Juheon Rhee
Dear Lizabeth

Dear Lizabeth

In the little apartment you stay have you heard the story of the old woman so neat and tidy quite rigid I suppose she kept a nicely written to-do list words neat cursive like dried elegant flowers color drained out plastered on the poppy yellow sheet

1. Water the mugunghua

1. The ones on the east side of the house, bending over backwards, petals like hands pointing in.

2. Feed the jindo and her puppies

1. I know they look like wolves but trust me, they don’t bite. They are loyal and will protect you, unlike the small artificial fakes you city people carry around.

3. Pray everyday

1. Your ancestors have done it and so have I. You and all those “revolutionary” people don’t believe in god and you’d probably argue that science has proven it all a myth—but a simple prayer before bed and meals will do you no harm.

4. Be happy

1. I know that in our household we have not touched this subject as much as we should but the fact that you are here reading this note means that you have moved in and that I am gone. I am proud of you, always. You moved to America wanting to be free of me and your father and now you are. Forever. I will always look down on you when I’m up there. Don’t be afraid. You are probably disappointed to find out that I have given you this house instead of money that would support you in America. One day you will be thankful. Korea will welcome you without hesitation and you will no longer have to suffer the brutal unfairness and discrimination that followed you everywhere you went.

She was strict alright never would doodle never carve the swirling suns now which is filled in the hanok rather the emotionless woman never thought would muster a single tear dearest Lizabeth you changed your name said Siheun was too hard to pronounce leaving you in this world all by yourself of course you would disagree this is my final gift

I’ll love you
Forever and Always,
엄마

Editor’s Note: 엄마 is Korean for “mom.”

Juheon (Julie) Rhee is a 13-year-old student and is currently attending International School Manila. During her free time, she enjoys reading Agatha Christie’s mysteries and hanging out with her friends. She has previously been published by K’in Literary Journal and has been recognized by Scholastic Art and Writing Awards.

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Simon Floris
Obituary

2AM,
Miguel and I can’t sleep.
He gets out of bed,
lies on the carpet we bought the night before
and grabs his guitar.
He starts playing the sweetest

and saddest

songs he knows.
Very quietly,
I hum along to the melodies
I recognize.
He gets back on his bed
and says something
vaguely humorous about masturbation
or racism towards Asians.

Miguel Hallare,
born and exploded on New Years’s Day.
“Put my ashes in a firecracker,” he’d say,
“and blow me up in North Manila”

He kept talking about the Philippines.
Where had he been?
Palawan? Puerto Princesa? Linapacan?
Did we walk the same streets?
He kept talking about his wet nightmares.
He kept saying he hated music
but he fronted three metal bands.
He stomped up and down the room
when he couldn’t find his pack
of Turkish Royals.
He dyed his shoes blue,
he circled the world in a paper canoe.

Miguel Hallare,
Sunshine all over me,
Moonlight down on you.

Simon Floris is an Italian and Danish student attending the Savannah College of Art and Design. His poems appeared in the Beijing Youth Literary Review when he was living with his family in Beijing from 2016 to 2018. This is his first poem published in the United States.

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Katie Hartsock
Deseeding the Pomegranate, I Think of You

You would have liked the mechanics, the care
it takes to spring the arils out
of their clustered vaults, in rows as neat
as a civilization, or a dream

of one. I wonder if you ate them
stationed in Casablanca, or
on leave in Pompeii. The black and white
photos you showed me of the columns

still supporting nothing there
taught me the place existed beyond
my textbooks. I who didn’t even
comprehend that pomegranates

were real until I was in high school.
That name, and its underworldly seeds
that did not come in cans. When I finally
walked those streets, indented with

the ruts Pompeiian wagons tracked,
I helped an old man who was not you
walk his bad legs most of the way
the tour took us. So what I saw

was our feet, mainly, making sure
he didn’t trip on the famously
uneven surfaces. How Roman,
I thought, the thick white hair of him,

how satisfied, seeing it all,
escorted by a woman who’s arrived
at a place she’s longed for, only to
accommodate, to compromise.

The leathery skin is tough to cut
but the flesh pulls right apart. I love
the sweet crunch of this pithy treat,
red as the poppies I saw floating

between tombs in the cemetery
which was itself buried by lava
and ash. Maybe you stopped to laugh
a little ruefully like I did

walking by. It was near there
I ditched the old man and the tour
to stand alone for a moment in
the Villa of the Mysteries.

Katie Hartsock is the author of Bed of Impatiens (Able Muse Press, 2016), a finalist for the 2017 Ohioana Award in poetry. Her work has appeared in Beloit Poetry Journal, Ecotone, Exchanges, Massachusetts Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Southwest Review, and The Wallace Stevens Journal, among others. She holds a MFA in poetry from the University of Michigan, and a PhD in Comparative Literary Studies from Northwestern University. She is an assistant professor of English at Oakland University in Michigan.

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Nia Morgan
Fatal Cuba

He castrated her
took her prisoner
in the heart of Cuba

Have Ana
He proposed
let the 26 July army break her in
brand her M-26-7

Have Ana de Santiago
McKinley offered a hooker’s price
a payment too prideful to be met
Batista won’t want her now

Let’s bathe her
in crimson water
he commands
A baptismal cleansing
Two parts American blood one part Bay
times fifty Repeat

Lock her up
Seize her food hoard her medication
Shove missiles in her mouth—
numb like Novocain ’til she chokes
She hasn’t seen sick yet

Elian Gonzalez is escaping!
Have Ana is breaking
and serves to Raúl in fear.
Fifty-three people released
her captor deceased
Have Ana will rise again.

Nia Morgan holds a BA in English from Rollins College in Orlando, Florida, and is currently pursuing her MFA at the University of Tampa. Her work has appeared in Brushing (the Rollins College undergraduate journal of art and literature) and Voices (the digital magazine of Brain Mill Press). In her spare time, she enjoys reading books about activism and equality, binging shows on Netflix, and spending time with her family.

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Tim J. Nelson
Myth of Progress

Each day
plain miracle

Proof:
Saw two deer
chasing a fox today

Woods sandwiched between
a school yard
and a housing development

“Woods” is being
generous —
It has been

Within one of the dwellings
a beast with greedy eyes
sees trees as paper & profits

It will be sold as progress
It will displace and kill

Comfort and convenience
will fade away
The balance broken

Nothing left to do
but to care for and
to be kind

The fearful and nervous
might be as dangerous
as this coming storm

In concrete bunkers
is a sad way
to die

The Earth will
see you now

Poems by Tim J. Nelson have appeared in Cholla Needles, Poets’ Ink, Grub Street, and Yes, Poetry. Nelson holds a master’s degree in writing from Towson University. In addition to freelance writing, he teaches college composition in Maryland. Nelson writes essays and reviews for PopMatters.com and South85 Journal.  For more information, visit timjnelson.jimdo.com.

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Mary Ellen Talley
Gioia Della Vita

For Valentine’s Day
I give you
one of Nancy Pelosi’s scarves
to place a little joie de vie
upon your shoulders

In deference
to her Italian background
you and I may call
the flowing silk
sciarpa

Remember the sound
of it is /sha’rpa/ –
she, nobody’s sugar,
granddaughter
of immigrants

Editor’s Note: The poet submitted this poem on February 1, 2019, anticipating our need for a poem suitable for Valentine’s Day. We had so many submissions at that time that we did not reach this submission in the queue until today. But we’re not passing it up just because it is April. We can always use a little joie de vie, especially these days.

Mary Ellen Talley’s poems have recently appeared in Raven Chronicles, U City Review, and Ekphrastic Review, as well as in anthologies, All We Can Hold and Ice Cream Poems. Her poetry has received two Pushcart Nominations.

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Jane Yolen
Farewell to the Monarch

Your delicate wings,
the arch of them
like the slow arc of justice
bending, once again
does not bring success.
The judgment of the supreme court of nature
is brutal in its findings:
drought following flood, wildfires
the wrath of climate change.
Unless you can afford to skip
bail in California,
forgo the bright lights,
the red carpet now too shaggy
to hold even your light weight.
Better to fly back into the coyote hands
of Mexico,
you may no longer
be welcome in this newly
unwelcoming land.

Jane Yolen is a poet, novelist, children’s book writer, essayist, short story writer, and lyricist. To date, she has published 376 books, 10 of them poetry collections for adult readers. She has won many awards for her work, including two Nebulas, two Golden Kite Awards, a Caldecott Medal, two Christopher Medals, a New England Public Radio Arts & Humanities award, and three World Fantasy awards. Six colleges and universities have granted her honorary doctorates. Yolen writes, “But awards can be dangerous. One set my good coat on fire.”

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Chad Parenteau
Louis C.K. Jesus

Louis C.K. Jesus
looks at two Marys
and wonders which will let him
drop his pants.

Louis C.K. Jesus
asks which one’s the virgin
and which one’s the whore?

Louis C.K. Jesus
takes confession in moderation.

Louis C.K. Jesus
asks for consent before
he jumps on the cross.

Louis C.K. Jesus
keeps dying for his own sins.

Louis C.K. Jesus
saves his stigmata
for a fingerfuck joke.

Louis C.K. Jesus
hates welcoming children.

Louis C.K. Jesus
will only welcome children
when they can go to his next gig.

Louis C.K. Jesus
rises too soon to resume his work.

Louis C.K. Jesus
needs another ten months
for his new sermon to take shape.

Chad Parenteau is the author of Patron Emeritus (FootHills Publishing, 2013). His work has appeared in Tell-Tale Inklings, Queen Mob’s Tea House, The Skinny Poetry Journal, Ibbetson Street, and Wilderness House Literary Review. He serves as associate editor of the online journal Oddball Magazine. His second full-length collection, The Collapsed Bookshelf, is forthcoming.

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Deborah Marshall
The Tyranny of Control

She remains the one
to whom she must make amends.
She hopes to release

the contained frog
from the Atlas mason jar,
from certainty, fate.

She longs to deliver
the princess from the bullfrog,
from unconscious fog.

She prays to remove
the poison from the apple,
scorpion venom,

bane before ruin.
Toxicologist.
Dwarfs versus giants.

Before it’s too late
the hag with the camera
enters the forest

seeks out the maiden,
who’s naked, still, unshamed;
her pubic hair aflame.

Reintroductions:
these familiar strangers
state their rightful names.

Deborah Marshall, aka Nana Boots, is a grandmother and visual artist. A retired art therapist, she is a writer and photographer whose poems and images are derived from life experiences. She spends her nights with her spouse and their boxer, Frances.

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Katie Hartsock
Pregnant Ninja

When I realized our firstborn would arrive in the first full month

of the new administration, we had just watched A Touch of Zen.

Several scenes after the best warrior ninja-bounces over village

walls and through forest canopies like a slow-motion jackalope and

slaughters reams of the evil regime’s soldiers, it becomes clear she

was pregnant in battle. So much incredulity in those days. And no l

ying down for her. Later, when I saw my mucous plug slowly

sliding down the toilet’s throat in such silent expert movement, I

wrote a poem called “Pregnant Ninja” and tried to pour my anger

and joy into it. And a few little items of praise, like how the

pregnancy gave me dreams ending in real and often loud orgasms,

when all I had done was some simple thing like press a potted peace

lily against myself or ride bareback a running velociraptor.

Sinuously, very sinuously, we rode. But the little lyric could not

accommodate my anger, which appeared at the end so fast the

poem became incredulous of itself. And who wants to read that.

We have a book with a picture of a jackalope and my son, born in

but not of this administration, points at the bearded antlered thing

and says, “Pretty, pretty.” 37 weeks now with the second to be born

and I’m keeping watch for the mucous plug, hoping to see it

bounce down again. I’m thinking of that poem I had to let go, the

ending that wasn’t right, that needed the devils roaming earth up

and down to know there’s a heavy, very heavy, plan in the works

which I am meant to help execute.

Katie Hartsock is the author of Bed of Impatiens (Able Muse Press, 2016), a finalist for the 2017 Ohioana Award in poetry. Her work has appeared in Beloit Poetry Journal, Ecotone, Exchanges, Massachusetts Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Southwest Review, and The Wallace Stevens Journal, among others. She holds a MFA in poetry from the University of Michigan, and a PhD in Comparative Literary Studies from Northwestern University. She is an assistant professor of English at Oakland University in Michigan.

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