Poetry

sunflower elegy by hannah smokler

I mourn August sunflowers that never bloomed —

The world is more empty without them.

YOUR POEM IRISÉ, SONOROUS SUN AND SKIES AND THEN SOME AT FOUR BY AVA MIN

I want your skin like the earth grows grass 

I want your face the sanguine way dusk does dawn, 

fled by ada heller

The city made her naked,

scraped the skin from her palms,

adulterated by hannah Smokler

A puff of cotton-candy smog clouds the front

windshield of the car behind me as I step out of my own

in god’s likeness by sara kumar

when god crafted me she made me in her likeness

an ephemeral manifestation of the eternal

and she is yearning

small violence by sarah Shafiq

the world’s smallest violence is a baby biting its mother’s nipple

she winces, lips pressed tight, and allows it to suckle

Prose

who will burn? Alyssa Shonk

There I sat, continuously watching people buzz by, waiting for anyone to notice me. It had been 234 days since someone took the time to glance in my direction. I always ensured my pretty glass exterior was beautiful for people to observe.

a conversation with kali by salona bhandari

As I stand before you, I first see your garland of skulls and your blood smeared tongue, yet I can’t help but focus on your eyes instead. Like mine, they are almond-shaped and slanted.

clementines by ava min

we have a friend who shows up on diana's doorstep every few months.

she stays for a few weeks, plays the guitar and sings, and then drifts back off to india, or thailand, or the next place where the flowers change color.

night shift by brian gibson

Tara left the register and began locking the doors and making the rounds. However, when she reached the laundry aisle, she realized that she had made a mistake. There was still a customer in the store, a woman with matted hair and an elaborate matrix of tattoos along her arms and neck.

picture me. I am… by hayley ng

1. seven.

2. immaterial, in a dream.

Art