On the same side
turn a car
into a parallelogram,
an oft-read Bible,
a shelf of books
with a few
missing, a man
sitting and a woman
standing. Her hand
is on his shoulder.
His head lolls forward.
Her feet are anxious.
Kevin C. Stewart is the author of The Way Things Always Happen Here, a collection of stories, and Margot, winner of the Texas Review Novella Prize. He teaches at Carroll College and lives in Helena, Montana.
[Purchase your copy of Issue 09 here.]
EZZA AHMED
I was running, the neighborhood / boy my secret guard. A cloud of dust and dirt / my shadow. // My stomach would hurt / from fresh cow’s milk, / a white film swimming to the top. // In a place of people who are / and aren’t, the kids are raised on cardamom milk / and kites. The rain trembles at who it’s about to touch.
JULIA TORO
Sitting around the white painted wood and metal table / that hosted the best dinners of my childhood / my uncle is sharing / his many theories of the world / the complexities of his thoughts are / reserved for Norwegian, with some words here and there / to keep his English-speaking audience engaged
DYLAN CARPENTER
I have heard the symptoms play upon world’s corroded lyre, / Pictured my Wallonia and seen the waterfall afire. // I have seen us pitifully surrender, one by one, the Wish, / Frowning at a technocrat who stammers—Hör auf, ich warne dich! // Footless footmen, goatless goatherds, songless sirens, to the last, Privately remark—
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