Cathexis
Northwest
Press
Featured Poets:
New Poetry Issues on the 1st of each Month
Books and Merchandise Available Now!
Check out our nominations for
Best Of The Net and Pushcart
under Awards!
February 2020
Aisha Down
The Affair
At first, it was nothing: such a short time,
so many things left unsaid, like griefs,
like scraped knees, like afternoons
by the creek in the blue of early childhood.
Things were as they were: desire was desire.
Mouths were roses, hands were suns,
you burned, you fed me meat and marzipan,
and I came gentle, and I ate and ate.
Did we waste it? Could we do otherwise?
Many hours we slept, many hours waited,
many hours we forgot ourselves,
played dice at the table of the feast.
...
Christine Hamm
Oil Can
Various necklaces found or thrown in a recycling bin,
the garbage disposal, the community dump:
what most people remember.
The word “oil” pronounced like oww, a shriek.
I think about my mother forgetting how to drive,
my father coaching her on the phone:
Tell her about the dog you saw on the walk
Tell her about the rain
Tell her about losing your keys on the walk
...
Naomi Edwards
Of Snakes in Glass Tanks
We all believe there are no teeth. Surely
there is no more death now.
Green lawns abound between new
or remodeled responsible housing
that is basically affordable if
you speak of things basically, in code.
There are very few serial poisoners, very
few, and we don't know them
...
Debut poetry collection by Christian Czaniecki
"The poems in this collection are sharp, fiercely intelligent, multi-faceted, and, best of all, deeply-considered. Quick moving and thinking, these are truly poems that belong to our current world, which demands critical thought and nuanced artistry. While the collection meditates on the homogeneity of a suburban world, the voice of this emerging poet is anything but ordinary."
--July Westhale, author of Via Negativa & Trailer Trash
"There is such eternal longing in these poems of Robert Krantz. A series of gorgeously rendered, honest laments about the world and our place in it. Pleas for acceptance, for forgiveness, for just one moment of seeing without the blinders on, with a clearer vision. The world is composed of both darkness and light, and we are no different. Bloodied knuckles and skinless mice balanced against luminous wheat fields and a night sky that’s almost worth praying to. Almost. This is Krantz’ gift. His revelation. He challenges us to see, perhaps even celebrate, the almostness of our nature. He wounds us; he shows us ways to heal from those wounds."
-
John Sibley Williams, author of As One Fire Consumes Another
Valyntina Grenier's book is two poetry collections in one!
"Seung reintroduces us to ourselves through his richly particular yet powerfully identifiable and broad and human portraiture. Again and again we are invited into complex and divergent expressions of human experience, resulting in a heterogeneous testimony of meaningful life."
