SUPERSTITIONS Triston Dabney I knew we’d manage to squeeze another monthwhen momma’s hand started to itch.It meant money would soon come.To her palm she’d kiss and rub it against her bumto wash where the money was most deserving.That’s how she proved to Godthat she...
PREGNANCY TEST Camari Carter-Hawkins I keep it.The positive pregnancy test.It’s the last sign I have that confirmsI was a motherAm a mother. Settled like a coffin at my bedsideI can’t get rid of. I can bottle up the blood river on the floorBury it in a mason jar;It’ll...
KARA LYN & THE SOUTHSIDE CURSE Kiara Lowe (an excerpt) Common sense’ll tell ya that the North and South ain’t the same. Shoot, a compass will too. You see that big ole N at the top and that big ole S at the bottom when you open it. You know what else be at the...
ECUMENICAL SERVICE Ashley Mack-Jackson Nine and ten: pinned in between cobwebbedcloset corner and the arms of ill-fitting church dressesthere is a first kiss struggling between cliché and sacredritual hands held out and palm up like surrenderlike benediction: who is...
BREATHING IN THE RUINS Tony Medina I am as isolated as Elizabeth Barrett BrowningNever to be born, neither to be crowning.To whom shall I bequeath these lungsThat bare the markings of stale airGone viral? I am a virtual prisoner To maladies unseen, a spine...
