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Symptomatic
by Chelsea B. DesAutels Even after stitchesI bled through cotton & time— red afternoons,crimson midnights. Still they hush womenwho complain & anyway I was busy tending the baby so I washedmy underwear into rags. What would you have done? A woman knows when to bite her tongue, how to grindthe muscle until there’s nothing left but sweet familiar red. Chelsea B. DesAutels’s work appears…
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The Golf Course Is On Fire. That’s a Start
by BJ Soloy We’re not just hunted for sport or food; we’re hunted for light.The light here is broken, with a certain ferocity,a stutter bred in captivity. As we wait, patient, light shoots through the glass & glassed light sprays & stainsthe walls. After hacking up oursavior’s name, I’m so hungry.Honey in the skull. I address the…
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listen: my right hand is covered in blood
by Porsha Olayiwolo we are in my bed again and i am holdingher. this is unlike how we usually fuck. herspine is nested along my forearm and herhands lace my neck. everything is gentle.the lyrics blare for us to bend back and hairtangles the birth of her name in my mouth.i love her hair. black,…
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Biography of the Blade Back Girl
by Sara Biggs Chaney & Michael Chaney Sara Biggs Chaney has published poems in Sixth Finch, Blackbird, Rhino, Sugar House Review, Juked, Columbia Poetry Review, Pank, Gargoyle, Thrush, and more. Michael Chaney has been published in Michigan Quarterly Review, Fourth Genre, Los Angeles Review, Minnesota Review, New Ohio Review, and Prairie Schooner.
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Today 11 Jews Were Shot to Death At a Synagogue in Pittsburgh
by Hannah Oberman-Breindel And all the trees are bleeding. Marigold topsdrip crimson at the bottom. Fall is repletewith endings. Leaving the church-sponsoredbillboards and the state-sponsoredseatbelt reminders of the highway, we driveinto town. We are visiting for a wedding.On the business loop: big box stores, barswith windows boarded-up, parking lotsand drive-thrus. Spires above the tree line.Saturday’s…
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For Not Letting Go
by Arielle Hebert I begin again,the ceremony of searchingfor arrest records any small wordcarried like a spideron the shouldersof a gulf windto tell me she’s alive. Ten yearsthis ritual has growna knotted vine my wild needto dig up roots. I’ve dug so deepdown here, it’s gravedirt. I’m alone withmy loyal dogsCanes Venaticiand we’re hungrywaiting for the scent and when we find…
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Rearing Daughters to Survive
by Hannah V. Warren when mother slaughters a hogknife on throat blood on hands her daughters watch & clapbellies full of meat & hot stones it should be no surprisewhen the oldest sister says little sister you be the hog& I’ll be the butcher knife on throat blood on handsmother finds the eldest daughter belly full of meat & hot…
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After Everything I Taught You
by Leona Sevick If I told you I climbed into an old carwith an ex-con and a philandering drunk,neither of whom I’d met before,you’d shake your head long and slow. With an ex-con and a philandering drunk?You’d say you’re just asking for trouble,you’d shake your head long and slow.Did I tell you they were famous writers? You’d…