What Rough Beast | Poem for December 3, 2019

Stephen Gibson At the Nuremberg Museum American GIs would have learned from movies and posters during basic training that each poison gas had a different smell—in the museum video, Göring won’t look at camp survivors. Each gas was compared to something familiar, so any city kid or farm boy could tell—GIs would have learned about […]

In Taking Apart a Kaleidoscope by Adam Zhou

 When can you tell a book of poems is really working? For me, it’s when the poems provide revolutions on themes—like the tiniest clink of a kaleidoscope. Look at how Adam Zhou recognizes what stays with us, how “the landscape will remain sullen / still dressed in a sullen light” and yet the people are […]

What Rough Beast | Poem for October 13, 2019

Julien Berman Lost When in the course of my many events I stumble far from the pack Like the fathers of America I panic, agonizing over each step forward. The King’s last breath goodbye to the one being lost Is a sultry blessing; It splits the metal shackle tying the colony down. And lets America […]

What Rough Beast | Poem for July 18, 2019

David P. MillerLady Liberty in Photographs The head, World Fair, Paris, 1878 A bust severed just below the breastbone,colossal head denoted Monumentde L’Independence, flanked by park benchespoised for Parisian midday slumps.Men in bowler hats retreat out of her range,staring stock-still behind a barrierof bentwood chairs. Others twistup the spiral stair immured within her,poke their petite […]

What Rough Beast | Poem for July 8, 2019

Roy Bentley Umbrella It’s, you know, that true love thing. Divorced but friends. Still pretty tight. So just fine with being here with me. At the office of a urologist in Ohio. If she has a “tell” (that she loves me), this morning it’s her looking away before the needle enters my penis, a needle […]

July 12, 2019 @7pm

Patrick S. Donnelly, Lynn McGee, Joanna C. Valente Patrick S. Donnelly is the author of four books of poetry—Little-Known Operas (Four Way Books, 2019), Jesus Said (a chapbook from Orison Books, 2017),  Nocturnes of the Brothel of Ruin (Four Way Books, 2012), and The Charge (Ausable Press, 2003, since 2009 part of Copper Canyon Press), which was […]

What Rough Beast | Poem for September 12, 2018

David P. Miller The Parable of the Sower The teacher said: A sower went out to sow. Some seeds fell along the path. The birds devoured them and straightway perished, wailing to their bird god. Other seeds fell on rocky ground. The rock disintegrated, rasping into a tainted air. The people came to look where […]

May 11, 2018 @7pm

Dorothea Lasky, Elizabeth Metzger, Carly Joy Miller, Leah Umansky  Dorothea Lasky is the author the poetry collections Milk (Wave Books, 2018), ROME (W.W. Norton/Liveright, 2014), Thunderbird (Wave Books, 2012), Black Life (Wave Books, 2010), and AWE (Wave Books, 2007).She is the co-editor of Open the Door: How to Excite Young People About Poetry (McSweeney’s, 2013) and several chapbooks, including Poetry is Not […]

Schedule for Winter/Spring 2018

Click on a date below for more info about the poets. January 12, 2018 @7pm Gbenga Adesina Tyehimba Jess R.A. Villanueva     February 9, 2018 Tai Allen Nicole Callihan Terence Degnan Daniel Nester     April 13, 2018 Emari DiGiorgio Megan Fernandes Nancy Reddy     May 11, 2018 Dorothea Lasky Elizabeth Metzger Carly […]

What Rough Beast | Poem for October 10, 2017

David P. Miller What Would He Do He buddy-buddies the moneylenders back to the temple. They cough up for catering. Phenomenal deal on fishsticks and day-old loaves by the gross. He snatches a selfie with Lazarus, fakes his arms and legs all rigor mortis, pulls a cadaver face for guffaws. He corners the market on […]