QUINCY R. LEHR
“Up late. The wife asleep, the laptop screen / a nightlight of sorts, I semi-surf the web— / a Twitter deep dive—another angry teen / was shocked by murder into eloquence.”
Pentameter
JEAN L. KREILING
“The palette loses warmth: the hair gone gray, / the teeth not quite so white”
MARYANN CORBETT
“Perfect: the singers, strings, and keyboards. Perfect // Bruised sky above the tents of the squatters’ district”
RICHARD WAKEFIELD
“An old man at his kitchen window sees / by winter light”
STEPHEN KAMPA
“Beloved woman, beautiful and scared”
RYAN WILSON
“He’s happiest on weekends in the fall, / Those quiet afternoons”
PHILIP DACEY
“She sits as if before the stillest lake”
MORI CREECH
“I struck the match. My child watched dead leaves burn”
CELESTE LIPKES
“In bed, I shake the world by turning glass. / I twist the plastic tube and shut one eye; / I watch the people break apart and pass”
GWEN HART
“I have grown accustomed to his hands”
CAKI WILKINSON
“When neon ginkgoes fan the window panes / and sycamores unroll their yellow sleeves”
SANDRA SHAFFER VANDOREN
“Motionless as herons, snipers stare, / their long, slick beaks of guns all pointing down”
MATTHEW MCLAUGHLIN MALYON
“The open coffin waited in the room, / a stone in ocean tide”
JENNIFER ANNA GOSETTI FERENCEI
“Among our trees the devilish gypsy moth / scatters still-green leaves like scraps of cloth”
PETER SWANSON
“They change their bills / From green to feather hues, then buy the beers, / Push back the dampened sleeves. “
DANA SONNENSCHEIN
“The hillside held in shadows’ branching net / and the reservoir in wave-splashed ice resound / when swans rise, kicking, scattering light”
TONY BARNESTONE
“A man swings through the open doors on crutches, / his long arms thick with muscle like the Christ”
X. J. KENNEDY
“With thoughtful steps she made sure that no friend / Would catch the drift of what she planned to do”
