Jill McDonough
#notallluchadors

Jill McDonough - #notallluchadors

Poetry
Jill McDonough’s books of poems include Habeas Corpus (Salt, 2008), Where You Live (Salt, 2012), and Reaper (Alice James, 2017). The recipient of three Pushcart prizes and fellowships from the… Read more »
Shane Griffin
Abandoned Kiddie Pool

Shane Griffin - Abandoned Kiddie Pool

Poetry
Shane Griffin is a graduate student at Iowa State University’s Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing and the Environment. He is an award-winning poet and his non-fiction has appeared in… Read more »
Shavahn Dorris-Jefferson
Ode to the White Lady Who Asked to Touch My Hair

Shavahn Dorris-Jefferson - Ode to the White Lady Who Asked to Touch My Hair

Poetry
Shavahn Dorris-Jefferson is an MFA candidate at Vermont College of Fine Arts. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Salamander, Río Grande Review, and Sugar House Review, among others. She’s… Read more »
Len Lawson
Plan B

Len Lawson - Plan B

Poetry
Len Lawson is the author of the chapbook Before the Night Wakes You (Finishing Line Press) and editor of Hand in Hand: Poets Respond to Race (Muddy Ford Press). He is a PhD student in English… Read more »
Andrea Ruggirello
Proof

Andrea Ruggirello - Proof

Poetry
Andrea Ruggirello lives in Washington, DC by way of Seoul, New York, Boston, and West Virginia. Her writing has been published or is forthcoming in Third Coast, Day One, Catapult, and other journals.… Read more »
Madeleine Wattenberg
Reconfiguration

Madeleine Wattenberg - Reconfiguration

Poetry
Madeleine Wattenberg’s work has recently appeared or is forthcoming in journals such as Best New Poets 2017, Fairy Tale Review, Tupelo Quarterly, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, and Mid-American Review.… Read more »
Callista Buchen
Tornado

Callista Buchen - Tornado

Poetry
Callista Buchen is the author of the chapbooks The Bloody Planet (Black Lawrence Press, October 2015) and Double-Mouthed (winter 2016, dancing girl press). Her work appears in Harpur Palate, Puerto… Read more »
Holly Mitchell
Turning Out (The First Year)

Holly Mitchell - Turning Out (The First Year)

Poetry
Holly Mitchell is a poet from Kentucky. A winner of an Amy Award from Poets & Writers and a Gertrude Claytor Prize from the Academy of American Poets, she earned an MFA in Creative Writing from… Read more »
Florence Weinberger
We’ve Taken Care of Everything

Florence Weinberger - We’ve Taken Care of Everything

Poetry
Florence Weinberger was born in New York City, raised in the Bronx, educated at Hunter College, California State University, Northridge, and UCLA, and has worked as a teacher, legal investigator, and… Read more »

Turning Out (The First Year)

Holly Mitchell

The farm hands move
the mares with foals,
pulling them by halter
to the back paddock.
The dams have waited
for this opening. They paced
in the barn’s smallnesses
for months. They crave more
tender grass, more sisterhood.
Their foals know just milk
& trying to keep pace.
The herd watches. They are
broodmares but barren
this year, maybe all years.
They’re the too-old
& too-young. They wait
until someone shows them
what to do. At dusk,
the cool air picks up
hair on everyone’s legs.
The hands open the gate.
The mothers canter
& their foals learn the steps
almost in the same motion.
This is turnout.
From the herd, the new
alpha mare steps forward.
She blocks them with her body,
sixteen hands tall, built
for running distance. She hasn’t
given birth or let go
of her sense of order yet.
Through the field, she chases
dams she once knew,
foals she has smelled
but never been allowed
to touch. She almost catches
some flesh in her stride,
almost corners the others
in tines of wire fence.
The mothers rear up.
Behind their shaking legs,
the young narrow themselves.
It isn’t natural.
The hands running
to catch a horse by the slips
of leather on her moving face.
It doesn’t work. All this
is animal. They spook &
maybe bruise until
tired. The herd splits
for good, hundreds of teeth
snapping on two sides
of the warped fence.
Read more »