Each morning: Right foot down, lucky foot first… And press go. Point A to Point B to F and G, Repeat and repeat, Reach Z, return to start.
I haven’t taken sides. The sides cannot be seen. When you’re standing on one side of the ocean, the ocean doesn’t end. My friend has left her shirt on the sand, and she’s going into the water. I should tell her to stop, she’ll drown, but my throat is as closed as the night.
Good, golden advice from my father Used to come at me and hit me in The heart. Ancient advice. Advice that Came packaged with ancestry and honor. Came at me Like pearls out of an old brass grammaphone Set in fine oak on which was carved The stern kind faces of the ghosts of the men of my family.
Call me more often. Tell the Whitman of watercolor your favorite restaurant. Tell the Picasso of poetry how you like your eggs. Tell me lies, lovey, because they make me feel like a feline. Pledge allegiance to the pedophile who steals everything you touch.
Like Aegeas cliff-jumping for his son at the wrong black sails, Or Montagues and Capulets missing each other by terrible inches of time, Things get fucked up. And weird, and quiet, and cosmic. The sorry silence of elevator air can mean just about anything.
Don’t be afraid to ask questions I think I already know the answer More answers leads to more questions and I’m back to I don’t know. Except to never crash while trying to catch your breath under a tub of all those feathers before they fall into cold water splashing on that red brick, remembering to breathe in the fallen leaves on the road that points arrows away from this smelly shoe So silent that you never saw what was there and I won’t think about how I never knew or what you told me to Erase, bouncing that Pink Pearl off tables all day flipping it over, weighing it in my hand but always kept the memories.
It fades, it fades. The dark, it fades. The scent ascends. Existentialism. Manure. Your black heart is Bitter on my tongue, Your tongue. Your idle hands are Rank with air. Barbarous hands, Are your hands, my hands And lips of poison Are wet still with The swagger, the swig.
No longer do I allow music to take control of me But I take in with control, the music as I begin what I refer to as my Music Digestion It’s a simultaneous transition from My mind to my heart and from my heart to my core From my core, I give music access to my limbs And with my limbs I make imprints of art through the air I consume music with my entire body and deep within I hold the rhythm until the DJ stops.
Title Subtitle Byline
This is a haiku. Just seventeen syllables. Contribute to us. -Ashley, Editor-in-Chief Submit, mother f, It makes life easy for Meg. See your name in print! -Kelsey, Layout Editor Feel free to submit. I mean, I’m not forcing you. It better not suck.
Lyrics
I pull my own weight I pull my own weight She lifts me forward I keep going on I pull my own weight through the blood and bones I pull my own weight and me alone She said baby won’t you come on in Tell me please what you’re thinking I pull
ACADEMY OF AMERICAN POETS PRIZE: Winner
The father tells his son: the fish Are hungry at night, And early in the morning. He trusts his father, Has never caught a fish, Is twelve years-old. Alone, He carries a yellow Inflatable raft down To Donner Lake – So cold, the body composed Almost entirely of snow.
ACADEMY OF AMERICAN POETS PRIZE:
This is a real family and these are contrived events: We broke into the triage with wire cutters; the nurses, somehow, cared like prostitutes. The private room smelled from the tombs and blood seeped beneath the walls. We claimed he beat himself with a shovel; the fever, however, shouted like gunshots.
BERNICE KILDUFF WHITE & JOHN J. WHITE CREATIVE WRITING PRIZE: WINNER
An orange sweater’s spread-eagle on the floor. The Lhasa Apso cries to the melody a grand piano churns out despondently. The taxi cab ignores pedestrian gestures. An Oreo splits to reveal lost dreams of ponies and D-train adventures. The scientists’ Q-tips scour blackberry- and Skippy-stained kitchens, searching for a clue, a crime.
ULLY HIRSCH/ROBERT F. NETTLETON POETRY PRIZE: WINNER
I. Boy I found your heart tied to a peach tree in our back yard. When I touched its pulse, morning fell into night and the ground around me burned blue. We are asleep in a circle of dropping stars, your circle swarms me like thirst and I need glass for shattering vowels and spinning black space.
ULLY HIRSCH/ROBERT F. NETTLETON
i have impractical shoes i cross my legs is this being a woman, my lips fuller at eventide i am a good girl i am a big girl i have childbearing hips my hips look good in jeans you sound like grass you smell like hills you feel like i don’t know
ULLY HIRSCH/ROBERT F. NETTLETON POETRY PRIZE: runner-up
The sky cracked open and I fell into Our silhouetted shapes pre-movement; I wait, An unread book on your fancy shelf—you Have forgotten patterns we made. This state Hurts; my soul is stale, chapped, dry Without your presence. I am not the girl You thought I was.
and 
