Fruits 8th Grade, Freshly Emigrated from Mexico by Paco Marquez

By Paco Marquez sandias are watermelons melones are melons limones are limes limas are lemons crucifixion of blood fruits teenager baffled by a new language resting on gestures speaking in tongues throat driven down hallways wood shield as smile little body asphyxiating on delicately cut prunes elegant phrases eaten not this pinprick not that whistle minute words asphalt affection backs turned mini flesh never mind hot luck re turn sit this eat hi oh! o

Poems by Ladan Osman

by Ladan Osman That Which Scatters and Breaks Apart Everywhere they turn, the walls ask, why, why not. From every space someone calls a question and there echoes so many answers, it’s impossible to hear. Save me, he calls. Open me, she calls. Divorce me. Their despair is a bird in an abandoned nest, its brother has jumped out and died, its sister is dying beside it and still it perches: Do I fly? Can I fly? You’re here because you said, I hate you instead of, I’m sorry. You’re here because you couldn’t forgive but kept on making stews and hand-washing his good socks, blowing curses into hot water. “Knives All Over”, 2013 by Alison Kuo. Digital Photograph Trouble I have a chill in my womb. I have a child in my wound. Everything is massed up. The sea doesn’t blow. The wind rivers the sea in the wrong direction. How will I get along with this man wolfing me? How will I get alone? He herd me. It never bordered me before, what I got as a regard. We used the hardest language. We cast threats. We’ll born in hell. Some of us fall by the waistside and...
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