Wearing an Armband with my Name

Date of Birth, and Scannable Barcode

by Kelsey Bryan-Zwick

I pace the length of the hospital's pre-surgery gallery

it is not nerves so much as not wanting to tense up

after all I know just how much muscle they will have

to cut to get at the bone, and like with any other meat

I'm told the tenderer slice goes down all the sweeter.

So I walk back-and-forth, past the row of predawn windows

and again, past the black-and-white portraits of Hollywood stars

in the reflected light of so much fragile glass I take my own picture

I let myself be grateful for the miracle of breathing

and for all the amazing mechanics within.

* * * * *

Kelsey Bryan-Zwick is a Spanish/English speaking poet from Long Beach, California. Disabled with scoliosis from a young age, her poems often focus on trauma, giving heart to the antiseptic language of hospital intake forms. She is the author of Watermarked (Sadie Girl Press) and founder of the micro-press BindYourOwnBooks. Kelsey is a Pushcart Prize and The Best of the Net nominee, and has had poems accepted by Spillway, Writing in a Woman’s Voice, Trailer Park Quarterly, Redshift, Lummox, and Right Hand Pointing. Moon Tide Press’ Poet of the Month for May 2020, find her at www.kelseybryanzwick.wixsite.com/poetry and on Instagram @theexquisitepoet.

Feral

by Betsy Mars

I wish I was as feral as you, fearing

for my children first and foremost.

What maternal instinct is lacking in me

in this pandemic-induced disloyalty?

If, in the end, they survive

and some wider spread,

all-encompassing love does not,

what world will they have inherited

that's worth living in,

virus-free or not?

And yet,

I'm not holier than thou –

maybe only that much more detached –

resigned, fatalistic to a flaw,

believing not in god

or any grand design,

but only in what science or evolution decrees,

as my world implodes and I write my latest elegy.

* * * * *

Betsy Mars is an LA-based poet, photographer, and an occasional publisher. Her chapbook, Alinea (Picture Show Press), was released in January 2019. She published the anthology, Unsheathed: 24 Contemporary Poets Take Up the Knife through Kingly Street Press in October 2019. Her writing has appeared widely online as well as in print. Her work was recently chosen by Alexandria Quarterly Press for the First Line Poetry Contest Series prize. Her poem, “Bedlam, 1982,” was selected by The Poetry Salon in June 2019 for its Practiced Poets Prize. Her photography has been published in Praxis, and RATTLE, among others.

In Memory Of....

by Amy Ballard Rich

Ghosts surround me,

sipping me down

with my coffee

as I sit on my deck

bathing in red spring leaves,

blossoms, flowers,

and new light green tips

of fir tree boughs

Sitting on my deck

is my homage to the fallen,

my 30-minute jog around the house

doesn't shake them loose,

the dust on my car

remembers their breath

The fallen dying alone,

maybe saying goodbye

into a tablet or phone,

now keep me company,

alongside my sips of coffee

My breath in and out,

still going strong,

tells me not to complain

that I cannot hug my friends,

or read a poem at a mic

The ghosts linger

on the rim of my coffee cup,

tricking my ears into hearing

a far-off lawn mower

sounding like a wheezing lung,

struggling on a ventilator

My stillness is my small homage,

my silence is my sign of respect

my breath is my reminder,

that although surrounded by ghosts,

I am still alive

* * * * *

Amy Ballard Rich's work can be found in many anthologies, including Mermaid Mirror and Milvia Street Art and Literary Journal. When not writing she can be found advocating for social justice, and hugging trees.

Weekend Getaway

by Emma Alexandrov

Just for an hour on the beach

I accord myself my right to hunger.

I amuse myself with pretending I am immortal.

Beside me my man's body dissolves into sand

from the inside out.

I imagine unfurling inside him

there is a conch-shell spiral

of sand replacing his organs

twirl by twirl. Soon he will blow

away. I look into his darling face,

which I can't even see.

Instead there is a zoetrope

where flicker the faces

of all the men I've loved

like nervous reflections on a tidal pool.

I imagine god is cross

with my hubris

and he changes the beach

into a bank of sand

at the bottom of a glass bottle

turned on its side.

I feel the sky sloping around me like tight walls

and my blankeyed man is all I have

to comfort me, half-buried in the sand looking

like a doll so cheap it's got a sticker

for a face. Thing always peels off

and it's always me

who's gotta stick it back on,

poor thing,

that doll.

* * * * *

Emma Alexandrov is keeping herself from dwelling too much on mortality by reading and writing poems, trying to figure out how to get computers to think, and editing Windows Facing Windows Review. She's currently rooted in Atlanta, GA, Portland, OR, and Poughkeepsie, NY. 

Pandemic Pantoum

by Lesléa Newman

Is today Monday or Tuesday?

Are you taking a shower today?
Has anyone fed the cat?

Would you like me to make you some breakfast?

Are you taking a shower today?
Is it time to do laundry again?
Would you like me to make you some breakfast?

Are you getting dressed today?

Is it time to do laundry again?

Are the plates in the dishwasher clean?

Are you getting dressed today?

Would you like me to give you a haircut?

Are the plates in the dishwasher clean?

What time are you Zooming today?

Would you like me to give you a haircut?

Would you like me to make you some lunch?

What time are you Zooming today?

Would you like to go for a walk?

Would you like me to make you some lunch?

Did you speak to your family today?

Would you like to go for a walk?

Is it time to order some groceries?

Did you speak to your family today?

Who ate the last piece of chocolate?

Is it time to order some groceries?

Did you remember to wipe off the mail?

Who ate the last piece of chocolate?
Are we running out of TP?

Did you remember to wipe off the mail?

Would you like me to make you some dinner?

Are we running out of TP?

Can we please stop watching the news?

Would you like me to make you some dinner?

Are you ready to go to sleep?

Can we please stop watching the news?

Would you make me a snack before bed?

Are you ready to go to sleep?

Is today Monday or Tuesday?

Would you make me a snack before bed?

Has anyone fed the cat?

* * * * *

Lesléa Newman is the creator of 75 books for readers of all ages including the poetry collections, Still Life With Buddy, October Mourning: A Song for Matthew Shepard, I Carry My Mother, and I Wish My Father (forthcoming, Headmistress Press). Her literary awards include poetry fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Massachusetts Artists Foundation. From 2008 - 2010, she served as the poet laureate of Northampton, MA. Currently she teaches at Spalding University’s School of Creative and Professional Writing.

Novi Sad, 24 February 1922

in the imagined voice of Mileva Marić Einstein*

by Catherine Arra

Papa died today

a disheartened man

stripped of wealth and standing

by war.

Mother ill,

a son missing in Russia,

a mentally dysfunctional daughter,

and me—

his hope and sacrifice,

his prodigy,

who would make history,

his aspiring scientist

lost to motherhood, domesticity,

and the world as it is.

I’m so sorry, Papa.

* * * * *

*Mileva Marić Einstein was a visionary mathematician and scientist in her own right. There is evidence to indicate that she was instrumental, and perhaps a collaborator, in the scientific papers that comprised Einstein’s Annus Mirabilis, or Miracle Year, of epoch-making theories that redefined the mechanics of the universe and laid the path to his fame. Mileva and Albert married in 1903, after the birth and loss of an illegitimate daughter, Lieserl. They later had two sons, Hans Albert and Eduard. They separated in 1914, and officially divorced in 1919.

"Mileva" is part of the forthcoming poetry collection Her Landscape: Poems Based on the Life of Mileva Marić Einstein (Finishing Line Press 2020).

Catherine Arra is the author of (Women in Parentheses) (Kelsay Books, 2019), Writing in the Ether (Dos Madres Press, 2018), and three chapbooks. Her poetry and prose have appeared in numerous journals online and in print, and in several anthologies. Forthcoming in 2020 from Finishing Line Press is a new chapbook, Her Landscape, Poems Based on the Life of Mileva Marić Einstein. Arra is a native of the Hudson Valley in upstate New York, where she teaches part-time and facilitates local writing groups. Find her at www.catherinearra.com.

Mileva

in the imagined voice of Mileva Marić Einstein*

by Catherine Arra

His trajectory would span time itself.

His magnetic field, his center of gravity—givens,

a blueprint demanding architects, builders,

fans, financiers, and sacrifice.

He siphoned people into himself, a whirlpool,

or pulled them along in his wake.

Irresistible. His vision unrelenting.

His poetry and light inescapable. All were helpless

against their love, hate, or awe of him.

Each in kind—family,

colleagues, lovers—would become fuel, lift, velocity,

his coterie in collusions, betrayals, all that was necessary

to complete the arc of his life.

It was non-negotiable. No one bargains with God.

I knew his mind, merged and mated with it.

I loved the man too, his boyish frailty,

his appetites and sensuality,

the padding softness of his footfall,

the rhythms of his breathing, his smell.

The way he beckoned me, come.

I was his wife. I am Mileva.

* * * * *

*Mileva Marić Einstein was a visionary mathematician and scientist in her own right. There is evidence to indicate that she was instrumental, and perhaps a collaborator, in the scientific papers that comprised Einstein’s Annus Mirabilis, or Miracle Year, of epoch-making theories that redefined the mechanics of the universe and laid the path to his fame. Mileva and Albert married in 1903, after the birth and loss of an illegitimate daughter, Lieserl. They later had two sons, Hans Albert and Eduard. They separated in 1914, and officially divorced in 1919.

"Mileva" is part of the forthcoming poetry collection Her Landscape: Poems Based on the Life of Mileva Marić Einstein (Finishing Line Press 2020).

Catherine Arra is the author of (Women in Parentheses) (Kelsay Books, 2019), Writing in the Ether (Dos Madres Press, 2018), and three chapbooks. Her poetry and prose have appeared in numerous journals online and in print, and in several anthologies. Forthcoming in 2020 from Finishing Line Press is a new chapbook, Her Landscape, Poems Based on the Life of Mileva Marić Einstein. Arra is a native of the Hudson Valley in upstate New York, where she teaches part-time and facilitates local writing groups. Find her at www.catherinearra.com.