight
we whet our incisors on soft-lipped gutters,
tasting rust mixed in with salt.

Rust is another word for exposure,
a city undressing itself to reveal
the sky, folded, afraid.

May trickles out the window.
This city is a cauldron of
fluttering moths and backlit alleys.
(Too sanitized, too clean.)

On the train we shed eyelashes,
each one a parenthesis curving towards the light.

In the movies the girl is tied to the rails
and the whites of her eyes show
as she rechristens her kneecaps
and thinks, I am softer than I was before.

In the movies the dog chases after the girl,
fur blooming in the wind.
This is what it learns:
to love is to surrender.

Through the window, we see it running.
(Silverfish wriggle through your fur.)

Ropes twine around the girl,
binding her to the ground,
dirt pebbling against copper skin.

There aren’t enough looms in the world
to weave wings to her spine.
This I know.
I hold the threads
in my cold dead hands.

By Nandita Naik

Biography:

Nandita Naik is a junior at Proof School in San Francisco. She enjoys writing, programming, and musicals. Her poems have been published or forthcoming in Canvas Lit Journal and Polyphony HS.

The Children Next Door, 1939 By Jacqueline Jules

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The Children Next Door, 1939

When my grandmother was young
in Poland, she lived beside
a ramshackle house with many mouths
and not much money. Skinny children
cried in the yard. Bubbe would climb
over the fence with rolls and butter.

Then the Nazis came to Poland
and the children next door
threw stones and slurs.

Recalling the broken glass
on her bedroom carpet,
Bubbe still doesn’t wonder why
she brought ungrateful neighbors bread—
only why they threw rocks in return.

Why so many homes became targets
and so few havens emerged.

Why so many mouths
turned hunger for bread
into thirst for blood.

By Jacqueline Jules

Biography:

Jacqueline Jules is the author of three chapbooks, Field Trip to the Museum (Finishing Line Press), Stronger Than Cleopatra (ELJ Publications), and Itzhak Perlman’s Broken String, winner of the 2016 Helen Kay Chapbook Prize from Evening Street Press. Her poetry has appeared in over 100 publications including The Broome Review, Sow’s Ear Poetry Review, Hospital Drive, and Imitation Fruit. She is also the author of 40 books for young readers. Visit www.jacquelinejules.com.

One Photo By Thomas Gillaspy

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15296728010_21131e8760_o (1)By Thomas Gillaspy

Biography:

Thomas Gillaspy is a northern California photographer with an interest in urban minimalism. His photography has been featured in numerous magazines including the literary journals: Compose, Portland Review and Brooklyn Review. Further information and additional examples of his work are available at: http://www.thomasgillaspy.com
http://www.flickr.com/photos/thomasmichaelart/

Struggles of a Migrant Job Seeker By Akachi Obijiaku

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Struggles of a Migrant Job Seeker

With every waking moment, I hear that anything’s possible
But to them, my inequity seems plausible
The soil on which I was conceived appears to be a risk;
Appears to suggest a lesser value.

I stick to my five a day like it’s a spiritual doctrine;
Yet this time not of fruits but of job applications.
I sacrifice my mental and physical health for security
Yet, I’m reminded that foreign nationals are not functional

Day by day, I learn the hard way …
… that their national policies of inclusion are purely deceptional –
fictional and surely not operational.
Sitting in my room on Chancery Lane, I search for the upside
But this hustle is eating me alive
I love their nation but it is unrequited
The whispers remind me that I don’t belong here
Meanwhile, my inbox floods with rejection e-mails

The different shade of my passport suggests my human capital is not worthy
The ignorance is amazing; my rage rising
They consider immigration an abomination
As they sit on their thrones, carved with imperialist gold.
To fork out a living, all I need is decent work
Figuratively, they nod their heads ‘no’
But why? Is that too much to ask?

How come no one has faith in me?
Why do the lawmakers punish those who do?
With taxes and fines, name-shaming and levies,
Anyone who dares to care is burnt at the stake.
Why do I threaten them so much?

By Akachi Obijiaku

Biography:

Akachi Obijiaku is an emerging poet residing in London. Originally from Nigeria, she is interested in international arts development and practice. Only three months after writing her first ever poem, one of her works has been accepted for publication in a 2018 issue of the Sentinel Literary Quarterly. She uses poetry as a platform to address social ills.

Journey to the 1st world By Akachi Obijiaku

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Journey to the 1st world

A Poem on Migration (Seeking better opportunities)

Don’t judge me – it’s substantially better
The lives and the looks – they’re significantly fairer
A thousand miles I go, I fly to my saving grace
A land of the unknown – whispers of a dreamy life
We are painted as villains, we are
As we flee our homeland to the arc

It’s a boeing 747 but it’s my arc
My ticket to a new life in a place with no strife
Across the oceans, I hear it flows with milk and honey
I hear they drink fresh milk
I hear of the lack of sweat patches on their silk

The ear pressure as we ascend –
Apprehended by the silent judgement of patriots.
A national treasure I seem to be
Well, where was the love before I ceased to be?
Fended for by wolves on the street

The journey I’m on is a risk but I hope it’s brisk
The critics rage as I migrate
Yet my hopes and dreams they ate
I march along, brethren, I march
And my mother think it’s fatal but I think she’s just post-natal

The future lies ahead
No more waiting, lest I dread my choice.

By Akachi Obijiaku

Biography:

Akachi Obijiaku is an emerging poet residing in London. Originally from Nigeria, she is interested in international arts development and practice. Only three months after writing her first ever poem, one of her works has been accepted for publication in a 2018 issue of the Sentinel Literary Quarterly. She uses poetry as a platform to address social ills.

ALTAR By Umang Kalra

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ALTAR

“Despite My Efforts Even My Prayers Have Turned to Threats”
– Kaveh Akbar

I built the ocean out of broken
driftwood entangled like us
I built it in you
I built it in your lungs I spun
it out of the salt inside of the
sea shells you told me were pretty but
would not let me string into thread
for you

I hesitated to name you a god I knew
I watched how you flinched
at the sight of reverence you always
washed your hands when we left
a temple your mother had forced you to
go to I was always left wondering

whether you would wash your hands
just the same when you touched me
if you had known
that I had built your altar in the
back of my throat planted flowers
in between each of my ribs
watered
from your lungs

By Umang Kalra

Biography:

Umang Kalra is an Indian poet who splits her time between Dublin and New Delhi. She is a student of History at Trinity College, Dublin. Her poems have previously appeared or are forthcoming in Coldnoon, Blue Marble Review, Esthesia Magazine, and Quail Bell Magazine. She is currently involved in a year-long mentorship program with Doireann Ni Ghriofa for women of colour in Ireland.

Mrs. Watson’s Bible By Jacqueline Jules

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Mrs. Watson’s Bible

Southern Virginia, 1963,
Mrs. Watson had a Holy Bible.
Black leather, gold embossed letters.
Too big to fit in a hotel drawer,
it stood upright on a metal stand,
eye level from my seat in the third row.

Its gold cross glared at Jewish me
each time Mrs. Watson called
an errant child to be chastised
by the blackboard.

“Are you a Christian?”

Like simple math: 2 + 2 = 4,
Christian was the only logic needed
to understand why
you shouldn’t use curse words,
swipe a quarter, or knock
the skinny girl off the swings.

“Are you a Christian?”

I still wonder what
my bitten lips would have said
if she had asked Jewish me.

But that was long ago, before anyone
praised or decried “Politically Correct.”
Before anyone would even consider
telling Mrs. Watson
she shouldn’t judge others
by her own equations.

By Jacqueline Jules

Biography:

Jacqueline Jules is the author of three chapbooks, Field Trip to the Museum (Finishing Line Press), Stronger Than Cleopatra (ELJ Publications), and Itzhak Perlman’s Broken String, winner of the 2016 Helen Kay Chapbook Prize from Evening Street Press. Her poetry has appeared in over 100 publications including The Broome Review, Sow’s Ear Poetry Review, Hospital Drive, and Imitation Fruit. She is also the author of 40 books for young readers. Visit http://www.jacquelinejules.com.