CONVERSATIONS WE MUST HAVE THESE DAYS
by Anna Sutton
what will our children eat will they know how teeth break the tart skin of a plum before digging into its honeyed pulp will they know snow the particular Fibonacci sequence of frost on the windshield Monday morning when a harried father is hurrying them into the car it’s time to go when my firstborn is my age Mumbai and Miami Beach will be underwater when I finish this poem typed onto the clean white suggestion of a page thirty more people will have drowned or starved or died of thirst am I making a mistake am I birthing some ravenous spark or something tender that will bruise and rot what’s worse I have to ask
VOICEMAIL FROM THE RIVER BENEATH MY HOUSE
by Bruce Bond
When I was young, I took a stranger as my lover, and as we talked, her bodystriped in the sun that fell one morning through the blinds, I heard her use Jew as a verb. I was a coward and said nothing.I weighed one silence against another, my shame against desire. I told myself, forgive her. She is clueless. But the house sank a little deeper in the river. Everything moved, David. This lamp, that face, the leaves of the lemons beyond the glass, as the water took us under.
Guilty Party
by Juliana Gray
Imagine the snacks: foie gras, veal medallions,
shark fin soup, fat and suffering
congealed on plastic plates, garnished with scallions.
Imagine the decorations, a scattering
of glitter, deflated balloons bumping your knees.
The playlist is The Smiths, The National,
moody stuff you burned on blank CDs
whenever you felt too emotional.
No one is dancing, just shifting their weight.
No one dares to touch the Jenga tower.
How did you get invited? Who’s your date?
Maybe one more drink, another hour?
Do you have to say goodbye or can you ghost?
Sorry, darling. Remember, you’re the host.
Voicemail from a wrong number
by David Keplinger
Of course
you did not expect to hear
from me. This is a voice
you have not met, message
from a sudden stranger, angry
child who never felt
he was enough, or felt too
much, too loved, in the house
sinking into the river. I hope
you’ll call me back. If you know do not know me, Bruce,
you have my number
Two of the Eleventy-Three Curiously-True-Tales of Greenie Streeter
by William Henry Lewis
Of course
you did not expect to hear
from me. This is a voice
you have not met, message
from a sudden stranger, angry
child who never felt
he was enough, or felt too
much, too loved, in the house
sinking into the river. I hope
you’ll call me back. If you know do not know me, Bruce,
you have my number
Voicemail from a wrong number
by David Keplinger
Of course
you did not expect to hear
from me. This is a voice
you have not met, message
from a sudden stranger, angry
child who never felt
he was enough, or felt too
much, too loved, in the house
sinking into the river. I hope
you’ll call me back. If you know do not know me, Bruce,
you have my number
