William Hicks __________ Not Old Yet but I look at the barista’s skincovered shoulder to fingertipin intricate figures of bones, decay, drooping rosesand I wonder what tattoo I would have gotten at her ageand what five years after thatand what six months laterand what when I got married/engaged/hired/fired/drunkand if I…

Native Lands Benjamin Goluboff __________ There’s a place where the north branch of the Chicago Riverbends around a little island and turns hard south. There’s condos on the west side and Forest Preserve to the east.The woods in between, the riverbanks and the little island are all blanketed with the…

Disappointment, Blue, 1982 CJ Giroux __________ Blue is the color of your best friend’s Honors Chemistry textbook when you got placed in what everyone knew was Biology for Dummies. In the dissection unit on a late spring Friday, it’s the fetal veins wandering like the Big Two-Hearted; you weren’t invited…

Jo Angela Edwins __________ Vignette The girl at the bus stop faces her boyfriendwho stands one foot to the side, his faceturned so he’ll catch first glimpse of the buswhen it rounds the distant corner. She slips her handsin the pockets of his jacket, the sharp windsthis morning the coldest…

Laine Derr __________ A Golden Red Oncea lankyboy, Ihungfroma tree,cherriesshiningw/ love. __________ Inheritance Like my motherI learned to cryin a car, behinda wheel, a childin the back seatsinging along – songs we learnto forget, but Irefuse to followthe ones, notesblue and yellow,green or red, who believe in horizon,a boundary of…

Troy Coll __________ Whirlpool My first memory of dirt is the griton the slick plastic floor of Maw Maw’sabove-ground pool. Too smallto swim, I hold my breath and sink crouch leapI break the blue meniscusto the smell of cut grasscharcoal and Virginia Slims. I inch along the rail as the…