(Edmonds, WA: Ravenna Press, 2021) In Lord Baltimore, poet Peter Ramos offers a dark vision of mid-to-late twentieth-century America as a lonely urban and sub-urban, post-industrial wasteland. The poems, named for Cecil Calvert, the 18th-century patron saint of Baltimore, teem … Continued
The way she wears her sweater is so Sunday. If her parents were here she’d say why don’t you go watch Dancing With the Stars. It is every generation’s job to feel deprived. If she had kids she’s scared of … Continued
Two Californias (C&R Press. 2019) Sunsphere (BlazeVOX. 2019) Andrew Farkas and Robert Glick, both fiction writers, speak here about their books, Two Californias and Sunsphere. Through a conversation that took place over e-mail, the two discuss non-traditional narratives, hyper-objects, as well as formal … Continued
Before a globe is pressed into a sphere, the shape of the paper is an asterisk. This planet is holding our place in line: look out for metallic chips of meteor hurtling through the universe. On my drive … Continued
Growing up, my mother called it nuni. My father called it nunus, pronouncing it new-newshh. It was the shh sound that I never liked about that one, like my stream hitting the toilet bowl. My grandmother never called … Continued
(North Adams, MA: Tupelo Press, 2020) “How young were my boys when I moved them to a town, actually not even a town but a hamlet situated inside a town that would, within months, become the site of the largest … Continued
Yvette and I were in bed, watching through a gap in the curtains as my neighbor, Lou Spellman, stood at his mailbox and cried. The corner of the box was pressing into his gut, and he took a handkerchief from … Continued
1. Daddy In his last photos he looked unhappy cutting the thick dry ham For Thanksgiving he sat alone eating in the snow under the crow’s irritating call He should have posed for another picture on another day Instead he … Continued
(Denver, CO: Clash Books. 2019) In an age where sprays and sprays of digital and streaming media envelop us in bright blooms and the rich scents of reality, poetry may not serve social change as much as it desires to … Continued
I was sixteen and for the first time in my life I was on the move. A forced exodus. My mother packed me up and dropped me at the airport with a cursory wave. I knew she was … Continued
This poem imagines the exchange on audiotapes from “the wife” to “the blind man” in the story “Cathedral” by Raymond Carver. The story is typically taught and discussed as if the blind man’s relationship with the wife was entirely platonic … Continued
(San Francisco, CA: Outpost19. 2020) Imagine the world going silent. All cars and buses, trains, subways, and planes stop in their lanes and patterns. Tiny particles drifting quietly through the air slowly and then pause, waiting. Even you are still. … Continued
The first invitation led to the roulette invasion. These words echo in nightmare after nightmare. Luckily, the invasion was a success. Success—as is well known—does not preclude the ransacking of sleep. The Hired Chair accepted the invitation and … Continued
I close the shutters, leave a wink of light to keep from burning down my paper house. The seams are creased. I move about in my tattered plight slowly. Elbow on the table, skin puckered makes a kissing … Continued
(Edmonds, WA: Ravenna Press 2021) Raven with huge paws and a brown snout. Boots with an active tongue and a fluffy tail. Bird the husky mix who “sings.” Spiff. Doodle. Elle. These are but a few of the delightful dog … Continued
to explain how a tributary becomes a river there isn’t a way but for the tributary to deny it— I deny the very river I deny the paying of tribute grow up, say the men in my life … Continued
(North Adams, MA: Tupelo Press/Leapfolio 2020) In a slim paperbound volume, which sports a pale blossom on its rain-colored cover — reminiscent of Pound’s “In a Station of the Metro” — poet and oncologist Matthew Mumber’s thirty-nine poems offer a … Continued
(Kenmore, NY: BlazeVOX Books 2019) Wade Stevenson’s Going Head to Head is a book-length poem that takes the head as its central theme and uses it as a way to explore various states of being — from the metaphysical to … Continued
(Cleveland, OH: Cleveland State Poetry Center 2020) Lauren Shapiro’s second poetry collection, Arena, deals with a father’s attempted suicide and its traumatic aftereffects. These poems move back and forth between lyric and prose modes as the speaker seeks to bring … Continued
After a briefly too-long period of agonizing over the matter, I’ve concluded that it’s impossible to artistically justify why we, at TLR, wanted to do a John le Carré issue, and nearly impossible to summarize how the magazine you’re reading … Continued
The husband of one of our editors was pursuing a doctorate in Game Theory when I first arrived at the magazine six years ago. I thought then I had never heard of a more evocative subject for advanced … Continued
In the Glutton’s kitchen, there is no food. There is a giant refrigerator, but it’s empty. There are cabinets and cupboards, of course, but where the food should be, there’s nothing, not even a cobweb. The plates are … Continued
Women’s Studies when I was in college was a fairly straightforward, interdepartmental major that, at my school, emphasized continental literary theory and its blunter-edged cousin, identity politics, as well as (interestingly enough) health care from a social-historical perspective. Other colleges, … Continued
For Willa Frierson, the whole family, the Kenyon Review’s Young Writers Workshop, and for Gambier, Ohio: the most magical town in the world. Because I came home I became estranged / but in a soft way, like how … Continued
When I got out of the military, I stayed on in Albuquerque, renting a house month-to-month from a woman who’d recently been moved to a nursing home. I slept during the day and got a job working nights … Continued
Authors Katie Nolan and H.L. Hix, both philosophers, speak here about their recent releases, The Gospel according to H.L. Hix (Broadstone Books) and Confessions of a Hobo’s Daughter. Through a conversation that took place during this past election season, they touch on care … Continued
(McLean, IL: Dalkey Archive Press 2020) Toward. The word looks odd by itself, untethered from what’s behind, not yet having arrived at that which lies ahead. This untethered state is often mistakenly attributed to poetry and poets — it’s accompanied … Continued
The hunters at the gas station under the fluorescent lights. The man in front of me lets me go because I’m a woman, it’s long been a ruling that women and children go first. Waxing towards full duchess, … Continued
(Seattle, WA: Red Mountain Press, 2020) Donald Platt’s new poetry collection One Illuminated Letter of Being is a tribute to his dead mother Martha, whom he desperately wants back. Closure is a myth; we are unending, ever-evolving, always reshaping the … Continued
I’m thirteen and I look like a child bride in my Confirmation dress. I receive the sacrament by an old Pastor who’s also my math teacher and it’s titillating the way he grazes my tongue with the wafer. … Continued