by Gloria Frym

not about the event but
the event is how
I like poetry to be

as for a martini
make mine dry
with a twist

is also how
I like
poetry

by Gloria Frym

“an asperity of expression”
you see once in print
though don’t speak

“her pugnacious contribution”
you wouldn’t repeat
you’ve never uttered
“eponymous” or “oeneric” but
reading “her pulchritude”

strengthens a flaccid
vocabulary
better than flash cards

“adamantine panniers”
would frighten
the toughest bike rider

by Gloria Frym

fear is animal
no other mammal thinks sure I’ll

strap this crap to my chest
and jump off the deep end

for the clan

martyrs, no one cares for them.
such desperation is hard to love

putting yourself in the path of
destruction purposely

blowing up children
no god would sanctify

it’s not written anywhere

the gods are terribly jealous
of self-imposed suffering

they insist on doing the work
alone

by Xue Di

My Home
Translated by Wang Ping & Keith Waldrop

My home brings grapes to harvest
A warm afternoon my
wife, like a tender red fox
reaches her slender hand
into my chest, full of music

The windows are acrawl with bees
Flowers bloom in every word
My wife bustles, dressed in red, bangs the
screendoor in the bright sunshine…

I sit in a bronze chair
listening to roots roar away in the garden
and a drop of water seeping into a rock
A bird, far
off in my thought
cries