Category Archives: Poetry

by | November 21, 2024 · 3:51 pm

Kelli Charland

SILT HAS COLLECTED IN MY CELLS

S.J.M.

The print on my favorite shirt

crackles off,

gone soft

together with my nerves.

A new age rests

on his shoulders.

My fondest memory—

twisting snow peas

off the vine.

A new kind of

loneliness sent off

down the river toward

the geese in the heat

of July

and yes,

a gentle hand cupping a nape

under the cover of

silence and sky.

It’s all fragmented.

There were no words

for the longest time until

a finger was plunged

into the deep to poke

at a river snail

and we realized it’s stupid

to guard feeling by burying it

in the marrow of our

bones.

Kelli Charland (she/her) attends SUNY Plattsburgh for English literature and creative writing. She has worked as the copy editor for North Star, SUNY Plattsburgh’s student-run literary magazine, and as an editorial assistant and social media manager for Saranac Review. One of her essays appears on Saranac Review’s blog. She was awarded 1st place for the Robert Frost Memorial Poetry Prize in May 2024 for her poem, “A letter to my amygdala.”

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by | · 3:50 pm

Kelli Charland

TRAVEL-SIZED MAP TO THE ANTIDOTE FOR MISERY

To get there, find an old abandoned sandbox

with C+L4EVR carved into the NNE plane

of its chipped frame. Plant your knees down

into the grit and dig                   dig

until your

finger pads bleed.

Fingertips.

The air turns to pink gossamer spun

from the sound of Neptune’s rings.

Two squirrels squawk and chase each other up

and down the telephone pole that you are unsure was there before

until it tips but does not

fall.

Slowly                slowly

your knees will disappear and your fingers will be grated to knuckle

and somehow before you know

it what you knew

melts down                      down

into the grass and you will see a little blue-gray fuzzball

who just three days earlier

dozed under your breast

and you will erupt in tears at the loss but keep

digging. No more elbows and no more femurs,

mince everything all the way to the quick, gored

into carmine mud.

Destination:

the merciful unfolding of the cerebrum.

Kelli Charland (she/her) attends SUNY Plattsburgh for English literature and creative writing. She has worked as the copy editor for North Star, SUNY Plattsburgh’s student-run literary magazine, and as an editorial assistant and social media manager for Saranac Review. One of her essays appears on Saranac Review’s blog. She was awarded 1st place for the Robert Frost Memorial Poetry Prize in May 2024 for her poem, “A letter to my amygdala.”

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by | · 3:48 pm

Kiel M. Gregory

This Is What I Know

a cento* for LD, who asked me to write this poem

I am the next, the one more, another who hasn’t heard you,

and all I can feel are your earnest eyes:

stubborn sun,

choosing to rise,

stopped seeing beneath the shadows.

I don’t know your past.

I can’t cross this ground.

I imagine myself inside your skin.

I saw what waits there.

O heavenly dark rendered in a woman’s body,

I am truth. I am evidence.

I can make it all visible:

between god’s legs there are no answers

hard and unbending,

and I can see why you’d hate

wounded poems.

When it’s over, I get into my car,

then you’re human again.

You too once knew what it was to feel impressive.

How different is that from lovemaking?

*

This cento is composed of text from the following poems:

Title: Christine Grimes, “The Heritage of Leon Clovis Grimes”

Lines 1-2, 6-7, 11-12, 15-16: Jan Beatty, “Letter to Mario”

Line 3-4: Kathleen Sheeder Bonanno, “A Poem About Light”

Line 5: Philip Levine, “On the River”

Line 8: Maria Mazziotti Gillan, “Piecework”

Line 9-10: Tracy Brimhall, “For the Glory”

Line 13: Jan Beatty, “The World between Jim Morrison’s Legs”

Line 14: Laura Donnelly, “Of Knowledge”

Line 17: Laura Boss, “For Months”

Line 18: Marie Howe, “The Mother”

Line 19: Justin Phillip Reed, “On Being a Grid One Might Go Off Of”

Line 20: Gregory Pardlow, “Alienation Effects”

Kiel M. Gregory teaches philosophy and world literature at Binghamton University where he is a PhD student in Comparative Literature. His nonfiction has been nominated for inclusion in Best American Essays and the Pushcart Prize. His creative writing and photography appear in Lips, Atticus Review, Hypertext Review, and other fine journals. Visit kielmgregory.com for more.

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by | · 3:45 pm

Audrey Redmond

our rot

a phallic symbol of death

nudges me to get out while i still can.

biting and kicking below the surface.

gnawing on life so ferally

until my dolphin smile is kicked in.

the days used to be an idyllic heaven.

red cadillac seats covered in sticky sweat.

the peaches were always ripe.

my insides still smelled like lavender.

i was an angel until i screamed.

now i think something is rotting

from the inside out.

maybe there was something wrong.

an unfixable thing deep under my flesh.

but you said that’s how it is out west.

everything is dying if it isn’t already dead.

so, yes, you are well on your way.

rotting from the inside out.

Audrey Redmond is a student studying theater and creative writing at Purchase College. Her writing stems from a place of love for human connections and all the weird, grotesque parts of life that often go unnoticed.

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by | · 3:45 pm

Hannah Fuller

Things My Mother and I Don’t Talk About

Mother taught me to linger in doorways.

Assess intent. Always sleep with one eye open.

Suffer immensely.

I wonder if she knows how long I’ve carried this. I still do.

Sleep evades me. There’s a guillotine under my eyelids instead.

Are we so obsessed with messy hearts?

Spilling pink matter onto paper,

onto sidewalks,

onto oncoming passerby.

Who decides when we’ve endured enough?

Cosmic fingertips plucking us up by

shirt collars. We are covered in shards of glass

that we’ve renamed Love.

Mother taught me to be inconspicuous and

calculating both.

To give my heart but never said to whom.

She bleeds pink. I stay awake.

Hannah Fuller is a graduate student at SUNY Brockport pursuing a career in school counseling. She has been published in Gandy Dancer, Third Wednesday, and Polemical Zine.

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by | · 3:35 pm

Hannah Fuller

Aquarius

I read your palms in my dreams. Your hands are soft. They rest in mine like a bird on a branch. Temporary. Ready to take off. The lines are deep. The heart line is straight. I think this means you don’t love me. I think this means that you never can.

I do not ask the time that you were born. I know you were born in February and that is mostly enough for me. The cold months make the most independent babies. I think it’s something to do with survival. Maybe Uranus and her radical change. Calves, shins, ankles. I think you’d laugh at me asking either way.

I wonder if you care what my palms look like. How the sky looked when I was born. If my hands are steady or shaky. I think this means I’m in love with you. I think this means I always will be.

I wake up to the sound of you shifting—moving farther into the distance.

Hannah Fuller is a graduate student at SUNY Brockport pursuing a career in school counseling. She has been published in Gandy Dancer, Third Wednesday, and Polemical Zine.

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by | May 3, 2024 · 11:34 am

Madolley Donzo

Thanksgiving Conversations

I

are only ever after                my throat burns from              the clear, crisp liquid hidden

            underneath my bed.             I sway             side to side                     run back up

stairs to my secret                              stash. The family is          almost here.        Take another
swig. Fix my shirt. Fluff my hair. Take another swig fix shirt fluff hair change shirt take swig
take swig take—                                     until I don’t                    know how much I’ve taken

the lights are too bright & carpet shocks me    every step I take the doorbell is louder than I’ve
ever heard it        conversations float,            clouds of words             around

              my head, never daring to           enter unless              welcomed.

                                                                                                                  Unlike my family.

II

My aunt comes first,              always on time            arms filled            with sausage peppers &

                                    criticisms drenched              in compliments.

                                              Your brown blouse is                     pretty

                                                          (though it was inappropriate last year)

                            Followed by her kids,                      my cousins:

D’s                      (not) wife                 (maybe) girlfriend             baby mother holds their two
kids in her arms,         his daughter lingers           behind, awkwardly         fitting into the entry

          the same way she fits            into their family.                Ambs enters with a fiance–

less Ish,                           talks of trips & (not) Forex an after            taste on her breath;

conversation clipped                     at the door, words lost

                                                  like her money in that pyramid scheme.

K & her boyfriend take                     up the space my                                   brother
doesn’t.                   He’s busy, an excuse               to hide his distaste             for the family.

                    I am forced                                                                   to mingle with people I
only talk                          to while we give thanks.                    My sister’s surrounded

                                                                        by dirty shoes kicked                           to side

& jackets thrown                   on worn-out couch. Her fingers fly

across                                her screen, my phone              pings:

                                                                            next year we aren’t hosting dinner.

III

                                              I stay back                            in the kitchen:

          check the bread,           use the blow torch for crème brûlée,

do everything                                          anything                                   nothing.

                      Fix shirt. Fluff hair.                          Don’t reach             for the bottle calling

          out to me, begging                   for a quick

return.                     Don’t ask. Don’t ask.                    Don’t as— How’s school?

Not                                                                                                                               fine.
Shut eyes. Sit down.                           Open eyes. Shut eyes.                     Hope I don’t

cry. It’s not fine.                  Never fine.

            Failing. No sleep. Can’t             relax. Not now. Not with them here.

                                                            Fix my shirt.

IV

K’s white boyfriend                           (not the one from her birthday in August)

                                      scrapes fork on ceramic plate.

I stare                                         (emphasis on)                     her white Boyfriend;

my sister stares                           (emphasis on)                     her White boyfriend;

nobody else                   stares or talks to                                           him.

                                                Conversations about broken                 engagements—never

Ish’s because we can’t,               it’s too soon—, broken

              promises—(not) all the ones D’s made to his (not) wife             (maybe) girlfriend

                        baby mother—, broken                   bonds—we only share       niceties

at this table. I shove               dry turkey in my mouth—spoon             fulls of salty mashed
potatoes.                              No mac & cheese. Need more              dragonberry.

                                  What are you studying now?

They always ask. It never changes. I’m a                     psych

          major, but I’ll                                                   never make money. They hope,

like my parents, I change                     my mind. I won’t

if it means their disappointment.                                              Revel in that feeling & wish

                they were                     the mac & cheese (not here).

V

I need another                         long sip of                  not water—maybe

                                                                    the brown liquid because they won’t

leave.                   Let’s play a game? Is this gathering                 not charade enough?

            Please, it doesn’t                   have to be home, just go                           anywhere.

                    Give me space                       to mourn my peace. If I must stay                 home,

enjoy this meal,             provide a bottle of wine to wash down

                      the inconvenience. Lights dim &           conversations become crystal.

Dinner’s over

                                                                                                                                      but—

Madolley Donzo is pursuing an undergraduate degree at SUNY Geneseo in psychology and English (creative writing). She has been previously published in Recess Magazine, SUNY Geneseo’s only BIPOC, student-run literary magazine. When she is not working on editing different drafts of her pieces, she can be found in a reading nook with a fantasy novel in hand.

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by | · 11:14 am

Jenna Coburn

Jenna Coburn

revolving doors, what have i done?

i get lost on purpose

drive into the mountains like

maybe i’m waiting for a cliff

like maybe route 44 will go off the grid

unmap itself

from my neurons and from google both

i brake disgusted

reminded of the guy who took the hairpin too fast

and didn’t even make a dent in the ridge

reminded how it looms so large with every rev

till all i see is rock

, road

, and impossibly the flightiest glimpse of

vanishing point

so distant from the guy who escaped the sky

i pull over next to smoking trucks and their smoking drivers

silhouetted against a valley so vast it may as well be nothing

a pipedream projected somewhere

beyond

some etching from the silurian period

that i won’t understand (not even when i’m older)

i’m sorry i’m late

i get lost on purpose

but i still repeat myself:

the second the county signs change color

i’m shivering at the lookout

i’m swinging around and glancing nervously at the sun

i’m slamming my brakes at the hairpin

neither earth nor air nor new

just home.

sorry i’m late

but i’m here.

i parked at the end of the driveway

like always.

Jenna Coburn (she/they) is a graduate student completing her master’s degree in clinical mental health counseling at SUNY New Paltz. She hopes to continue work as a therapist in the Hudson Valley after graduating. In her free time, she enjoys knitting, playing Stardew Valley, and petting all the wonderful dogs in her life.

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by | · 11:02 am

Diana Morley

My Grandfather Taught Me How To Read

No one warned me that the dead visit in dreams.

Or that the smell of gasoline sticks to memory the way it sticks

to skin—my childhood bus stop at the end of the street—

But visit, they do, and stick, it does,

With no reason to wish for them to stay

Until daybreak comes again and

What’s left is the irksome feeling of

Forgetting where you are—the crosswalk by the high school—

How you can be two places at once:

Around the corner from your grandparent’s house / in a town you’ve never been to.

A gas station at six in the morning / a stop sign off a main road.

Dead / eating at a restaurant that doesn’t exist.

Diana Morley is a senior English and adolescent education major at SUNY Geneseo. She has one previous publication in the Songs of Survival Literary Journal. She primarily shares her work on an Instagram account, @deempoem.

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by | · 10:52 am

Stella Gleitsman

Whole Again

And violence becomes an addiction

when you do not love it enough

when you do not lean into it

you have to eat enough of it

like a star

like a gourd

like a vision

lit by echo

you must get used to how it spins

in your mouth

like a hunting rock

like something

that breeds flowers

gecko son

perused topaz diagon

blankness

yeah

it wreaks so much havoc on the body

and the soul,

it designs so much mythology

on your shoulders

tears into the bone life

loots its good structure

leaving everything so

dead

beetled jewelry bugs

brittle branch love

and poetry comes easy to me now

to the whole of my

self

borne out the skin

almost

breathed

out

so

easy

blushing

seeping

out the papery clouds

and beauty is in

so so so much to me

mostly in nature

in the bodies it has melded

three stones

grifting together

crafting organs

out of fertile

entranced

dough

and always, always in sound

the half-weeping

smoke of it

billowed

and

protected by pixies

slinking into

love odes

collapsing onto me like a

bleeding pen

shifting me slowly

out my mind

so I become a type of insane

that roots me

lizard

it stirs inside,

something patterned

something seamless

as if I’m something more

than I thought I was

and today it is here:

in

this breath

this breath

this breath

.

and what I want most now is:

to become

whole again,

whole again,

whole again,

Stella Gleitsman (she/he/they) is a poet from the Lower East Side of New York. They make zines and artist books. 

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