Part II
1 . Wayfarer by Emily Smith^
2 . I Remember You by Mary Elder^
When the night is over and I have laid down beside you and opened your chest, do you think I’ll find those saltwater pearls oystered between your heart and lungs that you promised? Because I don’t. I think I will just stain my hands black with the tar of your warm, noxious secrets. And before I fold you closed and wipe my sticky hands on your breasts, I’ll take something. When you wake up, you’ll wonder, “Is that my heart or a vertebra or my silver locket which is gone?” I’ll be outside, smoking a cigarette in another attempt to kill you.
3 . Indian Mask by Sierra Golden^
Weathered cedar creaks beneath my feet, while I roam from boat to boat and the edge of a storm begins to blow: slivered slices split by axe which creaks in meter, swish, chunk, swish, chunk, as it peals away one tree face to another, ravaged bark to smooth high forehead, grim brows, vacant blue eyes, proud arching nose. and fat red lips to be hung in a stranger’s home filled with sweet golden fumes of browning bread or burning whips of quips lashed out between two hearts. 
4 . Dry Wood by Marcy Ray^
and an hour or so of shade is conjured from the pocket of the sandy sky above. It is his favorite time of day. The women of the town go around making their calls and in doing so they stomp through the dirty streets wearing the dust like their wedding veils long passed on to a daughter or niece a more suitable age to have such thoughts. They wear the vibrant fabrics like they are the only ones who see such colors. He calls out in his native tongue which is almost not theirs anymore. Business is slow for the snail vendor but the view is not. When the shadows are longer than they are wide the other women come out. And they have a different dance that suits the time of day. They move through the streets speaking with hands that move like dust storms or smoke rising from the candle as a father waits up nights for his daughter. They speak secrets. And the vendor has a jealous ear. She speaks in hips, like a church’s bell that rings slowly and monumentally for only two occasions. One which she may never see. Her eyes sway like the water in the bucket on top of her head as she carries it home leaving behind the well and the boy who is becoming wide and tall like a door she can’t pass through, and knows more of the water than the well will ever echo back. Her clothes are not as fine, who dances with the dust in the afternoon, but she knows how to start a fire. And the snail vendor has seen it for quite some time. And the water atop her head cannot erase the flame when it leaks from the vessel and leaves a trail with each step carrying her back to her father’s candle.
5 . Fill 'er Up by Spencer Allison^
Toddle over broken asphalt Toward their neon mecca, Greeted by the Bad-idea stench of Gasoline and cigarette butts. Inside they intrude on a Chaotic medieval marketplace of Flannel truckers and Emaciated regulars, Negotiating a trade of Food stamps for smokes. The occasional wayward traveler Pays for his gas, Harried by young scofflaws Howling over nachos and hotdogs. The lone attendant presides, Surveying his kingdom of fools His haggard faced stretched out by A million hours of stress and boredom. They are all Empty.
6 . Let X Equal by Julie Depner^
He fell in love with her on Tuesday When under guise of gloom and gust They were punting quadratics around the mac ‘n cheese Served crock-pot style – chunky fondue. She had propped her ankles on the couch’s arm, Chomped fork-speared noodles, And without even a segue described Riemann’s theory of infinite primes as finding endless untranslatable words, Or diamonds, Or bright edges, or something; had trophied the language, Made it sound real and attainable. The scrabbling claws of her sequence tickled his spine. He’d let his notebook flop to the floor Watching her, watching, intent on all she was doing: The way the slinky she had cradled in play was singing, The way she speaks with a cadence of natural numbers, The passing of ideas across her face. She told him math is like sugar latticework, That it explains the universe. There is a Theory of the Everything And all it needed was this integer, no listen – This little variable! – and he had leaned across and kissed her, The popsicle shine of her lip gloss, the brilliance she was spilling. He thinks of this as Riemann’s overture, The neverending series of primes, the zeros, soft dips in the theoretical plane of quantum physics, How her ribs under his fingers were indivisible, How they were the ultimate sum of a single part.
7 . Play Something Interesting by Greg Hudson^
8 . Piazza della Repubblica: Notte by Anna-Sophia Zingarelli^
9 . Granada by Emily McCracken^
tumbling over stones and down open streets, lapped up with rough tongues, swallowed. Struck out of darkness, kept by footsteps falling deafly down the way. The winding corridors arose, curls, aeolian smoke. In this ancient perpetual dying, we are swallowed by the starless pools of its eyes. Here’s a joke I heard the city tell one night as we stumbled down the way… What noise is that, city? It is only some city. (Though I saw its dead borne up on a cold marble palm, and felt it ravenous through my shoes.) It is only some city. Behind the windowsill, inside a lampshade glow I fold my forearms over your belly and wait. A golden plane lengthens – no warmth rising, not a river for drinking, no darkness. Pressed to your cradling bone, I hear the hunger.
10 . Candyland by Oscar Oswald^
The 11 o’clock train on metal sheets. Drinking the fog of exhausts on my lips, Passing it over each taste bud until I’ve licked the city clean – I’ll wait, under bridges that build up grime; I’ll wait here bundled for what comes next – Semis, peddlers, lovers, pigeons – Whatever other cogs this machine has, Or whatever clogs it from running well Or what greases that drip between its joints. When it screams I watch the windows Flashing by me, 11:05 – a solid fresh blur that breathes. They all speak different languages here; No one speaks English here And I wander through the nights To see and watch what I’ll never see again: Those drunkards cursing America, those tourists Lost, confused Americans – It is strange for them that nothing is taller than three stories, And no one will speak English. I ache To never ache again but the city is stronger Under ice-reflected moonrays And snowdrifts illuminated by a silhouette moon in black Nights and clouds turned Chernobyl red. It grunts and breathes and bellows; Is silent, even at the tips of chimneys Where the wind moans through smoke in the dusk, Where the scream is a phantom Caught in bricks by this city – Held, to echo as I slouch towards Boilermakers in the rains – Screaming Trailing boxcars in this city’s night.
