TERRY TROWBRIDGE Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen Puberty is the moment a man becomes beautiful.He wakes up stronger than he was when he fell asleepif he bothered to sleep at all.With a lightning-fast attention to detailsand muscles that never tire or fail to promise victory,when every setback is temporary, every thought is assuredby a galvanized body that conforms to the shape of growing, hardening manhood.Except for Jimmy Olsen. If he had a psychoanalyst, the verdict would
JANET HEPBURN Somei-Yushino Sakura (flowering cherry tree) I sit beneath a canopy of lace — exquisite, delicate veil of tissue paper circles Translucent white like the faces of porcelain dolls, faintest blush on cheek A warming wind plucks petals loose to float — confetti dots tickle spring-bare arms before frosting the lawn in cherry blossom fondant Somei-Yushino Sakura (flowering cherry tree)appeared in CAROUSEL 30 (2013) — buy it here
KATIE JORDON Waitress I see the same labourers every morning on my wayto work, they use yellow gloves that remind me of something other than yellow gloves. I want to say canaries,but there is nothing sweet or wild about them. I wear black and carry plates, glasses — full or blanked —for most of the day. An occasional, strange hand placed on my hip, the small of my back; their coins in my apron sing
LOUISA HOWEROW Jigsaw Puzzle The kitchen smells of cabbage and quiet.On the table a jigsaw puzzle,the Basilica di San Marcowhose four hundred pieces my mother sortsinto straight edges, corners, colours,greys, blues, blue-greens. I tell her I’ve seen the holy relics,bones of saints, a vial with the blood of Christ “I should have saved mine,” she saysreferring to her left kidney, the cancerous oneshe’s convinced is living healthyin somebody else’s body. I imagine her bringing the
CLAIRE CALDWELL The Summer of Dead Birds 1It was the summer of cold hands.We played bingo in the afternoons,sipping cups of warm beer. It kept the birds out. The bartender slipped us sunflower seedsin packets. They’ll grow in August, she said,fingers flapping. Our mouths too fullto reply. 2The bird didn’t know it was being rescued,the girl said. She hadn’t counted on the hotstruggle between cupped hands,the bird twisting through its brokenness,forgetting it at the sight
LAURIE D. GRAHAM The Window Blind Factory Hardshipis the endurance of atrophy. On break outside Derwent High School,now a blind factory cultivating jobs, in the bookless classrooms of industry,gymnasium lifebreath enterprise, entrepreneurial smoke-breaks or not — the women in front of the school have the same devout braids,the same homemade blouses under company windbreakers, the same empty hands. Maybe they’re made to wear uniforms. Blind into blind-slot, factory vinyl,promise of supper and a walk to
NATALIE ZINA WALSCHOTS Supervillains Charybdis wolf-bellied and writhingshe the rock to your whirlpool all bladder all mouthyou vomit seawatereffluence all salt slavering tentacle to gaping mawperfect dinner companions you shatter the vesselshe devours the crew Lex my stately pleasure dome, decree Parasite hunger gone hollow slobber shankedgnaw to marrow swallow Doom 1 grillwork rebuff skin, bitten superconductordata scatters toes to TENS unitmy circuit shortens gauntlet concave vice, blasted infraredtatters tracked heat signaturewhat alloy allows jetpack
YI-MEI TSIANG We Take Our Children Tobogganing after wrestling with boots and mittsafter packing hot chocolate, teddy grahams, extra socks,after waiting out the held-breath tantrum over zippers. We stand at the top, an impasse, clouds of breathforming a storm over their little woolen-wrapped heads. Their voices needle us, sharp and small — I don’t wanna — enough to draw blood. I hear the whir of a distant bird, air plunging through its struggling wings. Some
JAIME FORSYTHE Lavender Pulse He was in a home, had soft bones, pausedfor days between thoughts, but knew whenevery one of us was born. All those phone calls,triple ring of a rural party line as the entire blockeavesdropped. Never knew privacy. Wallsthinned to curtains; his skin became transparent.Blow-ups of his organs; amplified tune of his heart.The nurse was a man. The nurse was his son, and hisgrandson, and his best friend from high school.The nurse
JULIE CAMERON GRAY Widow Fantasies I want my husband to disappear, dissolvelike a spoonful of sugar in a cup of coffee. I want him to fall asleep at the wheelfor a distracted driver to make a mistakefor snow to conceal a slippery surface. I want it quick and painless and over in a flash.Twist of metal, bone, the shatteredwindshield a constellation across black ice.Traffic backed up for miles. I’d get a call in the night,
LIISA LADOUCEUR Warren Ellis’ Violin Because poets are like shoesbest when foreignand in translationall of ache is lost.Because sad songscan only say so muchin four minutes twentyand life is too messyfor such pretty mouths.Because words can be warpedby lips, fits, lispsand voices drowned outin dark rivers and bars. Play onyour ocean songs.Fingers singingbows for knivespiercing the skinsthat hold it all in.Those nights we pukedup desire, stumbled ashamedcrumbled, humbledby love’s lost namesthose dirty deedswhen we were
FRED GAYSEK Figuring 16 — for Jesse Harris and liquid corescoring image surfacerace matter in matterhatter madder than ever beforeit is in saying one aliveone fossilone fool fuel Figuring 16appeared in CAROUSEL 24 (2009) — buy it here
AHIMSA TIMOTEO BODHRÁN Vergüenza He didn’t realize the shame of being Native was the same as the shame in being queer. The shame of wanting to touch something, someone, his hands reaching towards trees butlooking around before touching, or touching so brief it might be brusk, might bruise the branches, tear a leaf, rip acorn from what was once tender grasp. Soon he wondered the ways in which, during the years he has closeted, was
LEIGH NASH Day Trip This day beetles forward careening red eyelid on a two-lane Yucatan road110 km/h glass eyeballs unblinkchew up scenery, plowpast the tinted windows of white tourist vans The most earth with no earth, almond trees burstfrom lime rock, low bushesbear pink avocados; dogs spill sidewaysin the sun, feral ribs thin inlets Corrugated towns chatter Rusty graveyards swallowpastel crosses row, rowcrumbling plaster tombs thousand year-old stoneovergrown with lilies, bougainvillea Waist-high girls and boys
ADRIENNE GRUBER This Is a Book You Shouldn’t Open In moments like these it’s important to rememberthe angry cry of geese, their shrieking voices,the way they circle the bridge at night.Not to dwell on a more recent lossthe ominous kind, a warning. Instead,think of the mouse that died in the compost pitits body half in half out of the wooden binflies buzzing over the tiny carcass.Days later it was still there, a skeleton,crushed under foot.
KATHRYN MOCKLER Murder It’s not a good idea to bein the same room as someone who is just about to murder you. I wonder what it feels like to be murdered.I’m sure it hurts your feelings, and then I’m sure you feelreally mad but aren’t able to express your anger in a productive way. Some murderers are nicer than other murderers.Some murderers let you eatyour favourite food before you get murdered — like popcorn or
TALIA ZAJAC Bebelplatz 1933 and 2005 i Smouldering and cracking open, the pages furling into black ash, tossed by the thousands, the books perish as words crinkle, blacken, turn to dust, putting Wells and Marx and Mann in the same circle of the inferno as young men hold torches and offer hemlock to Socrates: nobody wants to hear about death in Venice. ii The ash blows away the words, as I stand in Bebelplatz, where
IAN WILLIAMS The Commute Nobody ever survives. — Margaret Atwood Ikemefuna certainly didn’tmake it through the forest, pot of palm wine on his head, with an entourage of slammer mouthed men who led him to believe he was going home. A lie, but they meant well. Machete to the neck. Then the unnecessary announcementMy father they have killed me, past perfect, as if he were already dead. And good weather, maps, company, trusty ship,
MONO BROWN Creak Make my bed and lie in it, bone-pile,you get to be the blanket lumps. Half a year or so ago your weightwould make this mattress creak, creak. Stay a bit and let me hear your teethtap dance, bone-pile. Knead an everlastingmeal from these pale sheets of flesh. My bathroom light stays on when you comeback to me in dreams that hold your jointstogether for the first time since they brokeand I see
ANTRANIK TCHALEKIAN Dream of Flying lush and raw, the night descends on you so quiet, hands raisedto catch any stray signals thrown down from spacetrying to chart systems,maps, divine movements I remember the momentwhen all the words left my headpoured out and were buried in mudas I ran over the soaked earth,was taken, joined the air and soaredthe moment time cleaved us in half a blackbird now,I spend days flying and nights trying to reach