So, are you really sick – of yourself?

Baby wants Blue Velvet To write in bruises, bruiseblue running uncoordinated in vain Down veins called baby, baby it aches like a solid wedged in in The blood blue velvet morning moving slow gasping coffee so as to Numb the shake from sleep. Baby wants Blue Anchor into concrete for shoes in reality blues Color graded northwestern pale vampiric in the evergreens with Sky so close falling heavy rain permeated in cloud Baby wants Blue morning holding making something More than t

The crisp January wind attacks my exposed ears and neck. My arms cross automatically at my chest, trying and failing to seek warmth. The air is so cold, so clean, that I can no longer smell the waft of marijuana that I know clings to my dirty hoodie and raggedy sweatpants. I dug through my closet for clean clothes, but ultimately gave up and stuck with what I already had on. My friends are a couple of feet ahead of me now, not so far that I’m alone, but far enough that I hav

As a lobster living off the Maine coast, you’ve always known exactly how you’d die. One day you’d be trapped, plucked from the cold ocean, boiled alive, and eaten by a hungry human. C’est la vie, you always told yourself, but when it’s my time, I’m gonna fight! Now, your day has come. The trapping and everything after was a blur, but you regain your wits just as you’re being dropped into a pot. You clench your claws and brace for the boiling heat. You

Alison Jennings is a Seattle-based teacher who volunteered at a writing center, inspiring a return to poetry. She's had a mini chapbook and 125 poems published in numerous journals: Mslexia, Society of Classical Poets, and The Raw Art Review. https://sites.google.com/view/airandfirepoet/home.

Quinn White is a poet and educator. She is a graduate of Virginia Tech's MFA in poetry program. Her poems have appeared in journals such as Sixth Finch, Gargoyle Magazine, and Bayou Magazine.

If I should be bare with her, She would be the only one to know Which scars have faded which are still raised, purple, circular There are those I can’t see in places too sharp to touch Is it strange that I’m rarely dangerous with her? Quills retract where they once would’ve drawn blood Closer and closer, yet I am only met with smooth hands Warm, all healing, requited hands They have drawn love in miraculous detail Unreplicable hands I think that’s what hurts now, Her fleeti

Lina Buividavičiūtė is a poet and literary critic. She is an author of three poetry books in Lithuanian. The poetry book "Dark ages" will be published in Spain this year. Lina is a Pushcart prize nominee and two of her poems won Honorable mention at Writer's digest competitions.