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Two Poems – Allison Whittenberg

Poetry Issue #10: Women's Health April 22nd, 2022 April 22nd, 2022 Two Poems by Allison Whittenberg Hedy beauty, the curse that coursed through her aggressively moreover, how dare she have a brain under such a face? all this was said to be so . . . unfortunate pretty and smart? unfortunate? that’s a joke-- right? Allison Whittenberg reads “Hedy”: Lip Service that Hollywood star is so woke the only Black person she has on her instagram is George Floyd. Allison Whittenberg reads “Lip Service”: A Whittenberg is a Philadelphia native who has a global perspective. If she wasn’t ...

Protected: PSM 10 Poetry Template

Poetry Issue #10: Women's Health April 22nd, 2022 April 22nd, 2022 Poem Title or # by Author Voice It is raw. Purpled and chafed thin, worn and warned. It denotes mere meemies before white coats: ++++++++another Medicaid queen to diagnose. It is tight. Squeezed fingers dig with nails that pierce the silence and trust that whatever pain I’m in, ++++++++it’s better than treatment in this skin. It is sore. It has hollered and howled, generations of harvests and fibroids and is now a high-pitched white noise— ++++++++bloody murder into the void. It ...

Protected: Poetry

Poetry Issue #10: Women's Health April 22nd, 2021 April 22nd, 2022 Poetry Letter from the Poetry Editor: A Requiem’s Saving Grace The Women's Waltz, The Other World, and ++++and The Professionals | Lake Angela Children's Hospital | David Banach Osteoporosis | P.S. Cottier Brandywine No. 1 and Home Sequence | Doriana Diaz Mother's Heart as Incandescent Lightbulb and ++++and The Art of Distraction| Dagne Forrest Anniversary and Red Shift | Emily Hockaday Magnitude 7.1 | Catherine Klatzker Migraines | S. Marie Watkins When the Orderly Wheels Me ...

Deaf & Dumb—Paul Hostovsky

Poetry Issue #9: Open Call November 19th, 2021 November 19th, 2021 Deaf and Dumb by Paul Hostovsky Deaf and Dumb The Deaf man in the waiting room asks me how long I’ve been working as an interpreter. I tell him many years. “Awesome,” he says. We sit there chatting, waiting for the doctor to come. He tells me a little about himself. His parents and grandparents are Deaf. His siblings are Deaf. His two young children are fourth generation Deaf. The hereditary master status of a kind ...

Because of the Wolf—Kendra Leonard

Poetry Issue #9: Open Call November 19th, 2021 November 19th, 2021 Because of the Wolf by Kendra Leonard Because of the Wolf I. when the diagnosis comes it fits it clings it feels slack like sheets flirting on a clothesline in a breeze— now bedding, now ghosts— will I die in strawberry time or live to see leaves on bricks or ice in the windows? II. The wolf has eaten the beach. It’s snapped up the sandpipers, running on their fast little legs. It’s taken the bright afternoon in the water twisting the sailboats around. Sunburn on ...

3 Poems—Sarath Reddy

Poetry Issue #9: Open Call November 19th, 2021 November 19th, 2021 Three Poems by Sarath Reddy Inheritance After the curry-stained dishes had been cleared, our dinner table became a stage— the cosmic dance of Shiva, Durga destroying the buffalo demon, Rama vanquishing Ravana. Father was a god who vanished every evening only to reappear at breakfast ready to finish those stories as if night was only an intermission. He never spoke about his bloodstained shoes, his splattered white shirt, never shared a heroic anecdote about those he had saved ...

Two Poems—Kasha Martin Gauthier

Poetry Issue #9: Open Call November 19th, 2021 November 19th, 2021 Two Poems by Kasha Martin Gauthier A Poet Homeschools, Week 2: Biology With each footfall, blood courses to your brain. Can you feel it? * Pinch the nerve to make it grow. Your grandfather pinched springtime buds from the coreopsis— thought he was deadheading them. Try not to confuse living with dying. * The doctors don’t know how he’ll react to the morphine, or the strength it took to ask for it. They don’t know how he still knows our ...

Three Poems—Jessica Mehta

Poetry Issue #9: Open Call November 19th, 2021 November 19th, 2021 Three Poems by Jessica Mehta Do You See the Stars? This is waking up. Remember when you pressed your thumbs, thick and unforgiving, into my eye sockets, slow as death until I gave in to the dizzy and you whispered, accent sticky, dripping in rose syrup, Do you see the stars? And I did. They burst in the darkness like kisses. This city has a heart, fluttering crazed and drunken as a beast, fingers itchy and always ...

Painkiller Seeker—Dara Kalima

Poetry Issue #9: Open Call November 19th, 2021 November 19th, 2021 Painkiller Seeker by Dara Kalima Painkiller Seeker After three years, and so many visits, as I sat with much angst in that ER bed, she said, “It sounds like your gallbladder.” I laughed. After all, it was almost three years of seeking help for a mystery that led to self-medicating after a ton of tears and unceasing nerve-burning pain. I laughed and said, “Funny, I don't have one. See, I complained of a pain three years ago, immediately after the operation that ripped ...

Lodged In My Throat—Emma Connally-Barklem

Poetry Issue #9: Open Call November 19th, 2021 November 19th, 2021 Lodged In My Throat by Emma Conally-Barklem Lodged In My Throat Lodged in my throat, is it a sticky willow or is it a conker? Spiky. Shot down at the age of five and festering ever since, No rinse can clear it. Instead, the child curled inside the wardrobe must be allowed her time, Daisies held, hopeful to reclaim what was hers and mine Before trauma trailed her dusky skirts across her ...