Today’s choice
Previous poems
Peter Leight
Instead of Dying I’m Taking a Trip
to Kansas
where the light appears
as if walking through a gate
in the air
opening the gate
and walking in
together with eleven
varieties of sunflowers
including the common one
you don’t need
to sprinkle the seed
in Kansas
domestic animals
outnumber the rest
the meadowlark has a dark V
on its yellow breast
for victory
or victim
it’s a mistake to assume
that everything is independent
I’m closing my mouth
to keep out the air
not even taking the ribbon
out of my hair
in Kansas
there’s a grinder
for everything
that needs to be ground
when relationships end
there’s nothing to replace them
in Kansas you go
to the stars with difficulties
relationships end
when there’s nothing
to continue
right now
I’m turning off the ringer
on my phone
it’s not a refuge
if I’m not gone
nobody minds
if I stay a little longer
Peter Leight has previously published poems in Paris Review, AGNI, Beloit Poetry Review, Raritan, Matter, and other magazines.
Fiona Sanderson Cartwright
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Alice Stainer
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Nia Broomhall
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Ann Heath
A very small thing. I found your fingernail creased inside the poetry I read to you. A dry paring, thin crescent, white as a hospital tag, cut when you could still fight me, with your vowels and yelping, with the stricture of your hands. I...
Michał Choiński
Fumes Everyone goes to the harvest – men, women, and children leave at dawn, as soon as the fog changes colour. It’s safer then, but beyond the stockade, they still wear masks and gloves. Except for the woman at the front – her mouth is free. She...
Silas Gorin
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Nastia Svarevska: to mark the beginning of Anti-Bullying Week
a solitary word when i feel lonely, i let hot water melt my iceberg body and disappear into the drain. it meets all kinds of ruined creatures there; we sit together by the fire, holding our flared up hands, and see that void is not so empty after all,...
Christopher Collier
Floodgate The first sight was a sound from a high valley it didn’t know itself it curled around corners a tree swayed gently and the water touched the low branches first a gentle flow then faster a double wave but no crest no breaking surf it passed...
Steven Waling
Tree of Jesse for Durgesh Born here that street with the hole in the middle was it I or you digging finds on a bombsite on my knees hands buried in roots Surrounded by grave goods suppress in yourself the idea of merit head of the great warrior in...