rump + flank

Carol Harvey Steski, Newest Press (SEP 1) Softcover $15.95 (96pp), 978-1-77439-028-3

A Winnipeg native, Carol Harvey Steski’s work has appeared in Room, Prairie Fire, Freefall, Another Dysfunctional Cancer Poem Anthology, and other publications. Once nominated for The Pushcart Prize, she lives in Toronto with her husband and daughter.

when children loved vegetables

when their feet were bare rough from days of running on sun-cracked ground

the mud clumped over toes as they wandered through watered gardens pulling sweet carrots from their homes

tossing lace tops to the wind unthreading peas + stopping beans like snakes across the earth + remember at the end of it all? crisp stalks of rhubarb (leaves big as me) dipping into bowls of white sugar, eyes + crystal mouths pinched tight as the tongues sour

Philomath

Devon Walker-figueroa, Milkweed Editions (SEP 14) Softcover $16 (104pp), 978-1-57131-522-9

Devon Walker-figueroa is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and a recipient of the New England Review’s Emerging Writer Award. Her work has been been published in Ploughshares, The Harvard Advocate, The Nation, New England Review, American Poetry Review, and elsewhere. Philomath was a winner of the 2020 National Poetry Series.

My Father’s House

After hitchhiking many miles to my father’s house, I asked for a glass of water. He told me it was safe here. I have killed all the pests, all of the rats and the flickers and those iridescent beetles that used to move through the sky like a glittering rain cloud, he said. He handed me a glass of his perfect well water and informed me I would never find the like in the city. I nodded. The water was warm and smelled like soil. It tasted like nothing at all. I asked my father how he was making do and when he pretended not to hear me I asked him if he had a cube of ice. Help yourself, he said. Feeling grown up, I opened the freezer and reached inside. But there was no ice. Only an ancient piece of wedding cake and my first pet cat sealed in a plastic bag. I opened the bag and ran my fingers through the rigid hair. Each notch in the spine felt like an angry knuckle. I could stay awhile, if you’d like, I said. But he was looking out the window at his freshly mowed fields, taking account of his labors.