Timothy Liu: “Looks like the wildfires on the West Coast and Southwest have now made it to the East Coast where we’re in the middle of a flash drought.” (web)
Abby E. Murray: “As the next administration unveiled its picks for senior leadership and cabinet positions this week, I was especially struck by the terrible choice for a defense secretary: a man who has a history of demonizing any life that doesn’t closely mirror his own. Most of my daily work involves examining and bridging the canyons that divide military & civilian populations, and I am imagining how much harder it’s going to be next year. I wrote this poem as a way to connect my pacifist life to the lives of service members in danger. Happy veterans day indeed.” (web)
petro c. k.: “As one who often writes haiku, it’s always a challenge to distill moments to its essence. When I was sitting with my thoughts, I heard sirens off in the distance, which captured the sense I had of melancholy, anxiety, and unknown dangers on the horizon.” (web)
Matthew King: “This poem refers to a bit of graffiti I saw many years ago, but the question it posed ironically—obviously, the real question is what’s it all worth with an open free and fair election?—is, for now, as pertinent as ever. This is what your open free and fair elections get you. What do you make of that?” (web)
Alison Luterman: “I don’t have to explain why this moment is so fraught right now. I’m feeling a lot of tenderness for all of us who are suffering anxiety this week, and trying to hold each other up.” (web)
Greg Schwartz: “Most of the poetry I read goes over my head, but haiku is something that tends to stick with me. The compactness of a haiku fits my attention span nicely, though the good ones have an impact much larger than their words. This poem resulted from that day’s #haikuhorrorprompt prompt on Twitter, which was ‘kerosene.’ It took a while to come up with something, but the vampire shapeshifting into a bat trope seemed to fit well with the Dracula-era setting conjured up by the prompt.” (web)
