Spike
by JW Mark
I return to spike the live-long morning
Dull brained, mush mouthed, drunk in dread
For burn bright egg goo gore made burn of morning here and now.
What yellow is this morning?
Buzz bomb, vibrant, fuzz fused …

We are sad to tell you that Geoff Stevens, poet, editor, artist and, to the end, his own man, died peacefully in his sleep at 3.06 a.m. on February 2, 2012.
Geoff Stevens was born …

The New Dentist
by Jaimee Kuperman
Driving to the new dentist’s office
the slow drive of a new place
with the McDonalds that I don’t go to
on the left, the mall two miles away.
The Courthouse and the Old Courthouse
road …

the great puritan migration suddenly reoccurs
by Travis Catsull
i lean back into a misting fan
and upgrade to leather
into my own thoughts
into root
the arrival of the pilgrims
the war of independence
then ghostly apparitions from another realm
arrive
or at least
it …

Start Here: How to Get Your Book Published

It’s the most frequently asked question I receive: How do I get my book published?
Unfortunately, when I hear this question, I know I’m dealing with someone who is …

I Was Never Able To Pray
by Edward Hirsch
Wheel me down to the shore
where the lighthouse was abandoned
and the moon tolls in the rafters.
Let me hear the wind paging through the trees
and see the stars flaring …

Austin music veterans Night Beats, and dynamic new comers The UFO Club released a 10″ split on The Reverberation Appreciation Society record label. For those of you unfamiliar with a “split” record it simply means …

So Much Glass to So Much Steel
by Nathaniel S. Rounds
Behind a clear, glass veil
Facing a snarling, spitting sea
And the dim shadow of Georges Island
I spent nine dollars
From Mother’s retirement cheque
On gelato down at the bay
Birra …

HOW TO GO ABOUT UNDERSTANDING WITHOUT STEPPING ON IT DIRECTLY
by Cheryl Hicks
I remember developing breasts,
(it was the same year the Russians launched Sputnik)
and going with my aunt to buy my first fully-trained bra,
and learning from …

Song To Cantaloupe Head
(derived from postcards)
by Nathan Ventura
O Cantaloupe Head,
forever fickle, yet unrelenting,
always tickling the doorknob
of abysmal death,
you have once again
happened into my skull,
seeping through my mind
like the tires
that ever so slowly
move along the river’s …

The Hunter
(An excerpt from “Valencia: Fresh Squeezed & Uncut”)
by Gideon Carlisle

I am twelve years old
hunting with my father
walking in footprints of
enormous boots; The Remington
heavy on my shoulder, sways
back and fourth
awkward in youthful hands.

We do not …

Metaphysics 101/Open Book Test
by Le Hinton
1. Do you always abbreviate et cetera? Why or y not?
2. If you owned a race horse, what would you name it? (Extra credit, 2 points) What about its twin …

WHORE
by David Gawlik
—–
we are sitting
on the edge of the bed
DAMN IT! she spits,
taking off her boots,
I’VE GOT A HOLE
IN MY STOCKING!
SHIT, I laugh,
sprawling out across the mattress,
THAT’S NOTHING,
I’VE GOT HOLES IN
ALMOST EVERYTHING I OWN
IT’S EMBARASSING, …

Rental Tux
by Bill Trowbridge
It chafed like some new skin we’d grown,
or feathers, the cummerbund and starched collar
pinching us to show how real this transformation
into princes was, how powerful we’d grown
by getting drivers’ licenses, how tall …

Not Your Parents’ Poems: A 2012 Poetry Preview
by Craig Morgan Teicher
I can’t tell you how the 2012 presidential election is going to turn out, nor can I say for certain whether The Office will outlast …

Don’t Hang Up
by Louie Crew
Don’t hang up,
I’m not a heckler.
I NEED your help
but I can’t tell you my name.
I’m in a phone booth
while mom buys groceries,
so I won’t take long.
I heard your talk show
and I’m …

Don’t Let Them [Bite]
by Paden Fallis
…you understand, you’d be remiss if you actually thought you had this thing licked, right? Hubris before the fall, they say. Well it stands to reason here, sitting amongst piles …

THE ANT
by D George Gawlik
i want to
be the ant
that lives
in the hole
in the mortar
of the brick
of the broken
wall that
surrounds
the house
down the hill
abandoned
at the bottom
of a dead end
road
unnoticed
unknown
unmolested
and be
alone

FURNITURE
by Amanda V. Wagner
Empty
Echoes traveled through the rooms bouncing off white marble tile, whistling through chandeliers, swinging off of banisters and circling columns. Glass tapped the granite counter his bottle was empty like the house, …

Shoulders
by Naomi Shihab Nye
A man crosses the street in rain,
stepping gently, looking two times north and south,
because his son is asleep on his shoulder.
No car must splash him.
No car drive too near to his shadow.
This …

By Rubbing 2 Stars Together
by Dan Raphael

stars cant say
or have said
as the frequencies aspiral
as if toothed persistent unexpectedly beneficial

every roof must have a hole
you start with a …

Why does art have to be mainstream to be significant?
THERE is a good chance that you have read something published by Jonathan Galassi. One of the wunderkinds of the New York editing and publishing …

Sometimes, When the Light
by Lisel Mueller
Sometimes, when the light strikes at odd angles
and pulls you back into childhood
and you are passing a crumbling mansion
completely hidden behind old willows
or an empty convent guarded by hemlocks
and giant …

Cramped Uptown
by Amy Temple Harper
34 ppg, Hard Cover, bound by Spork Press
Review by Travis Catsull
Cramped Uptown is the first book from Amy Temple Harper and it’s a thing of beauty and imagination. A very strange …

Visiting with Oliver Stone
by John Bennett
Oliver Stone pulled up to the curb in front of my house at three in the morning in a limo facing the wrong way into traffic. He wasn’t driving, a …

Robert Bly was born in western Minnesota in 1926 to parents of Norwegian stock. He enlisted in the Navy in 1944 and spent two years there. After one year at St. Olaf College in Minnesota, …

Scottish stone holds key to Holy Grail of Arthurian legend, claims historian
KING Arthur could be buried in the Scottish Borders, according to an amateur historian.
Literary archaeologist Damian Bullen, 35, says the famous 5th century king’s …

A Tantrum for Charles Potts (AKA Baba Hard Ass)
by Joshua Lew McDermott
I read Yellow Christ “Tantrum”
to two girls in a brown kitchen
from an apartment building
my parents happened
to live in thirty years ago
because the poem
spoke truths …

Mota
By Matthew Dexter
Parked the car beside the beach
Kept the motor running
Flat bed truck full of camouflaged
marina soldiers
Machine guns in hand, they jump from the back.
I turn off the ignition, they head toward the beach
Wearing bulletproof …

Drugstore
by Carl Dennis
Don’t be ashamed that your parents
Didn’t happen to meet at an art exhibit
Or at a protest against a foreign policy
Based on fear of negotiation,
But in an aisle of a discount drugstore,
Near the antihistamine …