What is it that we owe to each other? by Natalie JabbarApril 28, 2022 Art by Kristina Closs The First Toast by Aria Aber What is it that we owe to each other?I drink to the moment that riseslike a calendula flickerbehind your eyelids.I drink to the worldstill veiled with the wordsof childhood, our faces warmin history’s collateral light. from Hard Damage Advertisement
her child would never know the damp of hunger in his bones by Natalie JabbarApril 27, 2022 Art by Kristina Closs I Tell My Mother About My Depression by Eric Tran She is ashamed of my seasickness,her son, bled down from boat people. We are kidding, of course: between wavesand prayers to Mercy, she swore her child would never knowthe damp of hunger in his bones. She wanted him fat like clayand just as soft. In college, I lost ten pounds of myself and halfthe words she sang to me as a baby. The aunties cooed my new framebut she was silent, both of us famished for the words we meant. I say I’m sad from sun to sun and her response is a crisptwenty for the quiet burger joint we visited when I was youngand never talked, or didn’t need words, our mouths and belliessinging the same full rhythm. from The Gutter Spread Guide to Prayer
Have you been content enough being this content? by Natalie JabbarApril 26, 2022 Art by Kristina Closs Self-Care by Solmaz Sharif Have you triedrose hydrosol? Smoky quartzin a steel bottle of glacial water? Tincturedrawn from the stamensof daylilies grownon the western sides of two-story homes?Pancreas of toad?Deodorant paste? Have you removedall your metal fillings? Made peacewith your mother? With allthe mothers you can? Or triedcar exhaust? Holding your faceto the steaming kettle?Primal screamed into a down-alternative pillowin a wood while tree-bathing?Have you finally stoppedshoulding all over yourself? Has your copay increased? Right hip stiffened?Has the shore risen as you closed up shop?And have you put your weightbehind its glass door to keepthe ocean out? All of it? Rang the singing bowlnext to the sloping toilet?Mainlined lithium? Colored in another mandala?Have you looked yourself in the mirrorand found the blessed halo of a ring light in each iris?Have you been content enoughbeing this content? Whose shop was it? from Customs